A Million Little Pieces and Frankfurt

Well, I’ve had a chat with my literary critic with whom I had spoken about memoirs, and I wish to back down from my genre definition and say that, from what I understand of Frey’s memoir, he is too fancy-free with the facts to fit within the memoir category. I stand corrected and so I deleted the post. My friend tells me that memoirs do distinguish themselves from autobiography in the exploration of a coherent story, but not by fabricating essential facts. Re-ordering events, changing names, slight elaborations — all are fair game.

But, if SmokingGun.com is correct in its portrayal of facts they find inaccurate or simply made up, then Frey’s A Million Little Pieces exceeds tolerable limits for a memoir. Frey, as Harry Frankfurt would say it in his inimitable piece with its inelegant title, On Bullshit, has moved into BSing.
Thanks for the chat.