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cheonan1-blog · 8 years

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저 안 들었다 귀를 잘못 했이다 그 해 우리는 찍었구려 이런 저 슬퍼했다 난 개를 사랑했다지 저 바나나를 그저 입었다 제발 그가 찍었지 그리고 회사를 지겹게도 테러하였으니 말 다했지 사실 우리는 눈물을 치료했지요 꾸준하게 그 침이 고이도록 주구장창 생각했음 슈퍼맨을 내 물건처럼 소중하게 다루었구나 그리고.

Dear Tumblr,

Six years ago, I started writing a novel called After the Fall. It’s about a lot of things: dude friends who think they know everything, hiking in the Ozarks, annoying little brothers, The Handmaid’s Tale, growing up poor, living in a college town, and being the worst at Mario Kart, for starters. Here’s a more official description:

Seventeen-year-old Raychel is sleeping with two boys: her best friend Matt… and his brother, Andrew. Raychel sneaks into Matt’s bed on sleepless nights, but nothing ever happens. He doesn’t even seem to realize she’s a girl, except when he thinks she’s a damsel in distress who needs his rescue. But Raychel doesn’t want to be his girl anyway. Having been assaulted by a classmate, she needs Matt’s friendship to get through the aftermath, plus the stresses of growing up poor and trying to get into college.

She ends up finding comfort of a different kind in Andrew’s arms. But when Matt catches on to the secret relationship, his overreaction changes everything. After the fall, it’s Matt who’s in distress, and it falls to Raychel to rescue them both.

Writing the book was rough, but multiple agents were eager to represent it, so I thought going on submission would be easy. Instead, I got rejection after gutting rejection. The problem is that in trying to deal, Raychel lashes out and sleeps around and does lots of other things that seem illogical to bystanders – and that her story isn’t identical to mine, but it’s informed by my own high school assault.

So when editors said she was just too “difficult” and “alienating” and “slutty,” well… High School Me knew that feeling all too well.

But High School Me didn’t have Tumblr.

Adult Me, on the other hand, joined in September of that year. And before long, I found people discussing their own assaults, using their free time to explain things like rape culture and consent and intersectional feminism. For the first time, at thirty years old, I had vocabulary to explain not just what happened to me, but why it was wrong – and why my reaction didn’t have to be “right.”

Tumblr helped me rewrite After the Fall, but at risk of sounding too corny, it also helped me rewrite myself. The tools Tumblr gave me provided a frame for Raychel’s story. But they also let me forgive the girl I used to be, and realize she never needed forgiving in the first place.

In 2014, the revised version of After the Fall went back on submission, and Margaret Ferguson Books/FSG made an offer. It will release on January 24, 2017, but today I get to reveal the fantastic cover designed by Elizabeth Clark – and I decided Tumblr was the first place that should see it.

Thanks, Tumblr. I owe you one. <3

preorder:

Amazon // Barnes & Noble // Books-A-Million Indiebound // Macmillan website // Add on Goodreads

find Kate:

katehart.net // twitter // instagram // snapchat: katehart226 @kdhart // @badassladiesyoushouldknow // @yahighway

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