Christopher Moore's Blog

Gentle, trusting readers.

I have to tell you, that James Frey’s admission yesterday that parts of his best-selling, Oprah-blessed biography, A Million Little Pieces, were made up, has cause me to do some soul searching of my own, and now I must confess, that although my books are marketed as fiction, and there are disclaimers all over the place to that effect, parts of them are totally true, factual, and not made up at all.

I haven’t called Oprah to break the news to her, but I have a call into her people, who assure me that my call will be answered in the order that it was received, and I really don’t mind listening to Maya Angelou reading the lyrics to The Girl From Ipanema while I’m on hold. (I love French Americans and I have been a fan of Miss Gelou’s work ever since she served as Surgeon General for the Clinton Administration.) Still, I can’t help but think that Oprah will be disappointed, and will, in fact, have to call Dr. Phil to console her. (“Phil, I was ignoring that motherfucker for other reasons altogether, now I find out that he hasn’t made all of that nonsense up. I’m distraught. Steadman make me a pie, bitch!”*)

I know that many of you will be shocked to see my name on the front page of America’s major newspapers, and will, indeed, be worried for my well-being when I have to sit at the same desk as Larry King, because we have all watched him slowly suck the life force out of Suzanne Sommers and Richard Simmons over the years, but worry not. I have brought this on myself. I knew going into this, that I was going to not make some stuff up. For instance, the laws of physics as portrayed in my books? All pretty much true.

Please, please, please, loyal readers, do keep in mind, that I did it for the kids. Do you want to be the one who has to answer those hopeful, upturned eyes when a youngster comes to you and asks, “It this all complete bullshit?” Of course not. You want to be able to say, “No, little Legolas, some of that bullshit is true.” Then you can move on to more important things, like why you named your kids after characters from the Lord of the Rings.

So there it is. Drag my name through the front pages of a thousand newspapers if you must. Buy all my books and burn them in protest – and if it makes you feel better, buy them and burn them again! It’s okay. Implicate me in love trysts with actresses of wide and varied sluttiness if you must. I will soldier on. (Those pictures were Photoshopped! My car would look small next to lips that size!) And as God is my witness, I will never tell the truth again!

*My attorneys have advised me to say in the interest of full disclosure, that Oprah probably doesn’t really talk like that, and, in fact, may not even like pie, as we have never seen it on her “favorite things” show. But that may just be because they couldn’t get a pie that big under everyone’s seat. Anyway, my attorneys have advised me to say that I’m just sayin’.