The Untamed Author

“Go feral. Write books.”

I complained about being overwhelmed. I couldn’t handle peopling. I had to leave the grocery store, it was so bad. (Thankfully my wife was there to purchase the items we needed, but I couldn’t handle being in the store anymore.)

I asked a friend if I could just go be a hermit. He responded, “Go feral. Write books.”

I imagined my ink-stained claws digging into loamy soil. I sniff the air. My stomach tells me it is time to hunt. I crouch in wait.

There. I see my prey.

I pounce. My fangs pierce the book’s cover. I fling it side to side to kill it. I rip into its pages, devouring every last syllable.

I am the feral reader. I will take whatever prey I please. I will gulp it down, ink and page and pixel, however I wish. None can escape me.

But I am also the untamed author.

I… well, I actually don’t exactly know what that means. I get the picture of an author with ink-stained cheeks chewing on a laptop and writing in jam on a canvass of bricks. Someone totally unhinged. And while I don’t think I’m entirely hinged, I don’t think I’m that far gone…

What is an untamed author? Someone who writes what he pleases? Well, that’s me, mostly. Is it someone that has no master? Well, some of my books have publishers while others are self-published, so I guess that kind of works… Is it someone who thumbs their nose at standard tropes? I dunno. I kinda like certain tropes while despising others, which makes me entirely normal, I suspect.

Maybe I’m not so untamed. Maybe I’m not so feral.

But I do like the picture.

So excuse me for a little bit. I think I’m gonna go write some books in the woods.

Go feral. Write books.