Readers Deserve Better.

My first job after graduating university was as a Special Markets Assistant at St. Martin’s Press in New York. I had my own office on the fifth floor of the Flatiron Building which was cool as fuck given, I was an assistant; but then we all did in my department because it was just the layout of the floor. Still, how many fresh out of university kids could say they had their own office, right? For those who don’t know, Special Markets can be summed up as “non traditional book sales.” This means pretty much anything that isn’t a traditional bookstore or traditional book retailer/ distributor. My area was premium/ corporate gift sales, author events and general dumping ground for things no one knew what to do with. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was getting a crash course in publishing that has stuck with me till this day.

My phone number and address were given out freely which made for some interesting voicemails come Monday morning and also my weekly post consisted of anything from fan letters to authors, odd requests for free books and my personal favourite: members of the public who would return books completely marked up with grammatical corrections, incorrect facts and letters that pretty much told us how shit we were for allowing these books to be published in their present form. I know people like to knock independent publishing because they think its amateurish but let me tell you, the Big 5 are just as capable of looking amateurish. Anyone who owns an e-book reader can attest to this one.

There has been a lot of talk recently about The Salt Path revelation. As it turned out, this bestselling memoir by Raynor Winn and now major motion picture with Gillian Anderson and Jason Isaacs is not entirely based on truth. It has called into question the integrity of the author and her life.  If you haven’t heard about it, you can find more about it here.

Anyone who has worked in publishing can tell you that this is not the first nor will it be the last time a publisher, an agent or the public will be duped by a supposed true story. Two names that come to mind are that of Ned Irving and JT Leroy who both deceived publishers, agents and the unsuspecting public in spectacular ways. Penguin Random House released a very vague statement about their own due diligence which admitted no culpability. Behind the scenes, they will be managing this closely with the agent involved and looking at all contracts. The most likely outcome is the book will be moved into the fiction section and the news will move on accordingly.
What’s been on my mind the most though is the broken contract between author and reader. As authors we enter into a contract with our readers the moment, they pick up our work and invest their time and energy into our writing. There are more books than readers, and people have less free time to read. But also, readers are trusting us to take them on a journey, to entertain, to excite, to fill them with wonder or fright. Memoirs in particular are successful because in this post-truth world, people are looking for a connection and authenticity. They want to feel inspired and to see others soar because it means that there is a possibility they too can soar.

Had Raynor Winn written this as a novel, would the reader have been fooled? Not at all, but by selling it as a memoir, she violated that sacred contract and once again, everyone who writes autobiographical/ memoir will find themselves burned by this deceit. There are enough lies in this world that are passed off as truth.

As authors, our readers should trust us to not make fools of them. They have elected officials who do that on a daily basis.