They say you should write what you know. But I wonder if the person who came up with that phrase would think about someone writing what they know when also writing about a viral apocalypse.
Well, now they, and you, can find out, courtesy of author C.J. Leede and her new apocalyptic horror novel, American Rapture (hardcover, Kindle, audiobook), in which things, and she, get very personal.
To learn how, and why, and other things, check out this email interview.
Photo Credit: Sydney Angel
To begin, what is American Rapture about, and when and where does it take place?
American Rapture follows a very sheltered sixteen-year-old Catholic girl who comes into her sexual awakening at the same time as a violent sexually propagating virus sweeps across America. She has to travel across the state of Wisconsin to reach her brother while grappling with some pretty big ideas and trying to stay alive.
It’s a story about guilt, shame, repression, and learning what one’s own value is as a person in a societal system that doesn’t necessarily encourage finding that.
Where did you get the idea for American Rapture?
I worked on this book from 2013 to 2023, and so the number of things that inspired it is through the roof.
But mostly, it was me as a young adult grappling with some difficult ideas carried over from my childhood and the church I was raised in. But it was a million things: relationships of all kinds in my early 20s, difficult happenings and situations I read and saw in the news, music from the ’90s and ’00s, watching the lives unfolding of those around me, trying to catalogue who seemed happy and who didn’t. All of that informed this book.
So, what made you decide to make Sophie a “good Catholic girl” as opposed to a “bright young man” or devout member of another religion? Was there something about Catholicism and its impact on young women in particular that you wanted to explore?
Definitely. I mean that’s really what this book is about.
Also, it’s just the story I knew and felt I wanted and needed to tell for myself. I grew up Catholic and really struggled with the guilt and shame aspects of the ideas and stories we were taught, and I wanted to write about that struggle as I was working through it. I’m in my thirties now, and these ideas still dictate so much of who I am and what I do, and I know I can’t be alone. I think this book was me just saying this is something I’ve struggled with, and to anyone who’s struggled with it too, I see you, and hopefully these pages might bring some kind of comfort in that shared experience, or even some catharsis.
In a different vein, when deciding how this virus would work, did you take influence from any specific stories about zombies or other kinds of zombie-like viral outbreaks?
When I was originally writing this ten years ago, there was an ebola outbreak, and I read Richard Preston’s The Hot Zone (terrifying book!).
In general, I actually have a very hard time with zombie, viral, or apocalyptic fiction, and they all really scare me. It was the same for me with slashers and Maeve Fly [her first novel]. I wrote a book that frightened me, not because I necessarily am way into books like it (if that makes sense), but because I was working through something, and it felt like the right medium to do it in. But I love the found family aspect of apocalypse narratives, and I tried to include a lot of that here.
American Rapture is clearly a horror novel, but is it an apocalyptic horror novel, a post-apocalyptic horror novel, an erotic horror novel…what?
My feeling is always that genre really doesn’t matter that much, and is really subject to individual interpretation. I just am excited by the idea of anyone reading my work, and whatever they want to call it is cool with me.
I guess you could call it an apocalyptic novel, a found family story, a road trip novel, definitely horror, coming of age. But really, I just think it’s the book I had in me and had to write.
American Rapture is your second novel after Maeve Fly. Are there any writers, or specific stories, that had a big influence on American Rapture but not on anything else you’ve written, and especially not Maeve Fly?
I’m laughing as I answer this, but I’m going to say there was one big book that for sure inspired a lot of it, and that was The Bible. Most of American Rapture and the ideas in it came from growing up Catholic, and I’ve since read a million things having to do with Catholic horror, apocalyptic stories, and stories of sheltered young women coming into their power — Stephen King’s Carrie comes to mind; I just reread it! — but really I would say The Bible did the absolute most work in terrifying me as a child, and that’s where most of these ideas came from.
And then Anne Rice has been hugely important to me as a writer and reader, and her work always influences everything I do as well, and probably this book more than the others.
What about non-literary influences? Was American Rapture influenced by any movies, TV shows, or games?
Mostly it was probably inspired by music. I grew up in the ’90s and early ’00s, and there was so much angry girl rock and hugely important songs about these same themes I was grappling with in the book. Specifically, Tori Amos, Sinead O’Connor, Alanis Morisette, Fiona Apple, and pretty much everyone at Lilith Fair. All of them writing and singing about guilt, shame, anger, fear, and love in a way that was so visceral and empowering and important in my life and so many others. I listened to them all throughout the writing of this book (and all throughout growing up), and their music still affects me as much as it did when I was young. To me, they’re the real warriors and saints of our day and age.
And how about your dogs Esme, Violet, and Bug? How did they influence American Rapture?
We actually lost Violet this year, not too long after we lost our Chupacabra. Their losses were devastating, and I was really working through that (or trying to) while going through edits on this book. We’ve rescued a lot of dogs, and I grew up in a house of rescues–usually five at a time, and they all slept in the bed with me and were effectively my siblings. Dogs are angels and saviors, and it’s the cruelest fact of our reality that they don’t live as long as we do. Every dog I’ve had has influenced my work and will forever. I feel so honored and endlessly lucky to get to experience life with them. The current pack is Bug the one-eyed princess, Esme the two-legged wonder-dog, and our two new puppy mutts, Pangur and Nessie.
Horror novels like American Rapture — especially apocalyptic ones — are sometimes stand-alone stories and sometimes part of larger sagas. What is American Rapture? Is it a one-and-done kind of deal or the first book in a series?
I definitely see this book as standing on its own. It’s a big book, and I think I got to the heart of what I was trying to say with it in these pages. I’m learning (from people smarter than me; in this case my genius editor) that there’s a lot to be said for letting a story just end and not stretching it out longer than it needs to be.
That said, never say never!
Earlier I asked if American Rapture was influenced by any movies, TV shows, or games. But to flip things around, do you think American Rapture could work as a movie, show, or game?
I’m not really sure! It’s a book about sex and sexual shame and violence with a young protagonist, so there could certainly be difficulties with other mediums.
But at the same time, it’s a story about finding yourself and your people and the things you believe in and feel are worth fighting for, and I’d love to see those ideas interpreted on the screen.
In general, I’m just always so game for any of my work to be adapted however it might be. I’m a book person and am just now learning about TV and film world, so I feel open and excited by the idea of any potential projects but am mostly just so happy to get to have the words on a page. Everything else feels like a bonus.
And what if they wanted to adapt American Rapture into a game…
Maybe I could see it working as a role-playing game; maybe a video game, or maybe tabletop. Though I have to say, I really have only played RPGs (I love The Witcher and Skyrim), so my references are also pretty limited. I think it would be a lot of fun to move through the different roadside America spaces though, and really play up that neon-glow terror and beauty of it all.
So, is there anything else you think people need to know about American Rapture?
I think the book kind of speaks for itself. But in general I’d say, I just feel lucky to get to be here and writing and getting to know the readers who have connected with what I’ve written. It’s really every writer’s dream, and I am so happy to get to be sharing my second book with the world.
Finally, if someone enjoys American Rapture, they’ll probably read Maeve Fly if they haven’t already. But once they’ve done that, what horror novel would you suggest they check out next?
Any and all Anne Rice! She is the queen of erotic horror, and Catholic themes, backdrops, ideas, ritual, and lushness. The most decadent, the most interesting. I’ve read almost everything she’s ever written — fiction and nonfiction — as well as biographies on her life. Her relationship with the Church, both while a part of it and not a part of it, fascinate me, and the work that came out of both her more religious periods and the really hedonistic atheist ones is all incredible. I’ve never understood why we should have to choose between genres when you can have more than one in any story, and Anne Rice really showed the world how well romance/erotica and horror play off each other. She’s forever my answer.
