Winners & Losers

Once upon a time there was a clear distinction between winners and losers. The winners went home with a trophy, money, movie deal, or whatever they were playing for. The losers went home dejected and empty-handed.

In sports, the winning coach gets a raise or an offer for a better job. The losing coach gets bad publicity and oftentimes replaced.

On American Idol the winner gets to make an album and tour the country. The losers make albums and tour the country. I don’t get that. But the worst infraction of the rules of winners and losers comes in the form of one young man named, Sanjaya.

Not only is this boy-man still getting face time on the morning news, but he had the “audacity” to write a memoir, as though he’s actually lived a life. What is he? Nineteen?

Sanjaya isn’t a very good singer. But he’s very good at drama. He wept often during the weeks he was on the American Idol show. When that didn’t move Simon, he started arranging his hair in crazy Mohawks and girly curls. As his lack of true talent became more and more obvious, he became more and more outrageous. Apparently, millions of ten and eleven-year-old girls were calling in to vote for him, but eventually, (thankfully), he was axed.

I find it hard to believe he had enough life story or even words to fill a book. Perhaps it’s a picture book memoir, or one of those flip books where the character inside looks as though they are changing and moving, but really aren’t.

Sanjaya–still strange but with a new hairdo, was making the news circuit this morning to publicize this book of his and inform everyone that he is working on an album.

Why am I still surprised when publishers print this drivel?

 They’ve snatched up so many memoirs in the past couple of years that later turned out to be complete fabrications. At least this time they should know what’s true and what’s not. Millions of viewers watched Sanjaya for weeks on end make a fool of himself. Besides, the litmus test for a true memoir is if Oprah does not promote it for her booklist. Apparently, she passed on this one. She’s probably still engrossed in that memoir of the girl who survived a Nazi prisoner camp by hiding in the woods and living with wolves. I can see where she might be fooled. After all, Tarzan was raised by wolves.

Publishers usually want to know an author has a platform and an audience before taking on a project. Sanjaya seems to have a platform. Just the fact that he was a contestant on American Idol gets him booked on Good Morning America. But does he have an audience anymore? Those ten and eleven-year-old girls are now twelve or thirteen. Will this skinny, off-key man-child still hold the same appeal as he did two years ago? Or have they crushed on a manlier type like Robert Pattinson (star of the vampire movie Twilight)?

I don’t know about you, but I will be watching the New York Times best seller list with bated breath.