Question: What compelled you to tell your story in Searching for Daddy? What did you hope to accomplish for yourself and for your readers?
Answer: I always wanted to write about my life after seeing a movie as a child called Doctor in Clover. The young girl in it writes her life story and gets retribution on those around her. I guess it appealed to me. I had a mixture of revenge on my parents, my teachers and with bullies at school. I also wanted to examine why I had a relationship with a caged serial killer.
Question: You mentioned to me in a tweet that you were "attracted" to serial rapists/killers? Do I have this right? What was it that drew you to write about them in your second book In for the Kill, and is there a relationship between your personal experiences and to these dangerous people?
Answer: Yes, I was sexually abused as a little girl by my adoptive father. My Mother was very jealous of me. That made her violent towards me. I read about the Moors case and Ian Brady who was adopted and had real rage inside him, as I had anger. I wondered was there a link between adoptions and murder. It turns out there is: most serial killers have been adopted. I banged the drum of "adoption is bad; it produces killers" for a long time.
Finally I realized I had to forgive my parents for ruining my life and let go of my own anger that was eating into me, or I would ruin my whole life. I found recently that part of me had split off -a soul split -- and I did some Shamanic journeying. I also used Indigo Essences, "Poppy," which is to reclaim lost parts of the self. It works! I saw that a part of me was digging around in the minds of these serial killers and going to visit them in order to try to find that missing part, you know, a rapist took it. Maybe one can give it back, but that was on an unconscious level.
Question: Is there anything that you wish you knew better when you were a little girl that could have helped you? I guess I am thinking of this: does innocence help or hurt a child?
Answer: I wish I could have told an adult what was going on, but mostly adults in those days referred to parents over and over. My class teacher once, without a word to me, called in my Mother to say I never smiled at school. I got a beating as soon as I got home and then had to plaster a fake laugh and smile every minute at school, or the teacher would have told my Mother again. It was very stressful and even now I find it hard to really let go and relax.
Question: Given what you have been through, how did you become successful? You are strong; where did you get this strength? I mean, how can a past victim become someone empowered and strong?
Answer: I think for me it is a spiritual thing. I always felt that deep within. In the movie Ben Hur when he is chained to an oar in the galley of a ship, he says to God, "I know you won't let me die here. I was born for more than this." I kept telling myself I wasn't born just for my adoptive parents to break me. When I went through Primal Therapy in Los Angeles, it was very harsh treatment that breaks down defenses, and I was terrified as it made me feel so bad for a few years as all the pain poured out. However, faith came into play there. I told myself, "You were not born to end up a basket case.
You have things to do here," and it helped me. I have had a crisis of faith recently when I lost my job as investigator in the press due to a phone hacking incident. It was me that introduced a "Mr. Big private eye" who was the one who bought the hacking in. The actual phone hacker they have was just a patsy. I lost my income and have found it hard to find work. Hatred for this person who was once my boyfriend overwhelmed me. I found comfort in Luke 6:24 that the rich man has his reward/consolation now. I only need to bear the minimum to live, and the Bible tells us over and over not to worry about what we eat or clothe ourselves with. Jesus himself was homeless. Our Father knows what our needs are; we just have to pray daily. I find prayer a drag but have a "God Box" and I write notes -- sometimes they are angry notes -- sometimes just me asking for stuff and I post them in. Its prayer!
Question: Given your own experience, is there hope for some sex offenders? Can they become good citizens? If so, where do you draw a line between mercy and rehabilitation and incapacitation?
Answer: Primal Therapy would be good for them. It should be compulsory or some other kind of real smashing the defenses. This is a therapy that John Lennon had, and then he produced his White Album and Ted Bundy applied for it to do from prison. I think they will re-offend without it. It would help if parents kept guard. They talk about online child pornography, but whose kids are these? I don't want to know the answer to that. It kills me.
Question: What is evil? You examined it closely. In my book, Glen says that good can come from bad. There has to be a crucifixion before a resurrection. Is this true? Or are there exceptions?
Answer: I think we all have to feel our own pain; pain is a teacher. Life is about suffering, and we all have a sacred contract to fulfill to grow our soul on schoolhouse earth. We aren't here to amass money or loll on a cushion. There is human evil which is usually base and animal in its nature. Supernatural evil is another thing, and what I was always drawn to examine because spirituality was cut off from me as a kid. I was told I was evil, so I wanted to know what it was. I finally came into contact with it when I met Kenneth Bianchi the Hillside Strangler in America in 2010. He strangled and raped 13 girls. Bianchi houses demons. To go near him one experiences all kinds of occult phenomena, and it terrified me. I actually ran to the church for help as did another writer who met him. Now I know what true evil is; it's an energy and it has its minions -basically "Diablo," and I have come face to face with it. I just wanted to run. I lost all fascination with it. It has a reptilian feel to it. You are now hearing about these aliens who are like reptiles. Well, they aren't aliens. More and more we are experiencing this around us. We are entering a new dark age when sadly that force will become more and more prevalent down here. It is easy to see where demonic forces are present--for example ISIS shows all the signs for channeling something beyond this world. Their anti-humanity crimes and satanic evil shows itself in the way they behave. I can now tell if certain crimes are a sick man or a man that has something taking up residence inside of him.
Question: I think we need to know more about human sexuality because we don't know what is really normal; people don't tell, do they? Would you agree that if we were more open about sexuality, sexual problems and deviancy, that the world might be a bit safer?
Answer: I liked to think children didn't have a sexuality for a long time, as I didn't feel I did. I felt as if it was stolen off from me before it was present, but now I believe it was present in me at a young age. It was just subordinated. My sexuality is still damaged. I can feel sexual to a man like Kenneth Bianchi, but it is angry and vengeful much like it is for some of these criminals. I still haven't quite got to that. One day I hope to but getting older now. Lately as I wrote about How Nick Davies Hired Me To Spy on My Former Colleagues at News Corp, I fell in love with this good guy reporter who went up against Rupert Murdoch in the phone hacking incident, so I feel for Nick Davies and had sexual fantasies about him. For me this was a breakthrough. He's such a non-abusive and good man. My life has been wasted in some ways as I could only feel "aroused" for cold or cruel men. The upshot to that is you get a bad life. Bad guys hate women and want to see them in the gutter. My last book is about that. I want all abused women and men to read that book and PLEASE do not waste your life on shit like I have. Literally the abusers not only wrecked my marriage chances but ruined my business. The effect my rapist father had on my life was gargantuan. I have an attraction to women but didn't want to act on that as I think that homosexuality is a neurosis. The Nick thing is such a breakthrough for me although he has not rang me and asked me out yet!
I think that children's sexuality must always be kept away from adult sexuality. One is pure and connected to a soul, the other is dirty over time or heavy with an animalistic nature. If the purer experiences the adult one, it blots out the new, undefended soul--in effect blotting out its light. That was my own experience, and I would not wish it on anyone as for decades I had no idea what was wrong with me. All I knew was I could not join in, and I was an outsider. It was painful! In an older child, you only have to watch Jeremy Irons in Lolita and just see it in action. If the main character wanted purity in his sex life - go and work on it and find a grown woman and not "steal" it from a girl who is underage and just needs support.
Question: What advice could you give parents based on your experience?
Answer: Protect them all the time. Make your children aware and when they are young go with them everywhere. I have a ten-year-old boy, and he is clued up on pedophiles. He learned to scream, shout and kick in the "goolies" if one ever comes near him or says anything to him. His school friends are accessing porn on their laptops, and I was upset when I heard this and had to complain to the school. They are too young for laptops and have to be supervised. Adult sexuality in the mind of a child blots the healthy stuff--the soul--out.
Question: What advice would you give a child that is alone or weakly supported?
Answer: Turn to God for protection. I hate to think of a child with no adult around to trust as that was where I was all of my childhood. If more of us keep aware and step in--not just confining ourselves to helping our own children--they would all be protected. Recently we had a column from a woman who talks about not letting her child play with this or that kid because the kids are poor and have a single parent. English snobbery is rife here because of our class system, but it is precisely kids like this who are sometimes isolated. They badly need the support of other kids and adults. Let's wise up and keep that "evil" out -- and that way we can defeat it. The alternative is unthinkable.
Thanks for your time. I appreciate it.
(Please note that the opinions shared in interviews on this blog are the interviewee's own.)