Lauren Slater's Lying--is she truthful for admitting it? (Part 1 Response)

While reading Lauren Slater's Lying, I felt like I was trying to grab hold of slippery-slimy fish that continually squirmed against grasping my efforts. Reading this book definitely taught me that the line between truth, fact, memory, and fiction can all be neatly wrapped into a ball of grey and murkiness. However, the honest language, tall-tales, and spinning auras seduced me to keep reading--even when I became weary of her story because I didn't know what to believe.

I wondered about her father. It is said that he is passive, but I wondered if he was more involved in her life. He seems absent in the book and is shown only a few times, but positively; Lauren focuses more on the relationship with her mother. Their relationship intrigued me the most. As Lauren showed the reader her mother at the piano, taking her to ice skate, talking to Lauren about will, it was apparent that her mother was suffering as well. I could not help but dislike her mother as a character. Now, whether or not Lauren fabricated some of her mother's words or actions, can be questioned, however I felt that the mother was the antagonist--if there is such a thing in creative non-fiction.

There was an interesting parallel that was happening throughout the book between Lauren and her mother; specifically I would like to point out this line, "Brilliant were those days of waiting, those days of May, when the sky was soft, the air warm, and the sun went down into a pool of red." It's as if Lauren was recreating the same reaction her mother had when she was awaiting the rejection letter. "Waiting" became a way to convince herself (just like her mother) that she was so good that the editors were taking time to respond. Lauren was entwined with her mother like two growing vines, living her life not only as an extension of her mother, but also (at times) being forced to accomplish what her mother had not; thus being forced to be her mother. This was an interesting parallel that propelled the narrative forward and added to the structure of the piece as it layered the story with an emotional narrative arc.

The structure worked well. As a reader I felt as though she was guiding me through every nauseating and painful experience; entitling each part of the book worked, as it kept me focused on what she was trying to convey. Even though the structure worked, I was not sure about her memories, stories and made-up people and if it added to her credibility. At times, I was frustrated because I was not sure if she was telling the truth or not. I was not sure if I could trust her as a writer, due to the fact that she kept questioning herself in the text. I had to remind myself that the book was entitled "Lying" and that she had, in some way, redeemed herself for implying that she is actually lying and that in admiting this, she is truthful. However, there are moments in the book and I want to know for sure if it the epilepsy that influenced her to believe Dr Neu was "touching" her (inappropriately)? I believe she leaves this ambiguous and up the reader and I can understand that as a little girl she might have imagined this; also as a writer, I am aware that some of creative non-fiction is made up and so she is playing with the idea of personal truth versus fact.

I really responded to her story; I tried to gulp down this tale of seizures, pathetic feelings, and emotional embellishments. The book begins with, "I exaggerate." and I knew that she was preparing me for the story to come. But also preparing me for who she was as a writer and how she planned on telling this story. So, since she admits that she is lying (not during most of the book?) does that make her work truthful? Creative Non-fiction?
Lauren responds to this inquiry by stating in her book, "Everyone knows that a lot of memoirs have made up scenes; it's obvious. And everyone knows that half the time at least fictions contain literal autobiographical truths. So how do we decide what's what, and does it even matter?"

However, for me, it does matter whether or not I am reading fiction or non-fiction and there were times through out her work when I was not sure if it was her epilepsy truth, her mother's truth, all the other people who she pretended to be and their truths or if it was all wrapped into one story that relied heavily on exaggerating rather than experience. Most of the "truth" is ambiguous in the book, but I still believed her story.