murder.booklocker.com

By Rick R. Reed

With the publication of my novel, IM, in May of this year, readers were treated to an online world inhabited by a serial killer. Many people have told me that the scenario in my novel, where gay men invite other men into their homes after just a quick chat online, is an entirely plausible one. Readers tell me this is what makes my story so frightening. Many people, especially gay men, have done just what the characters in my book do: go to an online hookup site, see a picture of an attractive stranger, read a description, and then, with nothing more to go on than the exchange of a few IMs or instant messages, invite that stranger over. Fortunately, for the vast majority of people, that contact in cyberspace is looking for the same thing: romance, sex, or just meeting someone new. The subsequent encounter poses no more risk than meeting in real-life might.

The horror of IM is that it would be very easy for a cunning person to manipulate people online…manipulate them into giving out an address. And once they’re inside your house, with no one knowing they’re there, they can be the cause of all sorts of mayhem. Below are a few precautions that have been probably said a hundred times before but bear repeating because they’re common sense and so many people (myself included) throw caution to the wind in the face of a hot pic and the promise of a hot encounter.

• 1. Never give out personal information. Things like phone numbers, addresses, even ages, can and do get people into trouble. Even if you’re not talking to a monster, this stuff can go out to other people you never intended to see. Be a little patient.
• 2. Never invite a stranger into your home. You may have developed a great rapport online through IMs and e-mails and think you know this person. You don’t. Again, be patient and…
• 3. Always meet in a public place. It’s unlikely anything seriously bad will happen to you in a café or bar. In public, you can make many common sense judgments you couldn’t make online. It’s much easier to detect a fake or a flake in person than online, when the other person has much more control over how he or she is coming across.
• 4. Never trust posted information or photos. This is why you meet up in public if you’re going to meet. It happens all the time: photos are old or are not even of the person behind the profile. There’s no one checking the veracity of any statements made online: everything could be made up. Worse, everything could be made up for a purpose: to entice like a spider luring its prey into a web.
• 5. When and if you do invite someone home, make sure that by now you know a little more about the person, such as a verifiable address or phone number. Ensure someone else knows these things in case things should go awry. And make certain the person you’re invited over knows someone else knows who he or she is.

The bottom line is there is no such thing as a completely safe encounter with a new person. Whether it’s online or in person, there’s no way to completely protect ourselves. So what do we do? Live in paranoia and never meet anyone new? Of course not, and I’m not suggesting we become hermits. Just like there is no such thing as safe sex only safer sex, there is no such thing as safe meeting of a new person, only safer meetings. Use common sense, go slow, and you’re much more unlikely to place yourself into a dangerous position.

They said it best in Hill Street Blues: “Let’s be careful out there.”

To see the worst that can happen online, order yourself a copy of IM from Amazon for 32% off the cover price. It not only will give you a fast-paced, suspenseful reading experience, it will make you think twice about doing something stupid. And thinking twice is what this blog is all about.