Jason Dias asked Kate Jonuska:

The main character of Transference is a pretty terrible human being. What was it like to write that character? Did it give you more empathy for men like him, or make it harder to understand them?

Kate Jonuska Inhabiting the character of Dr. Derek Verbenk was not as uncomfortable as you might expect, despite the fact that the man’s actions are 100% at odds with my values as a progressive feminist. I saw him as a deeply flawed person, yes, but also as just another scared, scarred human who in this story is waking up to the consequences of his selfish, hurtful behavior. I know how that feels, I think we all do, and my connection with Verbenk was based on that common humanity.

So obviously I have a lot of empathy for Verbenk. With that character, I wanted to break down the line between men and women, if only for the space of a story. Verbenk’s chance at redemption takes the form of a challenging woman with whom he needs to have a non-sexual relationship. The vehicle he’s offered is friendship, which is really that same human-to-human connection across differences I feel with Verbenk.

Bottom line, though: I’m a woman, and women have a long, documented history of having empathy for men — even men who hate us, hurt us, use us, think we’re literally stupid. If that upward-sent empathy made any difference, it would have done so by now. The divide needs to be bridged, in my opinion, from the top. In other words, by men throwing some empathy downward, which takes the important step of admitting that up and down exist. Many men are these days, though there will always be Flat Earthers. Maybe books like Transference can get more people talking about these issues and upping their empathy.

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