OBITS

Michael Anderson studied journalism at the University of Rhode Island. Following a string of odd jobs after graduation, he is offered a job at a webzine, Neon Circus, on the basis of a joke obituary he wrote for an actor who died of a drug overdose. The editor of Neon Circus, Jeroma Whitfi eld, gives him the obituaries column. After Whitfi eld denies him a raise, Michael writes her obituary as a way to vent his frustration. A colleague later calls him at home to tell him that Whitfi eld is dead. He tries to rationalize it as a coincidence, but when he writes another obituary for a living person, it becomes clear that he actually has a power. The power becomes like an addiction. With each use, Michael feels a stronger compulsion to use the power again. Eventually he fi nds that he can kill not just specifi c individuals, but simultaneously anyone who shares the same name. He leaves Neon Circus, moves to Wyoming and takes a job painting houses. He stops using computers generally, but he keeps a tablet computer to read Neon Circusoccasionally. He remembers one of his professors taught that the end of any story is the end „only for now”.