1. What is the title of your forthcoming book, and would you tell us a little more about it?
"KAELIDESCOPE" is a fictional story based on my experience living with PTSD and DID. It will be available by March 2016. It has erotica, thriller, crime and semi-biographical elements that linger through the dramatically different "lives" of the same person: a beautiful woman, the daughter of a drug lord, who has been through trauma since early in her life.
2. What inspired you to write your book?
It wasn't inspiration but rather a sense of cleansing, a need to free myself from what, to some extent, burdens me that pulled me, literally, to write it. I want to contribute to eradicate the stigma and shame associated with mental illness; I want to show the world how capable people like me are. Writing is my tool so I am using it for it.
This book is a baby of passion, courage, and insomnia.
3. How did your previous work as a ghostwriter prepare you to write your own book?
It only did in a practical sense; this is a completely different scenario for me and the most difficult of all as I had an idea and the knowledge about what I wanted to convey but not a schedule or guidelines or anything that provided me with structure or a linear path, which generally exists when you write for someone else.
It was also somehow taking a piece of me and leaving it out in the open for all to see, which is very scary, but I need to do it not only for me. Nothing prepares you to undress your soul to strangers and although the stories in the book are fictional, the process of it all is something intimately aligned with my reality.
4. What would you most like people to know about the experience(s) of living with mental disorders?
As my wonderful editor said to me: I am not broken. This made me think that perhaps "we" are touched by some kind of magic wand (I don't mean it in a literal sense!) that allows us to experience life and emotions at a more profound level that most. I would like everyone to be able to rid of the shame and the silence that accompany mental illness. Feel valid because you are amazing! You go through life with a much bigger weight on your shoulders; know you can be whoever you decide to be and take that power with you wherever you go.
I strongly believe in the power of one: I know that coming out and telling a bit of what is like to live like me will impact at least one more person and so on, and I hope one day we live in a world that knows and understands and doesn't discriminate because of ignorance.
5. What are your goals and hopes for the new year, 2016?
2016 will be a year of implementation and to harvest. I have decided to make some drastic changes in my life, including spending an extended period in Chile where I was born; this means my children will stay in Australia with their Dad and although my heart feels only half full, it is something I must do in order to regain certain degree of balance.
I have social projects that I want to start developing further, like encouraging kids at risk to communicate and/or enjoy art. I've been talking to some other people in the arts world and am very interested to connect and form a collective to use our combined powers to create better societies where it is most needed.
In the world of words, I am working on a dark/erotica poetry book, but living with DID means things can be very inconsistent at times so the plans could change or grow. I only clearly know that I want my kids to be happy, I really just want to be a good human being, and I hope to contribute wherever I can. I practice gratitude, and I would like to reciprocate the opportunities I have, for I believe no one should be not allowed to explore their full potential and to experience happiness.
Thanks, Marcela!
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