Jeremy Murphy's New Book 'Too Good to Fact Check' Is Full of Amusing and Glamorous Moments

The guilty pleasure of 2024 is gearing up to be Too Good to Fact Check: Flying the Skies with Stars, Scotch and Scandal (Post Hill Press, $18), coming out July 23.

Available for pre-sale on Amazon and Barnes & Noble, the book chronicles 10 years of absurd memories by author Jeremy Murphy’s decade of editing a glossy celebrity magazine. In it, he recalls recalls photo shoots around the world with celebrities like LL Cool J, Neil Patrick Harris, Julianna Margulies, Harrison Ford, Christine Baranski, and other top stars who he traveled with. Not quite a dishy memoir, Too Good to Fact Check is more of a hilarious confessional that takes readers into a rarefied world filled with glamour, access and excess. Along the way, the book includes amusing recollections of Murphy’s many reckless actions, one more outrageous than the next. The book is co-written by screen-writer/content creator/actress Sophia Paulmier.

Hotel room set on fire? It’s in there. Bar fights at the King Cole? In the writer’s defense, he was defending prostitutes! Arrest on a commercial airplane in Paris? It wasn’t him, but he helped cover it up. Drunkenly serenading TV host Ted Koppel with the Nightline theme song? Yea, there’s no getting around that one. The writer’s most absurd actions unfold against glamorous photo shoots with Neil Patrick Harris aboard the Orient Express, Julianna Margulies at the venerated Hotel du Cap in the Cote d’Azur, Christine Baranski at a Tuscan vineyard owned by the Ferragamo family, LL Cool J striking a pose in the Place de Concorde, and a surly Harrison Ford arriving at the wrong hotel in Los Angeles, among other events. Murphy and Paulmier bring those moments to life with colorful detail and humor, told through the editor’s Macallan-soaked goggles.

“I didn’t think I had this book in me, but in recalling that insane decade I realized I had so many ridiculous stories I can laugh about now that the statute of limitations has passed,” says Murphy. “These are memories I’ve never shared, and I’m frankly surprised I can still recall given the over-the-top lifestyle I’d come to enjoy. Too Good to Fact Check is a diary, love letter, stand-up act, and mea culpa in one book. And great way to become un-employable.”

“Jeremy told me about this idea and I was fascinated, but not sold until he humored me on a couple of crazy stories; I could not believe was hearing,” said Paulmier. “Bringing this to life was a challenge that intrigued me. We spent months recreating this decade through his voice and memories, and the end result is a genuine, character-rich narrative that brings readers back to the highest era of pop culture.”