TWIST IN THE PLOT! Susan Meachen faked suicide to sell books but editor raised doubt over misspelled word
TENNESSEE, NASHVILLE: Romance novelist Susan Meachen has been accused of faking her own death. In September 2020, the Tennessee-based author's apparent suicide was announced on her Facebook account. Shockingly two years later, Meachen returned to her social media account announcing she had been alive the whole time.
On January 4, Meachen posted a cryptic message blaming her family for hoaxing her death two years ago. "I debated on how to do this a million times and still not sure if it's right or not," the post read. "My family did what they thought was best for me and I can't fault them for it," reported The Sun. "I am in a good place now and I am hoping to write again. Let the fun begin."
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Who is Susan Meachen?
Susan Meachen is an indie writer who describes herself as the 'author of perfectly flawed romances'. She has founded a Facebook group named 'The Ward' which consists of self-published romance and erotica authors who sell affordable e-books and print-on-demand paperbacks, especially on Amazon, as per Slate magazine, reported MSN. The announcement of her death was made on the Facebook group 'The Ward' by someone who claimed to be her daughter.
Soon, tributes started pouring and the writing community began to mourn Meachen's death. Fellow authors and other writing community members even donated funds for Meachen's funeral which was transferred to her daughter. However, soon after the announcement of her resurrection, the same community is enraged by her stunt and accused the author of creating fake publicity in an attempt to sell books.
'Red flags?'
Meachen's former book editor Kasey Hill said she mourned the author's alleged death and it "tore her apart" when she realized it was a hoax. Moreover, Kasey claims she grew suspicious of Meachen's death after the writer's social media accounts were regularly active, promoting her books in a familiar style of writing and spelling. "I noticed a lot of the things that she was posting, or what was being said or typed in the conversations, and everything looked exactly like how Susan messaged me and how Susan wrote her books," Kasey explained, reported The Sun. She noticed that the posts misspelled the word "supposed", same as Susan allegedly did.
The author had always been open about her mental health struggles. "The day before her supposed suicide, she had messaged me asking me for the edits and everything because she was being committed [to a mental health institution} the next day, and that was one of my first red flags," Kasey said.