Writers Can Spot Catfish!

First of, if you think that by catfish I mean a smelly, whiskered and gilled creature, you deserve a cookie because you obviously have a life.

Catfish- A creeper behind a (computer)screen who impersonates or creates a false persona for his/her  personal gain in creating relationships with people on the internet.

Got it? Good. Now, if you are a writer, then you are special. Why? Because you have the ability to spot Catfish faster than any other human being out on the interweb! Here are some reasons why.

1.Storytelling is in our nature.

     -It's like spidey senses. We just know when we've come across someone else who is, well, gifted in the art of make believe.

2.We research.

     -When writing, to get the most believable story, we have to do our research. If you do your research on something that your catfish has boasted about experiencing, or even did something as simple as doing a picture search on the internet, then you can immediately know if someone is who they say they are. For some odd reason, no one cares to double check if someone is real into it's too late. As writers, we know that research is vital to a good story. If a catfish has told you about something that doesn't comply with your research then, ding! ding! ding! you've got yourself a catfish.

3.We too, use aliases

     -By this, I mean Pen names, which doesn't apply to every writer. Let's use me for an example. Leah Lotus is my pen name. Does Leah lotus sound like the type of girl who spends her time creating stories for the voices in her mind and stalking her crush on fb? Of course not! Leah lotus is a big shot blogger  who will one day be a bestselling author, in the midst of choosing which producer  she'll allow to make her novel into a movie. Her last name is a flower for goodness sake! Let's use an analogy to further understand a possible catfish online name verses her real name.

Luxe Jolie is to beautiful young, aspiring model as Lucille Zass is to forty something cat lady  going through a midlife crisis.

4.Finally, as writers we have no choice but to  ponder things until they finally click for us. 

     -When writing, the perfect story, there will be  multiple times when you think, "this story is near perfect, but something just isn't clicking." Sometimes it takes multiple drafts to find and insert that missing puzzle piece.

Example; A profile of a guy  named Luke Skywalker who is single, 18 years old and in a band. Did I mention he's gorgeous? Okay, so only a writer would consider that maybe he is really an FBI agent who's investigating a rock band's lead singer has murdered his girlfriend and "Luke"  just uses Facebook to maintain his cover. Or you know, maybe it's just obvious that Luke Skywalker isn't a real name.

That is all.