Books for Company: Blog Tour : Dangerous Girls by Abigail Haas

19.7.13

Blog Tour : Dangerous Girls by Abigail Haas

Please welcome Abigail to Books for Company.

Abigail is the author of Dangerous Girls, published by Simon and Schuster.

I can not wait to read this!

Dangerous Girls - My Inspiration

by Abigail Haas.

The plot idea for Dangerous Girls began in a suitably dangerous place: at a gun range.

I was living near Boston, Massachusetts at the time, and to celebrate a friend’s birthday, we embarked on a day of stereotypically American pastimes: eating steak, firing semi-automatic weapons, and watching the delightfully trashy patriotism of Red Dawn (the original 80s cheese-fest, of course!). As someone snapped a photo of me posing with a handgun, I remember joking that I better not ever be arrested, because these were the photos they’d wind up showing on TV.

The Amanda Knox trial was unfolding that year in Italy: an American college student accused of murdering her roommate during a semester abroad. Although I’d only glanced at the coverage, certain things stuck: the nick-name, ‘Foxy Knoxy’, that had been playfully given to her for her skills on the soccer field, now twisted to imply some salacious reputation; the photos of her and her boyfriend that the media were analyzing in forensic detail, and the footage of her in the court-room: vulnerable, powerless, a young woman just like me, but trapped far from home, accused of unspeakable crimes.

I didn't think much more of it at the time, but as other big cases followed over the years—the disappearance of Natalie Holloway in Aruba, the trials of Casey Anthony and Jodi Arias—I became fascinated by how the rise of 24-hour news channels changed the way we think about these cases. Just simply reporting on the trials isn't enough, now we have ‘experts’ picking over their body language, poring through old school papers and building all kinds of theories based on text messages and status updates—all used to pad out the broadcasts and offer round-the-clock updates.

‘Trial by social media’ was a phrase that haunted me, and I couldn’t help but think how I would fare under similar circumstances. I’ve always been the ‘good girl’ – I rarely drink or do wild, dangerous things, but like every other person who came of age in the facebook era, there are plenty of photos of me online out with my friends, having a good time. If you held the pictures up out of context, pieced together essays I’d written in class, or bored tweets, what kind of story could you tell about me?

Stuck in traffic one day last spring, the pieces finally came together in one of those wonderful ‘aha!’ moments. I knew my lead character would be one of these young women in the center of the storm, accused of murdering her best friend on spring break. Through her eyes, we experience the nightmare of police interviews, media speculation, and a trial that will determined the rest of her life—all the while questioning if the accusations are true. I wanted to bring in the element of voyeurism and spectatorship, so I alternated the narrative with snippets from outside her POV: police transcripts, TV news reports, and evidence from the trial, all to (hopefully) make the reader try and solve the crime for themselves before the verdict is read.

Amana Knox was found guilty of murder, then acquitted on appeal. She’s currently facing a retrial. Natalie Holloway’s body has still not been recovered, but the man accused of killing her was arrested after murdering another woman; Jodi Arias was recently found guilty of murdering her boyfriend—she claims after months of psychological and sexual abuse. Writing this book opened my eyes even more to the complex nature of the truth: we all tell different stories of how we experienced something, and it’s almost impossible to get a real glimpse inside someone’s mind. We collect evidence to support our view of the world—and ignore everything we don’t want to admit. Day to day, it doesn’t matter so much. Everyone has their own unique perspective, and that’s part of what makes life, and relationships, so interesting. But what about when the stakes are life or death?

The photos of me at the gun range are still online somewhere: laughing at a joke someone made off-screen, casually holding an AK-47 like it’s nothing. With all the things I googled researching this book, there’s more than enough material out there to make me look guilty of just about any crime.

How about you?

Wow, Thank you Abigail for a VERY awesome guest post. Probably one of my favorite guest posts I have ever had the privilege of hosting. What a powerful post and I most definitely completely agree with you! I now can not wait to read Dangerous Girls even more!!!!