Many authors fraudulently claim a piece of history as their own story to gain popularity. This is the case with many Holocaust memoirs. Authors transform history and facts into an imaginary playing field, which they believe they can use to tell their “stories”. Although the Holocaust was a very serious, dramatic and depressing period of history, some authors see it as a way to attract public attention. The authors tell the story of their lives transforming from despair to happiness; however, to avoid this type of work being seen as a cliché, where in the end everything goes perfectly, dates, places and facts are attached. Misha Defonseca took advantage of the shocking tales of the Holocaust by creating his own fake memoir titled Misha: A Memoire of the Holocaust Years. The factual truth of these events is important because the true aspect of the memoir is what gives it additional meaning and importance, so without the truth, such a story loses value. Misha Defonseca has written a thought-provoking memoir about traveling alone across Europe to search for his imprisoned parents and to survive the Holocaust; however, the “memoirs” turned out to be completely false. In her memoirs, she described being trapped in the Warsaw Ghetto, killing a German soldier, and, most extreme, being protected by a pack of wolves during her journey (Gelder). Not only was her entire trip a lie, but it also turned out that she was not Jewish. Defonseca defended herself through a statement in the Belgian newspaper Le Soir stating: "It's not the true reality but it's my reality." Defonseca had a difficult childhood, as he claims; however, he is not referring to what he writes about in his memoirs. Some people believe that your daughter… middle of paper… would recommend books to her based on her connection to the written word and its message” (Baillie). She states that publishers should be the ones to define a memoir as a memoir and she will accept the book as the category she has been given, and that if it is a memoir, she understands that the dates and facts may be confusing and compressed; however, it is argued that a memoir should not be composed of vague and compressed facts, but the simple truth. The most important aspect of Defonseca's book is the truth; however, when validity is drawn from a memory, its meaning follows. The themes, messages and morals of his book come from the fact that it is a true experience; however, when the truth of the memoir was taken away, so was the meaning of the memoir. His inspiring story is no longer inspiring when it becomes fictional, causing it to lose value.