Emotion can be a double-edged sword depending upon if it is negative or positive. This is a bit of an understatement, of course: humanity has long since shaded the full spectrum of emotion into an almost endless rainbow of possibility including sadness, frustration, anger, rage, despair, acceptance, calm, peace, whimsy, joy, happiness, euphoria, and countless others.
Some would argue that life is often lead in service to one guiding emotion, or at least largely defined by it. We all have that one grumpy co-worker, that one flirtatious friend, that one funny family member, or that one sad waitress. But usually what we see on the surface does not reveal the complex depth of an individual: sometimes that grumpy co-worker is hiding a secret joy, that flirtatious friend a boiling anger, that funny family member a consuming despair, or that sad waitress a well of compassion. We must dig deeper in our study of others to truly understand the branching links between emotion and action, thought and expression, and ultimately declare with strong conviction whether any one emotion can be said to define a person’s life.
Rage is an emotion I know well. My youth was not carefree, and without going into the gory details I will just say that it left me with a wariness of those who let anger drive them. Rage is a step beyond anger, however. It is what comes after that first burning thought, when a person has been pushed so far that their capacity for emotion itself simplifies into a burning, consuming heat that drives them to lash out, damage, or destroy. Most of us have also felt that overwhelming force at one time or another, and depending upon our self-control possibly gave into the fiery temptation it represents…
Which leads us, finally, to my career as an author. My debut novel, Übermensch, was an exploration of the far future, showing a dystopian civilization which had produced the consummate Darwinian creatures known as “The Masters”: godlike superhumans who enslaved the rest of the humanity into an endless nightmare that we were also paradoxically genetically engineered to love. My second novel, Nightglory, concerned itself with the nature of power and detailed the end times of an immortal sorceress who had taken the magical title “Queen of Night” and been twisted cruelly by it, over the centuries, into something dark, paranoid, and eventually apocalyptic for her own beloved people. My third novel, The Rage, is a dark superhero origin story on the surface, but also exists as a treatise upon the veracity of emotion. The first book in my “Hard Feelings” series, The Rage thoroughly explores such questions as “Can rage be used as a tool?”, “Is it possible to define oneself by anger and lead a normal life?” and “Must anger inevitably lead to self-destruction?”. A very personal story set within a modern city rich, corrupt, and decaying, the narrative is not afraid to view the gutter, nor is the main character afraid to get their hands dirty.
Damon is the main character of The Rage, and life has rained shit upon him from the start. His parents were never there and he was raised mostly in the foster care system. Unsure, shy, and weak as a child, he was bullied and pushed around for most of his youth which caused him to begin nurturing anger instead of sadness or despair. By adulthood, his anger had turned to rage, although he still always kept the full extent of it a secret, appearing merely taciturn and uncommunicative even to those who knew him best. Finding himself working at a job he hated and living in a crumbling neighborhood wracked by gang violence, even his only solace, Monica (an improbably amazing girlfriend), is weighed down by the immense baggage of her own abusive past. Tragic enough so far, right? But things would get even worse: Damon began having nightmares of abduction, where terrible, mysterious figures known only as “Them” experimented upon him. This in turn led his reliable rage to grow and change in his waking hours, transforming him physically into something bigger, stronger, faster, and firmly beyond human. Using it for good to fight crime at first, Damon also started to lash out in his personal life, hurting those around him until he eventually, and perhaps inevitably, found his “normal” world was falling apart around him. The final question the story asks us: is it possible for a feeling that can give one such strength (which for Damon ramps up to the superhuman) ever truly be used for lasting good, or must it invariably lead to that common fate shared by all who would try to build by destroying?
Rage is a wilderness. Much like the concrete jungle of a modern city, it is a sprawling emotion easy to get lost in. There are beasts among it too, and giving in to that fiery impulse can transform one bestial as well. Yet even with that cautious caveat, it must be admitted that negative emotions are real, and ignoring them does little good. Although such strong feelings might be hard to address for some, finding finding a lasting solution to negativity is the only way free of that personal death spiral that worship of a negative emotion can bring. Allowing these latent emotions to simmer inside runs the risk that they might begin to warp you, and use you, until one day you find yourself unrecognizable to friends, family, and perhaps even yourself. Damon follows that dark path, which leads him to triumph, tragedy, and an uncertain future I won’t spoil for you. Add to that mix superheroes, supervillains, love, and a dying city once glorious, and you have a recipe for thrilling, impossible conflict.
The Rage is a story near and dear to my heart. Let me know if it rings true, and if you have ever felt the same way as Damon about the strange, beautiful, troubled modern world that we live in. First and foremost a superpowered story meant to entertain, if Damon’s journey helps anyone else who has ever found themselves lost out there among the wilderness, then the effort to have written it will have been entirely worth the while.
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Mathew Babaoye is an author living in northern California, reading and writing whatever genre strikes his interest. Be sure to check out his website at mathewbabaoye.com and his books at Amazon.
