"Om" Part Two

I got nothin'.

I tried to think. Revenge is an interesting topic, so surely I could come up with something to say about it. Turns out, not so much.

I've never had the desire for revenge. The most I've ever thought about it is to think that if someone has done wrong, their Karma will catch up with them.

Now, I realize this is a strange stance for someone who writes mystery fiction, where characters must routinely kill each other.

It dawned on me: To date, I've never used revenge as a motive in something I've written. (Um, once one of my books comes out, you should probably forget you read that. Just to keep you guessing a little more.)

So, instead of making up some nonsense about revenge that I know nothing about (being too calm for my own good and all that), I'm going to share my exciting news of the week:

I finished a draft of my first young adult mystery!

What's it about?

A family curse. A town built on a damnable act of greed. And an evil legacy that continues deep in the heart of California Gold Rush country.

See, I've got greed and desperation in there, but no revenge.

--Gigi

Martha's Revenge Standards

I don't have a lot of personal experience with revenge, but I think I'd be awesome at it.

I'm selfish, quick to violence and ruthlessly efficient. In addition to making me a shoo-in to survive the impending zombie apocalypse, those traits would make me some kind of revenge master.

I think when you're naturally talented at something, you should help others exceed. Just call me your personal revenge sensei.

1. Revenge is a solo act. Ocean's 13 was a fun watch, but how are you supposed to hang onto seething self-righteous anger while syncing your Blackberry schedules?

2. Revenge gets served within 24 hours. Revenge is only a dish best served cold for losers who can't get their shit together sooner. Any decent revenge seeker should have the motivation and anger to envision, implement and execute revenge in less than day. Any less than that, and you're just screwing around.

3. Revenge is not proportional. No Hammurabic "eye for an eye" code here. If someone takes your eye, you take their face. Got it?



4. Revenge is permanent. Anything less is a frat-boy prank. Replacing water with pee/switching shampoo with Nair/spitting on a burger = prank. Burning down a house = a prank - people are insured these days. Infecting someone with a raging drug-resistant strain of gonorrhea? That's better. Infecting them via their spouse? Now you're talking.


5. Revenge should not affect the person dishing it out. Give yourself a week post-revenge to revel in the act. Then forget about it. If it bothers you, if you can even be bothered to remember it, it's not revenge.

I really hope this weeds out any pansy revenge seekers and encourages the rest of you to take your revenge seeking to a whole 'nother level. Excellence in everything, my friends!

Revenge or Karma?

According to Dictionary.com
Revenge:
1. to exact punishment or expiation for a wrong on behalf of, esp. in a resentful or vindictive spirit
2.to take vengeance for; inflict punishment for; avenge
–verb (used without object)




Revenge makes great fiction...the burning desire to right a wrong, the character forsaking their wordly possessions, their comfortable life, and even their values in pursuit of that elusive balancing of the scales.

This is so not me. That isn't to say I don't occasionally have a moment (a tiny moment which I squash quickly 'cause I really don't want karma to come back to me!) where I wish something bad to happen to someone who done me wrong, but the truth is...I'm a Karma girl. I believe if you do bad things, mean things, even little minutia of snarky things...one day, your bad karma is going to come back and bite you in the ass.

And while I won't outwardly cheer, I'll take a moment of gleeful 'I knew it!' before returning to my regularly even-tempered life. It's my belief that Karma is far more dangerous than revenge.

Karma:
Hinduism, Buddhism. action, seen as bringing upon oneself inevitable results, good or bad, either in this life or in a reincarnation: in Hinduism one of the means of reaching Brahman.

The philosophy of karma appeals to me.



To live your life and act with others as you wish to be treated. To live as authentic a life as possible. To be your best. It's very easy to get caught up in the 'but she did this to me' frenzy. But the truth is, maybe she's just having a bad day. Or maybe all her days are bad and her anger and her meanness stem from her own feelings of inadequacy.



At the end of the day I believe that lurking in that mean soul is an extremely miserable person, who if they could only develop their own feelings of self-confidence and self-acceptance would be much nicer to the people around them.

So I pity them. Because when karma comes calling they won't have anyone to lean on and that is the best revenge of all.

Lisa

Nothing to See Here

L.G.C. Smith

I don't do revenge. It has a certain dramatic appeal, but when you get right down to it revenge done properly usually requires more time and energy than it's worth. Beyond high school (where all bets are off) or when someone very, very seriously harms your child, practical concerns dictate that most folks are too lazy for revenge.


When wronged, I stew a bit, then move on. There may be a fantasy or two where the offending party undergoes a humiliating public revelation of their true (dastardly) character. I may have, a few times only, pretended I was a powerful witch able to hurl bad karma acceleration curses at the odd malicious soul I've run across. Then...onward. Sometimes forgiveness is required. Fairly often a little perspective does the trick.

Fictional characters, however, have carte blanche to indulge revenge impulses of towering magnificence. This is one of the joys of fiction. As in romance where manly men readily learn to deal with emotion in ways satisfying to women, so can wronged characters fritter their lives away in service to revenge without wearying of the ass-backwardness of it all. Currently, I'm writing a couple of characters based on real people for whom revenge was as mother's milk. These guys were seventh-century Anglo-Saxon kings.


Early Germanic societies seem to have put a high premium on revenge. I comment as a novelist here, not an expert, but the legal systems in use in the early Anglo-Saxon period (450-700 AD) had a lot to say about blood feuds and compensation for crimes against persons and property. Everybody had a price, from the kings and their kin down to the slaves who cleaned up after the pigs. Families, especially those worth a lot, generally seemed to have a right to revenge. Or, possibly it would be more accurate to say that they had a duty to revenge.

My characters are based on the very real Northumbrian kings and rivals, Æthelfrith of Bernicia and Edwin of Deira. Bernicia encompassed much of what's now the county of Northumberland, while Deira was centered on York and the surrounding area. This picture is taken on the beach just south of Bamburgh, which was the main fortified settlement in early seventh century Bernicia.


Æthelfrith took over Deira to form the basis of what would become the kingdom of Northumbria. He killed Edwin's father and assorted family members, married Edwin's sister, and forced Edwin into exile.

It's not hard to understand why Edwin was impelled toward revenge on Æthelfrith, and he did achieve it ten or fifteen years down the line. Thus when Æthelfrith was killed in battle by Edwin's allies, Edwin took over a combined Northumbria and became perhaps the most powerful ruler of his time.

Then Æthelfrith's sons who were children sent into exile when Edwin took over, came roaring back another fifteen years later and killed Edwin. In succession, they they ruled Northumbria as perhaps the most powerful kings of their time. And so it went. Lather, rinse, repeat.

For men like Æthelfrith and Edwin revenge was a defining aspect of everyday life. It's not precisely fair, but one can describe the history of Britain in the seventh century as a series of revenge-driven raids by warlords who were heavily intermarried with all the other warlord kings. It was the original family feud.


Against this backdrop of constant squabbling --deadly squabbling in a population that could ill afford to lose too many farmers, blacksmiths, or cheesemakers -- I can see why the Anglo-Saxon kings, like Edwin, accepted conversion to Christianity. It offered them a way out of the endless cycles of revenge. God took over retribution duties, and paying penances to the Church reduced the toll in dead farmers and pillaged fields when the warlords couldn't contain their violence.


Times have changed when it comes to the role of revenge in our lives. We now trust many aspects of revenge to governments and call it the justice system. Flawed, yes. Very. Better than warlords? Most definitely. Ethically, we have several millennia of religious history urging us to let evildoers take their chances with the the higher powers and karma so the rest of us can worry about getting three kids to four different sports activities in three cities in two hours.


In the meantime, my time-traveling Anglo-Saxon kings are finding themselves in a world that doesn't give a rip about their mandates for revenge. What's more, they now find that the person they most seek to annihilate is the only person alive who shares their past. That's way more interesting than any revenge scenarios that may have come up in my real life.

Good Hair Is the Best Revenge

When I heard that the theme this week at Pens Fatales was “revenge,” I immediately ducked my head, hunched my shoulders, and let out a low roll of evil laughter. Finally, a topic I could sink my teeth into! One of the things I love about writing – and in particular, about writing mysteries – is that I can let my characters do all the crazy things that I would never dare to do in real life. Oh no. In real life, I’m all tight smiles when someone does me wrong.

But in fiction, oh boy. No holds barred!

There’s a fabulous scene in the movie Fried Green Tomatoes that captures perfectly what I mean. Some young bimbo steals Kathy Bates’s parking spot. In real life, we’d continue circling the parking lot, muttering under our breath. But in the movie, Kathy did what we all want to do – she deliberately crashed her car into that bimbo’s car. And then she did it again. What a moment!

Writers get to live that joy every day, by having our characters behave in ways that make us gasp and giggle and cheer. So I started thinking, who in my real life deserves revenge? Not my husband. He’s a doll. (An anatomically correct doll, too, thank goodness!) Not my editor. She’s fabulous. She helped me shape If Books Could Kill into a book that I’m proud to present to the world. It’s been pure pleasure working with her.

No, if I were to seek revenge against anyone in my life, it would have to be my hairdresser. Actually, every hairdresser who ever promised me she could turn my mop into something presentable but instead forced me to face the public looking like… well, like this, for example.

Okay, so revenge against Bitsy, a composite of every hairdresser who has failed me. And believe me, there have been major fails!

So who is Bitsy? She’s in her early 20s, and she chews gum so much that her jaw muscles rival Clint Eastwood’s. She asks me questions and then talks loudly to her colleague at the next mirror while I answer. Her fingernails are approaching Guinness Book of World Records length, and when she runs them through my hair, strands get caught and yank painfully at my scalp. Worst of all, when she’s done, she tells me I look fabulous and convinces me that it’s true. When I step outside the salon, people point and laugh. A four-year-old shrieks and hides behind her mother.

Do you recognize Bitsy?

Do you want to help me kill her?

How does Bitsy die? What does her in? Not a gun. That’s too mundane. Revenge is personal, especially in good fiction. Maybe her own shears buried between her shoulder blades? But no. She wouldn’t have seen what was coming, and Bitsy needs to admit her sins before her big death scene. Help me out here. Let’s brainstorm together. How should Bitsy die? What should her last words be? And while we’re at it, share your own hair horror stories!

Bestselling author Kate Carlisle spent over twenty years working in television production as an Associate Director for game and variety shows, including The Midnight Special, Solid Gold and The Gong Show. She traveled the world as a Dating Game chaperone and performed strange acts of silliness on The Gong Show. She also studied acting and singing, toiled in vineyards, collected books, joined a commune, sold fried chicken, modeled spring fashions and worked for a cruise ship line, but it was the year she spent in law school that finally drove her to begin writing fiction. It seemed the safest way to kill off her professors. Those professors are breathing easier now that Kate spends most of her time writing near the beach in Southern California where she lives with her perfect husband.

Visit Kate online at http://www.katecarlisle.com/ or www.Facebook.com/KateCarlisleBooks

Everything I Ever Needed To Know About Revenge I Learned From Ricardo Montalban

--Adrienne Miller

I’m not a vengeful person by nature. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not a saint. I can hold one hell of a grudge (yeah, I’m looking at you, blonde girl who tripped me in 8th grade art class). But that’s sort of the problem, all I ever do is hold on to my righteous indignation and seethe. And seethe. And seethe. I never get around to the whole “taking revenge” part of the anger cycle. While this has no doubt saved me some jail time, it hasn’t been very satisfying. I’m also worried that I might be working myself up to one hell of an aneurysm.

I figure what I need is beginner course, so I’m going straight to the source. The one film that I’m certain we can all agree is the master work on the subject of revenge - Star Trek II : The Wrath of Khan. And I’ve decided to bring you all along for the ride. Lucky you.

So, **starting up dvd**  let’s see what the recipe for real revenge is. 

*Marooning a group of genetically engineered super warriors on a desert planet is bound to piss them off, but that’s nothing compared to what’s going to go down when they find out that the guy that put them there has been promoted.

*People will be even more intimidated if show off your awesome pecs. 

*Mutant earwigs are wicked effective as phase one of your revenge.

*A good revenge plan isn’t really in full swing until you give a clenched fist monologue explaining your resolve in seeing it through.

*Some part of your battle plan needs to include killing off as many obscure relatives of secondary characters as possible. This packs surprising emotional punch.

*“Revenge is a dish best served cold. *creepy breath*  It is very cold in space.” Go ahead, say it. It’s amazingly cathartic. 

*When in doubt, overact the hell out of it. 

*For a threat to be truly effective, you need to say it twice. Once in a normal-ish voice, then in a whisper/growl.

*Just cause you’re a Starfleet admiral doesn’t mean you can’t rock that popped collar.

*Apparently you have a son you’ve never met, because with all the scientific and technical advances of the 23rd century the one thing they can’t figure out is effective contraception. (And he’s kind of a wussie that likes to wear sweater-capes. Sorry about that.)

*Whatever you do don’t battle face to face, or even in the same room, for heavens sake. Just keep repeating threats and dramatic monologues over intercoms and space age wrist watches. 

*Go on. Cheat. Then just tell everyone that you “Don’t believe in a no-win scenario”. 

*Somebody needs to go flying over the rail. I don’t care who it is, make them do it.

*Get a flashing COMMIT sign installed somewhere in your revenge lair. It’s going to look so cool when you’re rolling around quoting Herman Melville and dying. 

*Don’t feel too bad when your best friend sacrifices his own life to save yours. You can always bring him back in the next installment.

Now that you know how to do it right, go forth and avenge! I know I will. That’s right, Blondie. You better hide. 

Is There a Time to Kill? by Juliet

I would have no trouble shooting a child-molester, point blank, if he harmed my child.

I know this about myself. At least I think I do – I thank whatever gods that be that I’ve never been tested. But I’m pretty certain, deep down in my primal, mama-tigress bones, that it’s true.

I would think about it…. Plan for it…. Lay in wait…. See it through. My actions would pretty much qualify me for Murder One, any way you look at it.

I might even be moved to torture the fiend, just a little, before dispatching him to the Great Beyond. And in that knowledge, that acceptance that there are some things we just can’t bear without lashing out in violence, I find a certain understanding of the motivation behind the seemingly undoable: Murder of a fellow human being.

I think crime writers are attracted to the field because it’s about people being driven to that unspeakable moment: The moment in time when taking someone out makes sense. The instant our wrath defies our judgment, our primal nature surges from within the civilized veneer.

Personally, I’m not interested in stories about serial killers and assassins, because to me those types have made their peace with causing death long before the story begins. No, I’m fascinated by the person who wouldn’t normally kill, but who makes an exception in the case at hand –because of blind fury, or terror …or revenge.

Recently a man named Aaron Vargas went to the home of a man named Darrell McNeill, an upstanding fellow in the community who had, for years, been a Boy Scout leader and Big Brother.

Vargas shot McNeill in his doorway. Point blank. In front of McNeill’s wife. Vargas then stayed with McNeill for half an hour while he died. He has never denied that he murdered the man.

(to the right: Aaron Vargas not long before falling prey to Darrell McNeill)


Even McNeill’s wife (now widow), eyewitness to the crime, herself has pleaded leniency for Vargas, saying she has “no reason not to believe Aaron.”

It seems McNeill's stepson, his friends, other boy scouts, and scores of vulnerable boys in Fort Bragg had been raped and preyed upon, repeatedly, by Darrell McNeill over the years.

The town has rallied to Vargas’s defense, saying that there is revenge, and then there is justice, and that this shooting was the latter: A way of seeking justice, putting things aright.

Now, I know that giving Aaron Vargas a pass on ridding the world of the monster named Darrell McNeill is tantamount to endorsing vigilante justice, and believe me, I don’t believe in the populace taking justice and retribution into their own hands. And I don’t envy the police and prosecutors in Fort Bragg – no one wants to make those kinds of gut-wrenching decisions.

I’m just saying. Sometimes revenge looks pretty sweet. Like justice, in fact.


And the knowledge that I could go there, just that fast -- just like Aaron Vargas did--does inform my writing...especially the really hard stuff. Like justice, vengeance, and revenge.

The Wrath of Rachael

I'm terrible at revenge. Given a good night's sleep and a sunny morning, I'll forgive most people most things. I stubbornly refuse to see the worst in people, even when they're displaying their ugliness for all the world to view. Even when they're pointing at it, showing it to me, saying, "Look here, I'm a terrible, awful person, and I hate you, you're ugly, and your mama's ugly, too," I'm the one saying soothingly, "Oh, no, you don't mean that, it's just been a long day and you're tired. Just have a rest and a sandwich. You'll feel better tomorrow."

So when people are actually mean, I don't understand it and I can only think that they're sad and scared. When people are actually angry, I can only think that they're hurt. I'm not sure that mean or angry really exist, except as mile markers, signposts for sad and hurt. (Don't say that to an angry person, though. They won't buy it, and you might get clobbered.)

But revenge, in writing, is so interesting. As is anger. And meanness. And pain. I always need to UP those things in my writing. I can't run around to all my characters soothing them (although I try), making every little hurt better. What I'd like to do is let them all sit around chatting, engaging in funny banter. Then, ideally, someone would stand up and say something mildly rude. Then my characters would spend the next hundred pages engaging in friendly therapeutic encouraging dialogue, and then everyone would sing a rousing kumbaya around a pretty campfire and turn in for an early night.

However, my editor won't let me do that (DAMN IT). Something about "emotional depth" and "real conflict." Whatever. Books with plot. Ahem. (I jest, of course. I want to read books with depth. They're just slightly harder to write than books without.)

So revenge. I need to dwell on the possibilities, even if I can't seem to act on them.

(The urge to insert a smiley face is almost physically unbearable. So...)

:)