Found out why people didn't read GW2, and maybe
I should be writing horror?
I've been investigating the
complete lack of sales on Ghost Warrior 2, and I think I've figured it out.
Because I've seen this before - about ten years ago. So let's take a little
trip down memory lane, shall we?
I wrote 'Wolf Killer' back in 2015, and published it the following year. Wolf Killer is the 2nd book in the
Hammer Commission series and it became an immediate best seller for me. The
story is about a sociopath serial killer with a number of serious mental
issues.
He's also a werewolf.
A werewolf who kidnaps hot young
coeds who work for him as models, who he then turns into werewolves. Who he
then tortures one at a time (with the others helping). Which he films. And
sells on the black market. Eventually he makes a snuff film with one of them.
Oh, and he's been doing this for years and nobody knows how many women he's
murdered this way.
It's quite horrific; he tortures
them to death slowly. He has a woman (human) who helps him (she's a piece of
work herself - former beauty queen and centerfold), and of course the other
girls who help him all know that eventually, they'll end up dying the same way.
There are lots of hints dropped as to just how horrific this torture is...
BUT...
But I never show ANY of it. None.
All of the torture scenes take place in the reader's head.
I got a lot of hate mail. I got a
lot of bad reviews. I was accused of writing the most graphic horror that some
folks had ever seen. The numbers on the people who bought the next book in the
scene were radically lower and now I finally understand why.
I squicked and freaked out a lot of people. They couldn't deal with
what I wrote. Even though all the bad stuff happened, happened in their heads
and not on the pages of the book. Maybe that's why they got so upset?
To be honest, I was a bit proud that I could get in
their heads like that. That I hit that horror nerve dead on because it was
supposed to be horrific. I wanted people to hate
the bad guy, and to hate his
accomplice. Apparently I just did a far better job than I realized. I'm
seriously now considering going back and putting a Warning on the book.
And this brings us to Ghost Warrior
- Serendipity, the first book in the Ghost Warrior series. I've now had two
people publicly, and a few via email and other private channels, tell me that
the mental disorder of the hero,(he's suffering from MPD - Multiple Personality
Disorder), bothered them greatly. Enough to stop reading, or skip parts, etc.
That it really bothered them. A Lot.
This was with book 1. So yeah, of
course they're not going to read book 2.
I was honestly surprised to learn
this. I don't know if people don't like reading about people with serious
mental issues, or if I just write them in such a way that I'm getting into
their heads and horrifying them. And yes, making people feel 'uneasy' and
causing them to have to put the book down, or skip scenes because they're so 'troubled'
by it, well I think counts as 'horrifying' them.
I had no idea people would react
that way, and it wasn't my intent. So, Maybe I need another Warning tag.
And as I sat there thinking about
all of this, I recalled a few other scenes I've written in other books, where
there are scenes in which bad things
happened and how some people just really lost their shit over those scenes.
A lot of it suddenly stands out a lot more in my memory. I've always known that
there are people who can not deal with bad things. That certain bad things
really set some people off. But it's a grab bag of what sets off who, so I made
the decision a long time ago that I'm not ever going to do trigger warnings.
But on those two books, I
apparently struck a much larger nerve than I realized existed? I know there are
a lot of people who get really upset if you even mention mental illness in public. They freak over the word
'retard'. As an aside I spent almost a year having to deal with mentally
disabled and even convicted criminally insane people. I did not like it. At
All. If you want to know horror, imagine driving a shuttle and it's you and a
convicted criminally insane murderer in the back who is CHAINED to his
wheelchair, and he spends the entire trip telling you in great detail how he's
going to kill you.
Yeah. Did that. Refused to take him
back. Fuck that - get somebody else or give me an armed guard.
About the only sociopath I've ever
written that people liked, was Shadow.
Note that I wrote him long before 'Dexter'
came out. Years before. But he's very much a sociopath. Just a functioning one
(and I've met several of those in my
life as well - it doesn't take long to learn the signs after you've dealt with
the extreme ones).
But I digress. Again, I don't know
exactly how I squicked out all of
those people and made them uncomfortable - I only know that I did. There's no
'fixing' it. The guy has MPD, and has it for logical reasons. It's key to the
story. His progression in dealing with it was one of the key story lines of the
continuing series and the second arc. But at least I now know why so many did
NOT want to read book 2 after book one.
Which leads to the thought: So
maybe I should start writing horror? I don't like the stuff, never have. But
apparently I really know how to get into people's heads and mess with them.
I don't know if that's a good thing
or not?
