A new wave of viral violence begins with brutality on live stream

As social media evolves to become more instantaneous than ever, viral violence has once again hijacked the ride.

Why wait five seconds to post a video of your life? Services like Facebook Live and Periscope provide a real-time look at what’s in front of your face. With instant audience metrics and feedback, they make life like a mini TV station. What more can the host do in that moment to grow an audience and go viral?

Four teenagers in Chicago found a way to juice their Facebook Live viewership past 15,000. They kidnapped a mental disabled teenager they went to high school with, tied him up, mercilessly beat him, cut his scalp with a knife, and taunted him with racial insults. The victim was white and the attackers were black, so this might be classified as a hate crime.

The video went on for 30 minutes on one of the suspect’s Facebook Live page, with viewership building as the seconds tick by. Facebook removed the video after the four suspects were arrested.

This story has some strange parallels to my novel Famous After Death. In my story, the teenagers are also abusing victims for the gratification of an online audience. However, they mostly posted the videos after the fact, using public wifi and a device that couldn’t be traced directly to them, and they didn’t put their faces in the video. When there is an attack in my book that is filmed live on the internet, it’s the victim’s camera phone being used for the live broadcast, not the attacker’s phone. They don’t want to be caught!


With these suspects in Chicago, they acted with zero regard for evading capture. Not only did one suspect post this on a Facebook profile using a personal device, they all appeared in the video. You know, just to make sure there’s no doubt. Yet, like the characters in my novel, there was a pack mentality. Get a bunch of people together with bad intentions and a camera, and the watch their aggression multiply.

Were these teenagers so proud that they could beat the poor guy that they wanted to show the world?

Here’s the other thing that gets me. Did any one of the Facebook Live viewers bother calling the police?

Violence can’t go viral unless an audience supports it.

Book it! I've lined up two great author events

I'm excited to announce two upcoming author events in support of my second novel "Famous After Death."

Come see me at Books and Books - Publishers Weekly's Bookstore of the Year in 2015. I'll be speaking at the 265 Aragon Ave., Coral Gables store on Monday August 17 at 8 p.m. I've been practicing an animated read of an explosive chapter from "Famous After Death."

Here are the details of the event. You can also purchase the novel directly from Books and Books now. Wouldn't you rather shop with a local businessman like Mitchell Kaplan than Jeff Bezos?

The Miami Book Fair International has confirmed me as a speaker on Sunday November 22 at Miami-Dade College's downtown campus. Details will be worked out later. This will be my second speaking engagement at the country's largest book fair. It's a must-go festival for book lovers.

Finally, if you want a preview of what I will likely discuss at events, check out my guest post on Criminal Element about "The Top 8 Crimes That Went Viral." Can you believe that people promote their crimes on social media? It's not just fiction.

If you comment on my Criminal Element story before July 30, you are entered in a sweepstakes to win a free copy of "Famous After Death". So let me hear you!

  

What could inspire me to write something so outrageous?

Now that “Famous After Death” is finally out and people can actually read it (without hacking into my computer) I’m sure people who know me and race through the first chapter will wonder what inspired me to write this.

The thriller starts with three Miami teenagers dangling a blowup doll over a highway overpass at night and waiting to see what happens when a car smashes it. WTF are they thinking? It’s an adrenalin burst amid their mundane lives and a way to seek glory on social media. See, the camera is out.

They’re sitting on the edge, bubbling with laughter but deep down terrified at what could happen. It’s a rush, until the police car rolls under the street light.

Read what happens in “Famous After Death” Chapter 1 for free here.

You might think I couldn’t be more different from those teenage delinquents. Truth is, I know what they were feeling. I took part in some “pranks” as a teenager that could have ended badly but didn’t.

One time I hid behind a fence and threw apples at cars driving by. Did I consider what could happen if the flying fruit distracted the driver and led to an accident? No. I wanted to see something go splat. I nailed a convertible good. Then it stopped and the driver got out. It was a huge guy, with arms as wide as my head.

At 14, I was just as short as I am today. My friend ran but I stood there paralyzed as the hulking guy scaled the fence and stormed towards me. He hoisted me over his head with his arms fully extended. This is it, I thought, he’s going to power bomb me on the pavement Undertaker style.

The man set me down and walked away, his point proven. One would think I’d have learned my lesson. Not even close. I wanted to top it.

What can I say? I was an asshole. Ok, I’m still an asshole, but at least I’m not a stupid asshole.

The fortunate thing for me is there weren’t cell phone cameras and social media sites when I was a teen in the ‘90s. By the time those came about, I came to the revelation that destroying stuff for no reason wasn’t so funny…unless it has a New York Jets logo on it.

Teenage delinquents today don’t have it so easy. Everything in their lives is chronicled on social media, so why not their pranks? It’s not hard to find clips of teens lighting things on fire, fighting, and humiliating people. Most of these jerks haven’t figured out that immortalizing their faces online will make them unemployable, unless they want a part in the next Jackass movie. 

What if they were smarter than that? What if one of the teenage delinquents was computer savvy and posted the videos anonymously? That’s what happens in “Famous After Death” and praise from the sadistic fringe online inspires them to go bold for their next deadly pranks.

There’s this stage some teenagers have where they feel invincible yet they can’t comprehend the damage they can cause. Looking back, I’m relieved that no one got hurt because of me.

If I was a teenager today, I’m afraid how it would go. I might become famous for the wrong reason.

“Famous After Death” is available now on Amazon and Kindle.

Dropping lines from my sizzling new novel, which will be released one day, I promise

I wish I could share my entire novel Famous After Death with you today as I intended, although I have some feisty snippets to whet your appetite.

Yeah, I’m sort of eating crow after previously announcing its release by June. I got a call from a balling , book-starved Oprah, but I calmed her down and promised it would be out soon.

What’s the hold up? The novel has been edited. We need to put the finishing touches on a few things, including the layout of the cover. My publisher Silver Leaf Books is determined to release multiple books this summer and into the early fall, so I must be patient as all of them are prepared. At this point, I don’t have a hard release date from my publisher but I’m sure it’s close.

I’m sorry, Oprah, I can’t tell you exactly how close. To make sure you get Famous After Death on your doorstep at the earliest date possible, you can pre-order it from Silver Leaf Books here.

What I can do is share some of my favorite lines from Famous After Death with you. Like any good movie, a book should have plenty of one-liners and, what they call in the wrestling business, verbal pipe bombs.

Here’s a sample of what you’ll find in Famous After Death.

Better to live on a roller coaster than treading water.

Clyde’s physique was perfectly sculpted for a desk and chair. Occasionally, he met a paper clip that needed a firm twisting.

“Just imagine how it’ll feel when we make him lay belly-down on the pavement after he took Viagra. Raging hard-on, meet unforgiving concrete.”

As Uncle Alberto had told him in his last letter from jail, a man owns his transgressions. Just don’t let them catch you owning them.

“You’re the man of the family now, Jorge. Are you gonna be another faceless teenager? Or are you gonna be a roaming panther?”

“You don’t trust seedy men, but that’s the only kind you’ll attract acting all fakakta.”

“Don’t look at me like that,” his mom said. “You don’t scare me.” (Response): “Then you don’t know me as well as you think you do.”

“Sorry I didn’t dress the part. It seems that my clothes were soaked with blood tonight. A woman’s blood. You know who I’m talking about, don’t you?”

“It’s so easy to hide behind a computer and laugh at the horrors of the innocent. But you’re not passive. They’re killing on your behalf.”

“Get on your knees and put your hands behind your head.” (Response): “Your momma can get on her knees.”

You think you know what it’s like to lose everything you love? No you don’t. Not yet.

There’s plenty more where that came from. When Famous After Death is out, I urge you to share your favorite lines from the book with me via video. Silver Leaf Books will post the best fan-read lines from the book on its website.

More information on this special video coming soon. After all, what’s a book about murder gone viral without viral reader interaction?

April Fool’s and Viral Pranks Rule - my novel’s coming soon

I’ll be straight up with you this April Fool’s Day, I love a good prank.

I’m not saying that I dupe my co-workers or friends. That ceases being cute at a certain age and strays into jerk territory. I love viral pranks, the endless reel of YouTube slapstick featuring such classics as shackling the sleeping drunk, the shove into the pool, and the paintball gun ambush.

While enjoying all this hilarity I wonder, what is possessing these kids (and immature adults) to universally declare themselves assholes by starting in these prank videos? Would any decent employer hire them after this?

The thing is, it doesn’t matter. Not to them. Posting their pranks online is their validation. All the clicks, likes, retweets and comments fill the void that seeks acceptance. When I was a kid, I did stupid things to get attention in class because I didn't know how to socialize like a normal person. This was before everyone had an outlet to reach billions of eyeballs.

That leads me to my new book, which - and this is no joke - is coming out soon. Famous After Death will be released by Silver Leaf Books by June 1.

What happens when a viral prank goes too far? In Famous After Death, three Miami teenagers hang a blowup doll off an overpass hoping to film cars slamming into it. They didn’t think a police office would fall for their trap with disastrous results. The opportunity to post the video online is too tantalizing for them to pass up.

Famous After Death explores what motives the teenagers to seek viral fame with increasingly violent pranks. The difference between these teens and most online pranksters is they are clever enough to stay off camera and post anonymously.

You can see the Famous After Death page at Silver Leaf Books now. The cover isn’t quite finalized, but the image you see there is the one I’m going with, thanks to El Cesana.

I’m shifting into publicity mode, so stay tuned for some articles, events and, just maybe, another offering on YouTube. I’ll try not to hurt anyone.

My 2014 plans: Book signing, new novel release, big sequel brewing

After reaching so many milestones last year both professionally and personally, I have more groundbreaking writing planned for 2014.

First up, I’m doing a book signing at the renowned Books & Books in Coral Gables on Jan. 28 at 8 p.m. I’ll read a chapter from Mute – I have one in mind but I’m open to suggestions – and then talk about how the story of my novel is a metaphor for my life. The discussion really moved the people who heard it at the Miami Book Fair so I suggest you hear it live.

If you can’t be there in person, Books & Books will stream it online. Go here for more information about the free event.

This fall Silver Leaf Books will release my second novel, Famous After Death, in print and e-book. My publisher already posted a landing page for my novel. How do you like the cover photo? It’s by the same photographer from Mute, El Cesana in Australia. The font for the title will probably change, but I feel the photo captures the shocking nature of the story.

I’m glad there weren't camera phones and YouTube when I was a teenager because a lot of the stupid things I did probably would have been shared, to maximum embarrassment. I’m lucky some of those stunts didn’t go so bad that people got hurt. But what if…

In Famous After Death, three Miami teenagers figure: Everything else has gone viral so why not murder?

This is fast-paced thriller set in South Florida (mostly Miami). The teenagers do terrible things for attention as the trials of their childhoods drove them to dehumanize their victims, and make them famous by posting their deaths online.

Most teenagers who glamorize their violence online are too stupid to hide their identities, but this trio is clever, and they have help from a mysterious hacker with an ax to grind against the police officer tracking them down.

Besides all this, what else could I possibly have cooking? Well, another novel of course. Mute is just itching for a sequel and I’m hard at work on the first draft. I can’t say how long it will take to finish and, especially, to edit. That’s the hard part.

I’ll say this, though. It’ll have more science fiction than the first novel, and more romance. Yet, other parts are pure horror. 

I call it…

Silenced

Lifting the curtain on my next novel - Famous After Death

I did it! I completed the first draft of my next novel, Famous After Death.

I still have Mute coming out in 2012 with Silver Leaf Books. I will take that baby through the editing process with my publisher and then we’ll announce the launch date. I haven’t been sitting on my hands all this time. I’ve been writing another intense story.

Famous After Death is a white knuckle thriller that takes murder viral. The storyline has been gathering inside my head for years as I imagined how the trouble I saw kids get into growing up would play out with this recent development of instant online videos. 

The theme can best be summed up by a 2010 column in the Miami Herald by Leonard Pitts. In describing bullying and prank videos posted on YouTube, he said: “There is always some video going around whose calculated effect is nothing more or less than humiliation on a global scale. Technology, it seems, has unleashed an ugliness in us.”  

In Famous After Death, three Miami-Dade teenagers take out their angst over their troubled family lives by setting up a roadside prank for an online video only to see a police officer drive to his death because of their trick. Chris Crawford, a high school dropout whose father ran off to start a modeling agency, and Kelso Stokes, an underachieving skater and son of a famous motocross rider, pressure Jorge Casanegra to post the video online anonymously. Given that his only friends are the horror movie action figures in his room, Jorge chooses to seek notoriety through murder videos to impress his new pals and attract a gothic girl he has a crush on. With an overwhelming number of hits on their video, the teens press on with more viral murders. But they aren’t doing it alone. Jorge solicits help from “Sir Black Market,” who runs a bootleg software website. Soon enough, Jorge’s mentor insists that they strike back at the police officers that are investigating them.

Clyde Deauville pursues online sexual predators with the vigor of his Born Again Christian faith as a “cyber cop” for the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. He helps Miami-Dade detective Olga “OC” Cohen track the viral killers after her ex-fiancé becomes their first victim. With each new murder, OC becomes more vengeful and self-destructive while Clyde grows increasingly frustrated that the online audience is reveling in the bloodshed. When the teens realize that Clyde and OC are closing in, things turn personal.

In the end, someone will be famous for the wrong reasons. 

This novel won’t see the light of day until it’s thoroughly edited. I’m going to let it sit for a while – let the fruit ripen on the vine – and then dig in with an open mind. At some point, I might post part of it on Authonomy and request feedback from the generous readers/authors on there. 

I hope you don’t mind the wait. Trust me; this one will be well worth it.