I am a passive person. The only drama I want, the only violence I will tolerate, is on my television screen, at the movie theatre, in the novels I read. And in the stories I write.
I have a pretty sweet life. I have good kids. I have a loving family. I have never had a drug habit, never been arrested, never even been in any real trouble. My life is like the first fictional scene I wrote with violence in it. No blood. No anger. I was tiptoeing about the issue. It was nice. Nice violence. Boring scene.
Maybe that’s how I want to live. But who’d want to read about it?
Even though I could never physically hurt someone in the flesh, I found a way to visualize. There’s always someone, living or dead, real or imagined, whose eyes you fantasize about gouging out, right? Someone who could benefit from a good ax murdering? Well, someone from whose ax murder YOU may benefit.
Use them. In your mind of course. Only on the pages of fiction. Not in back alley under the anonymous cover of a moonless night sky.
My aweso
me editor, Scott Morgan, has a writing mantra – “write for the jugular.” He’s taught me a lot about being brave and facing the tough stuff. So I say take it a step further. Don’t just write for the jugular, slice that puppy wide open. Let blood spurt all over the floors, dip your fingers in it and paint crimson pictures on the wall, leave a scarlet confession on the mirror.
Just don’t be so damn nice about it.
I’ve shot drugs, murdered teenagers, beaten a priest to death, sliced off a husband’s, um, body part, and even forced a young girl into prostitution. Once you get the hang of evil, it starts to come easy.
In fiction only. On the pages of my made up world.
In my boring real life, I’d never do any of those things. I try to right wrongs. But in the fictional realm, I write wrongs. And lots of them.
What do you write that makes you squirm? Or at least used to…
{ 10 comments }
