In order for a book to be published and considered non-fiction, it needs to be as true as the author can possibly make it. As Seth Greenland said in his video interview, "We (the readers) make room for allowances in non-fiction and memoir writing for the fallibility and the imperfection of memory; however we should not be blatantly lied to." I agree with Mr. Greenland full-heartedly. Non-fiction needs to be true. A memoir should be every bit as true as a biological review of the behavior of lions in the wild (which I don't have any personal experience with).
There is definitely room for creativity in these not-so-true-true-stories; however they shouldn't be branded as absolute truth if they are, in fact, only relatively true. What is wrong with writing a novel and simply calling it "sensationalized nonfiction/memoir"? The author should take a page out in the back to explain that not all events in the book are true, and admit to inflating events of the story for desired effect. Does it still belong in the memoir section? Absolutely. But this way the author would absolve themselves of any guilt, because it would be up to the reader to know the true nature of the story before-hand.
As far as authors who call their story a memoir for publication purposes, I do not blame them in the slightest. An author falsely branding his story to get it published is similar to the minor league baseball player who juices up and smacks a billion homeruns in a season in hopes of getting called up to the big leagues. For this reason, while I don't agree with James Frey's branding of his book A Million Little Pieces, nor do I blame him. He was just doing what he had to do.
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