Acclaimed
author lies to everyone, even Oprah
Aneya Fernando
A Million Little Pieces of crap. That should have been the title of James Frey’s
fib-infested “memoir.”
Most of us by now have heard about the controversy surrounding Frey’s critically
acclaimed so-called memoir, “A Million Little Pieces.”
The story of Frey’s heartbreaking childhood and his gut-wrenching account
of 6 weeks in rehab is a great read, that’s for sure. I’ve read it.
I decided to read such a book because I heard about it through my mentor, my
idol, the person I hope to become one day: Oprah.
Towards the end of my read I heard about this Web site, The Smoking Gun. The
Web site was trying to find a picture of Frey while in jail. In the book, Frey
mentioned his encounters with the law. He was a menace to society — or
so he said.
According to The Smoking Gun, he spent a mere two hours in jail before he was
bailed out. Police in Ohio claimed that they’d never seen him before in
their lives. Seems a little suspicious, doesn’t it? Of course, after that
we found out much of the book was fabricated. He conned us all.
OK, the man flat out lied to millions of faithful viewers and readers. More importantly,
he lied to Oprah. Lying to her, one of the most influential, not to mention generous,
kind and compassionate people on earth, really is a sin. She trusted him.
She boosted his book sales by millions, and this is how he repays her?
What bothers me most about the whole scenario isn’t that Frey lied. It’s
how much publicity he’s getting because of it. Larry King? Anderson Cooper?
Oprah — twice?
I don’t understand why major news channels are using so many precious hours
of television on him. The American people should be hearing about the elections
in Iraq or the AIDS epidemic in Africa.
So enough about Frey. Let’s focus on the stuff that really matters. Just
promise me you’ll turn off that Bill O’Reilly crap and tune in to
CNN. You never know, you might just learn something.
Aneya Fernando is a freshman journalism major.
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