I'm upset, but I'm not giving up

It’s been a little while since I’ve written a newsletter, and I’ve even been slow with my side Substack blog, Waking Dreams. The truth is, I’m burnt out on life.

I try to keep this space about book updates and the writing world, and in general I try to keep an upbeat tone. This time, I just can’t. And when I can’t find anything positive to mention, I go to my side blog to write poetry or sort out my thoughts.

Things are going to get very difficult here in America for people like me. Being trans and disabled is a double whammy, and I am fearing for my future. Despite falling into long spells of dissociation, and experiencing rage and hopelessness and dark thoughts, I still am trying to figure out how I can do something to fight back.

And I remembered, I’m an author. Books are one of the first things oppressors try to ban for a reason; they don’t want you to hear stories that would prove them wrong or challenge their rule. Queer stories do just that.

I will continue to write as soon as I get the energy to write books again, and I’ve decided to offer any of my published works, in ebook form, for free to anyone who contacts me. All you have to do is ask and give me an email address to send the books to, and I’ll get them to you.

I appreciate monetary support, and I may definitely need it in the future, but right now that isn’t the most important thing to me. The important thing is to make queer art accessible in a time where queer people are being heavily oppressed.

My first book, Everything Is Wonderful Now, is actually about challenging the popular narrative where ‘Light is good and Darkness is bad.’ In my story, it’s the Dark that is misunderstood and oppressed, and the Light is the side that is in the wrong. I tell this in a semi-autobiographical way; I use moments from my own life as a queer person to challenge this narrative, and if I can be entirely honest, I’ve had a few readers who completely misunderstood or misread the message — people who put the book down because they still, somehow, thought the angels were supposed to be good guys and they should have felt bad for the kid for being helped by a fallen angel.

The angel is the bad guy. The fallen angel, the king of Hell who becomes the child’s guide and protector, is the one who was wronged, who finds meaning in caring for someone and protecting them. He is the good guy. And the kid happens to grow up to be trans, and as they meet more spirit guides from Hell, they find a sense of chosen family love they’d always needed.

I wrote the book to make people think, to help them examine their own biases — to challenge people to open their minds to an unconventional story. I won’t lie, it’s weird and I break a few writing rules, and it’s hard to categorize, but I’m extremely proud of it and I’m glad I chose that story to start my publishing journey with.

I published a follow-up to it called Open Wound that’s much darker and more mature (it’s ‘erotic’ but not in a way that’s meant to be titillating; the purpose of the erotic element is to add to the narrative about recovering from sexual trauma), and again, I went off and did my own thing which was taking a huge risk. Open Wound is a literary horror that falls deeply into introspection about what it means to be mentally ill and queer, and the struggle involved while trying to heal from trauma — sexual trauma, especially, while being gray-asexual. It also takes a deep, unflinching look at self-image.

The third book I released is erotic, called It’s Only A Little Death, and it’s a standalone unrelated to my previous two books. In between the cheesy B-horror humor and sexy monster scenes, there is a story about being trans masculine in a world that is often hostile to that identity, or that doesn’t even know trans men/trans masculine people exist at all. It’s ultimately full of fun moments, but it’s another book in my growing collection of published works that aim to tell honest, often difficult, queer stories.

So, considering current events and the state of… *gestures wildly at America,* I want to make my books as accessible as possible, which means offering them for free. Unfortunately, I can’t afford to ship out free paperbacks to everyone, but I can at least offer free ebooks. I’m going to continue to get my books into local libraries, I’ve already gotten Everything Is Wonderful Now on the local author’s shelf in the library up the road. I live in a very conservative town, so we’ll see how long that book lasts on the shelf.

I might order several copies to keep on hand of EIWN so I can leave them lying around in coffee shops and other places, conveniently ‘forgotten’ for anyone to claim (but not in places that sell books, that would be bad practice). If you have any other ideas of what I could do, I’m all ears.

If you’re a writer or an artist, especially if you’re queer, are you planning to fight back? And how? I’d love to hear other people’s ideas.

Hang in there. Resist. Don’t let them silence you.