BUSTED! Plagiarists, Fakers & Literary Hoaxes

[intlschizo]

lolad, I'm also interested in know where Go Ask Alice is shelved at your library.

[Ripley]

In my library, it's shelved in the nonfiction.

[Mouse]

winnifer said:

I once read that there was some evidence that the "Jay" of Jay's Journal, the Beatrice Sparks book about satanism, really did exist. He was a teen suicide from Utah, I think. However, the story was very sensationalized in the book and probably "Jay" was making the whole thing up anyway.

The real "Jay" was a teenager who committed suicide, but he never had anything to do with Satanism or black magic. Sparks made that part up.

[kanding]

Would it be possible to do some guerilla-type dissemination of info? Like slip a note in Go Ask Alice explaining that it's a work of fiction and listing some key words to google (like the author's name) for backup. Or in the case of *ahem*, Savage Love, stating that the author has lifted other people's works and claimed them as her own.

I borrowed a book from the library many years ago that contained a review by a previous borrower. I thought it was an interesting idea.

[Deleted]

Wow, Go Ask Alice was not real? I had my suspicions way back at the time I read it, but wasn't sure. The book even made it as far as Sweden (where I grew up). I had to read it for a class, and I don't think it was an English class... which means it was translated into Swedish!

Loving this thread.

[twistedangel]

Wow. This is a great thread! I knew about some of these, but I hadn't heard of all these stories before. I have to say that the story of the heroin addicted kid who never existsed was one of the worst. I remember reading about that and discussing it in a paper awhile back.

[Auroranorth]

intlschizo said:

lolad, I'm also interested in know where Go Ask Alice is shelved at your library.

I found it in the children's fiction section as a teen.

[Deleted]

Can't forget Jayson Blair at The NY Times, who lied in his articles about the DC sniper case. He also played the race card when he was exposed - his book is called "Burning Down My Masters' House."

Yes, poor him - he was like a SLAVE and had to fabricate his articles to get revenge on the WHITE MASTERS... give me a break!

Classified as controversial, if not definitively busted:
Martha Beck, who writes a column in Oprah magazine, wrote 2 memoirs - one about her baby son with Down's Syndrome and one about being abused by her father, a famous Mormon professor. Her ex-husband says she tried to sell the baby book as fiction, didn't get anywhere and so sold it as memoir. He also says in his review on Amazon that her abuse book is full of events not as he remembered.

[Smilla]

Martha Beck, who writes a column in Oprah magazine, wrote 2 memoirs - one about her baby son with Down's Syndrome and one about being abused by her father, a famous Mormon professor. Her ex-husband says she tried to sell the baby book as fiction, didn't get anywhere and so sold it as memoir.

Woah, hold up. She tried to sell a book ostensibly about her actual son as fiction and when that didn't "work out," sold it as memoir? What?

ETA: Okey dokey. Wiki entry on Martha Beck. Scarycredibilitygap Interesting.

[cantienne]

So, in the last two decades, Martha Beck has

1. Co-authored a book on "overcoming" homosexuality (1990)
2. Broken with Mormon church (1993)
3. Separated from (2003) and divorced (2004) her husband
4. Publicly accused her father of repeated sexual abuse based on memories she recovered as an adult (2005)
5. Come out as gay, as has her former husband (2005)

Repeated major traumas that show complete upheavals and reversals in judgment, all occurring well into her adult years (she's 45 or so). And her job? Life coach. Of course.