An Interview with “On the Spectrum” Author Justin C. Key

What inspired this story?

I spent the summer after my first year of medical school doing research at the Seaver Autism Center in New York City and spent I a lot of time with children on the spectrum. In truth, one of the initial things that sparked my interest in autism and psychiatry was the portrayal of Shep in Dean Koontz's novel By The Light of the Moon. I thought the character was done really well and, combined with my experience that summer in NYC, I began to think about the different ways we humans perceive theworld. As someone who was becoming increasingly interested in mental health, I thought about how society itself could dictate a lot of what's ‘normal’ and what’s ‘pathologic.’ Formanymental health disorders, it's in the diagnostic criteria that it has to interfere with the ability to function—which is, a lot of times, directly related to society's structure. So, I came up with the idea of what a society might look like, how what we consider ‘neurotypical’ today might be seen as significantly impaired.

Your story touches on identity, belonging, and communication. What do you hope the readers will take away from your story?

My goal was to have a character that readers could relate to and then maybe experience some of what it might be like to live in a society not made for you. My hope is that people think about the implications of systemic bias/structure in what defines ‘normal.’ Also, I wanted to show an example of how different ways of seeing theworld—even if they are defined as ‘impaired’ by our current standards—should not be dismissed as unimportant, maladaptive, or without a place in our society. We should try and find room for all kinds of people the best ways that we can. It will not only benefit them, but all of us.

What got you excited about the Many Worlds project?

Initially, Cadwell. I was introduced to his writing through The Lesson and became loosely connected through Clarion West. When I saw that he was thinking of doing something new and collaborative, I jumped at the opportunity. Since then, the collaboration and the scope has really excited me. Writing can be a very isolating process. At the same time, trying to work collaboratively—on a short story, for example—may be tedious and feel hard to make flow. This project gives us the opportunity to have the best of bothworlds(no pun intended) in being able to expand on other people'sworlds, introduceworldsand characters yourself to inspire others, and to see how far the rabbit hole goes.

To your mind, what/who is the Simulacrum?

The Simulacrum remains mysterious to me, in the same way that any omnipotent-spectrum entity may be. I would like to think that the Simulacrum is neither evil nor good inherently, but that it could be defined in both of those ways, depending on who is doing the defining. The purpose of its actions is beyond our comprehension. This is a cliché example, but it’s similar to how a person might manipulate multiple ant-farms. We are the ants. But unlike ants, we have the ability to speculate and explore, to try and understand who's in control. Like the ants though, we will never be able to enter anywhere near the lane of consciousness of the Simulacrum. In other words, all bets are off.