19 August 2014

more from our authors

One of the stories we're proud to present in our upcoming awesome August 2014 issue of Electric Spec is "The King Must Die" by Bo Balder--and it's not a fantasy, which you may be thinking. This is one of the most unique stories I've ever read.
Bo would like to tell us about:

My Experience in Writing "The King Must Die"
by Bo Balder

It was one of these rare moments of inspiration – I woke up at 5 in the morning with most of this story in my brain. I couldn't get back to sleep as long as the story was forming. I tossed and turned, feverishly imagining more, fleshing it out, until I gave up, got out of bedand wrote a brief outline. The actual writing, later that day, was as feverish and unusually smooth. I'd been to Vegas once, so imagining and looking up what it looked like in the seventies was easy. I've always loved Elvis and his music, so that wasn't hard either. The title is from Mary Renault's novel about Theseus in ancient Greece. In the novel, kings die to ensure their people's health and prosperity. I don't know where the frogs came from, I really don't. They were just there in the story from the beginning. Maybe somebody else will have an explanation what metaphor they are, but as a writer I think you should leave these symbols alone and just be grateful they appeared to you at all… Of course the story needed revision, but the essence was there from the beginning. It's special to me because of its strange birth, and I'm glad it's found a home!

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