Based on a True Story - Paperback

by Elizabeth Renzetti (Author)

A delectable satirical novel about celebrity culture, journalism, truth, lies, consequences -- about the fictions we tell ourselves and the fictions we tell others.

Augusta Price (not her real name) is famous in England for playing a slatternly barmaid on a nighttime soap opera and for falling down drunk in public. Now, she has no job, no relationship with her long-lost son, and a sad shortage of tranquilizers -- but she has had an improbable hit with her memoir (which is based on a true story, but only very loosely).

But when Frances Bleeker -- an insecure and not very successful American tabloid journalist -- tells Augusta that a man she once loved has written a book, Augusta becomes terrified that her life story will be revealed as the web of lies it really is. She sets out on a trans-Atlantic journey from London to California to seek revenge on her former lover -- a journey that will require the reluctant help of Frances.

Author Biography

Elizabeth Renzetti is a columnist for the Globe and Mail, and for several years worked the London bureau. Her work has been anthologized in collections of essays, and she regularly appears as a radio and television commentator.