The exposure of yet another fake memoir last week has the book publishing world doing another round of hand wringing and finger pointing.
“I do think that publishers are getting upset by the number of fake memoirs and the reaction to them,” said Sara Nelson, editor in chief of Publishers Weekly. “I think there is a collective sense that it is getting to be a bit too much,” said Nelson, who noted that reform of the industry is difficult in the long haul.
The latest hoaxster is Margaret Seltzer, who, under the name Margaret B. Jones, wrote “Love and Consequences” an alleged memoir about her life in a foster home in a rough and sexually charged ghetto neighborhood.
Seltzer’s exposure comes only a week after another book, “Misha: A Memoir of the Holocaust Years,” by Misha Defonseca, was also found to be a fake.
It was Seltzer’s sister who blew the whistle on Margaret’s lies – after she saw a photo of the author in a newspaper profile. The sister revealed that Seltzer grew up in a nice middle-class neighborhood in Sherman Oaks, Calf. and never spent a day in a foster home.
Two years ago, James Frey, author of the number-one best-selling book, “A Million Little Pieces,” turned out to be one of the best-selling fake memoirists of all time.
Doubleday offered to refund the book’s purchase price to consumers but only a few thousand people took up the offer after the exaggeration and downright lies were exposed. Surprisingly, even after the ruse was discovered and the book switched into the fiction category, the paperback edition still went on to sell several hundred thousand more copies.
In the latest case, the Riverhead unit of Penguin Books recalled Seltzer’s books and cancelled the author’s tour.
The backlash against the genre may have worked its way into how at least one upcoming book is being put together.
David Carr, a New York Times reporter, sold his memoir about life as a reformed addict who ultimately pulled himself up by the bootstraps and went on to a successful journalism career. “The Night of the Gun: A Reporter’s Investigation of the Darkest Story of His Career: His Own,” is expected to hit in September.
Carr, who snared a nice mid-six figure advance for the book tells the story as he remembers it, but then goes back and investigates by interviewing people who shared the moments, digging up medical records and other documents to support the story. All his interviews were captured on videotape.
The book world, more than many other industries, still does a lot of its business on trust.
Ben Yagoda, a teacher of journalism at the University of Delaware, who is writing a book on memoirs (for Riverhead) said fake memoirs have been around for over 150 years.