Fact-checking too costly for non-fiction publishers?
From the Wall Street Journal:
Jeff Kleinman, an agent with Folio Literary Management, said publishers could add a clause to the author’s warranty section in their contracts, stating that to the best of the writer’s knowledge the facts in the book are true. “The point being, if the author’s found to egregiously misrepresent the facts, the author could be sued for breach of contract,” said Mr. Kleinman via email. “Wouldn’t that be a lot simpler than asking an agent, or even a publisher, to verify and fact-check every book?”
Of course the cheapest thing to do is blur the line between fiction and non-fiction altogether. And why not? Fiction readers want to know what authors use from their own lives in their books, and non-fiction readers want to know what events were embellished. Poor James Frey—by all accounts A Million Little Pieces still would have been a heck of a book if he didn’t lie.
Here’s some perspective: Robert Byron wrote a fabulous, yarn-filled travelogue called The Road to Oxiana. So much B.S. in a book once passed off as fact. So much good writing.
