PJ Vernon explores intercourse, infidelity, and betrayal within the second thriller Tub Home
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August 20, 2021 • 34 minutes ago • 6 minutes read • Join the conversation 
Author PJ Vernon. Photo by Jodie O. jpg
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“Gays belong in books,” says PJ Vernon, “including dark books that are messy and end badly.”
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According to the author, this was part of the thought process when planning his second novel Bath House, a fast-paced and often cheerfully scary thriller recently published by Doubleday. There is some overlap with the Calgary-based author’s first novel, 2018’s When You Find Me, a southern Gothic suspense thriller about murder, politics, and dysfunction in a wealthy family. But Vernon made an early decision about this book that he was determined not to repeat it.
“While designing it, my instinct was to focus it on queer characters like myself so that I would have access to the same tools and lived experiences that every author draws on when writing their books,” Vernon said in an interview with his home in Calgary. “But I was afraid of it. I thought no one would buy it from a publisher’s point of view. So I wrote it from the book. I had a ‘fk-it’ moment while trying to find a literary agent. It was like, “If I can’t sell this book that I’ve preventively written characters like myself from, what does it do?”
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So Vernon knew he wanted queer characters to populate his next attempt. But he didn’t want to write an autobiographical book or a coming-of-age book. He didn’t want it to be about characters coming out or dealing with their sexuality while facing social prejudice. He wanted it to be a twisted, sexy, mainstream thriller full of horror, suspense, and deeply flawed characters who just happened to be gay right now. Most importantly, it should find a place on bookstore shelves alongside the A-list thrillers by Gillian Flynn and Laura Lippman.
“I don’t want to be at the diversity table,” says Vernon, who will be attending an online Wordfest event on August 26th. “I want to sit at the trill table.”
It was only after getting a literary agent and a contract with Doubleday, a publisher of the publishing giant Penguin Random House, that Vernon began to feel some pressure about the book’s groundbreaking nature. It wasn’t so much about how he wanted to showcase the queer characters and community in his novel. That would directly serve the plot, characters, and mystery. He was more concerned about what it would mean if the book was bombed.
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“I was afraid that being Doubleday’s first and with all that support, if the book flared up, I would become a hindrance to the business case of getting the next queer writer with a better book than Bath House,” he says . “If it were about sales it would go, ‘PJ’s book didn’t do that well. We tried that. Let’s lower the advance, or maybe just go through with it. ‘”
Vernon didn’t have to worry. Doubleday seems to have its formidable marketing power behind the title and it certainly deserves serious attention this summer. The New York Times wrote a review entitled “A white-knuckle ride to the dark side of love and infidelity,” in which author Daniel Nieh praised Bath House as “an intelligent, steamy thriller full of intoxicating questions about control and shame.” “Publishers Weekly praised Vernon for” keeping the tension high as the plot twists to a satisfactory resolution. ” Called it an “unexpectedly twisted, heartbreaking cat-on-mouse thriller,” the Los Angeles Times suggested that Vernon’s publishing deal was part of a larger industry trend of “getting more books by an exciting new generation of different authors.”
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The novel is certainly a page-turner, filled with troubled characters who reveal, page after page, tidbits about their past and personality. It is told by two narrators. Oliver Park is a 26-year-old man who appeared to have overcome great difficulties – including a difficult, abusive upbringing, a closed past in small town Indiana, and drug addiction – finding peace and domesticity in Washington, DC. The book’s second narrator is Oliver’s savior, Dr. Nathan Klein, a wealthy trauma surgeon from an even richer family. Although they are not officially married, Oliver and Nathan pretend they are wearing wedding rings directly. They live in a luxurious home in Georgetown and lead an enviable life, even if Nathan’s protective instincts often border on control. But when the doctor is away on business, Oliver succumbs to the temptation and goes to what he thinks is an anonymous sex evening in a gay bathhouse. Instead, he meets Kristian, a handsome Scandinavian, who immediately tries to murder him, leaving telltale gag marks on his throat. It plunges Oliver into a nightmare of dodging the obsessive attention of a likely serial killer while keeping the circumstances of the original attack secret from his partner. Of course there is more to it than that. There is the disturbing matriarch from Nathan’s family who Oliver disapproves of. Oliver has to grapple with his own baggage from his past, including an abusive lover he escaped in Indiana. As the police continue the investigation, it becomes clear that Oliver cannot keep his indiscretion a secret forever.
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It all culminates in a nerve-wracking, nothing-is-what-it-seems twist, but at the heart of the novel remains the complex relationship between our two narrators.
“It’s important to me to portray queer relationships as authentically and honestly as possible through my own experiences, ”says Vernon. “Which means it is not saturated with sex. There is a standstill. It is prone to homeostasis of indolence at home, just like any other relationship. Certainly, toxic codependencies and various dynamics of bad relationships are just as normal, if not more, or at least in different ways, as people try to establish themselves as normal in the eyes of mainstream society. “
Vernon was born in South Carolina with a PhD in immunology and worked for the US Department of Defense supplying combat in San Antonio. There he met his future husband, a Calgarian who works in oil and gas. In 2016, the two decided to move here permanently.
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“The US Department of Defense had no battle supply job in Calgary,” says Vernon with a laugh. “When I was here it was like, ‘Holy shit, I quit the job. What the fuck am I supposed to do? ‘ I started writing and was fortunate enough to also be able to fundraise the Calgary Public Library Foundation during that time, which gave me access to all kinds of people who love books. I’m in Canada writing and I’m happy with my husband because I made an impulsive decision to move here. “
He plans to keep writing and keeping queer characters in his future work, which will likely stay in the thriller realm for the time being. While Vernon is part of a larger trend in which major publishers are publishing work by a diverse and perhaps previously marginalized group of authors, Vernon has little interest in being at the forefront of any gay thriller sub-genre.
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“I think there shouldn’t be gay thrillers, I think there should be thrillers,” he says. “When I purposely think about new projects, I’m so refreshed when I read younger people and don’t buy those labels. The characters are who they are and it’s never mentioned or tied to any gender identity or sexuality. I am so encouraged and happy to hear stories like this. I want queer people to be just as boring as everyone else and just as threatening and sneaky as everyone else. “
PJ Vernon will discuss with Robyn Harding on August 26th as part of Imagine on Air at WordFest. The online event will take place at 7 p.m. Visit wordfest.com.
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