Hello, all my spicy friends!
Post 2 of my return! Are you excited? You can lie to me. I’m okay with that.
What shall we talk about today? Let’s compare my writing to a movie. When I was a kid a heard about something that fascinated me but could find absolutely nothing about it. Sin eaters. Have you ever heard of them? It wasn’t until we hit the 2000s that I heard of them again. There is a movie that came out in 2003 called The Order that piqued my interest.
Here is a quick overview from our friend GOOGLE:
- Premise: Heath Ledger plays Father Alex Bernier, a member of the Carolingians—a renegade, knowledge-seeking order of priests operating on the fringes of the Catholic Church.
- The Investigation: When the leader of his order, Father Dominic, dies mysteriously in Rome, Alex is sent to investigate.
- The Sin Eater: Alex uncovers the existence of a “sin eater” (played by Benno Fürmann)—an outlawed figure outside of Church doctrine who ingests the sins of the dying to grant them absolution and passage to heaven when they have been denied last rites.
- The Twist: A conspiracy led by Cardinal Driscoll attempts to manipulate the situation and transfer the ancient, burdensome powers of sin-eating onto Alex, a plot Alex ultimately resists and defeats before embracing his destiny.
Cast & Crew
- Director/Writer: Brian Helgeland
- Main Cast: Heath Ledger (Alex Bernier), Shannyn Sossamon (Mara), Mark Addy (Thomas), Peter Weller (Driscoll), and Benno Fürmann (William Eden)
- Release Date: September 5, 2003 (distributed by 20th Century Fox)
- Runtime: 102 minutes
Okay- back to me. Why is this important? Well, my book Sin Full is about a modern-day sin eater working in Saint Louis. I dove deep into the legend and lore of the sin eater. Like, deep, deep, DEEP dive. The hubs had to grab my feet to pull me out. My fat ass was wedged in. 😊 Anyway, I was able to find all the details and juicy bits I couldn’t find as a kid. When I was a kid, I was limited to the information provided in a small town and the Dewey Decimal System. If you don’t know what that is it shows you how old I am. I’m fabulous but not a spring chick.
Back to the point. A quick back story is that sin eaters consume the sins of the dead and or dying. The impressive part of my book is that my sin eater, Grigori, can see the sins committed by the vessel (person). He then plays Judgy McJudgerton and decides if he will consume the sin or shove it back in their mouths and let them take it to Hell. The historical idea is that a sin eater takes on the sins and allows the dying person to pass on to heaven squeaky clean.
It’s amazing the wicked things I thought up. Dark basements, whips, blood, duct tape, and soooo much more. If that isn’t enough for you, I threw in a serial killer to make it a bit more interestingly twisted.
There’s a reason I dedicated the book to my nightmares. Welcome to my brain (fever).
A snippet if Sin Full:
Grigori was losing control. His body was rebelling against the small scrap of bread in his stomach that was fighting to crawl back up his throat and out of his body. He had to forcibly will himself not to vomit, but he knew there was no way he was going to be able to eat the rest of the bitter offering. Not because he couldn’t, but he didn’t want to. Grigori’s moral stance swayed him away from the crust of bread and his years of training. He lay on the floor in the fetal position with his eyes firmly closed begging God for forgiveness because he was not going to release the soul of this man. He refused.
Grigori wadded the bread tightly in a ball in his hand then crawled along the wall to the wooden bowl that remained next to the chair. He sipped the wine to try to wash away the bits and pieces of sin still swirling around in his mouth. Grigori lay his weary form down and curled up tight willing his body to hold what little he had consumed. His breathing came in gasps as he begged for control.
Grigori felt Adler’s hand on his shoulder, “Boyo…Hey, hey, boyo…ya all righ’?” Grigori grumbled, but allowed Adler to help him up. “Come on, ya got ta finish this.” Adler helped Grigori to the doorway of the room where the Bishop laid in his grand bed.
“I got it from here,” murmured Grigori as he held himself up by the door frame. “Get them out of here,” he stated with a head jerk in the direction of the two hovering priests.
“Ya sure?”
“I’ll be out in a minute.” Grigori straightened and stepped through the doorway into a very lush room. “So much for the vow of poverty,” Grigori grumbled as Hayes shooed Opie and his cohort from the room and closed the door behind them. Once alone with the vessel, Grigori moved closer to the massive walnut bed and looked at the body of the frail and twisted man of God. He appeared normal. He almost gave off the illusion of purity, piety even, but Grigori knew all too well that it was what lived inside that mattered and not the façade. An outhouse with a fresh coat of paint still smelled like shit when you opened the door. The man that lay before him was repugnant, malicious, and revolting.
“At this point, I would be offering my soul in exchange for yours,” hissed Grigori. The Bishop moved his head to the sound of Grigori’s voice. “But, unfortunately for you, I see the sins I eat and I decided I didn’t want to eat yours.” Grigori straightened the plush white sheet over the Bishop’s failing body. The Bishop’s eyes opened and held Grigori’s in anger, the hate radiated from the ashen face. “I saw what you did you sick fuck and you don’t deserve absolution. You should be chained up and beaten. An eye for an eye, as it is written.” The Bishop’s breathing picked up, as he tried to speak, but his weakened state would not allow sound. “That’s right, old man. I saw. I saw what you did. I saw what gets you off,” Grigori whispered into his ear, “Did you think you could hide your perversions from God under the robes of a priest?” He raised his tight fist into the Bishop’s line of sight and opened his fingers to show him the wad of bread held tightly within. “I thought about forcing you to eat your own sin, but you would probably enjoy that. As long as the rest of this bread goes uneaten, the sins are still yours. I consumed some, but not enough to save your sorry soul. You will burn in Hell for eternity, Bishop.” The man thrashed in his exquisite bed and croaked in an attempt to protest, but Grigori simply fisted the ball of bread and walked from the room.
Find joy. Be joy. Enjoy.
