Meet the Newbies- S. Jae-Jones Author of Wintersong

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Meet the Newbies

Meet the Newbies is hosted by Rachel from A Perfection Called Books and is a way to get to know the latest debut authors and get a glimpse of their books. Check out all the authors and blog on the tour here.

From the moment I heard about Wintersong my heart skipped a beat and I knew I must, MUST, read this book as soon as humanely possible. It pulls from so much I love (Labyrinth, David Bowie as inspiration? SOLD). Sometimes, we run across a book summary it is so ‘us’ we feel completely connected having never read a word. That’s me and this book. I was HONORED when asked if I wanted to host the author, S Jae-Jones.

Author Most Likely to do a Dance, Magic, Dance
Nickname: The Great Miss JJ
First Day of School: February 7, 2017
Homeroom: Thomas Dunne
Grade: Gothic Fairytale
Extracurricular Activities: Piano, visual arts, fencing, jumping out of perfectly good airplanes, dressing up for movie premieres, obsessing over fictional characters
Favorite Class: English
Favorite Quote/Motto: “Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter.” -Yoda, The Empire Strikes Back

About the Author

13414088S. Jae-Jones, called JJ, is a voracious and indiscriminate reader, an avid traveller, and something of an adrenaline junkie.

Born and raised in sunny Los Angeles, she lived in New York City for ten years before relocating down to Dixie, where she is comfortably growing fat on grits and barbecue. When not writing, she can be found rock-climbing, skydiving, taking photographs, drawing pictures, and dragging her dog on ridiculously long hikes.

Social Media Links: Website | Blog | Twitter | Instagram | Pinterest | GR

About the Book

24763621Beware the goblin men and the wares they sell.

All her life, nineteen-year-old Liesl has heard tales of the beautiful, mysterious Goblin King. He is the Lord of Mischief, the Ruler Underground, and the muse around which her music is composed. Yet, as Liesl helps shoulder the burden of running her family’s inn, her dreams of composition and childish fancies about the Goblin King must be set aside in favor of more practical concerns.

But when her sister Käthe is taken by the goblins, Liesl journeys to their realm to rescue her sister and return her to the world above. The Goblin King agrees to let Käthe go—for a price. The life of a maiden must be given to the land, in accordance with the old laws. A life for a life, he says. Without sacrifice, nothing good can grow. Without death, there can be no rebirth. In exchange for her sister’s freedom, Liesl offers her hand in marriage to the Goblin King. He accepts.

Down in the Underground, Liesl discovers that the Goblin King still inspires her—musically, physically, emotionally. Yet even as her talent blossoms, Liesl’s life is slowly fading away, the price she paid for becoming the Goblin King’s bride. As the two of them grow closer, they must learn just what it is they are each willing to sacrifice: her life, her music, or the end of the world.

Book Buy Links: Amazon | B&N | Goodreads

Interview

The most obvious question and thus I must ask it, why the Goblin King? How much of the movie Labyrinth can we expect?
Why not the Goblin King? 🙂 To be honest, I don’t really have an answer for that, or at least not a straight one. Labyrinth obviously had a huge effect on me as a little girl (my name is Sarah, after all), but when I watch it as an adult, some of its storytelling flaws come through. Part of me wanted to fix some of the thematic dissonance and logic problems of the movie, but writing WINTERSONG wasn’t as conscious as that. I like Underworld stories, I love the trope Death and the Maiden, I love Franz Schubert’s Der Erlkoenig, I love David Bowie, glitter, and goth things and all of that came together in this book.
As for how much of the movie you can expect to find in the book, well, my editor did make me scrub out a lot of the direct references. 🙂 (And she was right for doing so; we want the book to stand on its own, after all.) However, there are two direct homages to the movie I couldn’t bear to remove. Easter eggs for my readers! Oh, and my Goblin King has mismatched eyes. Just like David Bowie.
I’ve read that your novel was first geared to an adult crowd but has been altered for a younger audience. Can you tell us how that changed the book?
The biggest (and only) change is the editing of the sex scenes. Yes, there are sex scenes. They are still in the book. They are still on the page. (When I was drafting WINTERSONG, my joke title was 50 Shades of Labyrinth.) But YA and adult sex scenes are treated differently and my editor and I worked to edit them to make them appropriate for a teen audience. Other than that, there has been no actual substantive change. In fact, I initially queried WINTERSONG as YA, but yanno, adult content. 🙂
From the summary and your website I can see that Mozart has a large influence on your work. Are you a musician? What about him and his music captivate you?
I am a musician insofar as I’ve been trained in music since I was very little. I do love music of all kinds: classical, pop, rock, country, hip-hop, etc. One of my earliest memories is sitting at my family’s old Yamaha upright piano, my feet dangling off the bench, picking out how to play Yankee Doodle by ear with just the black keys. I asked my parents for piano lessons when I was three; they told me to wait until I was four. I am a musician insofar as I am someone who can play a vast array of instruments competently (many self-taught), but without any true genius. In other words, I am just musical enough to love it fiercely, but not enough to be anything but passable.
As for Mozart…why does anyone connect to a musician? Why do I love Mozart? Why do I love David Bowie or Marc Bolan or Lady Gaga or Yeezy or the Dixie Chicks? My exposure to Mozart did come at a young, impressionable age; my mother loves his work, so I grew up listening to him the way other children grow up listening to Bob Dylan. But if you were to ask me what I connect to in Mozart’s SOUND, that ineffable quality that is uniquely his, I suppose you could say his transcendence. There’s a clarity and sprightliness to his voice (even in his unfinished Requiem) that’s almost magical.
On a personal level, I find him as a historical person very interesting. He was a child prodigy who grew up to be an adult genius, only to have that genius cut tragically short at the age of 35. But I also love that he was a genius who also liked to make fart jokes and write ditties for his friends called “Lick me in the ass.” (Yes, it’s true!)
As a reader I always hope to deeply connect to one or more characters while reading- as a writer did you find yourself connecting deeper to one of your characters? If so, which and why?
This is tricky for me to answer because all my characters are in some part me. I suppose it’s almost easier to answer which character I aspire to be. Well, maybe aspire isn’t the best word, but there’s a goblin in my book named Thistle, and her contrary, spiteful, spiky personality was really fun to write.
With your book being scheduled to release in early 2017 what part of this journey has been the most surprising?
To be honest, it’s hard to surprise me, mostly because my previous career was as a YA editor in a Big 5 publishing house. I’ve more or less seen it all. 🙂
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Giveaway

1 Pre-Order or Finished Copy of Any Debut Novel Featured on Meet the Newbies
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Comments

  1. Elle says

    Wonderful interview! I love JJ! You should definitely check out the PubCrawl Podcast which she co-hosts. I love retellings especially darker ones so Wintersong sounds perfect for me. I can’t wait for 2017.

    Reply

  3. Agus Z says

    Oh this book sounds so interesting! I’m so intrigued about the story! It’s already on my TBR and can’t wait to read it! Also the cover is so beautiful! Great interview!

    Reply

  4. says

    I was so intrigued about this one too! I’m not such a huge fan of Labyrinth as you are Kristen, but this also sounds very much like a me book, so I cannot wait for January to arrive!!
    I’m also so very much in lust with that gorgeous coverrrr!!

    Fantastic interview!

    Reply

  5. says

    I had NO idea what this book was about, but had seen the cover and thought it was beautiful. After reading the description and the interview, I am even more excited!!!

    Reply

  8. says

    Okay, but. Now it is the “new” design again. WHAT. It’s messing with me, haha 😀

    Anyway. Gooorgeous post Kristen 😀 Thank you for sharing about this book and author. <3 I love this cover SO MUCH. Seems pretty interesting too 🙂 I hope it's a good book. Ack 🙂

    Reply

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