Writer's Fallout Shelter

There are certain things that I choose not to read, but those are decisions that I have made for my own reasons and I'm not out to declare what others should or should not read. A lot of it comes down to why certain things are included. Gruesome to be be gruesome has no value to me and I have an active enough imagination - particularly in dreams. I avoid graphic violence and pornographic things simply because they seem to encourage addictive habits that never helped me. In my own writing, it is a fine balance. I write semi-traditional epic fantasy. I have people who die and battles and some graphic deaths, but I try to understate when I can. I have characters who live lifestyles that I fully don't "approve" of, from liars, thieves and drunks to murderers, fornication, adultery and human sacrifice to idols. I have good guys who turn evil and "villains" who turn good. My characters make good choices and poor choices, but they usually pay for them. No hand of God coming down to strike them with lightening. I favor natural consequences that as far as I have seen in my studies of human nature and life are common and typical outcomes. Some come to tragic ends because of their choices and some manage to end up happy, but if my readers are expecting a Fairy Tale ending, my books aren't their type of thing probably. For instance: A woman deeply involved in adultery has SERIOUS marriage issues. She loves her Husband and he loves her in their own ways, but between her affairs and him resorting to drinking, communication between them is pretty dead and both are generally miserable. A corrupt, hypocritical Priest who does human sacrifice is haunted by prophetic visions of his own death at the hands of those he has abused and oppressed. A paranoid ruler who suspects everyone around him of treachery eventually loses his best friend and the one he trusted most when in a fit of fear and jealousy, he refuses to listen to reason.

In truth, actually my beliefs do play a significant role in my writing. I may show things that I consider "wrong", but in no-wise do I show it in a glorified manner. I have seen books that do exactly that and they make me uneasy. In real life, have you seen a murderer live a happy and contented life? Or a man who beats his wife/children have a "happily ever after"? Perhaps for short-term it seems to work out, but from my own observations of real life stories and what happens to people around me, some "crimes" (even if moral and not breaking a law), typically seem to come back and haunt people. My books are not Christian persay - I am no C.S. Lewis. I'm not interested in "preaching", but I know that my religious and moral beliefs are key undercurrents.

I dislike sexual and bloody sequences that are not justified and merely included so as to shock or otherwise. I feel that heroes that always do good and are immortal simply because they are "the hero" as well as villains who are simply evil, power-hungry and sadistic simply because they were apparently born that way, are flat and weak characters.

-Renegade