Spotlight (Guest Post): Alias Hook by Lisa Jensen @StMartinsPress #adultlit

Title: Alias Hook
Author: Lisa Jensen
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin (Macmillan)
Paperback Release Date: May 5, 2015
"Every child knows how the story ends. The wicked pirate captain is flung overboard, caught in the jaws of the monster crocodile who drags him down to a watery grave. But it was not yet my time to die. It's my fate to be trapped here forever, in a nightmare of childhood fancy, with that infernal, eternal boy."

Meet Captain James Benjamin Hook, a witty, educated Restoration-era privateer cursed to play villain to a pack of malicious little boys in a pointless war that never ends. But everything changes when Stella Parrish, a forbidden grown woman, dreams her way to the Neverland in defiance of Pan's rules. From the glamour of the Fairy Revels, to the secret ceremonies of the First Tribes, to the mysterious underwater temple beneath the Mermaid Lagoon, the magical forces of the Neverland open up for Stella as they never have for Hook. And in the pirate captain himself, she begins to see someone far more complex than the storybook villain.

With Stella's knowledge of folk and fairy tales, she might be Hook's last chance for redemption and release if they can break his curse before Pan and his warrior boys hunt her down and drag Hook back to their neverending game. Alias Hook by Lisa Jensen is a beautifully and romantically written adult fairy tale.

Praise for Alias Hook

“Living in Peter Pan’s Neverland would be wonderful, wouldn’t it? But what if you weren’t a 9-year-old boy? What if you were instead a 43-year-old well-educated gentleman who because of a witch’s curse was stuck in a realm where you were eternally fighting off armies of boys with no peer to talk to and with no hope of ever escaping? Such is the enticing set up of Lisa Jensen’s newly published novel Alias Hook, an imaginative what-if tale that fills in the colors of one of the most famous literary villains of the 20th century.” — Santa Cruz Sentinel

“Need a Captain Hook fix before ABC’s Once Upon a Time returns? This inventive tale details why Peter Pan’s nemesis was banished to Neverland, what really happened to his arm – and how love’s power can break any curse.” — Us Weekly

“…Alias Hook gives voice and credence to the character of Captain Hook. Jensen captures Hook’s enlightened albeit bitter speech and thought pattern in the most dastardly villainous and incredibly satisfying way. So good is the character’s voice, in fact, that it’s easy to root for the tragic character of James Hook and wish Peter Pan would just fly away.” — Deseret News

“Alias Hook breathes new life into the character of the misunderstood captain, giving him a past filled with humanity and heartache, love and loss. And he’s pretty darn sexy too—no wonder Jensen has a thing for pirates.” — Good Times Weekly

Guest Post

The Villain As Hero
Lisa Jensen
I always thought Captain Hook was a lot more fun than Peter Pan, who just seemed like a cocky little boy with an attitude. But when I went back and re-encountered Peter Pan as an adult, I started to realize how horrible it must be for Hook, a grown man, to be stuck forever in this world of perpetual childhood, run by 11-year-old boys. That would be my vision of Hell! So I began to ponder the plight of Captain James Benjamin Hook, a witty, educated Restoration-era privateer cursed to play villain to a pack of malicious little boys in pointless war games that never end.

What, I wondered, had his life been like before the Neverland—as a child, a young blood about town, a gentleman privateer, a pirate? What on earth had he ever done to deserve this fate, designated nightmare to generations of storybook-reading children?

Long before I ever had a particular story in mind, I was writing dozens of scenes about the Neverland from Hook's perspective—which, as you can imagine, is very different from Peter Pan's. Turns out Hook had very strong, caustic opinions about the Neverland and its inhabitants: the Indian tribes, the diabolical fairies, the sinister mermaids. And, of course, The Boy.

The original Peter Pan story ends with Hook falling overboard and getting eaten by the crocodile, while all the children cheer. I thought this was a terrible ending for a character with so much potential. Suppose he didn't die? Suppose he was cursed to live forever, fighting bloody battles against the boys over and over again?

And then I started to wonder: what if he had one last chance to get out?

I realized I would need a new plot, not the same old story about the Darling children and Tinkerbell. I wanted my story to be James Hook's journey out of the fear and rage that have ruled his life for so long in the Neverland. For that to happen, I needed a catalyst, a new character J. M. Barrie never thought of.

The best way to shake things up would be to introduce into the little boys' club of the Neverland that most feared, mistrusted, and unexpected of creatures—a grown-up woman. Someone wise and forgiving enough to see the good in Hook as no one else ever had, but also open-hearted enough to appreciate the wondrous magical forces at work in the Neverland, forces that Hook has always thought were his enemies. Someone who could be a bridge between the two.

So my plot revolves around the new character I invented, Stella Parrish, a grown woman who dreams her way to the Neverland in defiance of the boy's rules against "ladies." In James Hook, she sees someone far more complex and sympathetic than the usual storybook villain. With her help, he dares to cooperate with his "enemies," and risk everything for love, and for the chance to finally earn his release. To finally become the hero of his own story.

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About the Author





Lisa Jensen is a veteran film critic and newspaper columnist from Santa Cruz, California. Her reviews and articles have appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Cinefantastique, Take One, and Paradox Magazine. She has reviewed film on numerous area TV and radio stations. She also reviewed books for the San Francisco Chronicle for 13 years, where her specialty was historical and women’s fiction.






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