Author Susan Meachen died from suicide two years ago “due to the bullying that she’d experienced in the book community”. Except, it turns out she didn’t die at all.

Here’s the initial post from Meacher’s ‘daughter’ in 2020 announcing her mum had died, while plugging her last book:

After people started buying her books to support her family, Meachen last night posted out of nowhere to announce that she’s back:

Some people pondered whether Susan had come back from the dead like some kind of fictional ghost story character, but then settled on the likelihood that she never unalived herself in the first place.

Fellow author Samantha Cole is understandably vexed about this turn of events, after not only mourning Susan and buying her books, but also initially receiving some flak for ‘bullying’ Susan herself:

At the time, a group of authors even compiled and dedicated this anthology to her, with proceeds being given to her family:

So it looks as though Susan Meachen’s ‘death’ was a scam to pump sales of her books, and it worked. According to a thread by the aptly named @draggerofliars, a GoFundMe also raised $1700, and there was an auction from which proceeds went to her family.

I’m not sure why Meachen would now come out and announce she’s alive after all, although she does seem to be suggesting it was her family’s idea to tell everyone she was dead while she was off getting treatment (yeah, right). Either way maybe the guilt caught up with her or it got too exhausting pretending to be dead for 2+ years, so she’s now come out of the woodwork and is hoping to return to writing. Probably a good idea to use a pseudonym from now on, I reckon.

For the man fined just £59 over cyberbullying charges following the death of pro wrestler Hana Kimura, click HERE.