j.a. kazimer is one of the most interesting and mysterious writers I’ve ever met. For a time, I thought perhaps j.a. wasn’t a real person. After all, I’d never seen a picture. Finally, at the Colorado Gold Conference last September, an author claiming to be j.a. kazimer sat at my table during the banquet.

If that was the real j.a., she’s lovely and she’s funny. Very, very funny.

She was recently interviewed by Janet Fogg at Chiseled in Rock blog, a post definitely worth your time if you didn’t catch it earlier.

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Murder by j.a. kazimer

Thanks, Pat, for allowing me to ramble to your blog readers. I thought and thought about what I wanted to write. My original idea was to talk about fairy tales and how we use them as a moral compass of our society…yeah, I pretty much bored myself…So instead, I’d like to discuss…

MURDER

*Fair warning, if you kill your neighbor using any of my methods below, I will sue!

Some of the questions I’m asked as a mystery writer are: How do I decide who and how to kill? And can I borrow fifty bucks? Let’s just get the latter question out of the way. The answer is: I’m a writer, do I look like I have $50? Now on to my murderous intent.

I hate to burst the mystery readers bubble, but I’m not murderous by nature (unless you make me really angry. You won’t like me when I’m ANGRY). I’m guessing Pat probably isn’t a cold-blooded killer either (just a guess, mind you). However, unlike the rest of the world (serial killers aside) I must slaughter my characters.

Now sometimes, it’s a joy to murder a guy who is eerily similar to my grade school nemesis, Denny (trust me, he was asking for it), but overall, I tend to like my characters, which makes their brutal murder that much harder. For example, in CURSES! A F***ed Up Fairy Tale, I smash Cinderella under a bus (yeah, some might argue that she had it coming. I mean, really, who wears glass slippers after Labor Day?) But my point is, Cinderella never did anything to me (unless you count that time at fat camp), so how can I justify her outright murder? I can’t and I don’t. But I do love it. Perhaps I’m not nearly as non-murderous by nature as I first thought…

Fiction is a violent place, filled with psychotic characters and…I’m sure Pat’s the exception (*wink, wink*)…even more twisted writers. And that is why I love to read it, because it brushes us up against the dark side of life that I hope like hell to never experience.

As for my methods of murder, I tend to favor the bizarre, like death by bluebird, or the Cross-town Fairy Second Street Bus. While the method isn’t difficult, the forensic science can be. Not everyone will be satisfied by my lame explanation of the velocity of an African Swallow affecting the bluebird migration patterns. Some might even call into question my credentials as a serial murder/author (I highly suggest you don’t, see the above mention of how you won’t like me when I’m angry), but that’s the beauty of fiction, I don’t have to be right! So There!

So tell me, how do you like your characters killed?

Now excuse me while I finish stuffing Prince Charming in a wood chipper!

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Thanks, j.a. This has been fun. (But let me assure my readers I’m am not a cold-blooded killer. I have no comment on the twisted writer question.)

You can find out lots more about j.a. and her book at her website and her blogs, The New Never News and A blog by writer j.a. kazimer. She is on Twitter as @jakazimer and Facebook.

The FAQ page at j.a.’s website is a lot of fun too.