The Personal Impact of Writing about Violence

I reported in a recent post titled Where I Get My Ideas how random thoughts, even a single word can coalesce into a potential story line. For me, that word was cult. A myriad of spooky scenarios ran through my head and in an effort to bring a semblance of order to the process I picked up a couple of well-known books on the subject.

I started to read up on the perplexing reasons why seemingly average people get sucked in by charismatic, yet pathological con-men. Why do people allow themselves to be utterly controlled, to be physically, emotionally, and sexually violated?

What drove the brainwashed acolytes of David Koresh and Jim Jones to blindly follow their leader into a brutal and painful death. What was so compelling about Roch Therriault from right here in Ontario, who disemboweled one woman and cut off the fingers and arm of another among his many abuses? What drove his female followers to bear him several more children, even as he languished in prison?

 In my last book, aptly titled, Dark Territory, Signy Shepherd encounters brutal violence. I didn't mean to write it that way, but the characters insisted. The use of extreme violence was no more than a means to an end for the antagonist and to add insult to injury, he reveled in his disgusting deeds. I didn't like writing it, and even re-reading my own words gave me the creeps.

A story with an evil cult leader as the antagonist would be more of the same. Do I really want to go down that road again?

The answer is a resounding NO. I'm not up for more blood on my hands. At least not now.

I put down the cult books. Hid them away, in fact, and re-visited an idea that played around the edges of my mind as I wrote Dark Territory. What if Signy went up against a highly skilled female antagonist. What if no matter what she tried, the other woman always seemed to come out on top?

When I let my imagination roam down that avenue, I envision a clever and complex game of cat and mouse with a potentially shocking outcome.

Clever....complex....kick ass.  One hundred percent Signy Shepherd! 

Even better...no need to scrub off the stink of evil at the end of the writing day.