The Wall Street Journal managed to coax "Marina," the ex-wife of Benjamin Anastas in his memoir TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE, to respond after publishing a Q&A with Anastas. Not surprisingly, she takes issue with the way she is presented. EDIT: Not to be outdone, someone on Goodreads has a theory about The Nominee, the man who (spoiler?) "Marina" left Anastas to be with in the memoir.
If you've read the memoir, here is an essay she wrote about the divorce and here is another that you might like to read.
3 days ago
5 comments:
Ben was the lit director at my college for a year (we're the sleepy small college town on the Chesapeake with the annoying geese).
There's no theories, it's clear who both of these people are:
the nominee (based off the year he was nominated and his still intact wikipedia entry) is: Christopher Sorrentino
and she is: Minna Proctor, as you so link to.
Here's them together: http://ow.ly/fm9Lz
I enjoyed the memoir. Read in one sitting.
You had his name already too. But yeah, that's def. it. Scathing!
I liked the memoir too but I can see how these two parties would have their differences with it. It wasn't clear to me from his descriptions, though, who they were; I had done a lot of Googling around it to no avail. I wonder how much and what kind of legal advice Anastas received around his portrayal of them in the book.
(Also, how aggrieved was Proctor that she contacted the Wall Street Journal? She could have just stayed anonymous.)
Otherwise, I was tickled to see that Meghan Daum endorsed it. The passing of the torch! Or something!
Since the cat is out of the bag, I can state for a fact that The Nominee is Christopher Sorrentino, who also left several harassing comments about me for a period of years under the names "Andy" and "Andrew Piety." (You'll find the name "Andrew Piety" in BELIEVENIKS, the book that Sorrentino co-authored with Jonathan Lethem.) He has also left comments under several handles at The Millions, making it a point to declare me insane whenever I have posted a comment. But his early comments were efforts to discredit me during a time in which I was publishing reviews in the Los Angeles Times, the Barnes and Noble Review, and several other outlets. It's too bad Christopher didn't cover his IP addresses. I spotted him when he was posting from Texas. Unlike Chris, I have always left comments under my real name.
That's bizarre. Had you ever met him or had any contact with him before you received those comments?
Regardless, if he attempts to sockpuppet his way out of this memoir he will surely find it difficult.
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