Born Free is
a Rock & Roll Spy Novel

Written by Blair Van Nort

Jackson Blue is the world’s biggest rock star. He’s also the CIA's most dangerous asset. But even a double life has a breaking point.

The Plot

The Pitch What if the world’s most famous rock star was also its most effective shadow asset? Born Free is a high-octane literary thriller that dismantles the classic spy trope and rattles it through the modern zeitgeist to create an explosive new sonic adventure.

The Story Jackson Blue is the magnetic frontman of The Rassle, an indie-rock band on the cusp of global stardom. But the tour bus is more than a mobile after-party—it’s the ultimate cover. Years ago, Jackson traded a prison sentence for his freedom, becoming a deep-cover operative for a shadow government agency. Now, as the band embarks on a massive world tour, his handlers have issued a high-stakes directive: use his VIP access to track a syndicate of corrupt financiers flooding the American heartland with synthetic opiates.

The Stakes Zig-zagging between sound-checks in Barcelona and sell-out sets in Berlin, Jackson navigates a life lived at two volumes. But when he falls for a magnetic French actress who is unknowingly linked to his primary target, his two worlds collide with violent velocity. To save her, Jackson must decide what is truly worth burning to the ground: a years-long mission, a hard-won musical legacy, or the government protection that has become its own kind of prison.

The Journey Written with the visceral musicality of Daisy Jones & the Six and the high-stakes intellectualism of Creation Lake, BORN FREE is a journey through the lawless margins of fame and international intrigue. It is a story about the delicate artistry of a man whose public persona is his most dangerous cover, and the complicated path of an artist who wants to create something so important it will live forever.

Inspired by

Jack Kerouac & James Bond, Mick Jagger & Jean Luc-Godard, Patti Smith & Tom Wolfe, Easy Rider & Oasis, Vonnegut & the Clash.

Born Free takes readers on a freewheeling, backstage adventure thru Europe.

Born Free shakes up the old spy genre and rattles it through the modern zeitgeist to create an explosively new sonic adventure.

The Author

My name is Blair Van Nort. I am a New York-based Creative Director (from Austin, Texas) who has spent the last decade building brand worlds and campaigns for J.Crew, Away Travel and Harry’s. This work taught me how to craft the immersive identities and narratives that define our culture.

Before entering the world of brand marketing, I was in the New York indie-rock scene. After studying fiction and semiotics at The New School under Neil Gordon and McKenzie Wark, I spent my twenties as the frontman of a “semi-successful” rock & roll band. We played legendary venues, recorded at famous studios and I learned a lot about the duality that exists between the person you become under the stage lights and the real person you are backstage, when the lights go out.

While my band found its way onto billboards & fashion magazines and our music was synced in TV shows & commercials, it was the "what if" of that life that stayed with me once the music began to fade. BORN FREE is my debut novel. It tells a glamorous and fantastical story that began as a daydream I had during one of those hazy tours...

What if I wasn't just a rock & roller? What if I was also a spy who was on a secret mission to save the world?