The most popular fiction is about people killing other people. The context varies greatly. Murder is the theme of the very distinct genres of mystery and horror. Combat is the theme of war dramas and action-adventures alike.
I wrote a novel about little girls killing droves of baddies. They slay monsters, cyborgs and lunatics. Most of their victims are normal people, however: boys and girls their own age. The boys are post-apocalyptic survivors that have become cannibalistic savages. The girls are brainwashed foot soldiers of villainy.
In fiction: Men are the usual victims of combat deaths. Women are the favorite victims of murders. Children are slaughtered in droves in reality, but seldom in fiction.
I wrote what I wrote reluctantly. I did worry about mindless backwash, mindful that it could incite self-righteous indignation from those who would not read it. My biggest problem was my own sensibilities, however. Context is everything. Making it appropriate for children to kill and be killed, even as fiction proved difficult.
Honesty is the best policy, especially when writing something innately questionable. I solved the problem quite simply: I wrote about how adults turn children into thralls. The means of indoctrination is primarily through public education, so the story is about a school. The brainwashed children grow up to be the foot soldiers of causes not their own, hence, girls as the foot soldiers of villainy. Boys are more apt to become angry by the methods that work on girls, so become criminals, as in savages.
The Wayward School
for Girls is written. I have illustrated its cover. I shall see what comes
of this strangely violent novel. I am pleased with the product regardless. It
was a labor of love. I am better than anyone who would hate it.
