Q&A with Jake Korell

   

 

 

Jake Korell is the author of the new novel The Second World. He lives in Los Angeles. 

 

Q: What inspired you to write The Second World, and how did you create your character Flip Buchanan?

 

A: I've always been drawn to outer space and imagining what's out there and what the future might look like—it's something I inherited from my family and never really shook.

 

About 10 years ago, when I was trying to break in as a television writer, I developed an adult animation pilot set in a Mars colony. Several dozen horrific drafts later, it settled into this strange, funny idea of a new society forming off-world and slowly repeating familiar patterns from human history. 

 

I kept returning to the project over the years in different forms—shelving it, dusting it off, turning it into a narrative podcast (twice), then shelving it again.

 

Eventually it dawned on me that there might be enough for a novel, even though I'd never really pictured myself writing one. What I had at first, though, felt more like a history book full of jokes than a story with a pulse. 

 

Flip emerged when I realized the book needed a human center. I borrowed him from a fictional space blog I'd written during one of those in-between phases, and once he was in place, everything clicked.

 

He became a lens for the world—someone perpetually in the background, living in the shadow of a much louder, more powerful father. Their relationship gave the story its emotional engine and a way to explore generational tension, ambition, and identity...just on Mars.

 

Q: How did you create the world of Mars in the novel?

 

A: Worldbuilding is my favorite part of storytelling—it's where it all starts for me. It's taking the familiar world we already live in, twisting it just enough, and finding the absurd places where it still feels uncomfortably real.

 

The tone and voice of the book grew directly out of that process, and once those were set, the characters and story began to really mesh together.

 

Practically speaking, I tend to build worlds by making a few lists. One is everything that exists in the real world—government, money, food, sports, media. Another is everything specific to the fictional setting, in this case Mars, outer space, and as many sci-fi tropes I could think of.

 

Then I mash those lists together and see what creates something new. Mars dollars became "crimsons," everyone lives under the iconic science fiction image of a giant glass biosphere dome, and I invented a new sport since balls in Earth sports would simply fly too far in Mars's lower gravity.

 

Even small details follow the same logic. If algae is grown more easily than anything else, it probably becomes the base for your cheap alcohol too. Hence, pond-scum IPAs, which I imagine taste exactly as bad as they sound.

 

Q: How was the book’s title chosen, and what does it signify for you?

 

A: I've always liked titles that carry more than one meaning, and The Second World ended up having a few layers to it. On the surface, it's literal—Mars is the second world humans inhabit.

 

But the title also reflects Flip's position in the story. He's never the standout, never the first to do anything, never remembered. He lives in the shadow of a father who's powerful, charismatic, and constantly in the spotlight, which leaves Flip occupying a quieter, more invisible world of second place and near-misses. 

 

There's also a historical echo built into the title. The society forming on Mars is new, but it's already repeating familiar patterns—the sense that we're always living through something for the second time, even when we convince ourselves it's unprecedented. All of those ideas felt like they lived comfortably under the same name. 

 

Q: Can you say more about the dynamic between Flip and his father?

 

A: Flip's relationship with his father sits at the emotional center of the book. He grows up in his father's shadow, constantly measuring himself against expectations he can never quite meet. From Flip's perspective, he always feels like a disappointment—someone who arrives a little too late or falls just short. 

 

Their dynamic mirrors a familiar generational tension: different values, different ideas of success, and a lot of talking past each other. There is genuine love between them, but it's buried under miscommunication, ego, and unspoken resentment, which makes their relationship both painful and deeply recognizable. And while Flip's father isn't based on my own...I did borrow a few things.  

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I'm working on a second book, which I'm really excited about. It's completely separate from The Second World and lives in a different genre, but it carries the same sense of humor and love of worldbuilding.

 

It's set in a modernized fairy tale world where Sleeping Beauty is a narcoleptic and dragons are bred to be airplanes. Two true-loves must fight to save their failing marriage, but their relationship might not survive fairy-dust drug lords, deep-sea-drilling mermaids, and the Big Bad Wolf of Wall Street as they quest (of course it's a quest!) to reclaim their lost connection.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: I wanted this book to make people laugh first, and then, occasionally realize a few pages later that something heavier has settled in. On the surface, it's a light sci-fi story, but at its core it's very character-driven.

 

If readers connect with Flip, his relationships, and his sense of humor, then the book is doing exactly what it set out to do. Mixing humor with emotional weight is the space I'm most interested in exploring, and it's something I plan to keep leaning into in future work.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb