When Your Literary Hero Turns Out To Be The Fucking Villian

The Sandman season two - There's no checkbox for "didn't watch because the creator is apparently a piece of shit."

Dear nerds¹,

Tomorrow, The Sandman season two arrives on Netflix. Tom Sturridge's Dream will once again navigate the realms of sleep and nightmare, bringing Neil Gaiman's beloved comics to our laptops and living rooms.

And I won't be watching a single fucking minute of it.

Joining the Cult of Gaiman

I fucking love fresh beginnings: new journals, pristine shoes, a freshly made bed. So when I finally purchased a Kindle in early 2000 I thought very carefully about the first book I'd read—this careful, deliberate novel would christen my digital reading life.

I chose American Gods.

Neil Gaiman felt safe. Feminist-adjacent. A storyteller who understood the magic in dark places without being the darkness himself. I loved this gateway novel into his imagination and devoured the rest of his canon, following on with podcast interviews, his advice on writing, his love of libraries and how we all desire scary stories.

I was charmed by Gaiman. I imagined bumping into him at a writer conference, then having a beer at the bar and discussing the craft...

FUCK.

The Magic I Thought We Had

There's a particular kind of magic in finding an author who seems to understand your inner landscape. Gaiman wrote about transformation, about the power found in dark places, about women who were complicated and unique. His stories felt like spells of recognition.

Like gentle hands guiding you toward understanding your own fucking power.

In my late 20s I lived in New Zealand for a decade, so when I read the New Yorker exposé I was transported to that bathtub surrounded by Waiheke bush and bird song. I felt a sickening recognition of the setup. The charm. The way certain men make you feel chosen, special, like you're the only one who really gets their genius.

God, that could have been me.

The Generational Wound That Keeps Reopening

I had to go for a fucking walk halfway through the exposé. It was way too fucking much. And of course it brought up my own sexual assaults, those uncomfortable man-handling moments.

There's something darkly absurd about reaching middle age and realizing the experiences you thought were uncomfortable, but fine, weren’t fucking fine. These things now have names. Sexual assault. Harassment. Abuse of power.

I don't think I know a single Gen X woman who hasn't been sexually assaulted. We're the generation that navigated this shit poorly, with polite excuses and fumbled apologies for leading our attackers on.

We're also the generation learning to say no without explanation. Fucking Finally.

The Particular Betrayal of the "Safe" Ones

Here's what makes me want to run, braless, down the street: it wasn't just any author who turned out to be predatory. It was one who felt like ours. A supposed feminist ally. Someone whose work seemed to understand women's power, women's pain, women's complexity.

Good Omens. The Ocean at the End of the Lane. Fortunately, the Milk. The Sandman. Stories that felt like they were written by someone who actually saw us.

But, the same imagination that created the Endless also crafted scenarios to manipulate real women. That’s fucking horror.

The Spell I'm Casting Instead

So while The Sandman season two launches tomorrow with its dreams and nightmares, I'll be here acknowledging that some betrayals teach us about boundaries. About trust. About the difference between the stories we tell ourselves and the uncomfortable truths we’d rather ignore.

This isn't about cancel culture or purity tests. This is about the fact that some of us can't un-know the cost of the entertainment.

Tomorrow, I'll be practicing the magic of saying no. Of trusting the tightness in my throat. Of honouring the women who’ve been traumatized. Of respecting the part of me that recognizes danger even when it's beautifully packaged.

With love and mixed up feelings of grief and fucked-off-ness,
Annabel
xxoo

---

If you made it all the way down here (thank you!) please hit the ❤️ button at the top or bottom of this email.

Maybe if you really loved it share it with a friend, or leave me a comment below. Any of these actions support my work and make me feel like I’m not shouting into a fucking void. Word! ❤️

🔔 Subscribe for posts about mental health, my debut novel, perimenopause, world’s shortest book reviews, and lately witches.

1. I’m using nerds in the best possible way. Nerdship: How we love a thing with such veracity that we annoy others, and then one magical day we find other people who feel the same way about the thing we love. That is nerdship.