Backstage: Thirteen (Patreon)

Backstage for Thirteen, which is a story about Meg Santoro, the protagonist of my novel "The Cold At The Heart of the Light". 

In the novel, Meg is a supervillain. In this story, she's a child, a survivor of CSA from one parent and emotional abuse from the other, who discovers she has the power to kill or heal with a touch. This, as one might imagine, completely upends her life.

Meg's backstory was created in the 90s when dark, edgy backstories for heroes and villains were common. Even then, I wanted to do something more original, so her father, who sexually abuses her, was also someone she loved and wanted to please, who probably looked from the outside like a great dad because he was always cheerleading for her and treating her like he loved her. This, I think, is probably how childhood sexual abuse goes down, more often than what we typically saw in fiction in the 80s and 90s with an irredeemable monster. 

Nowadays the zeitgeist has moved away from backstories with rape and abuse, and I understand why, and approve... but it's not like it's stopped happening, so Meg is keeping her terrible backstory. It's too much a part of her character at this point.