Scary times here in Canada. We think of ourselves as a peace-loving people and yet someone starts shooting a firearm at a PQ victory rally; a torso is found in a suitcase in Lake Ontario; another recent dismembering of a body in Montreal.
We're not insulated from violence even though we don't allow our citizens to be armed in public. We even had a gun registry at one time although as we see, that didn't prevent the recent tragedy. But I'm still in favour of it. We try to keep safe but the best we can do is to be non-violent persons ourselves.
It brings to mind a woman at a signing who said to me, she didn't like people who wrote about crime. In probing a bit, I realized she blamed crime writers for inciting people to commit crimes. Hmm. If only it were that simple. Eliminate crime novels and we'd have no more crime. I'd be willing to switch to writing romances if that were guaranteed to do the trick.
I wonder if she'd even read a crime novel. She seemed to have missed the part about justice being served in most of our works. The author definitely writes about a crime
but the focus is on the sleuth, the detective, the good guy who spends the entire novel trying to catch the perp and bring him to justice. I do acknowledge that's not always the case but it fits the majority of our novels.
This is what sets the crime novel apart from the headlines. This provides a reassurance that sanity can prevail even though it's sometimes hard to find it when viewing a TV newscast.
I think that woman should have thanked crime writers. Fiction is seldom more violent or stranger than reality. I, for one, like to have a healthy dose of justice in my life.
Linda Wiken/Erika Chase
A KILLER READ
Berkley Prime Crime, now available
READ & BURIED, coming Dec., 2012;
available now for pre-order
www.erikachase.com
