Me TLDR: He/She/They (fluid). Writer. Illustrator. Trans. Queer. Polyamorous. Neurodivergent (I identify with Elyn Saks). Pagan. Tattoos. Pierced. Sex positive. Dungeon Master. Maine Coons. Food. Chickens. Homesteader. Fuck. D.C. stands for Darren Christopher. Co-Talking head on And it’s Writing Podcast: https://anditswriting.com/

I was born and raised among ex-cons, thieves, drug addicts, wayward artists, and abusers that I loved and adored as a child. They were (and still are) my family, regardless of what they had done. My education was adequate at best, and by the time I was twelve years old I had known what it was like to live in a car, be banned from a school, and to be forcibly removed from my parents. I was lucky enough to have an incredibly level-headed set of grandparents and a high-school sweetheart (and his mother) that eventually ‘adopted me’ as a teenager and allowed me to flourish into something bigger than my ‘unusual’ upbringing.

When I was a teenager I developed a rather unhealthy obsession with storytelling as a means to escape some of the lesser-fun aspects of life. During those years of detoxing from an unhealthy childhood, I met many people that, to everyone else around me, did not exist. Today, those people function as the protagonists and antagonists of my artwork and books. I have grown to love each of them as family.

Many years later, here I am. Once a full-time fantasy illustrator (games like Dungeons and Dragons, and Pathfinder), I eventually decided that picture-making wasn’t an involved-enough way of telling my stories. I decided to quit illustrating full time, and pursue writing, to spend time with the people (characters to you) who had kept me company since my youth. I had to relearn my own language to write books, as much of what I knew about English came from a ‘badly’ educated background.

I now live with my seven other partners (two of which only I can see and hear) on a growing homestead outside of Detroit, Michigan. For five years, I have been running multiple Dungeons and Dragons campaigns. I am an advocate for sex positivity, mental health awareness (both diagnosed and undiagnosed), and anything LGBTQ+. I am a member of the transgender community. Black lives do fucking matter.

Bad Inspiration?

If you are misunderstood, you are not alone.

When I was young, and even now that I am older, my personality ‘quirks’ were often frowned upon by parents, family members, teachers, etc. When I was younger, people told me my family was ‘bad news’, and I was not allowed to socialize with friends outside of school because parents feared I would rub off on their children. Now that I am older, people still call me ‘crazy’, ‘whore’, ‘insane’, ‘different’, ‘impossible to understand’, just because I may not function the way most others do. For a long time, I failed to live a happy life due to my own lack of understanding , awareness, and acceptance of who I was. I assumed for a very long time that I was exactly what everyone always called me–Trash.

If society has ever called you ‘bad’ just because you’re different, or poor, or neurodivergent, you are not alone.

You are not bad.

Neither am I, I don’t think.