One of the best things about reading is the fact that when you sit down with a book you enter a new world. Tony DuShane’s debut novel Confessions of a Teenage Jesus Jerk is a guided tour through the world of Jehovah’s Witnesses. I thought I knew what they were up to, those little old ladies and nice young men who knock on people’s doors and offer them a free comic book called The Watchtower. I knew that there were religious groups—cults and sects and splinter churches—but I’d never gotten inside one of them. Confessions of a Teenage Jesus Jerk changed all that. I had no idea they were that weird.

And yet Tony makes it all okay because Gabe, the protagonist of the book, is a perfect tour guide. He’s funny, awkward, fucked up, and sincere, and he makes reading this novel a surprisingly heart-warming experience.

Photo by M. B. Garcia

I know that you were a Jesus Jerk yourself when you were younger. What was that like? Did you feel alienated from society or part of a special group?

Can you talk about how you came to write this story? What was it that inspired you?
I was inspired by bad writing—by woe-is-me memoirs written by ex-Jehovah’s Witnesses. They were of slight interest to me because I could understand what the writer went through, but so poorly executed as to what drives the intentions of Jehovah’s Witnesses. I needed to engage with the reader, not write at them.
And, my past as a Jehovah’s Witness continues to haunt me. Once pegged as someone who thinks for [himself], it’s a hard world to be a part of. I struggled because I had a passion for literature and music. Growing up a Jehovah’s Witness [would be] like an awesome sci-fi film if it didn’t really happen.
Stepping back from it, I put any personal pain or resentment aside and grasped at the humor of the situations. I put Gabe, the main character, through absolute hell…less hell than I went through, but I had a lot of fun with him.

How close is the story in the novel, and the character of Gabe, to you and your actual life? And was it difficult to write a story that could be seen as “autobiographical”?
I wish I were Gabe. He’s a lot cooler than I ever was. There were parts of the story that were a lot of fun, even inside jokes to myself, that will be funny to the reader, but are very layered.
Then, there were parts of the novel that absolutely tore me apart. I had to rehash certain family situations that really happened. My parents finally read the novel and I have to thank them for being good sports.
The most important part of the novel is the story and Gabe’s experiences. It was hard for me to write scenes where I felt he was making a wrong choice, but I had to stay true to the character and respect him and his belief system.

Gabe is terrified that his sexual fantasies, and the fact that he masturbates, will cause God to punish him. I love the tension between the teen yearning for sex and the undercurrent of terror that acts as subtext in all the scenes with his friends. Were you conscious of this while you were writing?
That was absolutely based on personal experience. I was a virgin until I got married at 25. To be able to sneak a peek at a Playboy and see a woman naked was pure bliss and hell. God sees all. Then, a girl at school wears a short skirt and it would take me 10 minutes to sit up without being embarrassed. The terror in the Jehovah's Witnesses and trying to come into your own as a sexual person is very real. It was a theme I wanted to capture. Some of it is silly, looking back and even reading the scenes, but I had to keep the characters and the scenes tense because Gabe is just going through hell....when he should be able to express infatuation, lust and love. Both he and I fumbled greatly at that age. He gets a little more action than I ever got...I had to wait a while longer...so I got to live a bit vicariously through Gabe.

Do you think God will punish you for writing this book?
Yes, the God as Jehovah’s Witnesses see him will give me leprosy and strike vengeance on my whole family. He’s kind of a Mafioso but with schizophrenic issues.

In one very funny scene in the book, a couple is confessing their mortal sins to a Church Elder. Their sin is “accidentally having anal sex.” How do you accidentally have anal sex? Has it ever happened to you?
My sexual experience is very limited. There have been a few times where I have poked at the butt before and my ex-wife would say, uh, wrong hole.
Anal sex is a big no-no for Jehovah’s Witnesses. And the only sex allowed is married sex.
Even though the scene is left open for interpretation, the couple confessing, in my mind, were actually going for it and then pathetically trying to get right with God by confessing to an elder. It's never made clear in the book.
As for how intimate the elder gets in his questioning, that's very real. They get so personal, like they actually have any qualifications other than Watchtowers to go by; they stand in for what people should probably see a therapist for.

Can you talk about how the book came about? You wrote a draft, then what?
Then it was draft after draft after draft. Some drafts were over 400 pages of material that I continued to edit and pore over, it was a blast. Walking around with my novel. It felt great. Then carving away, really tightening it up, working on the continuity, documenting every scene, it felt like I was DJ-ing. Days of frustration turned into 10 minutes of epiphany. Those moments are like a drug. I didn't realize how hard it is to get to a final draft.
A couple of sub-plots were bogging down the pacing and the story, which took the focus off of Gabe’s struggle.
Oh, and the first few drafts were written in third person. Then, I realized the story had more impact in first person. That rewrite was tedious, but I’m glad Gabe became the narrator. The original goal was to stay close third person to Gabe but play with a couple subplots that I thought necessary. I had to really work the drafts in a few different writers’ groups. It was like creating a different world for the characters to inhabit and for the reader to feel confident in the world as they experienced it. My problem was I was too close to that absurd world, so something that would sound normal to me would be confusing to someone who didn’t grow up a Jehovah’s Witness. Even though everything used in the novel is absolutely true of Jehovah’s Witnesses, I had to keep a light touch and at the same time not insult the intelligence of the readers.

How does it feel to have finished your novel?
Finishing the novel was brilliant. Getting a book deal was spectacular. It still doesn't feel real. I've interviewed writers for years....as you know. You and I have come full circle because I interviewed you for your first novel in 2002. The novel doesn't feel like it belongs to me anymore. It belongs to the reader.
I'm a very, “what's next” person. Even when I get articles or essays published in newspapers or magazines, I get that ten-minute crack high, then I need to produce more. The blank page beckons, but I know I can score another high.

What are your hopes for the book?
The novel means a lot to me. Even though it's a coming-of-age story, I want it to bridge some gaps. I want troubled Jehovah's Witnesses to know there are options. To leave, you have to lose everything: family, your social network, and even financial security. Jehovah's Witnesses are not supposed to have "worldly" friends. They can interact to make money or go to school. College is extremely disapproved of because they say it’s all about drugs and orgies. There is a lot of misinformation.
Jehovah’s Witnesses will not be allowed to read my novel, and it will be seen as a plot from Satan. Seriously. That said, I really hope there are young JWs who can get to it and know they’re not alone. I hope I can give them something that wasn’t available to me when I was a teenager and even in my 20s.

You also host the great radio show “Drinks with Tony” and edit the literary blog Cherry Bleeds. Can you talk about that?
I started Cherry Bleeds in 2000 as a webzine. It was a way for me to make friends with other writers on the Internet and publish my own stories every week. I faded out of the JWs a year earlier but was still hanging out with too many of them. It showed just how bad of a person I was. It was my way to uncensor myself. I put a call out for submissions and just enjoyed getting emails from as far as South Africa, people who dug the website and my stories.
Then, I decided I wanted free books, so I asked publicists to send books for potential review. It was always more of a recommendation instead of a review. I hadn't written and published a book myself, so I felt absolutely unqualified to be a critic. Then, after Chuck Palahniuk's publicist sent me a copy of his latest book, she got in touch again and asked if I'd like to interview him. Instead of saying what I felt like—that I was a fraud—I jumped at the interview and called it the Cherry Bleeds Podcast.
I was interviewing people already as part of Filmjunkie.com—that was mostly filmmakers and actors—but to interview my favorite writers, it was amazing.
And, all I did was ask them questions that I wanted answered about writing. I essentially learned about publishing from the masters, and only because I knew how to develop a website.
You were my second writer interview. That was a blast. Riding my bicycle to the interview is when I came up with the idea of calling the show Drinks with Tony, since I recorded at bars. I wanted a laid back vibe…
After that, Drinks with Tony has been broadcast on KFJC and Pirate Cat Radio, and there have been a few hundred shows. Starting February 26, I'm hosting Drinks with Tony in front of a live audience at a bar. I've wanted to do this for years, but the book, a wee little nasty divorce, and other obstacles got in my way. We'll tape the audio of the live show, which will have musical guests and literary guests and radio broadcast and podcast it on the website.
I had no idea what I was doing was networking...I was just getting to talk to people who I found very interesting, sometimes went out for dinner and drinks after the show and many I've kept in touch with…
I tell writers who ask me for networking advice to stop networking. Support local readings. Start your own reading series. Do it because literature needs to stay alive and the literary community is a very honest community. Interviewing musicians and filmmakers, they have the same old image to uphold and pat answers....not all of them, but most of them. I’ve had some guests who I’m friends with now who have been absolutely genuine. The percentage of the literary community that won't bullshit you, it's a high percentage.
Embracing the literary community after leaving the Jehovah's Witnesses has been important in my recovery. What better place to be than with a bunch of fucked up writers, who know they're fucked up, who admit they're scared, and who lay their souls down on paper to entertain and connect with readers? I consider myself very fortunate.

Now that you’re not a Jesus Jerk, what’s next?
I'm working on another dark comedy dealing with suicide and pharmacology. I'm a fan of heavy subjects. And, I know a lot about suicide since I have three family members who have offed themselves, as well as childhood friends. I don't know why I need to torture myself with this stuff because even though it comes across as comedic and dark, it's coming from a place deep inside me that's very tortured.
When I worked on the last couple of drafts of Jesus Jerk, I almost lost my mind, shut myself off from my friends, couldn't sleep, chain smoked and would finally drink a six pack of beer at 11 a.m. to get a couple of hours of slumber. I'd work through it after about a month, but I wouldn't leave the house, showers were intermittent and I was barely keeping it together.
The process hurts. I like to dig deep. Then throw some [salt] on it. Even when working with comedy, to layer it with a heavy theme from a dark place, that's the only way to release demons. I never want it to be overt in the final draft, but I hope the reader has a slight feeling of absolute dread while snickering at the absurdity of the human condition.

Mark Haskell Smith is the author of four novels: Moist, Salty, Delicious, and the forthcoming Baked.

(February, 2010)