What They Might Have Become by L.J. Sellers

What They Might Have Become

When I fell in love, re-married, and planned a romantic honeymoon in Costa Rica, little did I know I would soon be running through the jungle from men with guns. But let me back up a bit, because a lot of other crazy stuff happened in between.

First, my new husband’s daughter and three grandkids moved out of the country shortly after we got together. So we decided to spend our long winter honeymoon in Costa Rica and visit them occasionally . . . between days at the beach.

Upon arrival, Dave got violently ill. Then a storm came in and wiped out the beach near our B&B. Soon after, we became alarmingly aware that his daughter was mentally ill and horribly neglecting her children. They were unsupervised, starving, and covered with staph-infected mosquito bites that she refused to treat with antibiotics. We had no choice but to seek help from children’s services.
For a more-detailed account of our struggle to find and rescue the kids, you can check out my blog. But once we had physical custody of the children, the mother and her frutarian cult threatened us, so we went into hiding. Even deep in the jungle, the armed men found me while I was out walking, and I had to run and hide in the jungle so I didn’t lead them to the kids.

The good news is that we finally made it back home, and the children are with their biological grandmother and doing really well. But I couldn’t stop thinking about them and how their lives might have turned out if we hadn’t intervened. They had never brushed their teeth, seen a doctor, or been to school!

Those conditions formed the background of the characters in my new novel THE BLACK PILL. As I plotted the story, the other social issue on my mind was the online incel (involuntary celibate) culture and its hatred of, and violence toward, women. Who are these men? I kept asking myself. It occurred to me that at least some of them likely had troubled neglected childhoods—making them victims too.

I tend to write what I fear, so this story represents my concern about those little boys possibly growing up in that crazy cult and what kind of men they might have become.

The novel also features characters from two of my series, Detective Jackson and Agent Dallas, and early readers say it’s my best work yet. For more detail, visit my website. But here’s the short logline: A bizarre murder, a missing woman, and a pack of online predators. Can Jackson and Dallas stop the disturbing crime spree?

I know this hasn’t been a cheerful Valentine’s Day post, but the ending is upbeat. My husband and I are happily married, the children are thriving, and I’m optimistic that those boys will grow up to be good men like their grandpa.