Talk:A Million Little Pieces

Additions needed

I have not read the book and never intend to, but could someone who has read the book please add a few sentences that give the meaning of the title? Thank you.

Plot holes

It seems to me that this story has some holes big enough to fly a small plane through. First, Frey is ushered onto a plane by a doctor, even though he is unconscious, has a broken nose, hole in cheek, and 4 damaged teeth. Shouldn't he be treated? What is the point of putting him on the plane in his condition? Wouldn't the doctor by liable for this sort of negligence? Second, the airline accepts Frey on the plane, even though he is unconscious, covered with vomit, blood, and urine. Again, why would they accept an unconscious passenger without escort, particularly in this condition? What about the poor passenger that has to sit next to him? Again, what about the liability issues?

My thoughts exactly. I read that description on the back of the book long before any of these allegations came out and I thought "What airline is going to allow a guy covered in blood, vomit, and urine with a hole in his cheek on the airplane."

Hmm. Well, you know what they say about truth and fiction. --Bookandcoffee 21:19, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree. Lots of good skeptical reviews at Amazon. The crack house part seems unlikely. The dentist scene was riveting, but I haven't heard any support for the justification that addicts can't have local anesthesia. Rufus Sarsaparilla 20:11, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

A lot of drug users and even medical professionals assume that because cocaine and novacaine (and lidocaine or any of the other *caines for that matter) have the same suffix, that they must be chemically related. This may be the reason why he wasn't allowed to have a local anesthetic. It's pure nonsense of course. It's simply industry convention to give local anesthetics names that end in "caine". But this hasn't stopped people from claiming that they got high off of their shot of novacaine at the dentist ("because the doctor accidentally injected it into a blood vessel").--96.229.239.27 (talk) 16:01, 23 July 2011 (UTC)

Now that The Smoking Gun has raised serious concerns over the book's legitimacy, can we please work on changing this article? Dstopping 05:15, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

173.81.247.74, please follow the talk page guidelines when editing talk pages. Specifically do not delete other editors comments without a legitimate reason. — Rɑːlɑːjər^talk² 03:33, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

catagory hoax?

i mean come on. isn't this a little extreme?

-sparsefarce 30 jan 2005

This story must now be considered to be 100% fiction. Frey has less credibility than the Bush administration. Why would anyone believe any part of this book is not basically made up. For example, is there any positive evidence that Frey went to rehab? I would bet money that he did not. No aspect of his description rings true. I have worked at three different drug rehabs and not one of them resembles his description, while all three resemble each other closely. What is the evidence? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 141.150.155.167 (talk • contribs).

I'm wondering, how can we call this memoir a hoax, when the origin of the word "memoir" comes from the French word "memory"? I find it particularly difficult to dispute what someone remembers, saying that their account of what they remember is *wrong*. Frey never said that he had outright lied, only that he had taken some "creative license" in his writing. - S. Komae (talk) 15:10, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

I agree that parts of the novel are embelleshed, even made up, but let's look at the definition of "hoax."

An act intended to deceive or trick.

Now, he added things and, by his own admission, made himself look better then he was. But I think it's an overstatement to say that he, by writing his book, intended to deceive or trick the people reading it. "Hoax" implies he wrote the book with malicious intent, which I just don't believe is true. If we have a source showing, say, he never attended rehab, then we're closer to this, but I've read criticisms of him and they don't accuse him of not coming to rehab, at least to my knowledge. --Szabo 20:49, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

According to etymonline.com "memoir" comes from the early 15c French word "memorie" meaning "note, memorandum, something written to be kept in mind". But regardless of the etymology, just because it's supposed to be a person's "recollections" doesn't mean they can write anything they want. It's hard for me to believe that someone can mis-remember entire events that never happened (such as being arrested) unless they're a schizophrenic. And it's been established that the book was originally being marketed as a novel, and even the publisher has apologized for the author's deception. That the author uses euphemisms to minimize what he did and tries to rationalize his actions doesn't change the fact that his portrayal of himself is inaccurate (not just that he mis-remembered a date or mixed up some names or changed some dialog) was inaccurate and misleading.--96.229.239.27 (talk) 16:35, 23 July 2011 (UTC)

I reiterate: what is the positive evidence that Frey ever attended a drug rehab?

The fact he said he did and nobody has disputed it. Regardless, I don't think he wrote the book with intent to "deceive or trick." Fabricating portions of the book because of inner demons is not indicative of intent to decieve. I'm going to go ahead and remove the category for now.--Szabo 04:16, 30 June 2006 (UTC) 04:15, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't think you understand what the word "evidence" means. And what does "fabricating portions of the book because of inner demons" even mean? If I kill someone because of "inner demons", does that mean I didn't commit murder (or didn't intend to kill that person)? Lots of authors write novels and works of fiction based on their own lives. But that doesn't make them all memoirs or autobiographies. And that's why most ethical authors correctly label these works as fiction. And BTW, a hoax doesn't necessarily need to have malicious intent. It just has to be a deliberate/knowing misrepresentation or deception. The author may very well have intended to write a novel and then was persuaded by someone else to relabel it as a memoir for practical business reasons thinking that it wouldn't hurt anyone. This may not be a very severe or noteworthy hoax, and I personally don't think it warranted the media attention it received, but it's still a hoax by definition.--96.229.239.27 (talk) 16:35, 23 July 2011 (UTC)

Unblock

A memoir is how a person remembers his or her own life, not how it actually was. It's not structured like an autobiography, and memoirs are seldom completely true because they are memories. Think of it this way: If Don Quijote were writing his memoir, and he came to the part where he was fighting windmills because he thought that they were giants, he would write in his memoir that he was fighting giants, because that's how he remembers it. This book helped people, and the fact that it has some parts in it that are untrue shouldn't come as a surprise.

I only just read this book and his subsequent book, "my friend leonard". How anyone thought this book could NOT be fiction is beyond me. I have never done drugs and never been to rehab, but nothing in this book rings true. Having said that, I liked both books, probably the latter more. They weren't great novels, but they were entertaining and in the end, isn't that the whole point of reading?

      Uh, not necessarily? 130.49.93.169 18:18, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

No, it is not extreme. "Hoax" is often used pejoratively and therefore some people might mistake classifying this as a hoax as a subjective judgement, but "hoax" actually has a simple technical meaning that is totally appropriate in this context. To make it sound less opinionated, I recommend the term "literary hoax", as that is what it is. 97.88.244.2 (talk) 02:54, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Citations?

Did a little poking around, in part because I'm writing a paper that involves this memoir, or fictionalized memoir, or whatever we'd like to call it -- where the heck is there any mention in the cited sources that verify this?

On 26 January 2006, Frey once again appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show and admitted that the same "demons" that had made him turn to alcohol and drugs had also driven him to fabricate crucial portions of his "memoir"; it first having been shopped as being a fiction novel but declined by many, including Random House itself. (from the Wikipedia page itself)

I don't see anything supporting this claim... Where did that come from? - S. Komae (talk) 21:34, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Fixion

Wouldn't the fact that Frey initially tried to hock the exact same text to a variety of publishers (whom all turned it down) as fiction be mentioned? Yes, it really is that bad. I mean, clearly the history of the book is a history of deception, all the way; from decieving the publishers, to deceiving the buyers, to decieving the critics. I even tried this myself; I gave the book to a friend of mine (who wasn't privy to it being a work of fiction), telling her that it was a real account. When she was halfway through the book, I disclosed the true nature of the book. She didn't even finish it. It really is that bad. The only value the book has is when the reader is decieved to believe it's real. For what it's worth; AMLP is as real as Three Little Piggies, and Frey has as much credibility as H.C. Andersen. --82.181.48.38 19:37, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Capitalization

I do not believe the capitalization of nouns is random; rather, I am pretty sure he capitalizes only people (e.g., "my Sister") and places (e.g., "the Office"), and always capitalizes these types of nouns. It also seems very informal to say that he capitalizes them "for No Apparent Reason." 71.206.101.147 03:59, 15 June 2007 (UTC)Emily

Stylism or lack of talent?

"Frey also uses heavy repetition of words throughout the text, which is consistent with his repetitive use of alcohol and drugs as well as his repetitive run-ins with the authorities." This seems like someone is making excuses for his mediocre writing ability and small vocabulary. 220.235.3.45 14:39, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

Roman à clef

could it be possible to consider this book a Roman à clef??

it worked for Hunter S. Thompson! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gordonjay (talk • contribs) 03:51, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

"Memoir"

Why is it listed as "a controversial memoir" in the lead? To qualify as a memoir, it would have to be true. -96.228.203.46 (talk) 07:58, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

It would be arguably more accurate/less neutral to describe it as a "purported memoir". I'm tempted to change the lead to this, but want to give anyone who disagrees the opportunity to say whether that seems biased. TheGrappler (talk) 05:37, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Dead link

During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!

• http://www.startribune.com/462/story/175790.html
  • In James Frey on 2011-05-02 00:03:10, 404 Not Found
  • In A Million Little Pieces on 2011-06-20 01:37:37, 404 Not Found

--JeffGBot (talk) 01:38, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Dead link 2

During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!

• http://observer.com/20060123/20060123_Sheelah_Kolhatkar_pageone_coverstory2.asp
  • In James Frey on 2011-05-02 00:03:12, 404 Not Found
  • In A Million Little Pieces on 2011-06-20 01:37:42, 404 Not Found

--JeffGBot (talk) 01:38, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Placebo song reference

Is there really any definitive statements made by the band or the lyrics that show the song to be a reference to the book? To me it just sounds like some rock band just wrote a song called "A million little pieces" and never intended it to be a reference to this book. Note that there is no reference to this connection on either the album's or song's page. Can someone validate this and edit it if necessary?

73.150.35.148 (talk)

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