About Author: When Jehane Spicer left England for America, she found herself in a new country, in the rigors of culture shock, and far away from home. She also discovered a culture of creativity she had not expected, and realized she was free now to explore her deepest ambition, to become a writer. She knew nothing of life in the US, so she wrote what she knew. This story sprang to life when she first saw the tapestries The Hunt of the Unicorn in the Cloisters Museum in New York. In her mind, the familiar images and history of Europe made a time jump into the reality she was working to understand, and this story is how she made sense of profound change and came home again.
Jehane is a retired psychotherapist who has dedicated herself to working with deep trauma and dissociative disorders. She has made her home just outside Washington DC, the nation’s hub of political power, in a tall winged house in a deeply wooded area–open to the liminal and unseen.
1. If you had to describe yourself in just three words, what would they be?
Kind, fierce, creative
2. If you could describe Wild Girl in just three words beyond genre labels, what would they be?
I puzzled over this, and came to a one-word conclusion: Unmasking
3. What was the very first image or idea that made you think, “This has to become a story”
This story leapt into my mind when I first saw the tapestries The Hunt of the Unicorn in the Cloisters Museum 40 years ago: and then an image in my daughter’s coloring book inspired the Wild Boy and the Wild Men who guard the unicorn herd in the deep forest. (attached). But the most vital figure is the girl in the red dress: the hunters can’t catch or kill the unicorn unless a virgin calls him. And so, she is going to carry the guilt for the death of this legendary creature whose horn is known to have other-worldly powers of healing. Blood in her lap. That’s the heart of it.
Later I found myself fascinated by pictures of the tapestries hanging in John Rockefeller Jr’s study in his gilded mansion in New York; and I dreamed up the two bookends in a parallel timeline, with Abby Rockefeller on Black Tuesday longing to “have a voice…”
4. You describe Wild Girl – Hunting the Unicorn as “cross-genre.” How do you see the blend of history and fantasy serving the story you wanted to tell?
I’m intrigued by the different genres ascribed to WILD GIRL: literary, historical or psychological fiction, upper YA (not YA), dark fantasy, magical realism, interstitial, myth…Of them all, I think the most potent pairing is that of history and myth—they both reverberate through the ages, even into our present time. Myth gives history wings.
5. You set your story in the 15th century – why that time period, and how did you balance historical detail with fantasy?
The tapestries were completed around 1505, probably in Flanders, one of the great weaving centers in Europe. I envisaged the story taking place about 20+ years before then, so that one of the main characters can become a weaver and be the driving force behind the creation of the tapestries (trying to avoid spoilers for Book 3).
I set the story in the sunset days of the Duchy of Burgundy because it was under attack by rival forces, including the King of France, and on the verge of collapse: when Charles the Bold was killed at the Battle of Nancy, it was the final disintegration.
Also, the Chateau de Berzé le chalet is still a live, whole castle today, at least 1,000 years old, with a system of tunnels beneath the main levels…so anchoring the myth and fantasy with solid history and a real building. If you look closely at a photo, you can even see the window of Helaine’s room in the tower.
6. You’ve said your aim is to help young girls and survivors recognize and name what’s happened to them. How do you weave that intention into a fictional narrative without it feeling like “therapy on the page”?
I started off by wanting to portray a heroine in women’s terms, not one who decided or was forced by circumstances to become a page, a knight, a pseudo-male warrior figure who could combat and even defeat real male champions—a meme that’s still alive today. I wanted to show a different kind of heroism in the face of societal constraints and expectations that all benefited men. The underpinnings of our world today are perhaps less obvious, but still very much the same.
Helaine lives relational trauma through the loss of her mother and stillborn brother, to the limited code of affection with her father, the shifting authority of Father Robert, her chancy friendship with Marie…and then the pressures on her to call the unicorn mount to an intolerable level.
Then finally she makes a decision spurred by an ethical and spiritual awareness that transcends commonplace morality: that decision is a sacrifice but also deeply human—even transgressive. She will not play the part of Judas. She will not collude with the perpetrators to kill the unicorn. But there is a price she feels she has to pay.
I like to think that the pressure mounts in such an authentic and gradual way that the brief flashes of trauma are cushioned within the narrative but will resonate with trauma survivors.
7. Shame and guilt are feelings many survivors carry. How did you show those emotions in Helaine’s journey, and how does she begin to unravel them?
Helaine learns early in her life that she has no voice, and must accede to the opinions and decisions of the men in her life, especially her father the Seigneur and Father Robert. She feels she must please them, and this quietly undermines her sense of self. These constraints are coupled with profound grief and loss, so that she forms an inside-outside box in her mind where she keeps unbearable feelings—and memories. She starts to unravel her shame and guilt when she sends Robert away and tells the Seigneur how she broke her word to him. Step by step, Helaine begins to move into truth, greater maturity and selfhood.
After the death of the unicorn and her brief accession to a strange, other-worldly power, Helaine leaves her old life behind, and enters the forest, where she is mysteriously hidden by remnants of the unicorn’s magic. She goes through a time of madness in the forest, very similar to flawed Arthurian heroes—Lancelot, even the wizard Merlin–while she processes everything that has happened in her dreams and in her unconscious and begins to leave shame and guilt behind. It’s a slow but intense process common to most survivors.
8. As a trauma-informed author, what responsibility do you feel when writing about violence or betrayal and how do you avoid retraumatizing while still telling the truth?
When I work with a client who is a survivor, we must first establish trust between us: we may not touch the story of traumatic events for a year or even longer. I followed the same thinking in writing Helaine’s story: making connection first. I think the constraints placed on Helaine will resonate for most readers without triggering them because the revelation is so gradual. The one flash of sexual trauma comes more than two thirds of the way through the story, and is carefully placed. It is a lightening flash recognition of hidden truths, and vital to the story. This is how many survivors recapture their buried past.
After memory is restored to her, Helaine struggles to come into her own, and sees her father’s world as a place she must leave behind, at least for now. Trauma cannot be healed without processing memory.
9. Many survivors may see pieces of themselves in Helaine. How do you hope her story helps them reframe their own journeys?
Many survivors will see themselves in the girl who is not allowed to say “No,” and they may recognize her attempts to assert some kind of choice, even if it goes sour on them. I hope they too will gradually learn to say “No,” to be allowed to cry, to be angry, even to be a nuisance. I long for them to be able to take agency, make their own decisions as they heal. Sometimes that may mean leaving.
10. Exile is a recurring idea in your writing. You’ve said, “Exile has purpose. She is not broken; she is coming back.” Could you unpack what exile means to you both for Helaine and in your own life?
I came to the US when I was 40 y o, so even though my new country drew me in, it didn’t smell or sound or look like home. My life changed in ways I hadn’t expected and gave me the chance to develop in ways I wouldn’t have, I think, if I had stayed behind—the intensity and the joy of working as a therapist, having permission to write and paint. Over the years, I’m 82 y o now, I have learned to make a different kind of home. But my kids and grandkids—we’re all talking now about going back to England, to the West Country, for a visit, perhaps next year.
I’m curious to see what happens for Helaine. She’s in exile now, she’s been broken and is starting to heal; and she’s changing…what will she decide?
11. Was it difficult to balance the demands of telling a gripping medieval fantasy story with the deeper aim of helping readers understand trauma?
It just felt natural for all these aspects to blend together because I’m passionate about both: but it did take time. And when you work as a traumatologist, it changes your perception. You see how trauma is deeply embedded in human life, in our history and in our biology: and stories can help us understand this and begin to work through it.
12. Did you ever worry about the book being “too heavy,” and if so, how did you weave beauty and wonder into it alongside the darkness?
Once again, the beauty is inherent in the tapestries and in the natural world; the luminous co-exists. And there’s so much joy in the story as well as darkness.
13. If you had to pick one scene that captures both the mythic fantasy and the trauma-informed heart of the novel, which would it be?
The final death of the unicorn is the culmination, but for me, I think the scene where the unicorn is separated from the Wild Boy and attacked by the hunters and their hounds: he kills one of the dogs, and grieves that he cannot bring him back to life. The Wild Boy, led by Robert, thinks Helaine was colluding to kill the unicorn. Death and betrayal and helplessness and grief, it’s all there.
14. Your background is in psychotherapy. Was there ever a moment where your “therapist brain” surprised your “writer brain” while working on the novel?
I think they colluded! But perhaps my “therapist brain“ is most present when Helaine creates her inside-outside box to hold the unbearable.
15. Every author leaves fingerprints in their work. Which part of Wild Girl feels most like “you” hidden inside the story?
Perhaps Lady Agnes represents who Helaine might have become if she hadn’t had the courage to take agency for her own life. I feel such empathy for her, and how she has faded over time, though she still summons up all her strength as “a survivor of a different war” to guide and advocate for Helaine. She too comes into her own strength from a place of apparent weakness.
16. One of the most powerful threads in the book is female friendship, especially between Helaine and her friend Marie. Did you draw from any friendships in your own life when writing it?
Ah, Helaine and Marie: “so close yet so separated.” Different kinds of jealousy divide them, but their age and shared lives pull them together. Such a complicated relationship; but because of the circumstances of her conception, Marie longs for acknowledgment by the ranking members of the power hierarchy, while Helaine is focused within and longing to be whole. We’ll see how they change over time.
Yes, I’ve had friendships like that.
17. This is your debut. What surprised you most about the process of writing a book that carries so much personal and psychological weight?
I dreamed the story up and I started to write, and it grew, so I wrote some more, and then life made me put it aside, more than once. I was surprised when WILD GIRL insisted on being born!
18. Without giving spoilers, what’s one thing readers can look forward to in the next part of Helaine’s journey?
This first book has been the outward-bound part of the Hero’s Journey; the next is about winning the prize. The title is WILD MOTHER, WILD CHILD, and I can promise a re-union with Asad al Faradi, who is quietly one of my favorite characters. And other adventures; Lord Stephen will finally put in an entrance, and so will Odo de Grandfief.
19. Are there any specific authors or books that have influenced your writing style?
Robin McKinley, especially Deerskin; Katherine Arden, The Winternight Trilogy; and Juliet Marillier, The Sevenwaters Trilogy.
20. Do you have writers in the family/friends?
I’ve made lots of writer friends over time; I think one of my grandsons might be a writer one day. And there’s a strong thread of music in the family and art. I love my plein air friends.
21. What advice would you give to debut writers especially those who want to take on difficult subjects like trauma or women’s inner lives – but may feel hesitant?
Listen inside, trust yourself, do what feels right for you.
Support the author and experience a powerful story – available now on Amazon.
We believe in sharing knowledge with everyone and making a positive change in society through our work and contributions. If you are interested in joining us, please check our ‘About’ page for more information