We chat with Devery Jacobs about her first audiobook narration, In the Hands of Men, which tells queer Indigenous stories…
By Stephan Petar
In the Hands of Men follows protagonist Delilah as she navigates a world where an unexplained virus turns men into animals. Throughout the novel, Delilah embarks on a vengeful killing spree, but also grapples with her quest for love, the unresolved trauma of her missing cousin and the question of whether she is a monster too or is just taking her power back from the hands of men.
“I couldn’t put it down,” says Devery Jacobs (she/they), who narrates the debut novel by Indigenous writer and musician Gin Sexsmith (she/her) from Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory. While the book was released in 2023, it has now been adapted into an audiobook exclusively on Audible.
Jacobs, from Kahnawà:ke Mohawk Territory, is a rising star in Hollywood. She was in the Emmy-nominated Reservation Dogs, where she wore multiple hats as actor, writer and director. She was featured in the Marvel cinematic universe twice with What If…? and Echo, was most recently in the film Backspot, and is now in the middle of filming a new holiday film. She is also an advocate and leader for Indigenous and 2SLGBTQI+ rights. This work is one reason she received the Radius Award, an honour given by the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television to an actor who is making a global impact.
While she’s a busy person, Jacobs says she knew she had to take on the project of narrating In the Hands of Men. “Had it not been a novel that spoke so much to me, I don’t think I would have necessarily made the time to do it, but this is so powerful,” Jacobs says. “It’s my hope that people will be spooked out, thrilled, enticed, and go through the whole gamut that is In the Hands of Men.”
We sat down with Jacobs recently to discuss the project, her take on telling queer and Indigenous stories, and her Radius Award honour.
In an Instagram comment for In the Hands of Men, you said that you “had the privilege of performing this visceral, powerful and sometimes spicy audiobook.” What attracted you to narrate this project?
I hadn’t heard of Gin Sexsmith or this novel before, which I was surprised by because I feel like I am the target demographic for it – being queer, specifically being Kahnawà:ke, and a fan of thrillers. What really drew me was the spiciness and honesty. Imagining myself reading this made me clutch my pearls a little bit because people are going to hear some spicy stuff from my voice.
It was exciting and challenged me to consider each of the characters. I was with Delilah but was also afraid of her and I didn’t know what she was going to do because she’s so unpredictable. There are so many aspects of this novel I really love, and I knew I wanted to voice it. Regardless of whether or not I was approached to voice the character, I would have been a huge fan. This is also my first audiobook ever, so I was intimidated a bit by it, but it was something I knew I had to take on.
As your first audiobook, what was that experience like compared to the voice work you’ve done on Marvel’s What If…? I assume it differs?
It’s entirely different. It was definitely challenging, but a process I really warmed to. With an animated series, you’re voicing one character, but in an audiobook you’re voicing everyone. So it’s having the different personalities, cadences, accents, tones, tenors. It was definitely out of my wheelhouse, but being directed by Deborah Burgess and getting to work closely with Gin, who sat in on each of the sessions, was really awesome.
Would you do it again?
I absolutely would. I feel spoiled with my first process.
Did you do anything to prepare? Were there things that worked for you or didn’t?
I would definitely do vocal warm-ups in the morning before going to sessions. There were little tips and tricks that I took to heart. I associated different characters with different people in my life, so I could have a hook to remember them by to make sure that when the character would reappear, after like 10 chapters, I was still in that space.
You can now add ‘audiobook narrator’ to your storytelling repertoire. To date, you’ve been behind and in front of the camera, writing, directing and acting. Are there other storytelling avenues you want to focus on or try?
I am in the process of writing a graphic novel with D. W. Waterson, the director of Backspot, and I would love to venture into video games at some point. For me, it doesn’t matter what the medium is per se, as long as it’s a form of storytelling. Being able to voice an audiobook and bring Gin’s words to life was something that felt really special. Honestly, I feel like I found a long-time friend out of the process when we got together. It was just one of those things where it was like, ‘How do we not know each other already? How am I not already a fan of this ferocious and incredible writer?’
You’ve noted before that there are few queer and Indigenous characters in stories who are not undergoing trauma. Why is the industry inclined to portray queer, Indigenous and queer Indigenous people in these traumatic states?
If you look at Black Hollywood and the depictions of Black individuals back in the day, it’s primarily stories of enslavement and seeking freedom. For some reason, this is the only area where settlers and people in Western society really think of Native folks. They think of the genocide that was committed against us. They think we’re extinct and we’re ancient people. There are so many different points of modern North American history where we’ve had so much hardship.
In storytelling, and in film and TV, there’s an innate need for conflict. I feel those things get conflated and it feels like the only conflicts that can happen to Native people or Black people or queer people are these stories of hardship and oppression. While we face those things, we are not limited by our trauma, and I think so often marginalized people are reduced to stories of trauma. I think there are way more [stories] for us to pursue and to widen our view of these marginalized communities and to see us for the three-dimensional people we are: athletes, cheerleaders, queer, who live in suburbs or cities or rural areas and everything in between.
You recently received the Radius Award. What does it mean to get an award recognizing your global impact?
It makes me think of the first time I attended the Canadian Screen Awards.… I was really overwhelmed by the Canadian industry and knew nobody, and didn’t believe that I would be able to find a place in it because it felt so much greater than myself. To be a recipient of the Radius Award this year and to see that I’ve solidified a place for myself – with the support of countless artists who have lent their hands, have provided guidance and a sense of community – is really meaningful and a touchstone to tangibly see how far I’ve come in those 10 years.
Gin Sexsmith was part of the Audible Indigenous Writers’ Circle, an incubator for emerging writers. What queer, Indigenous or queer Indigenous emerging voices should we be paying attention to?
There’s a whole wave of people, whether that’s the entire writers’ room of Reservation Dogs, novelists like Gin Sexsmith or Joshua Whitehead, or filmmakers like Asia Youngman, Shaandiin Tome, Alex Lazarowich and Justin Ducharme. There are so many artists in the fashion space. Like every medium you can imagine, there are emerging voices who have the talent and the skills and the capability to make really incredible art. I’m excited to be coming up in a community that is surrounded by Indigiqueer, two-spirit artists who are able to come up and occupy the space that we haven’t had the chance to before.
STEPHAN PETAR is a born and raised Torontonian, known for developing lifestyle, entertainment, travel, historical and 2SLGBTQI+ content. He enjoys wandering the streets of any destination he visits, where he’s guaranteed to discover something new or meet someone who will inspire his next story.
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