David Jack Bell
From a Q & A with David Jack Bell at Dark Scribe Magazine:
Read the full Q & A.Dark Scribe Magazine: To start off with, tell us a little something about The Condemned.
David Jack Bell: The Condemned is an urban horror story that takes place in a decaying, dying city. My protagonist, Jett Dormer, works in the city collecting abandoned cars that are then turned into scrap metal to fuel the nation’s war effort. When his work partner and best friend is killed on the job, Jett has to live with the guilt and decide whether or not to go back into the city and recover his partner’s body. It’s a story about the choice between the obligations we owe to our friends and family versus the obligations we owe to society as a whole.
Dark Scribe: Where did the inspiration for The Condemned come from?
David Jack Bell: A couple of places, really. I read a newspaper article about Philadelphia’s efforts to remove abandoned cars from the city streets. The abandoned cars struck me as a great metaphor for our abandonment of inner cities. Then, I lived through the 2001 riots in Cincinnati, where I was living at the time. I lived in the city, and we were under curfew and lockdown. The streets were empty and quiet, and we couldn’t leave our apartment. Meanwhile, the people out in the suburbs were partying like it was 1999. I couldn’t stop thinking about that contrast.
--Marshal Zeringue
