The Story Behind The Key to Circus-Mom Highway
It was during the first couple of months of 2016 (probably a cold, wintery Los Angeles day… you know, in the frigid 60s) and I was re-watching an older 1980s film called After Hours, with Griffin Dunne and Rosanna Arquette. I had always loved its mix of mostly comedy with a little bit of drama woven in. I love its premise of a guy in NYC just trying to get home one night after unsuccessfully trying to hook up with a woman he met earlier in the day, but obstacles keep getting in his way, and the supporting characters are all very strange. And I thought, “I’d like to write something like that.”
That’s all I knew in the beginning–someone would be trying to get somewhere in a landscape populated by funny characters. The similarities with After Hours end there. I have to add that the desire to populate the book with quirky/outrageous characters was also partly inspired by the books of Carl Hiaasen. I’ve been a huge Carl Hiaasen fan since I read Tourist Season in the late ‘80s. His books are hilarious–my kind of humor. They lean into the humor of the world and the people around us, taking it all up a notch. I knew that if I ever wrote a book, it would be in that same vein. And The Key to Circus-Mom Highway definitely is.
Unlike After Hours, though, I wanted my protagonist to be female. And I wanted the “going-from-one-place-to-another” to encompass a larger area than just one city, but still remain in the U.S. Then the process of building the storyline happened by answering one question at a time–who, what, when, where, why, and how. Then sprinkle in backstories, add plot twists, stir, and bake at 425 degrees… for six years.
People who have read it have asked me how much of the story is true or based on actual events, and I have to say the book is largely fiction, though there are always details pulled from my real life. Maybe it’s a comment I once heard someone say, and I wrote it down so I could remember it, or one character might be inspired by a person I saw at the mall, or on the subway, or on a trip.
Speaking of trips… after I wrote the first draft, I actually went on the road trip that the three siblings go on in the book. I wanted to make sure everything I had written based on research actually worked, and I wanted to collect sensory details to make the locations come to life more fully. I wanted your mouth to water when Jennifer orders chicken and waffles with collard greens, and when Westley serves them sweet tea and Brown Sugar & Corn Meal Cookies with Peach Jam and Chopped Pecans. I wanted you to smell the decaying leaves wet from the afternoon rain, and feel the dampness of the mist in the air when Jesse sits on the back porch in Thibodeaux late one night listening to the frogs and insects and the hypnotic sing-song of the whip-poor-will on the bayou.
So a great many of the details in the various locations were absolutely inspired by the things I saw and smelled and tasted on that trip through the Deep South. Also, the juke joint was inspired by an authentic old juke joint we visited along the way. Sadly, the 99-year-old owner of the juke joint passed away a couple of years ago. As a blues fan, I had wanted to go there for years, so I feel privileged to have visited it while it still existed with him running it, and love that something in my story is an homage to what he had built and kept alive for so many decades.
Finally, speaking of the blues, the book title was inspired by the old Big Bill Broonzy song “Key to the Highway.” The lyrics echo the journey of the young runaway mom, so it had been part of the story from the get-go. “I’ve got the key to the highway. Billed out and bound to go. I’m gonna leave here runnin’, cuz walkin’s much too slow…”
In an attempt to secure an unexpected inheritance—and hopefully find a few answers—two estranged sisters and their newly discovered brother embark on a comically surreal trip through the Deep South to retrace the life of the mother who abandoned them as infants.
On a Tuesday afternoon, sisters Jesse Chasen and Jennifer McMahon receive a phone call notifying them that their birth mother has died, leaving behind a significant inheritance. But in order to obtain it, they must follow a detailed road trip she designed for them to get to know her—and that includes finding a brother they never knew existed.
For the next week, this ill-assorted trio treks across Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia to meet their mother’s old friends, from circus performers to a juke joint owner, each of whom delivers a shocking vignette into the life of a young mother traumatized by loss and abuse. Along the way, these three siblings—Jesse, whose fiery exterior disguises a wounded, drifting musician stuck in a rut; Jennifer, whose carefully curated family life is threatened by her husband’s infidelity; and Jack, whose enigmatic Jackie, Oh! persona in the New Orleans drag queen scene helps him escape the nightmares of Afghanistan that haunt him at night—must confront their own demons (and at least one alligator). But in chasing the truth about their real mother, they may all just find their second chance.
This uproarious debut novel is a reminder that sometimes, the family you’d never have chosen may turn out to be exactly what you need.
“This breezy, charming tale incisively shows a family’s bittersweet facets.” –Kirkus Reviews
A “feverish, entertaining novel” –Foreward Clarion Reviews
“In this rollicking family dramedy, debut author Rice sends three lovable siblings on a zany yet touching road trip… Rice’s sharp observations of society’s absurdity verge on the satirical… Fans of family drama, road trips, and non-stop laughs will love this cross-country adventure.” –BookLife
Release Date: Paperback: November 27, 2022; Kindle: January 3, 2023
Publisher: The Total Human Press
Soft Cover: 978-0982185544; 270 pages
Amazon:https://amzn.to/3XHsOiU
Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/the-key-to-circus-mom-highway
Target: https://www.target.com/p/the-key-to-circus-mom-highway-by-allyson-rice-paperback/-/A-87939489
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/62003645-the-key-to-circus-mom-highway
Some random bits of Allyson trivia: 1) She’s been skydiving, paragliding, bungee jumping, ziplining through a rainforest, and scuba diving with stingrays; 2) she has an extensive PEZ dispenser collection; 3) she played Connor Walsh on As the World Turns for seven years; 4) she’s been in the Oval Office at the White House after hours; 5) she’s related to the Hatfields of the infamous Hatfield/McCoy feud; and 6) her comedic rap music video “Fine, I’ll Write My Own Damn Song” won numerous awards in the film festival circuit and can now be seen on YouTube https://youtu.be/7Xe3nuVDkC4.
Also available from Allyson Rice is her line of women’s coloring books (The Color of Joy, Dancing with Life, and Wonderland), and The Creative Prosperity PlayDeck, an inspirational card deck about unlocking and utilizing your creative energy in the world. She’s currently at work on her second novel and her fourth women’s coloring book. But she is most proud of being mom to musical artist @_zanetaylor.
Website: www.allysonrice.com
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