A Million Little Pieces
 

I just picked up the book tonight. Has anyone else read it?

No, But I want to read it. The Author is going to be on Larry King Live tonight... Apparently the Smoking Gun website is claiming a lot of what is written is lies, or really over embelished. And the author and his lawyers tried to stop the site from posting such info. They claim to have checked out a few things that he said or wrote about where there would be court records, police records etc. and they don't add up. Doesn't matter, I still want to read it.

I tried to last year when my husband first went into rehab. Someone gave it to me, but it was hitting too close to home, so I couldn't read it. I've heard it's good though.

I'll bet there's a lot of people who did that. What great publicity! I would like to read it also.

He sounds like a regular Augusten Burroughs.

I read it and enjoyed it quite a bit, so now I'm off to the Smoking Gun website...

There was a whole big deal on Air America tonight on this book. Apparantly, the guy lifted his entire story from other AA/NA members at meetings. Supposedly, he had his court records purged so that no one follow up on it (I find that one kind of unbelivable). So, when whoever was investigating this pulled all the police reports, they either were contradictory to the passages in his book, or the passages in his book didn't exist at all.

Apparantly, he has hired a big gun Hollywood lawyer to defend/protect him from all the stuff that's going on- the same lawyer that defended/protected Eddie Murphy when he was screwing around with all those Trannies.

:shrug:

It was pretty interesting when Oprah called in there at the end of Larry King. Frey was looking at Larry with what looked to be hatred in his eyes. I don't know about this guy.

What happened on Larry? I can't wait for the transcript. :laugh:

BTW, here's the Smoking Gun stuff. VERY interesting...

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive...amesfrey1.html

That is just wrong. :distress:

Except that James Frey never went to AA/NA. He didn't believe in those programs (for himself) and what they were preaching/teaching, so he rejected them and went at it his own way.

He looks like he's had a rough time of it with all the bad press... But like he said, it's kind of the price you pay for having #2 in sales for 05. But I give him credit for remaining calm, I know I probably couldn't have, and he has to stand up for his product if he wants to continue to sell books now and in the future.

I'm reading all of the stuff on Smoking Gun right now and this guy seems like a real whack-job. If he really lied about the train accident like that, he's scum.

I can't remember whether or not they said he actually went to meetings. Randi Rhodes was on leave tonight and the one of the two dudes who replaced said that a large portion of the book was based on the life of his good friend who died from complications from drug use, etc. I believe they said he interviewed various AA/NA members a stitched together a lot of things to make a composite.

I haven't read the book and I hadnt heard anything about this dude until the Air America show tonight on the way home from work.

(Again) :shrug:

Didn't they interview one of the women who was in that train wreck and she stated that he wasn't on the train??? Something like that.

If he went to the Hazelden clinic in Minnesota he would have attended meetings daily, if not several times a day as part of his program there. He must at least know enough about NA/AA to say that he disagrees with it.

I'm in the middle of it. I borrowed it from my friend who's studying to be an Addiction's Councellor. It's pretty reveting; it's kept me up late the past few nights because it's so hard to put down. I'd be pretty disapointed if it was proven to be lies, but as far as I can see this is rumour right now. If I was true, I'm not sure why he wouldn't market the book as a story about someone else.

Quite a bit of this story t ook place in MInnesota btw.

That's exactly what it is, a story.

I can't watch another minute of this Larry King puff piece. It's infuriating me and I feel so duped for having bought into the **** he wrote about. Being made a fool out of isn't exactly pleasing to the intellect. Thank the stars that I caught the rerun or else I would have called in in the hopes of telling him where to shove his book. What a lying sack of feces.

Rumours, my ass. http://www.thesmokinggun.com/jamesfr...amesfrey1.html

so to sum up you opinion would it go something like "UH DUDE, YOURE BUSTED?"
:laugh: :laugh:

He's a fukcer. The ultimate was when he told King that he's been tempted this past week to go back to drugs. I literally screamed at my television set and woke up everyone in my apartment from all my bitching about that rat bastard. What a weasel. Pray that CNN reruns it this weekend so that everyone interested can see it because this guy is a real piece of work. A memoir is an autobiography, **** For Brains, not "creative nonfiction."

AND he trotted out his poor mother on the show to play the sympathy card.

This guy went to Denison University, where I currently go, and it's interesting to see all these news reports regarding the infamous (to us) GPD (Granville Police Department). I even saw one of the favorite bars in town on Anderson Cooper tonight!

I was not digging the white shirt tonight, man.

Man...
 

I should write a book about the **** that I did in my younger violent ( And yes...Felonious) days, Maybe God-Phra will kiss my ass as she gives me a reach-around and make me tons of $$$ with her wit-less book club zombie/cult-like followers/members...

But then again, I am ashamed of the **** I lived thru and dont want to share it with the public no matter how much $$$ it could possibly make me.

I, dare I say it, didn't really pay much attention to the shirt tonight! :distress: I was actually only half-paying attention, catching up on livejournal business after a day of no internet.

WATCH OUT FOR THE FURY!!@!

I liked the book well enough, but so much of it rang false for me in the initial read that I wasn't surprised by this news. I work part-time in a bookstore, and when the initial James Frey fever hit, we were selling out of every shipment we had of the book- we're talking hundreds of copies a night. It was insane. I'm waiting to see if people start bringing their books in for refunds, as apparently Random House has advised them to do ?

He's an addict, babe. His behavior is classic. I'm 130 pages into the book and I must say, it is very, very good. He's talented. But from what I saw of him on Larry King Live last night, I don't see a whole lot of the joy and healing that comes with recovery. I wonder if he's a dry drunk.

What's that?

But you have to admit, the little post Oprah segue was awesome. He broke into a really big smile.

I was thinking this exact thing, lying is part of the disease. I haven't read the book but I did see that Oprah episode. The follow-up episode should be interesting - she must be livid.

I thought of that later. :lol: Another one that cracks me up is John Everett, Sexual Ninja, San Francisco and the World. :lol:
Random House issued a statement last night through Larry King saying that the refund offer was just a hoax. So I hope you don't have to put up with people trying to return the books. I suspect that it will only make the book sell faster. I didn't even know about this book until a few days ago when I heard about the controversy. If I had read it thinking it was a true story, I'd be kind of pissed though. I know people, hell, I'm sure we all do, who lived things very similar to what Frey did in the book. In a way, by being disingenuous the way he has, I almost feel he is doing a disservice to their stories.

Dry drunk is when people actually get sober but the habits they formed when drunk are still with them. So even though they're sober, they're still trapped in the rut of bad behavioral patterns that afflicted them when drunk.

She's not. She called in to Larry King last night and said she stands behind him.

Hmm. What does she mean by that? That she's okay with his lying or she does not believe he lied?

Another part of the meaning of this is that dry drunks are not in a treatment program like AA which will help keep them sober while also fostering good relationships and character. Some call the president a dry drunk.

She means that she chose the book for her book club because she thought it was a good book with a good message that people would enjoy reading and get a lot out of. Whether or not the events described in the book actually happened has no effect on any of that.

You people who are all outraged at this guy and calling him scum because you somehow feel cheated or duped because the book isn't entirely true are just ridiculous. What the hell difference does it possibly make to you?

I take it you've never read Jerzy Kosinski's book, pal. When I read nonfiction, I expect it to be truthful, especially when the prick who wrote it is going around town telling everyone who will listen that it's all a completely true account of his life and something that he wrote in attempt to be honest with himself over his past transgressions. Call me silly, but I think it's pretty disgusting and scummy when someone invents a role for themself in an accident that claimed the lives of two people. Just as it's equally scummy to write a book detailing all of the horrible things that your involvement with drugs were partly responsible for when half of those things were fictionalized in your head. So, what difference does it make to me? A helluva lot. Not to mention the fact that it makes me sick to see him enjoying all the riches and accolades that this book brought him when he lied to everyone so blatantly. Without his truth banner attached to it, it wouldn't have sold or become as popular as it has.

What a crock of ****. She chose it mostly because it was a "true story," so that people could look at this Frey character and say to themselves 'Look at all the incredible stuff he's been through and he's still here.'

How is this scummy?

Sorry, I know that question can be read two different ways. I didn't mean, "How much of a difference does it make to you?" I meant, "What difference does it make to you?"

I'm enjoying the fact that the "scandal" is bringing him twice the riches and accolades he had even a week ago.

No, it certainly would not have. Which again begs the question: What's the difference?

I say good for him for exploiting an America that doesn't give a **** about fiction anymore but creams all over every two-bit inspirational memoir it can get its hands on. And good for Oprah and Doubleday for recognizing that a good book is a good book (according to them, anyway, I haven't read it).

How is this purpose and effect any different whether the book in question is a meoir or a novel? Are people these days so entrenched in their own realities and so far removed from the possibilities and promises of literature that they need to be told that the main character of a book is a real person in order to get anything out of it?

I guess our period of peace is over. Telling people they're rediculous for an opinion just stirs the pot.

That's up to you, babe. Your sense of morality must be different from mine and vice versa.

He had better enjoy it while it lasts because I predict his next book will sink as quickly as Jayson Blair's and Stephen Glass'.

The difference is that he lied to the book-buying public to sell his book. It's a work of fiction and should have been treated as such.

The book is fabulously entertaining, but he can't write for ****. It reads like a Hubert Selby Jr. rip-off.