journalist – Christy Grace Scarlet Pen

Estimated Reading Time: 4min

Okay, it’s rant time people!

I love reading authors that I know, that I don’t, and that I am hoping will become new favourites. I have had one such author on my shelf for almost a decade now, and finally got a chance to go through and read some of her books.

I ended up with four books of Lis Whiel’s that are part of a series – the Triple Threat Series, which follows three crime job ladies: a lawyer, a federal agent, and a reporter. We are getting crimes that are large scale, high stakes, and carry really serious themes.

So, why am i ranting? is it as simple as just not liking her books? Nope, there is something more sinister under the reason that i have noticed is not specific to the TT series.

there is something emerging in media of all sorts that i have noticed, and i am not behind it. these books by Lis are not new, they are several years old, but somehow they are still in trend with what it currently out there right now. we, as a species, are becoming more and more obsessed with dark stories that are intense, deeply evil and just sinister moments that are explained in detail.

there are some things that need to be brought into the light, and not shoved under the rug, don’t get me wrong, but that doesn’t mean i want to read about it in my fictional experiences. supposed to be an escape, while i choose to read crime or fantasy, there are some things that i don’t want to touch or read about.

one of those things includes se*ual assault, which i will refer to as SA moving forward in this post. some people don’t seem to have an issue reading or watching things that involve this theme, but i certainly do. i think that you can express that someone has been through a SA without actually going into specifics. hearing about these experiences are tough enough in real life, but when it comes to books, i’m not interested. there is a difference between Hitchcock off screen implication style, and describing stuff in details… i think for some things Hitch had the right idea.

having said that, content warnings were not a thing when i got these books, and as Christian fiction, i wouldn’t have been expecting it. now, there can be a book or two that does put this in there, whether explained or implied, but Lis seems to take it to another level with TT.

Every. Single. Book. contains this content. the main characters, the side characters, the victims – just everyone deals with this in every book. i don’t know exactly how this is relevant in every different crime that comes along, but Lis seems to manage it. i think that a lot of this rant comes down to personal preference in my stories, and what they should and shouldn’t include. but it did spark a thought and realisation in me.

why are we so obsessed with the dark? even the more tame crime/thriller books carry themes like murder, assaults and torture. we seem fascinated with why we do these things with each other, drawn to a character that is evil for evil’s sake, and the darkness is getting thicker and thicker. it’s almost too difficult to see the light in the stories, and i can’t help but wonder if this is part of the reason why the world is getting worse and worse.

if we are constantly subjecting ourselves to the dark, is there actually any wonder why we are acting out the dark potential that lies within us as human beings? in order to see the light, the darkness needs to exist, i suppose, but there is a line that i think has been pushed back slowly, and at this point, the line between what we accept in the dark is beginning to get darker and darker.

do you agree with my thoughts, or disagree? perhaps you think i’m right on the money, or maybe that i’m totally off and throwing a fit for no reason… share below.

See You in the Adventures!
Christy Grace

Alrighty, so it’s officially Day 4 of reading a physical newspaper (did you know they used to call them “fish wraps” so… yeah).

We are back again reading The Australian newspaper. If you didn’t catch yesterday’s post, I have spaced out just the one paper for the last few days of this test. I noticed pretty early on that it takes time and effort to read through the entirety of a newspaper – particularly when you are interested in almost all the articles. So I have split it up.

Today, I really appreciated reading an article pushing back on journalistic standards. Another journalist pointed out a particular writer who seemingly tends to leave out information on a story that doesn’t fit her narrative, rather than just share all the information. On the whole, I think journalists have forgotten that newspaper articles are NOT opinion, they are information providers. You want to write an opinion piece, start a blog. It’s not the same.

I was impressed again by the level of professionalism and quality – and made it to the “world” section, which appears to have pulled articles (or at the very least, ideas) from other papers around the world that the article relates to.

So, where do I sit on the Slob to Snob scale today? I feel like I am going steady at an ‘Enlightened and Surprised Human‘ – a marked improvement!

I’m still going, and there are a few more days left of this series, so check back tomorrow to see if my opinion goes downhill, I start feeling dumber, or maybe it just gets better?

See You in the Adventures!
Christy Grace