I’m reading Jonas Jonasson’s The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared as my Book Club selection this month and the story got me thinking about
biker gangs—because there are a couple in this upbeat, humorous, Forrest
Gump-type story.
I have several biker
gangs in my novels, too. I found creating biker gangs not all
that difficult, but when it came to naming them, I got in a bit of a tizzy. I
didn’t want the names of my gangs to resemble any real gang’s, for fear I might
aggravate someone with my portrayal and end up a dead victim.
The Traz, was the
first of my gangs that needed a name. I free-wrote prospective names across and
down and around on several sheets of paper for almost an entire afternoon. Many
of the prospects played on variations of darkness and devils. Evilness. Lucifer’s Liars and such.
I wanted a name that
was short—not just because I’d have to type it many times throughout the
BackTracker series and its parallel books, but because if I were creating
a real-life gang, I’d want something that when embroidered on the back of my black
leathers would be fierce and readable from a fair distance. The Traz met that
requirement.
I’m not sure where the name
came from. Perhaps because the local high school mascot is Taz, the Tasmanian
devil. Also “Traz” is sometimes used as a nickname for the notorious and evil
Alcatraz prison of yesteryear.
One can never just
have one biker gang, though. The worst violence that happens in gang life, is
violence between competing gangs. Other gang names I created in my stories include
The Blue Torpedoes, The Shadow Riders, and The Jackals.
I think Jonas
Johansson was much more creative than I was with his gang names. The first gang we’re introduced to is the Never Again gang. That’s a cool name for
bikers who are a bit on the bumbling side.
The best of
Johansson’s gang names though belongs to a gang of illiterate bikers. It turns
out that the girlfriend who embroidered the gang patches was also slightly less
than fully literate. What was supposed to be The Violence ended up The
Violins and nobody astride their cycles noticed!
This entire novel,
starting with the title is a series of tiny laughs and pickled wit. Give it a
go if you enjoy dry humour.
Gang Violins is brought to you by:
Firewalls and
the soon-to-be-released Operation MaxTracker
