Agent Drops Disgraced Author James Frey

NEW YORK – It's true, James Frey, you need a new literary manager.

Brillstein-Grey Entertainment literary manager Kassie Evashevski, who represented the author of "A Million Little Pieces" for more than four years, said she's not representing him anymore because of his tall tales.

"In the last week, it became impossible for me to maintain a relationship once the trust had been broken," Evashevski told Publisher Weekly for a story on Tuesday. "He eventually did apologize, but I felt for many reasons I had to let him go as a client."

Frey's story about drug addiction and recovery, originally released in 2003, zoomed up The New York Times best seller list when Oprah Winfrey named it her book club selection in September 2005. But early this year, The Smoking Gun Web site challenged some parts of the book, including Frey's claim that he served a three-month stint in prison.

Frey later admitted he had spent only a few hours in jail and had fabricated or embellished other parts of "Pieces."

Evashevski said she had chosen to represent "Pieces" because "I thought the book was the most visceral and vivid description of drug addiction I had ever read."

She told Publisher Weekly she didn't believe Frey set out to con anyone and she learned about his deception only after he called her to say thesmokinggun.com would be running a negative story about him.

She said she had kept quiet on the debate about "Pieces" because she wanted to let Frey speak for himself.

Winfrey expressed support for Frey, but days later she challenged the author on her show about why he "felt the need to lie" about the events in his book and chastised him for betraying readers.

Frey told Winfrey he didn't think of his book as a novel, despite its fiction.

"I still think it's a memoir," he said.