Latest / BREAK/FIX the Motorsports & Vehicle Enthusiast Variety Show / Inside the Wild Worlds of Jesse Fresco: From Drive Like Hell to Skyhawk

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Inside the Wild Worlds of Jesse Fresco: From Drive Like Hell to Skyhawk · BREAK/FIX the Motorsports & Vehicle Enthusiast Variety Show

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Break Fix podcast is all about capturing the living history of people from all
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over the autos sphere, from wrench, turners, and racers to artists, authors,
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designers, and everything in between.
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Our goal is to inspire a new generation of Petrolhead that wonder.
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How did they get that job or become that person?
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The road to success is paved by all of us because everyone has a story.
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Tonight we're diving headfirst into the kind of storytelling that
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smells like gasoline, questionable life choices, and a touch of our
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favorite Florida man headlines, but all in the best way possible.
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Author Jesse Fresco has carved out a lane all his own with his book drive
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like hell, an Autumn Frost story, a novella that's chaotic, clever,
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and unhinged in all the right ways.
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And that's just the beginning because drive like hell isn't a one-off.
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It's an opening salvo in a whole series of autumn frost adventures.
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Each one expanding this fever dream universe where danger, humor, and sheer
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audacity all share the same bar tab.
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Jesse writes with that rare mix of pulp energy and sharp world building, the
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kind that makes these stories feel like a doorway into something much bigger.
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And speaking of bigger, this wild rod is also a runway for
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his next major project Skyhawk.
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And if that name rings a bell, it should.
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Jesse's tipping his hat to the NES Classic Captain Skyhawk channeling that retro
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high flying save the world spirit into a brand new book series that promises to be
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just as bold and just as unapologetic fun.
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Everything he's written so far.
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So whether you came for the Florida man style chaos, the pulp adrenaline, or
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the nostalgia charged flight path into Skyhawk, Jesse Fresco is about to take
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us on a ride that refuses to slow down.
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So with that, Jesse, welcome to Break Fix.
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Oh, thank you.
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Appreciate it.
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Keep going.
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Keep more, more, more, more compliments.
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Keep going.
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Well, like all good break fix stories.
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Everyone has a superhero origin story, and I found your bio to be really interesting.
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It says.
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You began writing as an escape from your day job as a stage hand.
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Yep.
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And your work is heavily inspired by 16 years in the film industry.
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Mm-hmm.
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And your various life experiences.
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And I noted in the authors, you're inspired by one of my personal favorites.
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Garth Ennis is on that list.
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That's right.
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Talk to us a little bit about becoming an author.
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Got into the film business back in 2008, right as I got outta college.
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One month later I was in the business as a, uh, gripping an electrician.
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For, uh, films and tv and of course about three months after I got in the business,
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the 2008 financial collapse happened.
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And I swear to God, I was making a delivery to a place
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in DC for a commercial.
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I'm in a Sprinter van, so I'm at the loading dock and no one's
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coming out to receive the gear.
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So I'm just sitting there and I'm listening to NPR 'cause
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I listen to NPR in the truck.
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I'm like, man, no one's coming out.
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And I would call the contact number, no one would answer.
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I'm, uh, I'm listening to the radio and it says on the radio, Goldmans
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Sachs being investigated for fraud.
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The commercial was at Goldman Sachs in Washington, DC that day.
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So finally a guy comes out to the lone dock, he says, yeah,
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yeah, the job's canceled.
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I just looked at him dead in his face and I said, does this have
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anything to do with the fact that you guys just been accused of fraud?
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He stared at me for about five seconds, turned around and walked away.
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I'm pretty sure he lost his job that day.
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Uh, so for about a year at that point, I was working a kind of dead end job
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as a grip and an electrician at a grip house in Washington DC originally called
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Washington Source, now called Red Star.
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They've since moved out of that location, but yeah, it took a
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little while, but eventually I did.
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The economy did recover.
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I gotta work on various films and TV shows.
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Captain America Two Veep, season one through Four, a little bit
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on House of Cards, Phil Amina.
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I did a bunch of movies, TV shows, and I kind of realized at a certain
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point I don't really enjoy this.
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I don't like it, even though I, I love movies and I love TV shows, but
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I realized I don't enjoy waking up at four o'clock in the morning to
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be on set for about 14 hours a day.
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Because it's a soul killing job.
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If you have hobbies, you're not gonna enjoy them.
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If you have a, a spouse or a partner, probably not gonna see them.
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If you have kids, you're probably not gonna see them, don't have pets.
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So it just gotta the point where I was like, why am I doing this?
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And then eventually I since turned in my union card in 2023.
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In September, 2023, I did finally turn in my card for IOI 4 87.
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And, uh, in 2016 I was, I jumped into stagehand stuff where I was
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just working in like concerts and corporate events, which, well, it
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doesn't pay as much and it's non-union.
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It's more my speed.
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I can set my own schedule.
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I don't always have to get up at 4:00 AM I can work a normal job.
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If I had continued to try to stay in the film business, I would
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never have written anything.
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So they say.
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Write what you know.
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And coming from the DMV, the Autumn Frost Series is based on a resident of the DMV.
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And so I wondered, as I was reading it, in your sort of sorted past and all
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the jobs you've had, were you ever a, as you say in the book, a two and from
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driver, did you drive for Uber or Lyft?
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No.
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Okay.
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No.
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No.
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I've no.
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I've never, I've never driven Lyft or anything like that.
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I, I questioned doing it at one point back when COVID was happening.
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'cause I was like, I kind of need some work.
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But eventually I got the unemployment for that and I was
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like, okay, I can relax for a bit.
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One of the things that people always say is, well, I don't know how to write.
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Well, here's how you become a writer.
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You just start, just start, pick a thing you want to talk
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about and just start writing.
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I did the kind of lead child thing, the writer of the Jack Reacher books, when
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he lost his job and he was outta work, he said, well, I've read a bunch of books.
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I could probably write one.
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How hard could it be?
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You don't realize how hard it is until you actually start
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doing it, so, but it is tough.
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I would kind of off and on, start working on various things.
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I'd started off various projects all the way, like the Skyhawk novel.
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That started as another project back when I was in film school
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in 2006, seven, something like that, called Seven Star Fighters.
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That was the, the seven moniker attached to a sci-fi storyline, and I kind of
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abandoned it 'cause I, I just wasn't good enough as a writer at that time.
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Also, I then realized there's another story that is that it's
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called Battle Beyond the Stars.
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It's a Roger Corman film.
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So I was like, okay, I'm gonna truck that out the window.
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Don't need to do that.
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So I kind of put it on ice and I would come back to Skyhawk every now and again.
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It just kept changing over and over again.
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There's like.
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Three or four aborted attempts.
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I probably still have those on a flash rep somewhere, and I'm sure if I looked
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at them now I'd go, woo, that's not good.
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So let's talk about the inspiration for Autumn Frost then.
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Are they based on true stories?
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Were these things you were reading in the news?
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Where'd you get the idea for this?
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Because Skyhawk was so political and it's it's very politically oriented story.
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I said, you know what?
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I need something that's just like some pulpy fun, just so people just
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jump in, read it, and jump out.
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Like you said, you read drive like hell very quickly on a plane.
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That's what I wanted.
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Something that you can just jump in, read it in one setting and you're done.
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It edges into politics, but it doesn't get super political.
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And one thing I was kind of interested in at the time was the fentanyl
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crisis that's going on right now.
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Right around the time I was working on drive like hell, the Trump
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administration declared fentanyl to be a weapon of mass destruction.
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First.
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I was like, that's kind of dumb.
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That doesn't make any sense.
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And a friend of mine, Patricia, who is a magistrate down in Peterburg,
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Virginia, she said, yeah, that's true.
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It is a weapon of mass destruction.
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It is an incredibly addictive drug.
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Drug Dealers will cut it.
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Into other things like cocaine or crack, so it becomes more addictive.
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It can destroy an entire community.
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It's a highly, highly addictive substance.
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And so I thought, well, what if somebody ends up with two pounds
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of this in the trunk of their car?
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It'd be really, really shocking.
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I've always had this thought in my mind, like if I, if I was like
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steal like diamonds or gold or something like that, it'd be.
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People think, oh, I'm rich.
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Now, my first thought would be, what the fuck am I supposed to do with this?
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I can't change this anywhere.
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What am I supposed to do with it?
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So if I ended up with two pounds of fentanyl, you might think,
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oh, I could sell this somewhere and make a ton of money.
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I wouldn't know what to do with it.
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I, I'd just be like, give it to somebody.
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I don't know.
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So the Autumn Frost series, the character herself is actually based on a cosplay
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I really liked named Autumn Ivy.
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Okay.
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Because I had this mental image of Dr. Beverly Crusher, played
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by Gates McFadden from Star Trek.
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Just, just the way you explained her physique and the way she spoke.
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And I was just like, I had this mental image.
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But I also noticed there was a theme.
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Redheads play a big role in your books because there's a main
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character in Skyhawk that's a redhead.
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There's a couple ancillary characters that are redheads,
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and then Autumn Frost is redhead.
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And I'm like, okay, he's got something going on there.
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I, I like redheads.
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I was like, but uh, the character is based on a, a cosplay like named Autumn Ivy.
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And at one point I was gonna have her do the audio book for, uh,
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Skyhawk and Drive like hell, but just schedules just don't match up.
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She's very, very busy, but the character is physically based on her.
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She's big and she's buff.
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She's got muscles everywhere.
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She has red hair, but a very, very sweet, cute face.
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And I was like, oh, that's just Autumn.
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That's it.
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I just wanted a character that doesn't have a ton of baggage.
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She doesn't have like a, a twisted, sorted pass.
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She wasn't assaulted as a child.
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Like, no, she's just a good person because Skyhawk is filled with a
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lot of morally ambiguous characters.
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I said, you know what?
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Can I just have just a good person this sequel to derive like hell that
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I'm working on right now, black and blue, which is based in Baltimore.
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The person she's protecting says, why did you save me?
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And she said it was the right thing to do.
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Don't need a reason.
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I like the fact that drive like hell is a quick read.
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It's a novella format, which you don't see much anymore.
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That was really popular, let's say in the 1970s.
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These little novella series, like little murder mysteries.
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Yeah.
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Quick and cheap.
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Yeah, and you're bringing that back and I thought that was really cool.
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In order to do that, you have to make it punchy and high
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octane and very quickly paced.
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It's not a short story, it's not an essay, it's not a book.
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It's somewhere in between.
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How did you find yourself writing something like that?
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That really hasn't been done in quite a long time.
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I just kind of found ways to keep the pace up.
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For example, the, uh, the Baskins character, the sociopathic hit woman
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that was invented because I realized.
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About chapter five, I was like, oh God, I'm gonna wrap
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this up in about five pages.
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I need some other kind of threat.
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'cause originally they were just gonna just drop the fentanyl off and drive away.
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And I was like, well this book's gonna be like 30 pages.
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I need more.
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And so introducing that character, it just felt like it was appropriate to bring in
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some other threat because these follow the standard bell curve structure of plot.
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Whereas Skyhawk is, there's not really a plot structure to it.
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It's kind of slice of life.
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Um, these follow the standard rising action.
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Hit the climax.
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Descending action.
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They knew ma very kind of standard structure because it's just, you need
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something to just jump in, follow on a very easy path and then get out.
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And so the characters in many ways are not necessarily underdeveloped,
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but they're kind of straightforward.
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Like there's not a lot of depth to them.
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You know, like the Cassie character.
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Not super in depth, but there's a little bit.
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'cause it's meant to be a very quick compressed timeframe.
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It only takes place over the course of like 12 hours.
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It's just one bad night on New Year's Eve.
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And black and blue is an even tighter timeframe.
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It takes place over the course of like five hours.
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It's really, really quick.
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You mentioned Baskin and again, mental images, right?
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So obviously you had Autumn Ivy in your mind for our main character, autumn Frost.
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But Baskin reminded me of Mr. Kaplan from Blacklist, which was Raymond
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Redingtons right hand sociopath.
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But I packaged it in this sort of.
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What if Lucy Lou was Mr. Kaplan?
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Like that's, that's the mental image I came up with.
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Am I, am I off base here?
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Uh, I've never seen Blacklist, so I couldn't, I couldn't
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really relate to that.
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I, I can't remember where, what the hell was the inspiration for Baskin?
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It was, um, oh, I'm trying to remember.
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Oh, it was, there's a moment in Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, Mr. And Mrs. Smith
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movie where Brad Pitt is at a card game.
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Somebody walks in and says, it is like something like, are you here for a job?
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And Brad Pitt goes, you are the job.
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And then just bam, bam, bam, bam.
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Just shoots everybody in the room.
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I was like, okay.
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That's just Basket's character.
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Just does her job.
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Keeps to herself.
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Not really associated with people.
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'cause uh, I was looking into what mental impairments could be useful as a hitman.
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I mean, you could also go back to, uh, Anton Sugar from No Country For
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old men, it clearly, a sociopath has no regard for anybody but himself.
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He gets away with it at the end, which is.
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The way the criminal justice system works these days, bad
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guys tend to get away with stuff.
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So let's talk about Autumn's adventures a little bit more.
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And obviously you're expanding her universe, you know, with
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black and blue and whatever else you have on the drawing board.
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Mm-hmm.
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It feels like her adventures could go in a hundred different directions, right?
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Because they're sort of absurd.
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Like I, and we tongue in cheek the idea of the Florida man story, but you
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hear some of these Florida man story headlines and you're just like, truth
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is stranger than fiction sometimes.
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But where do you plan?
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On taking her character, how far can you really go and how
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do you balance the absurd with the grounded in terms of plots?
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I just kind of come up with what would be interesting to me at the time.
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What are legitimate threats that we're dealing with currently in America?
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I mean, black and blue.
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The main threat is ice agents.
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There was that whistleblower came out, said that ICE agents
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are being trained to disobey the constitution and violate human rights.
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I was like, oh, okay.
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Then they're bad guys.
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Not one of them stood up and said, Hey, this is wrong.
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So I thought I said to myself, okay, what if I made them the villains?
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I don't have to explain anything.
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Everyone sees it now, and no matter where you land on the political
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spectrum, if you see people being dragged outta their homes.
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This is inherently wrong.
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And so black and blue is about autumn protecting a 15-year-old
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kid who is on the run from ice, and it's a case of mistaken identity.
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They got the wrong person.
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The wrong person was listed on their poll sheet, like, whoop,
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we gotta bring this person in.
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It's like, no, that's the wrong name.
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But they're already committed.
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So they say, well, the hell with it, let's just get 'em anyways.
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And then the third one that's gonna be probably coming out around
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September called Funland Fury.
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Autumn is gonna be on vacation with her girlfriend Becky in Rehoboth
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Beach, and they're at a nightclub one night and there's a shooting.
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Very much is similar to the Pulse nightclub shooting that
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happened down in Florida.
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And it turns out there is a neo-Nazi initiation ritual happening.
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Gotta kill somebody.
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And so Autumn, instead of being sort of on the run like she is in the first
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two books, she is out for revenge.
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Oh, interesting.
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Yeah.
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One of her friends gets killed at the nightclub and so she's taking a more
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proactive approach in the third book.
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Alright, well this being a. We're gonna put air quotes, car show, you
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know, cars play a central role in Autumn's world as a to and from driver.
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And they're practical characters in the story.
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I mean, you talk a lot about her Honda, right?
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And yeah, the Honda Accord.
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I have so many questions.
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I could put so many threads and I'm like, why?
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Why a Honda Accord?
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Because it's plain Jane.
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Normal.
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It is.
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But then I kept thinking, well, is it the four cylinder?
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Is it the sixth?
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Well, she doesn't drive a stick.
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I figured that out.
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She knows how to drive a stick.
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All right.
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She knows how to drive a stick, which she, Dr. She does get one in black
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and blue, and there's a bit where somebody meets up with her and she has
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to drive his car 'cause he's been shot in the shoulder so he can't drive.
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And it's a Subaru and she says A Subaru.
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Really?
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Yeah.
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But the, but the Subaru is a manual.
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It's a stick shift and it's got a supercharger in it.
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So it's like, oh, this is gonna be great for a chase sequence.
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Great.
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We're gonna totally overpower these guys.
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So it's, it's fun things like that where you say, well, the
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Subaru's got a supercharger in it.
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'cause it's like, okay, so that's some fast and furious mods.
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'cause it came with turbos from the factory.
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Mm-hmm.
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So I found little things like that as a car nerd.
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They just kind of stuck out at me like the scene at the mall.
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Where she's trying to evade the guy in the old Land Rover, which
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if you've ever driven a Land Rover of that era, they're not that fast.
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That made me laugh for one, but then she's like up on two wheels and I'm like,
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oh wow, this is getting interesting.
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I would've assumed Honda Accord icy night, that would've under steered and
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maybe she would've rubbed the jersey wall going down the ramp or something.
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I was like, okay, well he put up on two wheels.
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I'll take it.
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I'll take it.
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You know, you take the absurd with the realistic.
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Yeah, like the tire change scene.
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I don't wanna give any.
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Spoilers out, but I'm so glad it didn't escalate.
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'cause I was like, spare tire, this is gonna get really good, really quick 'cause
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uh, it's not gonna hold up to her previous driving, you know, stuff like that.
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Mm. So I was thankful for those little tidbits, those little extras.
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And then again, as a car nerd, things stuck out to me and I'm like, well.
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Mm-hmm.
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Weird thing, I'm not a supercar nerd.
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I do like vehicles.
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I li I appreciate them.
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I currently drive a, uh, a Hyundai Tucson.
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Not a great car.
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'cause my previous car was a Buick Sare and I love that thing
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because hey now, hey, it was a very efficient car, great gas mileage,
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smooth ride, and then I hit a deer.
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So, so my mother was looking to get rid of her car, so I inherited the Tucson
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and she got something else for herself.
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I got this one for free.
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So in drive like hell, is that deer hitting scene, is that
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part of your actual experience?
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Yeah,
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it was there because I needed to get rid of one of these trucks that's chasing
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her, and I was like, well, I did hit a deer last time, so I wanted to do that.
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It wasn't as bad as that.
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It, it was just, I kind of just bumped it and it fell forward
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and then it got up and ran off.
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But it was enough damage that it was so out of date that they said,
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yeah, insurance isn't gonna cover it.
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It's basically just, just totaled.
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It would drive fine.
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It's just I can't drive something that's damaged like that on the road.
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I found the car chase scenes, which there are a lot of in drive like hell
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to be entertaining, especially because growing up in that area as well, I
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knew the roads you were talking about.
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I was like, I know exactly where they're going.
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I'm like, I can visualize that intersection in my head right now.
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I don't know if I would've survived it the same way she did some of those cases.
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She's bad luck in life, which she's good luck in driving.
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Yeah, that's what everybody keeps saying in the book.
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So I, I thoroughly enjoyed that and I expect to see that obviously.
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In black and blue and in the, in the following ones as well.
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So that being said, do you feel like you're gonna grow that
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because it is the central point she's driving and she's out there.
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What do the future car chase scenes look like?
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Can you give us some idea of like, do you get a little bit
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more into the driving part of it?
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Uh, well definitely in black and blue.
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I mean, first chapter it starts off, it's like right on the road.
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Kid jumps in the backseat is being chased by ice agents.
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They speed off, they're in Canton in uh, Baltimore.
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She makes a drop off of there.
17:40
And after her lunch breaks, kid jumps in, they speed off, and they try hiding
17:44
out in a factory that's been closed down.
17:46
And agents, uh, surround the building and they realize there's only one
17:49
way out that loading ramp for where they bring tractor trailers in.
17:53
So it's like she's gonna pull a fast and furious and leap out of it.
17:56
Unlike the Fast and Furious movies where cars are impervious, the moment she lands
18:01
like, okay, wheels shaking, there's a vibration in the pedals, what's going on?
18:06
Like just a tiny drop of like three feet.
18:08
Immediately something goes wrong.
18:10
So do you see a future for Autumn where.
18:13
Again, based in the area that we live in and the resources we have
18:17
available to us, where maybe she becomes one of the defensive drivers
18:21
for like Department of State.
18:22
I don't know if you're aware, but that training actually happens at
18:25
Summit Point, Motorsports Park.
18:26
Oh, I didn't know that.
18:27
Yeah, West Virginia.
18:28
That's where they train all the Department of State people.
18:30
So like do you see a future for her where she goes into.
18:33
Law enforcement or something like that, or is that too far in the future for her?
18:37
Uh, that's probably too far in the future.
18:39
I did have an idea where a politician jumps in the back of her car, like
18:43
there's some kind of an assassination attempt and the agents like, shove
18:46
the, uh, politician in the back seat.
18:47
Just say, just get outta here.
18:48
We'll tell you where to meet up.
18:50
Like, I'm just not sure how to get to that one.
18:52
You referenced in the book about she lost her welding job and she mm-hmm.
18:56
You know, she got the to and from gig and, and now her life is driving and
18:59
to me I was like, wow, that'd be a really cool progression if like in a
19:03
TV show where suddenly she went from pulling herself by her bootstraps,
19:07
losing the job that she had for such a long time, and now becomes like this
19:10
superstar part of Department of State.
19:12
Like I could see that'd be a cool way to sunset that adventure in
19:16
some ways where she became a. Super heroine in a way that could happen.
19:20
The issue though is if you look at the current department of state, they
19:23
have basically said LGBT characters or people like that, not welcome here.
19:29
So we're going backwards in that direction.
19:30
She is, at one point, I was gonna say, she's a straight up lesbian and
19:32
I think that she's just pan right open to everything, but she does have a
19:36
girlfriend that's not really gonna fly with the current political administration
19:39
because this is set in Trump's America.
19:42
Got it.
19:42
Yeah.
19:42
Yeah, I, I think I could probably get to maybe her being sort of a bodyguard.
19:47
I had one idea about her being a bouncer at one point at a club,
19:51
maybe doing something like that because in black and blue, due to
19:53
the events of drive like hell, she has a little arsenal in her car now.
19:57
She has, um, all non-lethal weapons.
19:59
She has a taser, a, an extendable baton, mace, and a. There was
20:03
something else I had in there as well.
20:05
Anyways.
20:06
She has like non-lethal stuff.
20:07
The two rules I had for myself was writing this, this series, she
20:10
has to be in a vehicle at least three-fourths of the time driving.
20:14
And two, she'll never fire a gun, never fires a gun.
20:17
Because I remember seeing a movie called Entrapment years ago with Sean
20:20
Connery and Katherine Jada Jones and Sean Connery says, captain Jada Jones.
20:24
He says, never own a gun.
20:25
You'll be too tempted to use it.
20:27
Interesting.
20:28
Yeah, I like that.
20:28
I needed to put some restrictions on myself.
20:30
'cause the more barriers and boxes you put yourself in as a writer, the
20:33
more creative you can get as a story.
20:35
Since we're talking about universe building, let's switch gears a
20:38
little bit away from Autumn Frost and the Autumn Frosts series and
20:42
talk a little bit more about Skyhawk.
20:44
Mm-hmm.
20:45
Skyhawk is a lot longer than Autumn Frost.
20:48
Yeah.
20:48
I had a lot to get outta my system, and I will say it reads fast.
20:52
I gotta pay you a huge compliment because in terms of tone.
20:55
This feels more like Earnest Klein.
20:58
It's very much more like ready player one in terms of style compared to
21:03
Autumn Frost, which is very fast and very easy to get through.
21:06
I've been enjoying Skyhawk, but in, in the back of my head, I'm always going, I
21:10
wonder if this part came from the game.
21:11
I gotta go back and play it.
21:12
You know?
21:13
I got all my old NES cartridges and stuff.
21:15
I'm like, where did he get his inspiration for that?
21:17
Although there were no spinning space docks or anything like that.
21:20
Yeah, none of that.
21:22
But it's all good.
21:23
But.
21:23
He's such a interesting character.
21:25
There's a lot of things going on.
21:27
Not yet Captain, but Cyril Eisner, his flight handle is Skyhawk.
21:31
Call sign, call sign.
21:32
Yeah.
21:32
It's call sign is Skyhawk.
21:33
Which is funny because that's the name of his ship and it is like you gave your
21:36
ship and the call sign the same thing.
21:37
He is like, well, it's too good.
21:38
I can't, can not use it's, it's overconfident and a little pretentious.
21:42
Well, that's kind of the point.
21:43
He is overcompensating.
21:45
Tell us about Skyhawk.
21:47
I get that the inspiration is from the NES Classic, but where
21:50
are you going with this one?
21:52
That one is a much more personal story 'cause Cyril is based 70% on me.
21:56
I started writing that in earnest in, I think it was August of
21:59
2024, when I was like, okay.
22:02
I have a lot to get outta my system 'cause I'd had like a
22:04
bad falling out with somebody.
22:05
I had a thing for a lot of relationships, kind of imploded one after another.
22:10
And at the time I had another po.
22:11
I had a podcast that I was working on at the time for film and tv,
22:15
and that was beginning to wrap up.
22:16
So I needed some sort of creative outlet.
22:18
So I said, why don't I just start writing Skyhawk?
22:20
Why don't I just start with that?
22:22
So it's intended to be the first in a series of seven.
22:25
The character came out of me just trying to get a lot of junk outta
22:29
my system, like Cyril's father.
22:31
That's based upon a combination of my father and my stepfather, the life that
22:34
he leads as a freelance star fighter.
22:36
That's basically just my freelance life.
22:39
Uh, he.
22:40
Likes to work out.
22:41
I enjoy going to the gym and working out.
22:43
And so he has an addiction to coffee.
22:45
I'm addicted to coffee.
22:46
I'm up to three cups a day.
22:47
I know my kidneys hate me.
22:49
Uh, so, but yeah, he also has a lot of mental issues.
22:53
Probably some sort of bipolar problem, probably some anger issues
22:57
that comes in a little bit later.
22:58
And he is a womanizer.
23:00
He sleeps around a bit, and I've since gotten out of that part of my life.
23:04
I'm 40 now.
23:05
I gotta kind of stop doing that, you know.
23:07
But, uh, yeah, it, it kind of was me just sort of what would I like to read?
23:11
What would I enjoy reading?
23:12
And I got to meet one of my writing inspirations, Lee Child,
23:15
who writes the Jack Reacher books.
23:17
I met him in 2019 at the Hamilton in Washington, dc.
23:22
I told him I was a struggling writer.
23:24
I was trying to figure out what I wanted to talk about, and he just
23:26
said, just write what you enjoy and have fun while you're doing it.
23:29
And that's basically what he did with his first book Killing
23:31
Floor, which now super well known.
23:33
It's not a great book, but it's, it's a good first attempt for a writer.
23:37
It the early Jack Reacher books.
23:38
There's some questionable parts in them.
23:40
So I just started writing Skyhawk the way I wanted it.
23:43
Like what do I want?
23:44
He's an ACE pilot.
23:45
He does the right thing.
23:47
He's probably got some anger problems, but he ultimately will
23:49
do the right thing no matter what.
23:51
He cares about his team, but he also doesn't like the idea of
23:54
command 'cause at a certain point later on, he really fucks up.
23:57
No spoilers.
23:58
He fucks up really, really bad.
24:01
I put in, a lot of those characters are based on people that I know,
24:04
like Jess is based on close friend of mine, ghosty Muffin cosplay named
24:08
withheld upon request for her privacy.
24:11
But yeah, that's just her.
24:12
There's an actual artwork image of her in the book that's her, that is just her
24:15
face and she does have a split tongue.
24:17
So yeah, there's lots of characters that are based on people that I
24:20
know, and I put them all into the book and they all appreciated it.
24:24
For the folks that might start reading your books, and they may start with
24:28
the Autumn Frost series and then jump over to Skyhawk like I did.
24:32
There's a big question that I have about Skyhawk that maybe other people
24:36
will come to the same conclusion I did pretty quickly, because it's something
24:39
you realize very early in the book.
24:41
The first chapter sort of sets the tone politically.
24:45
Yeah.
24:45
700 years after the revolution, we all went on to space.
24:49
Yeah.
24:49
And these things happen.
24:50
I'm exaggerating the dateline here.
24:51
The prologue.
24:52
Yeah.
24:52
Yeah.
24:52
Everybody kept telling me to cut that prologue.
24:54
It was like, it's too long.
24:55
It, it's not important.
24:56
It's like, no, it, it, it, it's necessary.
24:58
It is, it, it makes me understand, okay, we're not on earth.
25:02
But there's earth-like things, you know, we're in proxima B and there's
25:05
all the surrounding new alien species that are very humanoid or you know,
25:10
sort of like Star Trek, where the Vulcans are basically humans with
25:13
pointy, they're like elves, right?
25:14
I mean, yeah.
25:15
I didn't want people with head tendrils walking around.
25:16
There's no twills in this universe.
25:18
Exactly.
25:19
But the one thing that I struggle with, and I'm wondering if anybody
25:23
else will, and I'm, this is why I'm asking you to explain it, is.
25:26
When we get to Proxima B, where I'm just gonna say, captain Skyhawk
25:30
lives and makes his life, right?
25:32
Mm-hmm.
25:32
It is very much like Earth.
25:34
There's cars and there's regular planes, and there's this and
25:37
there's that, and there's the coffee shops and the police precinct and
25:40
all these things that I'm like.
25:41
But aren't we so many years in the future?
25:44
Sh I I felt like it's slightly devoid of sci-fi, which is not a bad thing.
25:49
But what I'm asking is why did you make the choice not to set it in, let's
25:53
say the same timeline as Star Trek?
25:56
The next generation would've been in.
25:58
The main reason is because.
25:59
When you're writing sci-fi, you're not talking about the future, you're talking
26:02
about the time in which you're living.
26:04
I'm a hardcore cynic.
26:05
My professional name on the podcast that used to be part
26:08
of was the professional cynic.
26:10
I, I think we're at the point where this is as good as it gets.
26:13
I don't think we're gonna really improve beyond this.
26:16
There's a really good book series I like call the Remembrance
26:19
of Earth's past trilogy.
26:20
Three body problem, dark forest and deaths end.
26:23
And in that book it does get very ridiculous and kind of super sci-fi
26:28
by the time you get to the second book and where people are using unique
26:31
forms of transportation to get around, people are living in underground
26:34
cities because up top, it's nearly unlivable due to climate change.
26:37
And that's.
26:38
Great, but it's not relatable.
26:41
And I wanted things that are more relatable, more believable.
26:44
And the reason I explained the situation on earth is because
26:46
in book six we go back to Earth.
26:48
Like I have the whole series planned out.
26:50
We're going back to earth at some point, and it's wrecked.
26:53
Ah, okay.
26:54
It does get cleaned up a bit because there's less people there.
26:57
That's the big problem we're having now is that there's just too many people.
27:00
There's just too many people.
27:01
Like this planet was not built to house 8.5 billion people.
27:04
It's built for like four, and I think we're about to go through massive
27:07
die off pretty soon, which is what happens in the book, the Dark Forest,
27:11
which is that there's this timeframe called the Great Ravine where due to.
27:15
Misallocation of funds, climate change and militarization of various
27:20
nations due to this impending alien invasion, 5 billion people die.
27:25
And I feel like that's what we're headed towards right now.
27:27
We're not getting off this planet, let's just be honest.
27:29
We're not getting off this planet.
27:30
And so I wanted things that are more relatable because I, I'm a big fan of the
27:32
Expanse books as well as well, also the, uh, the TV show, which is phenomenal.
27:36
And that does feel like realistic sci-fi.
27:39
If you wanna see what the future's like.
27:40
This is pretty much it.
27:41
And it looks generally like what we do now.
27:44
Yeah, there's a little more technology.
27:46
They have some holograms, which I didn't care for.
27:48
And I also prefer the Alien and Star Wars design of the used universe.
27:54
Things are kind of broken down.
27:55
Things are kind of running on empty, things are kind of
27:58
scratched up and scuffed up.
27:59
Like Cy Skyhawk is constantly being repaired, so there's like
28:02
plates that are misshapen and.
28:04
Coloring is wrong.
28:05
It's like it's things are just barely holding together.
28:08
I wanted it to feel a little more relatable.
28:10
Like there's a point later on in, I don't think you've reached this point.
28:13
They go to a pizzeria in the future.
28:14
Like there, there's a, there's a pizzeria.
28:16
Why?
28:16
Because there's always gonna be pizzerias in the future.
28:18
Like it's always gonna be that.
28:20
Well, and I think that's part of its charm.
28:21
It just feels very normal.
28:23
It feels very relatable, even though.
28:26
The Skyhawk series picks up, if I remember from the prologue, it's
28:29
like 200 years from now or 250 years from now or something like that.
28:33
Mm-hmm.
28:34
So it's in the not so distant future.
28:36
Yeah.
28:36
What I noticed was there weren't gigantic technological leaps outside of
28:41
his ship and a couple of other things.
28:43
Yeah.
28:43
I felt that that was believable.
28:45
Now you do take a massive leap with the foil system.
28:48
Yeah.
28:49
Where they're doing the basically faster than light type transport
28:52
teleporting type of thing.
28:54
We recently did achieve it.
28:55
We did achieve it.
28:55
I, I think just recently, I think, think it was a, we teleported,
29:00
I wanna say it was an atom from one end of a room to another.
29:03
So technically we have achieved teleportation.
29:06
Technically, uh, there's a lot of hoops to jump through to get to it,
29:09
but we have technically achieved it.
29:11
It's basically the Battlestar Galactica thing with the FTL drives.
29:15
That's, that's all it is.
29:16
I just need to get from point A to point B much faster because.
29:19
If I was to just not have that, I would have to use something like
29:22
what they do in The Expanse, which is the Epstein Drive, unfortunate
29:25
name or something like Mass Effect, where they use the mass generators.
29:29
Yeah.
29:30
But even that, that series relies upon, well, we found this alien
29:33
technology that we don't understand.
29:35
It's like, eh, I don't really want that.
29:37
It's.
29:38
The closest I get to that is in chapter three, where uh, they go to this planet
29:43
where they find these ancient ruins and there's like this whole alien
29:46
civilization that's been wiped out.
29:47
It's like, no, that's the closest you get.
29:49
It's like going and visiting like the Incan Temples in Mexico.
29:52
It's just an ex exploration of something that was bigger.
29:55
That's all you get.
29:56
It felt very Indiana Jones there for a minute.
29:59
Yeah, and then it ended sort of Jurassic Parky, which I liked.
30:02
I enjoyed that whole chapter though too.
30:03
That was very much inspired by the video game.
30:05
Hell divers.
30:06
Ah, there you go.
30:07
Yeah, because I was, I was super into playing Hell Divers.
30:10
I had a whole team I would play with.
30:11
We would jump on every night, jump into hell divers two, and we would drop in and
30:15
it was just always killing bugs and bots.
30:16
It was so much fun.
30:17
So bugs were on my mind.
30:19
I was like, I'm gonna put that in.
30:20
Yeah.
30:20
So the one thing I found funny though, to talk about the future by way of Skyhawk,
30:25
was that you kept the cell phone around.
30:27
Yep.
30:28
I mean, I don't say how big it is or how small it is, right.
30:31
In terms of like communications, like I remember seeing an interview with
30:35
the Expanse writers and they said, these people like Mark Zuckerberg,
30:38
think we're gonna have like implants in our heads and we're gonna have like
30:41
biomechanical parts shoved into us.
30:42
And all the writers that were like, no, that sounds terrible.
30:45
Why would anybody want that?
30:47
That sounds awful.
30:48
What if it breaks down?
30:49
What if you're trying to like download a file to like a chip in your head
30:52
and you don't have enough, you're not connected to a wifi, you can't get it.
30:55
Why would you want that?
30:57
It's like, yeah, so I just, I feel like the phone will always be around.
31:00
It's the 21st century slave bracelet.
31:03
It's like we're stuck with it.
31:04
Like, I don't think it's gonna disappear.
31:06
It might change its shape.
31:07
It might look a little different, but it's, I think we're
31:10
just gonna be stuck with it.
31:11
I don't see it really changing too much.
31:14
Like I said, I'm a professional cynic.
31:15
I don't see us moving too far away from the phone.
31:18
Let's switch gears here a little bit since you've made the journey
31:22
into not just one, but two series of books, what else are you working on?
31:28
Got a third series in there that you're cooking up.
31:30
I have a one off science fiction book about artificial filmmaking that
31:34
I'm working on called Artificial or.
31:37
The denouncement of false creativity.
31:39
I see all these AI videos that pop up on social media, and I'm just like, Ugh.
31:43
It drives me nuts.
31:44
I can't stand it.
31:45
And you just look at the environmental devastation that it causes.
31:47
It's like, this isn't worth it.
31:48
But yeah, it's about how I think the film industry is gonna look in the future.
31:53
Everything has been consolidated into one studio.
31:56
There's no competition left, and everything is done by mainly one or two
32:00
people to make a movie, and everything is just made in an artificial environment.
32:04
Actors sell off their likenesses so they can just make money off
32:07
of their likeness, but they don't actually show up to do anything.
32:10
It delves into the concept of super intelligence with artificial
32:14
intelligence, and that's.
32:15
If it achieves that, what would that look like?
32:18
How would that affect society?
32:20
What are the environmental effects of that?
32:21
How does an AI come to terms with its own existence when all it knows how to
32:25
do is just that one thing to make movies?
32:28
It's that Rick and Morty bit the Butter Robot.
32:30
Pass the butter.
32:31
Yes.
32:31
What is my purpose?
32:32
You pass butter, but what is my purpose?
32:34
You pass the butter.
32:35
Oh my God.
32:36
Yeah.
32:36
Welcome to the club.
32:38
Imagine telling that to a super intelligent machine.
32:40
It has nowhere to go.
32:42
It's like it's stuck in a box.
32:43
It would lose its mind, but does it really have a mind?
32:46
If it's super intelligent, it's aware of itself.
32:49
That's true.
32:49
It's aware, sentient, right?
32:51
Yeah.
32:51
So is there a passion project, something you've always wanted to write about
32:55
that would be totally off of the stuff you've been working on now?
32:58
I mean, I've got a bunch of the Autumn Frost series working on, I'm, I'm still
33:01
working on the seven Star fighters books.
33:02
I'm working on book two, which is called Seven Star Fighters.
33:04
Sorcerers Gambit takes place about 20 months after the end of Skyhawk.
33:08
Basically a big war breaks out after the end of that war.
33:11
The human race basically loses they capitulate and say, yes,
33:14
we give in, we're done fighting.
33:16
The story is basically a prison escape storyline.
33:18
It delves into, I dunno if you've ever heard of this thing called Unit 7 31.
33:21
Back in World War ii, there was a Japanese medical program called
33:25
Unit 7 31 for human experimentation.
33:28
They said it was experimentation, it was actually torture.
33:30
Really, really grim time.
33:33
And the worst part is that there were no survivors and no one was prosecuted.
33:36
Again, you're on this journey of many, many thousands of words.
33:41
Mm-hmm.
33:41
What would you say to, you know, an aspiring author, somebody that's you
33:46
a couple years ago, five years ago, 10 years ago, that's thinking about writing
33:49
a book, like you mentioned, write what you know, and, and you said at the top of
33:52
the conversation, how hard could it be?
33:54
Famous last words on top gear as well.
33:56
Yeah.
33:57
So what have you learned and what advice can you share for aspiring authors?
34:01
Number one, have an editor.
34:02
Uh, absolutely get an editor.
34:04
Uh, my, my editor, Brian Paone, who's also a writer in Maryland, great editor.
34:08
Also, he points out some continuity issues with some of my, some of my work.
34:12
Also, make sure to have people read your stuff before you start to publish it.
34:16
Make sure you get feedback.
34:18
Make sure that.
34:19
You're also a reader as well.
34:21
You can't write if you don't read.
34:23
Read everything.
34:24
Read literally everything you can.
34:26
Crime fiction, read biographies, read horror, read the classics, you know, but
34:31
read anything and everything that you can.
34:33
You have to be a reader.
34:34
If you're gonna write, like I'm currently in the middle of Thomas Pins, gravity's
34:37
Rainbow, which I'm not enjoying.
34:40
I don't like it, but I feel like I have to read it because it's considered a literary
34:43
classic and I feel like I should read it.
34:46
I'm also in the middle of Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace,
34:49
which I am enjoying very long book.
34:51
Feels like the ramblings of a madman, but it's very good.
34:54
And I'm also in the middle of the next volume of a series called Hammer Slammers
34:58
by David Drake, about a mercenary tank battalion in the year 3000.
35:02
That very much inspired a lot of skyhawk in that in the future
35:05
all warfare is fought with pmcs.
35:08
There are no official militaries anymore.
35:10
Easier to just pay people, well to fight for you rather than using patriotism.
35:14
It's like, well, if nobody believes in your country, it's not gonna matter.
35:17
But if you pay them well, they will absolutely show up as a writer, especially
35:21
in today's times, you know, a lot of folks have always relied on publishing
35:26
companies, but there's been a new trend, especially for younger authors, to go
35:29
the self-published route, especially through organizations like Amazon.
35:33
For those aspiring writers, is that something you would recommend?
35:36
Do self-publishing or go through a proper publisher?
35:38
What has your experience been like for that?
35:40
I tried pitching Skyhawk to various agents, and I got a lot
35:44
of rejections because it's not a traditional writing format.
35:47
Very much inspired by Derek Robinson's Hornet Squadron books,
35:50
which are written very slice of life.
35:51
There's not really a traditional plot structure.
35:53
There's not the standard bell curve, very morally ambiguous characters,
35:56
and I got a lot of rejections also.
35:58
Length of it.
35:59
Kind of put a lot of people off.
36:00
So if you are really passionate about a story and really think this
36:04
could be something, I would say go ahead and do self-publishing.
36:07
Just know you are gonna pay a lot of money, so if you can afford it,
36:11
go ahead and do the self-publishing.
36:12
I go through Ingram Spark, which is very efficient.
36:15
They're a little on the slow side, but overall I've had pretty good experiences.
36:19
It's also efficient in terms of payments.
36:21
Every three months, you get a nice little check and direct
36:24
deposited to your accounts.
36:25
I get a nice, like 10 bucks every three months, which is nice.
36:28
They do take a cut because it's basically print to order and it does link up
36:32
to things like eBooks and Amazon and books a Million and things like that.
36:35
So if you look there, you can find that stuff.
36:38
But if you go to Ingram Spark, it does go more directly to them.
36:41
So it's not like a six degrees separation kind of thing.
36:44
It is a tough thing to self-publish because you have
36:47
to do a lot of it yourself.
36:48
You have to market it yourself, you have to share it yourself, signings.
36:52
You have to organize that yourself.
36:53
Whereas if you're going through an actual publisher.
36:56
They handle that, they handle the marketing, they get it out there, and so
36:59
it's a little bit more efficient for them.
37:01
But, uh, self-publishing, I haven't really had too many problems.
37:04
Like I could have pitched Autumn Frost as a series to some major publisher, and
37:09
they probably would've taken it because it's a very straightforward story.
37:12
But they would've said, oh, make it longer.
37:13
Make it like 150 to 200 pages.
37:15
And I didn't want that because I just want 'em to be short, sweet to the point.
37:19
But they're not gonna publish a book that's only about 80 to a hundred pages.
37:22
So I just said, I'll just do it myself.
37:24
And in today's publishing world, it's a mixed media format too.
37:27
So we're just talking about printed media, and you mentioned eBooks in there.
37:31
Do you see a future where Autumn Frost, or even Skyhawk will show
37:36
up maybe on Audible as a audiobook?
37:38
I am working on that.
37:39
The problem with that is that it's very expensive.
37:41
I did finally get somebody that would be willing to do the audiobook.
37:47
Friend of mine, she's a musician in Maryland, and she will more than
37:51
likely be doing the, uh, audiobook for Skyhawk and drive like hell.
37:55
And so.
37:55
I would probably just pay her directly and then I'll have the audio file and
37:58
then I'll just send that to Audible and they'll have to approve it because she is
38:01
a musician, she has the proper equipment for it, so it shouldn't be a problem.
38:04
But yeah, it, I kept trying to get other people to do it, and schedules didn't
38:08
work out, and I saw people's rates on various websites for what they wanted.
38:12
It was like $3,000 for Skyhawk, and I was like, I can't afford that.
38:15
That's three thousand's way outta my price range.
38:17
But yeah, because Skyhawk technically to print it, publish it, edit.
38:21
All that stuff was about 5K.
38:23
So I'll never make return on investment for Skyhawk, but it's mine.
38:26
That is exactly what I wanted.
38:28
So with doing something like an audiobook, at one point I was gonna do it myself,
38:32
but I just, I just don't have the time.
38:33
I just don't have the time.
38:34
It's just way too time intensive.
38:36
It's better to just pay somebody, have them do it professionally, and then I can
38:40
send that off to some audiobook publisher and then they can handle it from there.
38:44
So I'm working on it.
38:45
It takes time.
38:46
Well with that, Jesse, we've reached that part of the episode where I like
38:49
to invite our guests to share any shout outs, thank yous, promotions, or anything
38:53
else we haven't covered thus far.
38:54
Things like how do we get a copy of the Autumn Frost Series or Skyhawk?
38:58
You can find both of these on Ingram Spark, or you can
39:02
find them over on Amazon.
39:03
There's links to places like Books A Million pretty much.
39:06
If you just Google it, it should pop up just fine.
39:09
Although the Amazon one, it does have another.
39:11
Cover that I rejected at a certain point because apparently the artist
39:15
was using an AI tracing program and I said, Nope, you're fired.
39:19
So they lied.
39:20
They said, yeah, I did it by hand.
39:21
And then I saw it and I was like, no, that's an AI tracing program.
39:24
You traced over another cover.
39:26
I see it right now.
39:27
So I had to fire them.
39:28
And unfortunately, the one that's on Amazon is the old cover.
39:31
So if you want the new cover, go to IngramSpark and get the
39:34
new one directly from that.
39:35
Well, and since we're talking about covers.
39:37
Wanna talk about the font on Skyhawk?
39:39
It's just the Captain Skyhawk font.
39:42
It is just, it's because I checked with the National Archives for
39:46
Copyright Registry and because that game is so old, Nintendo did
39:50
not re-up the copyright on it.
39:51
It's technically, I think, public domain.
39:54
So I just said, I'm just gonna take that.
39:56
I had my artist, Fark Poko, who's an artist over in Hungary.
40:00
I found him on Artscape.
40:01
He does a lot of Star Wars stuff.
40:02
I said, you have a really good look.
40:04
I'm gonna hire you.
40:04
So it's like 500 for the front cover and it was well worth it.
40:07
It's a great cover.
40:07
I love it.
40:08
At one point he was gonna do like a different kind of font for it.
40:11
It was gonna be a different kind of design, and we went through it
40:13
like a dozen different versions, and I just said, just use the
40:16
original Captain Skyhawk font.
40:17
It just looks better.
40:19
And the way it kind of swooshes around the, uh, the wing kind of
40:21
swooshes around the, uh, the title.
40:23
It just looked too good.
40:24
I was like, no, just do that.
40:26
Prefer that there is gonna be a change to it because once book two
40:29
comes out, I am gonna redo the title and it's gonna be called Skyhawk,
40:33
A Seven Star Fighters Prequel.
40:35
'cause this is meant to be the setup for the next six books.
40:38
This will continue in, uh, ongoing form once the second book is done.
40:43
These books take a long time to finish.
40:44
Yeah.
40:45
And these are retailing four.
40:46
Skyhawk is 20 and drive like hell is 10.
40:49
There you go.
40:50
Yeah.
40:50
Well, that's gonna wrap up our ride through this wild, weird
40:54
and wonderfully unhinged world of Autumn Frost, as well as skyhawk.
40:57
And huge thanks to Jesse Fresco for hanging out with us and pulling back the
41:01
curtain on the Florida man fueled madness That powers drive like hell, as well
41:05
as the upcoming sequel, black and Blue.
41:07
It's not every day you get to talk to someone who can turn chaos, questionable
41:10
car chases, and pure adrenaline into storytelling style that feels this alive.
41:16
So if today's conversation has you itching for more of Autumn's
41:19
Misadventures, good news.
41:20
This novella is just the ignition spark and Jesse's already building
41:24
out the larger autumn frost universe.
41:26
And if what we heard today is any indication, the upcoming stories
41:30
are going to crank the insanity, the humor, and the horsepower even higher.
41:34
And of course, keep your eyes on the horizon for Skyhawk.
41:37
Jesse's next big series, and it takes flight with a retro inspired punch
41:41
tipping its hat to the NES classic Captain Skyhawk, while launching a whole
41:45
new world of high flying adventure.
41:47
So if you love bold characters, big stakes.
41:49
And that's signature Jesse Fresco Energy.
41:52
You're going to want to be there from page one and beyond.
41:55
So thanks for listening and thanks for riding along.
41:57
And as always, buckle up, stay curious, and if you're dying for
42:00
more automotive floor demand stories, don't miss our monthly drive through
42:04
News series here on Break Fix.
42:06
And with that, Jesse, I can't thank you enough for sharing your evening with us.
42:09
Keep up the great work.
42:10
I'm looking forward to the misadventures of Autumn Frost and all her car hijinx.
42:15
And again, it's been an awesome ride so far with Skyhawk and I can't
42:18
wait to see where this goes to.
42:19
Oh, I think you're really gonna enjoy the, uh, there's one battle that I was
42:23
really proud of riding the Battle of Lightfoot Station towards the tail end.
42:27
I'm really proud of that 'cause there's a bit where.
42:29
People forget about a pilot that ejected out of his ship and everyone kind of
42:32
goes, Hey, are we forgetting something?
42:34
Oh shit, we forgot him.
42:36
There's a lot of dark humor towards the tail end of the book.
42:38
I'm very happy with that.
42:39
So think you're gonna enjoy it.
42:45
We hope you enjoyed another awesome episode of Break Fix Podcast, brought
42:49
to you by Grand Tour Motorsports.
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