Twat writes book

Title: The Final Testament of the Holy Bible, by James Frey
Publisher: John Murray
Marketing rating:

By Pete Smiley

James Frey, bestselling author of A Million Little Pieces and My Friend Leonard, has a new book out. It’s called The Final Testament of the Holy Bible. Make sure you aren’t eating anything before you read the blurb:

“James Frey is not like other writers. He has been called a liar. A cheat. A con man. He’s been called a saviour. A revolutionary. A genius. Now he has written his greatest work, his most revolutionary, his most controversial. The Final Testament of the Holy Bible.



What if the Messiah were alive today? Living in New York. Sleeping with men. Impregnating young women. Euthanizing the dying, and healing the sick. Defying the government, and condemning the holy.

If you met him, and he changed your life, would you believe?

Be moved, be enraged, be enthralled by this extraordinary masterpiece. Out in April.”

Frey is an endlessly fascinating character by virtue of his shameless, pathological desire to be perceived as a literary badass. I honestly think he would tour America fellating dogs at state fairs if he thought it would bolster his reputation in this regard.

But no amount of dog-fellating will ever make the world forget that he first achieved notoriety by lying about being a junkie and then grovelling to Oprah (Oprah!) when she called him out on it. And yet he’s still at it, talking about collaborations with wizened pseud Terry Richardson (rage-inducing link here), and referring to himself in the third person as “big, bad James Frey”. And now comes this new book, in which Jesus has, and acts upon, human desires.

First, and most obviously, it’s been done. By Nikoz Kazantzakis. By Martin Scorsese. By Quebec. By Jeffrey frickin’ Archer. By Andrew Lloyd Webber. By South Park. Then by Comedy Central, again. I’m sure Frey is entirely aware of this.

But I’m sure he’s also aware that Christians are the ideal group to offend if you’re trying to make a name for yourself as a literary badass. They’re vocal and visible enough for their discontent to earn you press, but also unlikely to put out any inconvenient fatwas on you. A book like this is guaranteed to earn denunciations from a few fat fucks like Bill Bennett and Pat Buchanan which, with a bit of judicious press-releasing, might earn you mentions on the mainstream news.

If you’re really lucky, you’ll win the self-promotional jackpot and catch the eye of the Westboro Baptist Church. I guarantee with ironclad certainty that Frey daydreams about Westboro picketing his readings. Fortunately, I think the Phelps family is sophisticated enough to know a fellow media-whore when they see one.

Another advantage of writing your “sacrilegious” book about Jesus, rather than Allah, Buddah, Jah, or Thor, is that Jesus is a mainstay of the majority culture. Consequently, idiots will feel comfortable having opinions about your book and discussing it around the internets. This will help you achieve the all-important word of mouth necessary to break your book out of the publishing ghetto where so many worthier books die unnoticed and are pulped. Witness this infuriating attempt at viral marketing where an obnoxious Hugh Grant-a-like plays “gotcha” with witless proles by giving them the precis of the book, waiting for them to take offence at it, then likening it to The Satanic Verses and The Origin of the Species:

That’ll teach you to judge a book by its transparently controversy-generating blurb, idiot on the street!

So kudos to you, James Frey, for proving once again that in today’s media culture, boundless cynicism and a chronic shame deficiency are no barriers to success. Tragically, your people seem to have scrubbed the internet free of the video of your moment of shame, so in lieu of that, here is a slideshow of you squirming under the penetrating gaze of a furious Oprah. Never forget.

Pete Smiley procastinates on the internet and writes at Fake Polo.