Interview with Woodrow Riley, my main character

I was having my daily Bloody Ceasar sitting in my patio in the beautiful city of Merida where I live when something rather unusual happened to me.

The main character of my novel, Woodrow Riley, suddenly appeared only to tell me he had accepted an interview with one of those famous writer's blog the name of which I can't remember.

Anyway, this is the content of his interview.

“Good evening Woodrow Riley. It's a pleasure meeting you. It seems that you carry quite a load in Bernard Boley's novel, 'My Ripper Hunting Days'. You probably wonder what your creator had in mind when he decided to call upon you as his main character in his novel. Do you want to tell us something about this? ”

“It's a great pleasure for me also to have this conversation with you, mister Thompson. May I call you Gregory? ”

“Of course, you may. ”

“Let me begin by making things clear. It's my diary and not Bernard's we are talking about and he graciously offered me to be my editor, agent, ghost writer and publisher. ”

“So you actually existed? ”

“Have you ever heard of Luigi Pirandello's play, Six Characters In Search of an Author? ”

“Who hasn't? ”

“Well, Bernard turned out to be my Pirandello. ”

“Would you like to expand a bit more? ”

“Bernard and I met in one of those bars of the old part of Quebec City. As he would always do, he wrote down some words on his damn notepad. You know, the kind of bar where all the good looking women would find themselves by the end of every afternoon hoping they would meet Prince Charming, fall in love and happily live together for the rest of their lives. I was reading while he was writing. I looked at him and asked him, "What the bloody Hell are you doing? Didn't you notice I was here each and every day you come here and you've never noticed my presence?”

“Did he react?”

“Of course he did! But not the way I expected. He kept observing the beautiful women all around him, ordering Champagne after Champagne hoping one of them would want a sip of his venom. God only knows what would have happened to anyone of them should one of them had accepted. I had to insist and remind him of the nightmare he kept having. ”

“And? ”

“So I told him, "I know who you are. You're like the predator I hunted during months a century ago. I'm the one whose's been sending you this nightmare and you still can't figure out what it's all about?" Well after three complete rewrites of the novel, he finally managed to understand what I demanded of him. ”

“I'm I to believe you are a ghost? ”

“Didn't you listen to what I said? Pirandello, Pirandello for God's sake. ”

“Do forgive me, Woodrow. So what's your story about? ”

“When I was a young boy, I ran away from home hoping it would put an end to the miseries I battled through because of my drunk and violent father just to find out fifteen years later it only served to set up a countdown where I found myself pursuing the man I was convinced to be Jack the Ripper and whose name was Francis Tumblety? ”

“Was he the Ripper? Did you catch him? ”

“You know what? Tim Riordan's Prince of Quacks and Michael Hawley's The Ripper's Haunts made a great fuss about Tumblety, but I'm the only one who knew exactly what was going on. I personnly knew him when he was in Whitechapel in the autumn of 1888. You know, London's East End.”

“With all due respect, Woodrow, I'm sorry but you didn't answer my question.”

“Listen my dear Gregory, if I told you what happened, you wouldn't believe me. I helped Tumblety in gathering female body parts, met Gorden Fitzgerald who became my protector, fell in love with his daughter, Elizabeth, struggled with Frederick Abberline and became a friend of Charles Le Grand, not to mention my close relation with Derrick O'Connell, a member of the Irish Brotherhood. I almost lost my life more times than one would want to. The rest belongs to you, if you decide to know what actually really went on.”

“So it's not a fiction?”

“There are so many non fiction theories about Jack the Ripper and even if no one has managed to come up with some valid historical and criminal evidence or interpretation of what happened, Bernard decided it would be better to submit it as a fiction because nobody would anyway accept what I went through.”

“Did Bernard get any comments about his telling of your story?”

Ripperologist's worst Jack the Ripper novel writer's nightmare, David Green said in his December 2016 review and I quote,"Bernard has written a picaresque drama about courage and personal responsibility and the consequences of family legacy. Its theme is not only how individual lives may be shaped by the course of history but how history itself is shaped by the actions of individuals. Ambitiously, several of the novel’s most important characters are kept on the periphery of the tale, and the Jack the Ripper murders are illuminated largely by subordinating them to the unfolding of Riley’s individual destiny. These are risky literary manoeuvers, but the author pulls them off magnificently. This is a thoughtful, skillfully plot"

“So he did a good job?”

“We both did a great job.”

“It was a tremendous pleasure having you with me Woodrow. Should we expect more of you? ”

“You shall if ever I decide to haunt you while you're dreaming like I did with my good friend Bernard. Until then, read our book, 'My Ripper Hunting Days'.”