Title: The Jammer
Author: Nova Weetman
Publisher: University of Queensland Press – UQP
Publication date: October 5, 2022
Themes: relationships, grief, belonging, friendship, growing up, roller derby
Additional notable information: Teachers’ notes can be downloaded from the UQP website here
Fred is the Jammer for her local roller derby team. This is a sport her mum coached her in from a young age and a tactical team sport she has come to love just as much as her mum did. Like her mum, when she is in her skates on the track, Fred feels fearless, electric and invincible. Fred together with her mum and dad have had roller derby as a constant in their nomadic way of life. The end of Fred’s primary school years sees the family settle in Brisbane, a place they are finally ready to put down roots and establish some permanency in their lives. After eight months of living in Brisbane, Fred’s mum, Sarah, receives a cancer diagnosis after a roller derby injury. Eight weeks later she passes away. While Fred, her Dad, Sarah’s step-brother Graham and Sarah’s roller derby friends navigate their own unique grief journey’s, the people who loved Sarah most come together, rally and most of all support Fred. This a touching story that sensitively explores grief, authentic friendships, the inclusive sport of roller derby, the power and beauty that comes from being part of a sporting community, family stories and finding your place in the world. Amongst the pain you can’t help but feel for Fred, there are so many glorious moments of beauty, kindness, courage, solidarity and hope. The people Sarah touched, slowly help Fred begin to feel less conflicted and help her find her place in the world again.
In an effort to navigate their intense pain, Fred and her dad embark on a road trip from Brisbane to Melbourne to stay with Sarah’s step brother, Graham and reconnect with some of Sarah’s childhood friends. Fred is reluctant to leave Brisbane, the place she felt she could finally call home, the place where she had settled long enough to make her first best friend, Jazzie.
It is here in Melbourne that Fred grapples with being in a new place without her mum. Her mum’s step brother, Graham, is highly intuitive, reading Fred, knowing when to pull back. Unlike her dad, who Fred shares a close relationship with; Fred is not comfortable talking about her mum. Graham comes up with another way to share more of Sarah’s story with Fred, a more covert method and a meaningful way that Fred comes to appreciate and treasure. He creates detailed and precise maps for Fred. These maps give Fred a sense of purpose in her days as Graham often gives them to Fred with an incentive to visit a particular place, for example, after a conversation about pets Graham invites Fred to visit him at the animal shelter he works at and of course provides a map for her with significant landmarks that Fred later learns relates to her mum’s childhood. While exploring, Fred discovers a skate park. Fred is used to striking up conversations in new places with new people and quickly befriends Sammy, who happens to have a pet mouse, Anonymouse. He is a fellow skater who plays roller derby. However, Fred has decided she no longer skates or plays roller derby, in fact, she is so adamant about this decision that before she left for Melbourne she threw her helmet, protective gear, derby tops and skates into the Brisbane River. Fred grapples with telling Sammy about her mum and doesn’t do so immediately.
In Melbourne Fred also meets Maxxed Out (Maxine’s derby name) who is an old and dear friend of Sarah and someone Fred’s dad is keen for her to meet. Fred feels uncomfortable with Maxxed Out’s sympathetic ways and deep desire to exchange stories about her mum. Fred strongly feels that her mum isn’t anybody else’s to talk about. In a very different way to Graham, Maxxed Out who is vivacious and a super keen roller derby player, earns Fred’s trust over time, but it isn’t without tension.
As someone whose mum has passed away, there were many moments where I could feel myself in Fred’s shoes, moments where she was caught completely off guard when a person or action triggered a memory of her Mum, where she clung to words her Mum had said, desperately trying to find meaning in them. I also related to the anticipation and dread of firsts, like the first Christmas without her mum. For Fred, this was all compounded by other changes that were also happening in her life, physical as well as starting high school.
It is through nurturing family and friends, both old and new, that Fred does begin to work out this new part of her life, she does begin to ever so slowly heal, discover her purpose and what she is passionate about.