Inspirations for THE MONSTERS AMONG US—The Abyssal Plane

Today I’m writing about some very specific inspirations for THE MONSTERS AMONG US.

First, I want to briefly touch upon the neurodivergent focus of the book. The main character, Seth, is a twenty-six-year-old man with bipolar disorder. In a lot of ways, his struggles, his being a slave to what I’ve been referring to in marketing material as a demonic version of The Truman Show, was inspired by the first twenty-six years of my life. Keyword: inspired by. Obviously, the book is a work of fiction. I was never enslaved by demons or any sort of supernatural beings! But more seriously, it’s important to note what I mean by being inspired by my life, I mean inspired by the emotions I felt:

The pain, the lonesomeness, the chaotic swing of emotions, the amplification of the severity of what I felt vs what actually occurred. Basically, my goal for this book was a lofty and ambitious one. Those who have read Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar, will know what I mean: my goal for The Monsters Among Us was to take command of the bipolar experience, and weave it into the very structure of book’s narrative. I took Seth’s chaotic, flailing emotions, and guided the narrative through the lens of his pain. When he’s depressed, the pace. slows. but. intensifies critically within him. When Seth is manic, anxious, angry, thepacemayswiften or growmorechoatic as he lashesout! And like the spotlight effect that those who experience anxiety and paranoia know all too well, when he’s being selfish, the narrative focuses in on him—but when he grows, the camera pans outward, becoming less about him and more about the loved ones by his side and the great, beautiful world they inhabit together.

This is a difficult quality to convey here, within a paragraph of a short blog post. But in the novel it works wonderfully. I spent six years writing it to make sure of that. To make sure that I could place the reader within the mind of someone with bipolar disorder, thus helping those like Seth, like me, feel less alone, and to make those who don’t understand neurodivergence, understand it. This is a rollercoaster I’m placing the reader on. Buckle up.

But as stated above, the neurodivergent aspect of the book is best experienced through reading it. What I’m more interested in talking about today is where the book’s theme of great human potential comes from.

When writing the book way back in 2018, I had the stakes, the characters, the magic system. What I didn’t have yet was what tied it all together. Why do the characters have magic? What does the magic mean in terms of literary value and metaphor? How do I tie the cast and contemporary setting into what occurs within scenes that take place thousands of years before it? Where does everything come from?

Well, let’s start there. At everything.

When I first began writing, of course I heard that classic piece of writing advice, show don’t tell. So, I figured, why not show everything? And do so in a way that ties everything together. We are all products of events and circumstances. We exist within the context of everything which has come before us. I wanted to explain everything. I wanted to explain the origins of the world: not in the way science has with the Big Bang, but in a way that was fruitful to the narrative I was writing, one rich in the supernatural, and in religion criticism. And so, I explained the world.

But how did I? You’ll have to read it to get the full picture, but as I stated above, when I first started, I was a bit lost as to how to tie it all together. There was something vital missing. And, one day in college, asleep in my dorm room, I had a nightmare.

It was standard fare, cliché horror movie stuff: I was in a cabin in the woods. Alone within its creaky walls, which shook furiously over and over. To the point where the very fabric of the world was distorted, shimmering like a stone clunking into the surface of a pond. And it intensified further until a wispy grey smoke cloud with a rageful face broke through the front door and smothered me to death—causing the same ripples distorting the walls of the cabin to run through my body. Over and over, this loop continued, until I awoke in a cold sweat, feeling those same tremors running through my chest in the real, waking world.

I was having heart palpitations which transcended the boundary of dream and reality. And furthermore, I was terrified, for this dream which has nothing to do with The Monsters Among Us, reminded me of one other time I had a looping dream where what was occurring within the dream extended into the real world as well; twenty years before, when I was just eight years old.

I texted a friend and asked him to meet me in my dorm as soon as he could, for I was frightened, and needed an interlocutor. I’m of the sort that likes to talk out my thoughts, for only then can I comprehend them fully. I suppose that’s why I write: I type out my thoughts and feelings, and I come out at the other end of a novel understanding myself all the better for having created something.

When my friend arrived, I explained the dream I just had, and more importantly, I explained the dream I had when I was eight (a brief trigger warning for a bleak dream and its dark analysis):

There was a vast, empty white space. A void that held nothing but me, and an iron maiden. How eight-year-old Kent knew what an iron maiden was is beyond me, but that’s what it was. A coffin standing upright, with spikes on the inside. Within this dream, I stared at the iron maiden, before walking steadily onward, entering it. The doors would close upon me, and I would feel pain. It would open again, and I’d walk out, as if in reverse, before walking back in again. The loop continued until I awoke, frantically reaching out to my legs, pain surging up and down them.

In retrospect, I understand this to have been growing pains. But for it to have existed within dream and reality was so surreal, it stuck with me for years to come. And when told about this, my college friend said, “Well, it’s clear that even then you just wanted to die.” And he was right. Looking back, that dream could be seen as a dark omen. Alone, adrift in an empty void, trapped in a loop of constant pain. The real-world emotions I mentioned above that inspired Seth’s struggle in The Monsters Among Us, this is where it began. The omen sent by that dream, warning me that I would spend my life alone, with no friends but the pain I was trapped with. It all came true…and would again. So, as I sat there, panicking at 28 years old, the memory of this dream having returned, revealing an existential truth that my life thus far had been entirely out of my control, that my brain, taking on the role of Judas, led me subconsciously along the trail dictated by this dream—but then my friend said:

“But I think it’s important to consider…you described the place as a white void. Usually voids are depicted as black; nothing inside. Perhaps this white void is the opposite? Perhaps it isn’t actually empty, but a place of infinite potential?”

It’s been seven or so years since then, so I’m paraphrasing his words, but this was the core message of it. And I don’t think I ever told him, but that discussion blew my mind wide open; it unlocked parts of myself I had never considered, and provided that missing piece of The Monsters Among Us: the White Abyss.

Through that conversation, and after years of philosophical reading, the White Void became the White Abyss, for an Abyss implies a great deal of unknown things lurking within its depths, a vast, infinite potential. And it’s the White Abyss, a mysterious realm within The Monsters Among Us that explains everything; the origin of the world, the origin of magic and what it means, the origins of so much more that I cannot talk about. I’m already venturing on spoilers here, but it’s a spoiler meant to entice you. And I hope it will—I hope you’re enticed to learn more about the Earth and its white shadow, and how it fuels all things; the nightmarish horrors found within our world, as well as the great potential for art and intellect, for creativity and everything great and wonderful that we human beings can do.

For each and everyone of us can amount to great things, if only we can brave the abyssal plane. As Seth will when the book releases on September 9th. I hope you’ll join him on this dire struggle through the dark and terrifying, beautiful White Abyss.