When I decided to step into the world of paranormal horror and paranormal thriller, Conjure Hill emerged first, followed by The Summoning and Facing the Curse.
In Conjure Hill, I went straight to the scariest subgenre of horror for me: demons and other such evil spirits. My protagonist, Jorgi, faces an onslaught of demonic attacks and torment. At the same time, I wanted to make Jorgi part of my own community: LGBTQIA+. Jorgi emerged as a bisexual transman.
Originally, I hadn’t intended for there to be a romantic element to the story, but Jorgi and his roommate, Thane, began showing interest in each other fairly early in the story. The next thing I knew, I was writing a roommates-to-lovers subplot, and the stakes grew higher: Jorgi and Thane would have to both survive the demonic onslaught in order to be together.
The other thing I wanted to do, which I’d never done before, was create a protagonist who is hard of hearing. This is a part of my life I rarely include because it used to be a painful topic for me. By the time I was eight years old, I had tinnitus loud enough to keep me awake at night. However, I was an adult before my hearing was tested. I had just graduated college, and I began having trouble talking on the phone. Voices sounded oddly mechanical.
What came next was the uncomfortable adjustment people often report when they first get hearing aids. But I adjusted the same way I adjusted to wearing glasses. Finally, thanks to YouTube, I began learning American Sign Language (ASL), which I hope to become proficient in, given I have decided to never get cochlear implants. I refuse to risk migraine headaches and partial facial paralysis. There’s nothing wrong with being d/Deaf.
So Jorgi became my first character with hearing aids and my first character to begin learning ASL.
My experiences being a transman also naturally unfolded into the story, especially the pain of being rejected by the Christian community. Watching other people fight over my body is unsettling at best.
Now that I’m older, I no longer understand why anyone thinks they have the right to tell another person what to do with their own body, whether that’s sex, gender, tattoos, piercings, or even medical issues. If I decided, for example, to still eat beef despite the danger to my colon, that would be my choice. It might frustrate my doctor, but it’s also none of his business in the end. It’s my body. And it’s not like any of us get to live forever.
Of course, the final aspect of this novel is that Jorji discovers he has Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID). As I explained for Facing the Curse and also wrote about elsewhere for Conjure Hill, this is #ownvoices. As someone who has been officially diagnosed with DID, I’m on a mission to clean up the portrayal of DID in the media.
Instead of writing about DID as someone who doesn’t even know anyone with DID or have a psychology degree, I’m writing about DID from the position of having it. Of course, I can only include experiences that my life partner, Keith, and I have had. (Yes, my life partner also has DID.) While it is true that Keith’s and my experiences cannot account for the entirety of everyone who has ever had DID, Keith and I still want a realistic portrayal to counter all those books and movies about people with DID being killers.
Seriously. Spare me.
My portrayal of Jorgi discovering he has DID contains a mix of Keith’s and my experiences, adding a distinctly psychological element to my horror story.
So this is my one “spoiler”: the villain of my novel is not the person with DID.
Nor will they ever be.
Comments