Lancer Kind, Malicous Deviant or just writing?
I’ve been accused of being unsavory or even outright bad, but also I’ve been accused of being a great citizen. None of those charges, I’m happy to say, have stuck!
As an author, I get to create characters that are bad people. In “Better than God,” I plausibly simulate a very rich jerk who likes to show others he’s the boss, to the point of getting away with murder. This story has been published in a book filled with stories of people doing bad things, called Malicious Deviance. Its editor, Robert Essig, sent me a message about how he found the story a little offensive, and that’s why he wanted to buy it for the anthology. The anthology’s published by Library of Horror Press so it’s loaded with stories that are better than a triple latte for staying up at night (my mom had to force herself to stop reading James A Sabata’s “Gossip Hounds of Sherry Town” so she could sleep). The anthology was reviewed by HellNotes. My story, “Better than God,” is about this very successful jerk who owns a Ferrari and knows how to use it. What could be so offensive about that?
Some may say that to write such a character, I must have quite the inner jerk. And to that I say, NO! Maybe there have been causes where I was a jerk to you, dear reader, or perhaps I was just “writing.” For like Brad Pitt who is just acting handsome for the cameras (Angelina Joli says he has a horrendous beer belly), a writer who misbehaves so he can tap the correct keys on his keyboard, is just writing.
To everyone who wishes to defame my character, you’re wrong! I’m not a jerk–I’m writing. I might not actually look towards a California defamation lawyer for such instances, so if you do feel as though I am malicious when writing, I might very well be. So I’ll not apologize for working on my craft. Someone has to suffer for art, so it might as well be you.
