Doubleday to Frey: See Ya!
Awed by the power of Oprah, Doubleday abandoned its previous go-suck-an-egg defense of James Frey and issued this statement:
News from Doubleday & Anchor Books The controversy over James Frey’s A MILLION LITTLE PIECES has caused serious concern at Doubleday and Anchor Books. Recent interpretations of our previous statement notwithstanding, it is not the policy or stance of this company that it doesn’t matter whether a book sold as nonfiction is true. A nonfiction book should adhere to the facts as the author knows them. It is, however, Doubleday and Anchor’s policy to stand with our authors when accusations are initially leveled against their work, and we continue to believe this is right and proper. A publisher’s relationship with an author is based to an extent on trust. Mr. Frey’s repeated representations of the book’s accuracy, throughout publication and promotion, assured us that everything in it was true to his recollections. When the Smoking Gun report appeared, our first response, given that we were still learning the facts of the matter, was to support our author. Since then, we have questioned him about the allegations and have sadly come to the realization that a number of facts have been altered and incidents embellished. We bear a responsibility for what we publish, and apologize to the reading public for any unintentional confusion surrounding the publication of A MILLION LITTLE PIECES. We are immediately taking the following actions: • We are issuing a publisher’s note to be included in all future printings of the book. • James Frey is writing an author’s note that will appear in all future printings of the book. • The jacket for all future editions will carry the line “With new notes from the publisher and from the author.” • Although demand for the book remains high, we are not currently reprinting or fulfilling orders until we make the above changes. • The publisher’s note and author’s note will be posted prominently on the randomhouse.com website. • The publisher’s note and author’s note will promptly be sent to booksellers for inclusion in previously shipped copies of the book. • An advertisement concerning these developments will appear in national and trade publications in the next few days. David Drake VP and Director of Publicity Doubleday Books [email protected] 212/782-XXXX Russell Perreault VP and Director of Publicity Anchor Books [email protected] 212-572-XXXXWhat's missing from this? Any acknowledgement that the folks at Doubleday, especially Nan Talese, bear any responsibility for the fraud of this book. Was there no one at this company who read the manuscript—originally shopped as a novel—and said, hey, guys, wait a minute here....? Did they really care if Frey had cooked a few details in the book? I suspect they didn't. As the old saying goes, some stories are too good to check.
Yesterday on Oprah's show, Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen made a good suggestion. Publishers operate on the cheap even though they're now part of huge multinational corporations, he said. Hire a friggin' fact-checker.
Of course they should; it's absurd that publishers expect writers to pay for their own fact-checking. Frankly, they can afford it far more than we can, and many writers, faced with paying $5,000 or so for a decent fact-check of their book, will simply blow it off. Publishers know this and don't much care. As long as they won't get sued over a mistake, they don't care much about its existence.
Oh, and as long as Oprah doesn't destroy them on national TV for it.
