Fatal Erotica
Lies and murder leave their deadly marks in Cruel Poetry, Vicki Hendricks newest noir novel. At the core of the story is Renata, an erotic magnet of destruction. She's gorgeous, young and wild, living in a hotel room in Florida where she gets her kicks having sex for money and thrills.
"I think of it as a book of illusion tied up in a grand illusion that you can control life and the world around you," says Hendricks.
Julie, an aspiring but frustrated novelist, lives in the hotel room next to Renata. At first Julie watches Renata through a peephole in the wall thinking she'll use her observations as material for writing. Instead, she falls in love with Renata then kills one of Renata's clients whom she thinks is strangling Renata during sex.
Then there's Richard, a married college professor who meets Renata while jogging. He's at a low point in his life. His mother just died. But like Julie, he is fascinated by Renata's sexual intensity. He can't resist her.
"Both Julie and Richard are drawn to Renata's free spirit because of their constraints and personality problems," Hendricks says. Add Renata's boyfriend and the professor's wife to this fatal mix and all are dragged down into the web of Renata's lifestyle.
"The book is about my favorite subject," says Hendricks. "Passion and psychological twistedness that leads to murder."
Vicki Hendricks lives and teaches writing in South Florida. She is an avid skydiver and has logged in more than 600 dives. An adventurer at heart, she swam with pink dolphins in the Amazon, climbed a volcano in Guatemala, sailed the Devil's Triangle, went dogsledding in Finland and Alaska and shark diving in South Africa. Her short stories have appeared in numerous collections including Best American Erotica. Cruel Poetry is her sixth novel. Read an excerpt here.
