Jennifer Lee Rossman is joining us today with her novel Jack Jetstark’s Intergalatic Freakshow. Here’s the publisher’s description:
Jack Jetstark travels the universe to seek out the descendants of superpowered freaks created long ago by VesCorp scientists. The vibrations encoded in a particular song transform the members of Jack’s crew into a firebreather and an angel, a wildman and telepathic conjoined triplets, so they hide the truth of who they really are with the theatrics of a carnival.
The song plays every night through the receptor Jack carries with them, but when one night it has a different ending and their temporary powers become permanent, Jack believes the change is a signal from the woman who sent him on this quest in the first place. He and his freaks must navigate a universe at war to protect the love of his life.
But does the ruler of VesCorp really need protecting?
What’s Jennifer’s favorite bit?
JENNIFER LEE ROSSMAN
I almost didn’t write this book. I had an idea, a real neato one about a space carnival, but that wasn’t exactly a plot so much as it was a setting. I wrote a chapter, got mad at the fact that I had no clue what happened next, and gave up.
But the idea stuck in the back of my head, slowly amassing elements of worldbuilding. Maybe there was a freakshow at this carnival, and maybe the performers weren’t really freaks but only became freaks when a certain song played? Yeah, and then a girl joins the carnival and discovers their secret! And then… what?
And then I heard American Pie.
I’ve always loved the song, from the first time I heard it in a pizzeria in the mall when I was seven, and my favorite music is from that era, but this time… I don’t know. Everything just clicked, all the little pieces of plot swirling around in my head suddenly fell into place.
The freakshow song had to stop one day. There had to be an assasination of a king. An entire generation of freaks had to be lost in space.
American Pie became my novel’s theme song.
I named characters after its lyrics and the people referenced in them (Jack Jetstark is Jack Flash, and his last name is made up of the names of two James Dean characters). I invented characters just to fit the song (Lily is the angel born in hell). I.. did something really drastic that affected a lot of characters’ lives (but I’m not going to spoil it for you).
I started officially writing the first draft on December 1, 2015, and finished it in May of ’16. I heard American Pie at least once a month during that time, and always when I was feeling a little lost. Once I wrote “The End” on the first draft and started editing and submitting to agents, I didn’t hear it until February of 2017, despite listening to the same radio stations.
The day in February was two days after I submitted my novel to the publisher who ended up accepting it. The day I got my revise and resubmit (publishing talk for “if you change these few things, we’ll accept it”), I’d had the song stuck in my head all day. Two days after I finally got up the nerve to edit it, American Pie came on the radio.
The day after I got my final edits on the novel, my mom and I were in the car and I joked, “Well, you know what song is going to be on next.”
And it was.
I don’t necessarily believe there’s anything spooky going on here, but it’s a great story to tell when people ask about my inspiration!
Some of my references are pretty oblique — I doubt that anyone will get the meaning behind the name of my moon Vespi 3-14 (Vespi is derived from Amerigo Vespucchi, whom America was named for, and 3-14 is a reference to 3.1415… AKA “Pi”) — but the musicians referenced in American Pie have been a major part of my life, and I love that I’ve been able to weave them into the worldbuilding.
LINKS:
Jack Jetstark’s Intergalactic Freak Show Universal Book Link
BIO:
Jennifer Lee Rossman is an autistic and physically disabled sci-fi writer and editor. Her work has been featured in several anthologies, and she co-edited Love & Bubbles, a queer anthology of underwater romance. She is perhaps best described as “If Dr. Temperance Brennan from Bones was a Disney Princess.”
