 |
The “Love and Consequences” Book Fraud |
 |
On March 4th, Motoko Rich in the New York Times revealed that the highly touted “Love and Consequences” memoir by Margaret Seltzer, writing under the pseudonym of Margaret B. Jones, was a complete hoax. It is much to the credit of the Times that this forthright article appeared; it is not to the credit of the Times that the newspaper was at the epicenter of promoting this fraud.
Furthermore, as one wag noted, this was the greatest literary fraud since the previous week, when it was revealed that Monique De Wael, writing “Misha - A Memoir of The Holocaust Years” under the pseudonym, Misha Defonseca, was a complete fabrication. In Ms De Wael’s book, she claimed, inter alia, that she was Jewish, and had traveled as a small child 1,900 miles across Europe during World War II with a pack of wolves. For her efforts, Ms. De Wael made 10 million British pounds exploiting the memory of the Holocaust. If you’ve ever received one of those e-mails from Nigeria from a former head of state, wanting to share 25 million dollars with you if you’d just…er…ah…help out with a few legal fees first, and you’ve wondered how many people respond to these, apparently the answer is a lot.
In “Love and Consequences,” Ms. Seltzer clearly fooled, or at least appeared to fool, a lot of people. She claimed that she was of mixed Caucasian/American Indian parentage, was placed in a black foster home in South Central Los Angeles, joined the Bloods street gang, and routinely saw her friends and relatives killed in street fighting. She claimed that her first purchase from the money she made on her initial drug sale was her cemetery plot. The book is also a tale of redemption; Seltzer manages to escape the ghetto and graduates from the University of Oregon. In reality, she grew up in a privileged home in the Valley, attended a high school with a $25,000 annual tuition, has not a drop of Indian blood in her veins, did not graduate from U. of Oregon, and says she learned about the ghetto while having coffee at Starbucks there. Whew!
The facts involved in both frauds are now partially explained in the mainstream media, though numerous other questions remain. What I find of even greater interest is the reaction from the publishing industry itself, as well as the media which helps promote these frauds. In Thomas Rick’s excellent book on Iraq, “Fiasco,” he says that at least the military has an institutional process for examining its mistakes and attempting to learn from them. He says that the media generally does not, but does cite, rather ironically given the current circumstances, the New York Times as an exception, mentioning the role of the Public Editor, in particular in the case of Judith Miller and the Weapons of Mass Destruction stories.
The Public Editor should be burning the midnight oil - there are many facets of this story that bear further examination, and explanation. Consider:
What does it say that one of the NYT’s leading book reviewers, Michiko Kakutani, was completely fooled, calling the memoir “humane and deeply affecting” Ironies abound: Of the various “unforgiving rules of the street” that Ms. Kakutani quotes from the book, one is: “Trust no one. Even your own momma will sell you out for the right price…”
Nepotism also abounds. Ms. Sarah McGrath, the editor at Riverside, a division of the Penguin Group, who worked on this book for three years with Ms. Seltzer and claims to have suspected that nothing was amiss, is the daughter of former NYT Book editor Charles McGrath. A commenter to the Motoko Rich’s article pointed out that Ms. Kakutani and Mr. McGrath practically shared the same desk.
Then there is the article on Ms. Seltzer’s home in Eugene, Oregon that appeared in the House and Home section of the NYT on Feb. 28, which included someone who is perhaps her real daughter, a pit bull that Ms. Seltzer says she raises, and Steve Moore, who “is staying at her home while recovering from a gunshot wound.” This article proved to be Ms. Seltzer’s final undoing - her sister called the publisher and said Ms. Seltzer story was a complete fraud. But why did we have to depend on a truthful sister, who has taken considerable abuse for her actions, and why didn’t the original reporter who wrote this article, Mimi Read, detect that something was seriously amiss in this whole picture?
The Times Public Editor needs to provide many more answers, and wouldn’t it be refreshing if he announced some policy changes - like the military might after examining one of its failures - to prevent yet another reoccurrence?
Even more troubling is the treatment this book and the subsequent revelations have received from the wider media. Yes, we know that Bush has weakened the rules governing media consolidations, and more media outlets are held under one owner. Still, the following sources are about as diverse and independent as one can be, yet reveal an unsettling tendency of “group think,” raising subliminal associations with lemmings. How did these different sources all decide, at the same time, that the book in question was the most worthy current book? How do they all give the book glowing reviews? And what is there reaction when the fraud is uncovered?
NPR’s (National Public Radio) Michel Martin was set to do an interview with Ms. Seltzer the morning the fraud was discovered when she received the phone call about the NYT’s article. She was obviously disturbed about this, and says that although other articles are focusing on the publisher, she wants to focus on the author, and why she did it. Ms. Martin even says, with respect to Ms Seltzer: “There’s really only one question: Why? Will we ever know?” Actually I can think of several more questions, closer to home, like why did NPR select this woman for an interview? And what sort of background check did they perform, if any? Why this “group think,” even at NPR?
Truth Dig - an excellent alternative news sources, founded by former LA Times columnist Robert Sheer, which sports the by-line “drilling beneath the headlines” - also decided to review this book at the same time. It was (apparently) a glowing review. Truth Dig could have elected to leave the review up as a cautionary tale, like the NYT did, but instead removed the embarrassment, and now even Google can’t find it. The book editor, Steve Wasserman, admitted that “we were snookered” and the actual reviewer, Yxta Murray, wrote a rather sad article that concluded with, “So, here, come close to me, tell me a story. I’m listening. I believe you. Make me feel something. Make a fool out of me.”
For a blog that would like to drill beneath the headlines, opportunities overflow. How does it come to pass that these diverse media sources are all reviewed the same book at the same time? Why not leave available the original review as a cautionary tale? Why not further explore the reaction of the publishing industry itself? And didn’t someone else, other than the sister, suspect that there was a rotten smell emanating from this book?
Meanwhile, at the other end of the political spectrum, there is the Wall Street Journal. It was at least not part of the group think party in that it had not reviewed the book initially. But it addressed the revelation that it was a fake with remarkable chutzpah. Let’s not focus on the author and her crime, nor the naivete or complicity of the publishers and reviewers, let’s focus on the sister who turned her in! In an article by Sara Schaefer Munoz on March 5th, the focus is on the question of turning in a sibling for wrong doing. How Ms. Munoz feels is obvious by using the phrase, referring to the sister,”the one who ratted her out.” Furthermore, Ms. Munoz downgrades this major fraud to “unscrupulous doings,” a WSJ tradition. (Remember the theft of billions of dollars by Michael Milken described as a few “technical trading violations?”)
In the publishing industry itself, the responses reflected in the media are not encouraging. There is the argument that they could not possibly fact-check everything in every single book. Who is asking for that? Simply run the same check on a prospective author as you might on the new receptionist. There is also the argument that one must “trust” an author, since this is all about a “special relationship.” Again, are these people the ones answering those Nigerian e-mails? There are a few bromides to “we’ll try to be more careful next time.” And there are the arguments that some famous authors have done the same thing, so what is the big deal? We’re looking for “truthiness” after all.
I’ll know an actual change in outlook has occurred when one of the media sources - or the publishing industry itself - says that as an act of atonement they will reveal another publishing fraud, and not wait for a sister to do it.
I suspect I’ll still be waiting for the sister.
John Paul Jones was a Medical Corpsman during the Vietnam War. He worked in hospital administration in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia over a 25 year period, from 1978 to 2003, with a four year “sabbatical” in the middle. He believes that all too many of the mistakes made by the United States in South East Asia are being replicated in South West Asia today. You can learn more about him at The Taza Press.
The article calls for a set of standards that hopefully would prevent fraud in the future whether in literature or the media. It also portrays the inadequacies and shortcomings of the publishing community. Is it time to overhaul such a community?
In summary, the writer has raised some valid points and I second his call for a mechanism to check and balance the process of publishing.
I can’t say that NPR is to blame for selecting Seltzer for an interview - (”…why did NPR select this woman for an interview? And what sort of background check did they perform, if any?”) - authors tend to get send to do promo puff pieces for the radio, even NPR, by their publicity departments, so is it really up to NPR to do the background checks? If Riverhead sent this author to them for a story, one would hope that she was legit. Although, if NPR was doing a self-researched story on her, that’s another story.
I do think that you may be looking into the conspiracy theory a bit too much - as in how did these “diverse media sources all review the same book at the same time?” It happens - again I think that Riverhead was pushing the publicity on this book, leaving the mess mostly in their lap, since they were the ones who didn’t check up on their own author. As for their lame excuse concerning their background check policies - how it is impossible to check everything & everyone - that’s just ridiculous. This is much more deplorable than the James Frey debacle.
It’s not the cigars in the backroom type of conspiracy, and I did not say that. “Group think” is the right expression. Like in, The Emperor Has No Clothes. I still consider it is a valid question: how do these quite diverse media sources, like NPR, Truth Dig, and the New York Times, without common ownership, decide to review the same book, at the same time, all with effusive praise, of the many possibilities available? Sure, I’ve personally been fooled by people, and by events, and would expect some of these media sources to be fooled, but not all. This is supposedly their job, to be a book critic, to raise some questions, and not function solely as an adjunct of the Penguin Public Relations Department. Why must we ultimately rely on that little boy, or the sister in this case, to point out that this is an enormous fraud?
Concerning NPR’9s interview, perhaps I am the one who is naive, but you’d think that the interviewer would at least read the book prior to the interview. Surely the placement of a white - Indian in a black foster home, or the line about buying a cemetery plot with the drug money would stretch credulity enough for the interviewer to raise additional questions. But suppose that all sounded plausible for South Central, as though the topic was as obscure as quantum mechanics. Then shouldn’t the interviewer at least ask someone who is an expert in these matters prior to the interview, just to have the necessary background for a good interview?
And you are right, this complete fabrication is much worse than James Frey - at least a magnitude worse, but then so was the Holocaust memoir fraud of the previous week.
And of course, if publishers aren’t going to do due-diligence, then the media should. Hell, if they start uncovering fraud regularly, they can even make news doing it.