Your Mother is a Satanist

All Rise Up

News

I have two pieces of good news to share. The first is that my upcoming novel Dust, publishing December 5, was selected for the Junior Library Guild Gold Award! This is a huge honor and will help my story find its readers.

I’m especially thrilled by the Gold Selection because Dust is the kind of book that these days, gets banned. It centers the experiences of a young girl who is disabled, and girls being forbidden to enter a library, read books, or attend school is a big part of the story.

Secondly, if any readers or friends are headed to YALLFest (11/16 in Charleston, SC), my publisher is bringing 50 ARCS of Dust to give away with any purchase. Stop by the Fierce Reads booth, and if you buy any book, you can get a free early copy of Dust, almost a full month before it’s published.

They tell me they expect the ARCS to go fast, so if you’re there, could you snap a photo for me?

Your Mother is a Satanist

Halloween week brought a development. Earlier this year, we moved to a small town in Ohio. And ever since I’ve felt like I’ve gone back in time.

Our house was last renovated thirty years ago. I’ve grown used to, even fond of, the flowered wallpaper in the bathroom and bedroom. I went as Sarah from one of my favorite children’s movies, Jim Henson’s 1986 film Labyrinth, for Halloween. And the new, secret project I’m working on is set in the 1990s.

But the town where we live is stuck in the past in less fun, more moral panic ways. I never felt this as strongly as when my kid came home from school and said one of his friends is not allowed to hang out at our house, according to his parents, because… prepare yourself… I’m a Satanist.

The evidence (are you ready for it?!): I have a rock collection.

Photo by Kier in Sight Archives on Unsplash

The collection, by the way, is mostly made up of rocks and minerals my son collected when he was a 4th grader who got heavily interested in geology. When he moved on, as kids do, I was stuck with the rocks. I’ve tried to arrange them aesthetically. Apparently, that reads as “demonically” to those with less real-world experience.

I feel it’s less that I’m a Satanist—no offense to Satanists, but I’m not one—and more that I’m a single mother who lives without a man, has a job, makes her own money, owns her own home, has published seven books, and has a PhD. The HORROR! I also have a cat, if you’re keeping tabs, but he’s fat, orange, and definitely not a familiar.

Would it shock those parents to know their favorite Starbucks drink is actually made of spell ingredients? Cinnamon, nutmeg, clove, and ginger are all spices traditionally used to ward off evil. That’s right. Pumpkin Spice is witchcraft. Bitch.

And I know, I know. This newsletter is titled the Village Witch. I jokingly call myself that and so do my friends. In Appalachia, the place my son and I both consider home, it’s a point of pride. But a witch is one thing. In this town of wealthy, white people where moms don’t tend to have a job, imaginations run surprisingly wild. And anything or anyone outside of their very narrow experience of what a woman especially should be, as I am, must be shunned, dismissed. Or worse. Blotted out.

I’m no Satanist, but I do know my way around a garden. There are no razor blades in Halloween candy, but there is a razor in words. And if you’re wondering if this story will find its way into my next book, with the offending details only loosely changed, you are correct.

A Spell You Can Cast

You have an assignment this week, and it might make you nervous or frustrate you. But it’s a power you have. No, it will not solve everything or most things. No, it is not enough. Yes, this place has deep issues and fractures. Yes, the system is broken. However, by sitting this one out, you’re contributing to the problem.

You need to vote. You need to vote for those who cannot vote, and yet will be forced to live with the consequences, or die in even worse conditions under them. For those who have been disenfranchised and stripped of their votes. Those who are in deep and real physical danger, which is ever-deepening.

Not voting is elitist and privileged. It dishonors those who came before you and dooms those who come after.

Your vote is a spell.

If you’ve never voted before, you can do it now. You’re never too old for your first time. It’s easier to vote in some states than in others, but there are many people who will help you wherever you are. Reach out to me, if you want! Free rides to the polls can be arranged. Your polling place can be located. You can go over the process in advance, learn what to expect going in, and there are non-partisan helpers to call if you have any issues. Good people want to help first-time and any voters, always.

I can’t tell you who to vote for—literally, I could lose my job, and I have to have a job to feed my child—and no one will know how you vote: only if you do. But I hope you vote for the planet. I hope you realize our future on it is not guaranteed. Those who believe it’s OK to call a single mother a Satanist, and who might really believe that and much much worse are voting. Think beyond yourself and your immediate anger. Think, have you done everything you can do to help? Think hard. Rise up. Be brave. And cast your spell.