#PennedPossibilities 1033 — Would you or have ever considered writing a MC with mental illness? How would or did you approach the subject?

The MC is maybe psychotic, but definitely not a sociopath. After horrible illness and fever, she started seeing a black leopard nobody else sees, then speaking to it and petting it when it helps her deal with life. Later, when a friend's bodyguard was killed, his ghost appears and follows her around. When she speaks with him, he becomes the friend she remembered while alive and starts advising her and helping her figure things out, sometimes nagging her when she disagrees with his difficult truths, sometimes comforting her. Later, a slain alien joins her "spirit" menagerie, adding another uncomfortable agenda she needs to consider. She becomes a shaman, but is never "practicing" her religion per se; she has bigger fish to fry. She considers it a nuisance and appreciates it for a span of years (between novels) when menagerie abandons her and she can live normally.

It's an SF world where shamanism is one of the religions, so when she accidentally revives the talking control system running the generation ship (a rotating asteroid) everybody lives in (including aliens that had invaded centuries ago), she takes it in stride that it considers it her the captain. It's obviously another world spirit! Right?

How did I handle the mental illness implications?

Completely on the level.

While she works problems out with the help of her guardian spirits, they never give her information she could not have gotten by other means or by pure chance.

So... is she crazy mentally ill? A delusional schizophrenic? Or does the supernatural exist? The story challenges the concept of religious belief and, rigorously, does it completely on the level. Inquiring minds would have to read the story and decide for themselves.

The gimmick, should you want to call it that, is in sync with how the series Joan of Arcadia is presented. (Not sure if I wrote the story first or saw the series first). The fabulous highly-recommended cancelled-too-soon series also never clarifies whether the protagonist is crazy or is counseled by a deity—by the stories never giving Joan information she might otherwise guess or glean from living in the moment. The story challenges the audience to question belief, faith, and how mental illness affects people.

EDITED: Added info about whether Joan of Arcadia inspired the story or whether it uses the same gimmick to make the story resonate and make points about faith. And, yes, I am not religious. So faith fascinates me.

[Author retains copyright (c)2026 R.S.]

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