tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4045057682441280238.post8570495817799783463..comments2024-02-24T08:17:41.032-08:00Comments on One Bite at a Time: Cheap Thrills and Cheaper WritingDana Kinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01350344882342624735noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4045057682441280238.post-77658813742288257122014-01-17T06:38:22.213-08:002014-01-17T06:38:22.213-08:00You're probably right about fear. What I don&#...You're probably right about fear. What I don't get is why women would read about what scares them so badly. As I type this, it occurs to me it could be what I call Amusement Park Syndrome, where people have fun doing things that would normally scare them, but there it's fun, because they know it's safe. If so, and that's why they're reading these stories, that's kind of creepy. I mean this is way past roller coasters and bungee jumps.Dana Kinghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01350344882342624735noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4045057682441280238.post-70575985321471466892014-01-17T06:12:22.918-08:002014-01-17T06:12:22.918-08:00Yeah, I think in good fiction the 'femme fatal...Yeah, I think in good fiction the 'femme fatale' was someone using whatever was available to them to survive, and maybe thrive a little or get revenge or something - they were usually motivated characters, products of their pasts and their environments, not just born bad. <br /><br />But plenty of the writers working at the time didn't live up to Chandler and Hammett.<br /><br />When it comes to the modern serial killer story I do think it's worth trying to figure out what nerve it hits among the readers. Because it certainly seems to be a nerve that a lot of people (mostly women) have exposed.<br /><br />In addition to the catching of the bad guy there's the randomness of the victims - they may fit some specific needs of the killer, but these aren't stories about killing Aunt Emilie to get an inheritance. This could happen to anyone.<br /><br />I guess the easiest nerve to hit is fear and these stories often do that. I guess because the people feeling the fear are women that makes the stories misogynist.<br /><br />But to me the problem is how much fear is sold. It's become the go-to motivator in most fiction and in politics and so much else. The sci fi I read as a teenager prepared me for a lot of things but maybe not for the amount of fear that people live with today.<br /><br />I guess women react to that fear by reading serial killer novels and men react to their fear by taking their guns to the movie theatre.<br />John McFetridgehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09442198820998606682noreply@blogger.com