I Interviewed the Assassin Who Couldn't Kill Wendell
A FieldScribe entry. Höbin Luckyfeller, doing something he swore he'd never do again: journalism.
Made with AI trained only on my own artwork. The honest story of how, and why →
I have interviewed kings.
I have interviewed a dying dragon.
I once interviewed a man who was, at the time, on fire.
…ask me later, it’s interesting.
None of them were harder to pin down than a bestselling novelist.
Buddy Keisler writes the epic Acid Rain series.
If you don’t know this thriller series, ask any gnome in Clockworks under the age of two hundred and watch their face change. His hero, Bookworm, is a half-gnome, half-Kutollum assassin with a tragic past and a magnificent jawline.
Buddy Keisler is a gnome.
Full gnome.
No Kutollum blood anywhere in him.
He is also has a secret, which mirrors his fictional character.
I did not know this when I requested the interview. Honestly, I was a bit excited, because I too, am a fan of Mr. Keisler’s writing skills.
Unfortunately, I found out partway through, when he explained... at length... well, you’ll see it soon enough.
Here is what I got out of him,…before he remembered he doesn’t do interviews for free.
H.L.: Thank you for meeting with me, Mr. Keisler, it’s a huge honor for me. I’m a fan of your work.
“Are you now? That wonderful. I need a few more fans.”
H.L.: Last count I read was over 200 million dedicated fans. You’re hardly lacking attention.
“316,873,492 dedicated fans to be exact, by my last count.”
H.L.: What?
“I have trackers on my sales pages, and the publishing company is required to provide statistics within 48 hours of any sale through their own channels.”
H.L.: Really!?
“It’s part of my contract.”
H.L.: Fascinating. Well, why don’t we start simple, so we can share a different perspective with potential readers who might not have discovered you yet.
“Sounds great. Shoot.”
H.L.: Bookworm is fictional. You are not. How does that work, exactly?
“What do you mean, ‘How does that work’? I’m a fiction writer. It’s a story. It works however I make it work. I would have thought the most famous fishis in Clockworks, with a specialty in archeological deduction and living in the same tavern as a famous bard, that you’d understand stories.”
H.L.: How…do you know where I live?
“I always do my research before I make a connection with someone who wants public information about me. It’s called insurance.”
H.L.: But…I don’t even live on Pävärios.
“And your point is what, exactly?”
H.L.: I…never mind. My curiosity is about your process. Many writers write from their own life experiences. But your main character is an assassin, so how do you make these books feel so real…and so authentic?
“Bookworm is inspired. There’s a difference. He’s got the tragic backstory, the exotic bloodline, the cheekbones I frankly do not have. I gave him everything I wish I had and kept the actual…well,…’employment opportunities’ for myself. Cleaner that way. Nobody really suspects a guy who writes about something of also doing that something.”
H.L.: And the... doing that something, from Bookworms perspective, is called something specific, I understand.
“I help people retire, Höbin. That’s all. Amateurs use other words. Disgusting words. It’s crude. It has no craft in it. When a job goes clean, that’s a retirement, and the client should be thanked for the opportunity to demonstrate professionalism.”
H.L.: You mean Bookworm.
“What?”
H.L.: You said ‘I help people retire’. You mean Bookworm helps people retire. Don’t you?
“Of course I do.”
H.L.: Uhhhh….okay.
“Are you following what I’m saying so far?”
H.L.: I’m positive I am, actually. Which makes this a curious matter.
“How so?”
H.L.: You’ve published six books in this series: A Clean Kill In Clockworks, A Messy Resurrection, Winner Will Fall, Assumption Games, Momentous, and The Killer Accident. Every single one of your books has hit the #1 spot on the New Yoke Times Best Seller list. All of them stayed in the top three spots for over twenty weeks, and A Clean Kill in Clockworks stayed at #1 for forty-TWO weeks.
“Correct. What’s your point?”
H.L.: I just imagine that you’ve made a considerable number of credits for those masterpieces of word art?
“Still waiting on that point, Höbin.”
H.L.: Bookworm has uttered many times, “A guys gotta pay the rent.” A great line, to be sure…but I’ve heard you say the exact phrase in multiple interviews when people ask you why you write.
“That’s correct. You gotta pay rent. Just a fact of life.”
H.L.: Then why be a….um…well. How do I say this? Then why the ‘extracurricular activities’?
[He smiled then. It wasn’t a polite smile, either. More like a person whose been found out and needs to measure the level of exposure before dealing with situation…]
“Nice save.”
H.L.: It shines a bit of light on the comment you made as you walked in. Clicking off your cell, you mumbled something to the effect of “certain jobs not going clean”?
[His face changed in an instant. I will describe it as a gnome remembering a great personal injury.]
“Four times. FOUR! A bird landed on my rifle. A bird. I have been doing this for decades and a common city PIGEON has cost me more professional dignity than any guild rival ever managed. Then a truck makes a wrong turn, gets stuck in traffic and has to back up, reflecting sunlight into my eyes at the exact wrong…second. What are the odds, right? Then my own grenade launcher decides to have opinions. I have never, not once, had a job go this poorly, and I’ve retired people at their own weddings.”
H.L.: You mean Bookworm.
“What?”
H.L.: You mean your main character, Bookworm, has retired people at their own weddings.
“Of course he does. That’s his job.”
H.L.: Did you consider that the universe might be telling you something?
“I considered several things, most of them profane.”
H.L.: You found out, eventually, that your target was a reader. A fan, even. I’ve heard…rumors…that you have a strict code to never ‘retire’ a fan?
[It was here that his whole posture changed. His shoulders relaxed, then adjusted his thick glasses on the bridge of his nose. The assassin had left the room and only the author remained in his place.]
“I have a rule, Höbin, and it is the only rule I have never broken. I do not retire my own readers. I don’t care what the contract says. I don’t care what they’re paying. If you have read my books, if you have loved Bookworm the way I meant him to be loved... you are safe from me. That is not negotiable. Frankly I was insulted anyone thought I’d need reminding.”
[When I asked him what happens to a contract when the client finds out the assassin quit on principle, he smiled. It was a smile I did not entirely enjoy and he said that was a conversation for another day.
I believe him….and decided not to ask further.]
Höbin’s Verdict
I have met professional killers before. Most of them are dull men with sharp tools, and there is nothing interesting to write about a dull man.
Buddy Keisler is not dull. He is a gnome who has built a whole second identity purely so the first one has somewhere safe to hide. Somewhere in the building of it, the second identity became more real to him than the first ever was.
He loves his readers more than he loves his contracts.
That is either the most unprofessional thing I have ever heard from an assassin, or the most gnomish.
I suspect both.
His next book, whenever it lands, will sell obscenely well.
I intend to buy it.
I will not be telling him that.
...more when (and IF) I get the nerve to ask him anything else.
Believe everything until you prove it otherwise.
— H.L.