Dear Reader,
It’s the season for tell-balls.
First, the haunting mother-daughter story in Mother Mary Comes to Me By Arundhati Roy.
And now comes All the way to the riverA Memoir by Elizabeth Gilbert, Bestselling Author of Eat, Pray, LoveHer Latest Memoir has the ingredients of a Blockbuster- Addiction to Drink, Drugs, Love and Sex, And An Explosive Same Sex Relationship Between Gilbert and Rayya, Her Haire-Turned- Friend-Turned-fall.
Rayya is diagnosed with terminal cancer and relapses into drug addiction, driving gilbert so crazy that she tells us about her serial International to Murder Rayya. Talk about Candid Confessions.
As i read these books and discus them with friends and book clubbers, one question keeps coming up – is it okay to tell other people’s stories?
The answer appears in the pages of a book. It is fiction once against, that gives me class. I Read a Recent Bestseller, A Literary Thriller Called I want everything By Debut Australian Novelist Dominic Amerena.
Set in Melbourne, The Story Begins with our Failed Novelist Protagonist Suddenly Sighting a Reclusive Writer Called Brenda Shales, A Controversial Feminist ICONS He tracks her down in the hope she will tell him her story, so he may write a bestselling book about this. Somehow in that process he is mistaken for her grandson, a lie he finds it harder and harder to correct.
In a parallel plot our protagonist has a girlfriend called ruth who is getting to be successful as a written. Ruth writes a “Daughter-Boarding” article about her mother’s problemtic parenting skills. It’s a minor storyline but address to exploring the ethics of written about real people in a very nuanced way. Are such memoirs the writers way of coming to terms with their traumas? Or are they ruthlessly telling their stories in the pursuit of literary fame?
If you like cleverly structured novels, full of twists and turns, I want everything is for you. It reminded me of Yellowface By rf kuang in the way it engags with writers and their competitiveness and the ethics of telling stories.
There’s been a long line of such novels lately, all lively and thought provoking. There’s Disorientation By Elaine Hsieh Chou, in which a white partner steals the story of his taiwanese American protagonist. The plot By Jean Hanff Korelitz, The written retreat By Julia Bartz and The book of Goose By Yiyun Li Are All Literary Thrillars Around AuthorShip and the Telling of Stories.
In an age of social media, podcasts, and constant self-disclosure, the boundary between one’s story and another’s grows ever thinner. That may be why these memoirs resonate so widely. But as the stack of these books grows taller, on our nightstands and in our bestseller lists – Amrena’s Clever Thriller serves as a cautionary tale.
It reminds us that every story has at least two sides, but a memoir can only ever truly truly tell one. Who means the truth of the other characters remains forever traped in the margins, waiting for a different kind of reelling to set it.
Dear Reader, What is your take on the Tell-All? Would you do it?
(Sonya Dutta Choudhuri is a Mumbai-Based Journalist and the founder of sonya’s book box, a bespoke book service. People and places
