In Gabrielle’s debut blackout poetry collection, The Phantasmagoric Effect, she turns a reflective lens toward Edgar Allan Poe’s short story Ligeia, telling a visceral, modern narrative of power dynamics, obsession, and psychological desire from 19th-century prose.

In this blog, Gabrielle talks about spontaneous inspiration, digital redacting, visual intensity, and what it felt like to publish something deeply personal.

Q: Every book starts with a spark. How did The Phantasmagoric Effect actually come to life?

Gabrielle V: It actually started with a casual conversation with my writer friend, Teyo. He mentioned how much he liked Ligeia, and I realized I’d never actually read it. So I decided to give it a read, and as I went through the text, certain words immediately jumped out at me, words that connected with the kink scene and sadomasochistic power dynamics.

I blacked out a single paragraph right then and sent the snippet to Teyo to show him. It was so much fun to do, and since I had a few hours to kill, I thought, Why not? and just kept going paragraph after paragraph.

Q: Walk us through your creative process. What does your day-to-day workflow look like when creating blackout poetry?

Gabrielle V: Since I was reading the story online, I would screenshot paragraphs directly,  and start isolating and highlighting the exact words I wanted to keep.

When I construct a story, I always visualize it as a movie in my head first. I took staple images from that mental movie and paired them with stylized royalty free artwork. I wanted the page design to feel visually overwhelming, reflecting the intense mental state of the characters in the story.

Q: Your usual work often explores self awareness and psychology. How did it feel stepping into such an intense headspace for this project?

Gabrielle V: It felt freeing in a way. It’s not that I don’t write about things are the darker taboo side of things, I do, but I rarely publish or publicly share work like that. Deciding to actually put a collection like this out into the world was a big deal for me personally, it allowed the project to feel completely raw and unfiltered.

Q: What do you hope readers take away when they experience The Phantasmagoric Effect?

Gabrielle V: I hope it invites them to step into their mind and see what remains when everything(social constructs) else is stripped away. It’s an exploration of control, dominance, and vulnerability and a reminder that hidden narratives(and motives/desires) are often waiting right under the surface of the stories(ehem people) we think we know.

The Phantasmagoric Effect is available now. You can order your copy (by purchasing here the author gets a higher royalty compared to Amazon or other market places) or explore more of Gabrielle’s work at GabrielleV.art