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Saturday, July 18, 2009

To Kill or Not To Kill

I have this poor, but dedicated reporter for the Messenger, the paper I created for the Last Logan. She's new, just screwed up once, and really wants to do a good job now to make up for her mistake. She's been assigned to check out on a murder suspect, her boss is doing a piece on the victim's family and she's just supposed to get some information at the hotel where the dead woman - Elizabeth, remember her - was found with her wrists slashed in the bathtub. She gets overzealous when she finds information about Travis's location (he's the suspect). Instead of reporting back with her information, she decides to go after him herself. I have two possible scenarios -

First, she ends up encountering the real killer and has to be killed herself. Her body is found in a place/location that further implicates Travis. Travis is eventually killed, a so-called murder-suicide after his sister is brain-dead from a supposed drug overdose they both die and everyone thinks the killing spree is over. It's not - he's just a poor decoy.

Second, she encounters Travis who takes her hostage because he knows the police are after him and he can't let her reveal his location. In a Stockholm like situation she and her captor grow close and she can't believe he's a killer. She helps him cope after his sister overdoses, and helps convince people he isn't the killer.

I'm not sure which way to go. I find I'm not as bloodthirsty as I think I am.

I did kill off Old Man Logan's three-year-old son, does that count?

2 comments:

mystwood said...

Sounds like an interesting story. However, I have a real issue with her not reporting back and pursuing Travis herself. First, the man is a suspected killer! Second, this reeks of TSTL syndrome (heroine is "too stupid to live").

I don't care as much if she does pursue him alone--but she needs a REALLY good reason to justify this seemingly stupid action--AND she has to let someone know. In this day and age of cellphones, car chargers, payphones, etc., there's no reason for her not to do something anyone with commonsense would do.

Regarding scenario #1, who's the protagonist? If she dies, it's not her. Is Travis the protagonist of the book?

Laurie

B. A. Binns said...

Poor Grace probably is too stupid to live. She is only a minor character, she's already messed up once at her job, she's going this alone to try to make up for her mistake. Travis is also a minor character, meant to distract attention from the real killer.

My protagonist is Beverly, Grace's employer who doesn't want her going off on her own. My hero is Kyle, Beverly's college sweetheart and the cousin of my villain Gary. As for the killings - it's all about the money.