Photo from PSICOM Publishing Inc. Facebook Page
Horror has been one of the best parts of the Wattpad Writer's life, Maureen Apdian. The 25-year-old Wattpad Writer Maureen Apdian from Davao, Del Norte Philippines is known in her pen name as 'SerialSleeper' and is also called by most people as 'Bambi'. SerialSleeper was best known for her works that were mostly written in Horror Genre. She is best known for her most-read story in Horror Genre, 'Dispareo' with a total number of reads 8.4 Million among all of her Horror Stories, and was also known for her second non-horror story that has the most number of reads among all of her stories with a total of 31.2 Million reads, 'Stay Awake, Agatha'.
According to Maureen, she started writing way back in 2012 when she was still 15 years old through Wattpad. Wattpad is a website and application where people can write their own stories and publish them, it does not matter if you're an amateur writer or an established author. She first started as a reader in Wattpad and was drawn to it. It all started when she was in 4th-year Highschool when they were practicing for their graduation ceremony. She found out that her friends were reading E-books, they were reading the stories of one of the famous Wattpad writers called HaveYouSeenThisGirl.
Before Wattpad was introduced into Maureen's life, she has been into horror stories. She has been reading True Philippine Ghost Stories books and the books of the American author of Horror and other genres, Stephen King. Maureen learned to love the Horror genre as she grew up watching horror movies with her family, particularly, her mother loves the horror genre. She started watching horror movies when she was at the age of 5 or 6. She was also watching cartoons but also with a touch of horrors such as Scooby-Doo, Ghost Busters, and Martin Mystery.
Maureen wrote her first story entitled 'Slaughter High' in which she wrote when she was 15 years old and it only took her 2 months to complete it. Its first title was 'The Devil Walk Among Us'. She changed the title in the middle of writing for a reason that she thought the title 'Slaughter High' was a perfect fit for the story. She also thought that the title would be a great homage to one of her favorite movies with the same title. The second story she wrote after a year was 'Vertigo', a supernatural horror novel.
As a first-time writer at that time, she had anxiety over the idea of no one would ever read her story and no one would ever like it. She didn't expect it when her story 'Slaughter High' had many reads, from 1 to 4, until it became 10 reads. According to Maureen, it only has 27 reads when she finished writing the story. She was so happy with that amount of audience and became contented. With that, she just continued writing stories until she produced many books on Wattpad. As her writing continues, her followers in Wattpad reached 1,000 and she found it unbelievable. Currently, she has 1.2 Million followers.
Here are the famous stories of SerialSleeper you might want to read:
Photos Courtesy to Maureen Apdian
SerialSleeper's second non-horror story is 'Stay Awake, Agatha'. She wrote this in 4 months way back in 2014. It was the result of her trying different genres other than horror. She first tried to write one-shots stories until she wrote 'Stay Awake, Agatha'.
She learned to write the Romance-Comedy and Tragic genre as she wants to give her readers, especially her friends for years, a form of entertainment and to bring something new to make them happy other than the horror stories. 'Stay Awake, Agatha' is based on the article that Maureen read, it was about a girl who can sleep for a long time.
'Stay Awake, Agatha' was published in 2018 by PSICOM Publishing Incorporation. It was already published but you can still read it for free on Wattpad.
Sleeper's message to the readers of Stay Awake, Agatha:
"Thank you so much for reading one of the stories I wrote in my teenage years. I hope Agatha and Cooper's story will stay in your hearts"
One of SerialSleeper's RomCom stories is 'Good Night, Enemy' in which she wrote in 2018 and ended up becoming a series called 'Filimon Height Series'. Currently, SerialSleeper is now on the 6th installment of the series. Some of the installments are mixed with mystery.
Here is the list of the installment of the series:
Good Night, Enemy
Attack of the F*ckboys
The Rebel's Rival
Please Find Me
When the Bridge Falls
The Fool's Gold
'Good Night, Enemy' is the second most-read story of SerialSleeper next to 'Stay Awake, Agatha'. It now has a 13.5 Million total number of reads and was published under PSICOM Publishing Incorporation in 2020, it can still be read for free on Wattpad.
'Dispareo' is the most-read among all the horror stories of SerialSleeper. It is a trilogy that she wrote around the year 2015 or 2016. It was also published under PSICOM Publishing Incorporation in the year 2018 and 2019. 'Dispareo' is the story of SerialSleeper that is close to her heart the most. SerialSleeper wrote this story way back when she was struggling in college. This story is written in full horror and is close to SerialSleeper's writing skills, which also is the reason why 'Dispareo' is special to her.
Since she is so in love with the Horror Genre, she is encouraging people to love it as much as she loves it. For SerialSleeper, Horror is the most misunderstood genre. According to her, some people say that Horror is a gateway to evil, just like Rock and Roll but for SerialSleeper, those people are completely wrong. For her, the horror genre allows people to face their fears without letting them face their fears. It's like people can get to play their nightmares and at the same time, play in their nightmares. And maybe along the way, people might learn how to conquer them. She also thinks that people can also learn a lesson in the horror stories, like people's safety.
"I think the horror genre is also a great way to tell people that the world isn't full of happiness and rainbows. And so, we have to treasure our lives and the people we love." she said.
SerialSleeper's most favorite part in a horror story is when the heroine fights back against the villain. As a writer who mostly writes teen-slasher stories, she likes the part where the different types of characters are working together, setting aside their differences and different opinions just to save each other and defeat the villain.
Like any other novel writer, there's always a difficult part and a favorite part in writing about certain characters. For SerialSleeper, the most difficult part in writing a character's part of the story is when she needs to kill them off especially those characters that have been a big impact on her and the readers. She only kills characters when it is necessary for the story to continue and go full circle. She needs to do it even if it's her favorite character or not, they will die in her stories. On the other hand, her favorite part is when she is planning her characters' concepts, the characters' colors, strengths, weaknesses, quirks, and how will they be connected to the stories and to other characters.
When creating a new story, there's always a way to start the plan on writing it. SerialSleeper said that every story starts with an idea. Every time she got an idea of certain stories, she makes sure to write it down on paper or keep it on her phone's notes. If the idea is already there, she will start to think of the possible premise and will plan on a plot twist and the ending of the story. It's just like a jigsaw puzzle for her, starting to be fixed as a whole. When she's already sure with the premise, plot, and ending, that's when she will start to plan her characters and the flow of the story. Sometimes she is only able to fix it while writing the story, as the most important thing for her are the premise, plot, ending, and the characters. As long as she knows where she's going in the story. When SerialSleeper experiences Writer's Block, she takes a break and a rest. And when she feels like she's going nowhere, she will read all the letters and the gifts she received when she was still attending book signings.
Photo Courtesy to BelieveBhem
SerialSleeper had her first book signing event in March 2018 in Davao City. It was her first public appearance as SerialSleeper. The book in her first book signing event was the release of 'Stay Awake, Agatha' under PSICOM Publishing Incorporation along with other authors under the same publishing company. Her other book signing event was in Cebu in June 2018. The other signing events were at Manila International Book Fair (MIBF) in the years 2018 and 2019. It was the release of her Trilogy book 'Dispareo'. Currently, there is no book signing events because of the pandemic. Just like any other artist, in order to meet their fans, they are meeting through live videos. They are doing their online meet and greet under PSICOM Publishing Incorporation.
SerialSleeper encourages people to give the Horror Genre a chance because there is so much to explore in Horror including its sub-genres. Reading horror stories like the works of SerialSleeper could also give you a way around on every path we cross.
SerialSleeper's message to her readers:
"I'm forever grateful to my serialreader family for the love and support through the years. I'm looking forward to meet new readers in the future."
If you would like to support and follow SerialSleeper, look for updates and read her stories, here are the links to her social media accounts and Wattpad account.
Instagram:
Twitter:
Wattpad: