writing, sex, striving for legitimacy

i published my first book this year <3

I have not made a Substack post since July. I have tried many times and found I had nothing to say. And I think that’s the problem with Substack: No one has anything to say, but they write anyway. Also this year Substack integrated new features, such as the Twitter-like feed, which turned Substack less into an oasis for writers and more of a social media platform. Quickly my feed became a cesspool of rightwing bullshit along with endless “Literary It Girl” thinkpieces, including a misogynistic one about how if you post thirst traps of yourself then you’re no better than OnlyFans girls (a comparison that is already ridiculous for putting down sex workers).

The year ends in a few days and this was a terrible week. First, I was attacked by people online for posting an album on Stereogum (my day job) by the band Whirr, who were canceled ten years ago for transphobia and bullying, and apologized earlier this year. I got an email of threats and slurs. A lot of people accused me of being transphobic. I just thought the album was good. Then, I came across a tweet from someone who has been hating on me for years calling me an idiot and expressing jealousy that I was on a literary reading lineup with Geoff Rickly and Richard Hell (I also questioned how worthy I was of that honor many times). When I responded to it, I was called “a dog with one trick (writing bad autofiction about fucking older men).” Over a hundred people liked it and I didn’t know that many people felt that way about me. I know my writing isn’t for everyone, and I know that many people don’t care for autofiction or writing about sex. Other things happened this week that I won’t waste words on.

It’s a shitty ending to a great year. This year I published my first book, an accomplishment I’ve been dreaming of since I was a child. As a teenager, I believed I had to publish my first book before I turned twenty or else no one would care. I had to be a prodigy. I had to be notably young. That didn’t happen. I was twenty-three. But what matters is that it’s a book I’m proud of, that it’s a piece of writing that means something to me and would want to read if it was written by someone else. I used to worry that no one would want to read my writing because it’s incredibly personal to the point of discomfort, but then I became enamored with Anaïs Nin and Annie Ernaux for that very reason. And since I published Pregaming Grief, many readers have expressed gratitude. I no longer have a reason to doubt myself.

It feels like the tide is really turning. After years of sex positivity—a movement of many faults—it’s become normal to shame women for being openly sexual again. Something that particularly bothered me lately was someone on Twitter claiming Sydney Sweeney doing a sexy photoshoot was her way of “[proving] that [she’s] hot to the men who degrade [her] if [she’s] ‘caught’ looking imperfect.” We’re back to assuming everything a woman does is for the Male Gaze, a term I’ve always found annoying as fuck. I’m just upset that we’re back here, though maybe I’m wrong, maybe we never left.

I want to be able to write and post pictures of myself without those two things being in conflict with each other, without someone claiming I’m not a Real Writer because I flaunt my sex appeal. A lot of my writing is about sex, about enjoying sex, finding comfort and euphoria in it, about not wanting it to be such a taboo topic in fucking 2024. Why are we still so weird about sex? And I don’t want people to make assumptions about me for posting pictures of myself, creating scenarios in their heads about the Male Gaze or whatever.

But because I often meditate on fucking, my entire life craft gets reduced to “writing bad autofiction about fucking older men.” Since it needs to be stated, here are other things I write about: Alcoholism, familial turmoil, existential confusion, and, ultimately, love. Because when I write about fucking I’m really writing about love, the pursuit of it. But some people don’t want to see it that way, they want to think of women as sluts rather than lovers. It’s easier to dehumanize them that way.

Not only did I publish my first book this year, but I also somehow ended up doing ten literary readings. I don’t know how that happened. I just kept getting asked. And I never say no. Because this is what I want to do with my life. I’m a writer and I’m not ever going to be anything else. I’m still striving for a sense of legitimacy because I have about four unpublished manuscripts and no agent to help me sell them. But it doesn’t matter because I believe in what I write. Being a writer is lonely. A million people can tell you they like your writing and you’ll still feel alone and somewhat misunderstood. But that’s okay, because you have your words, and when you get lost in a piece there’s a flash of cosmic connectedness. I’m excited to continue writing in 2025, and the year after that, and the year after that.