Holocaust Memoir a Fake
'Angel at the Fence' has been cancelled, but will live on as a film adaptation
Publisher cancels book by author featured on ‘Oprah’
By Matthew B. Zeidman
HOLLYWOOD, CA (Hollywood Today) 12/29/08 – TV personality Oprah Winfrey will surely be more wary the next time she features the writer of a non-fiction memoir on her eponymous talk show. She was already burned once by an author who admitted his tale of drug use and redemption was pure fantasy, and now another autobiographer promoted by Winfrey has come clean about his narration of love and hope amidst World War II.
Andrea Hurst, agent to 79-year-old Holocaust survivor Herman Rosenblat, said in a statement that while her client was in fact a prisoner at a concentration camp in Schlieben, Germany, the love story chronicled in his book about his relationship with the woman who sneaked him food during his incarceration was false.
The publisher, Berkley Books, said in a statement of its own that it would no longer publish the upcoming title, “Angel at the Fence, The True Story of a Love that Survived,” and expected Rosenblat to return all remuneration. Reuters reported that Atlantic Overseas Pictures planned to go ahead with a movie adaptation.
Rosenblat had claimed he met his current wife after he immigrated to America and realized she was the same person who threw him food over the concentration camp fence.
James Frey, who wrote “A Million Little Pieces” about his experiences with drug and alcohol abuse, admitted his memoir was also a phony in 2006 and appeared on “Oprah” to discuss the deception. Winfrey had previously included it in her popular list of recommended books.