If fact is stranger than fiction, than fictional fact is even stranger. Just consider Adam Wheeler, the kid accused of lying and forging documents to gain entry into Harvard -- and duping the school out of $45,000 in financial aid. Wheeler, 23, of Milton, Del., was ordered held on $5,000 bail Tuesday after pleading not guilty to 20 counts of larceny, identity fraud and other charges, the Associated Press reported.
So how long will it be before a book by or about Wheeler hits the stores? Faking SAT scores isn't very exotic. But who wouldn't want to read about a kid who had the chutzpah to claim he prepped at Andover and attended MIT, when he actually graduated from Caesar Rodney High Kent County, Del., and attended Bowdoin College. I bet a couple of dozen agents and ghost writers are lining up right now for a piece of the action. Far-fetched? Remember, it worked for Stephen Glass, the young New Republic reporter who was discovered to have fabricated stories; he turned his tale into a book and movie.
Wait! Forget the Wheeler book -- let's start talking about a screenplay. I'm thinking an academic version of "To Catch a Thief." And maybe we get Ryan O'Neal to do a cameo as an outraged alum named Oliver Barrett IV. So who plays Wheeler on the big screen?
Now that would be stranger than fiction.