In the summer of 2011, the Wall Street Journal published a piece on his book, The Marbury Lens, deeming it too dark and harmful for young readers.[2] Smith took this accusation personally, causing him to only write for himself and stop publishing.[2] Around the same time, his son had gone off to college and, after a few weeks, became homesick and wanted to read one of Smith's stories; Smith happily agreed to give his son his newest creation, Grasshopper Jungle.[3] His son loved it and pushed him to consider publishing it.[3] Smith stated that he wrote the novel straight through, with no outline or basis on what it was going to be and he liked to throw random things that he found through Google searches into the book.[4]
The three main characters of Grasshopper Jungle were created by Smith from one of his comics called Dystopia, U.S.A, which also took place in the town of Ealing, Iowa, the same town that the novel takes place in.[2] Smith bases his characters after real people he has met and his settings off of real places he has been to. According to Smith, Baby, the talking bird from a flashback in Grasshopper Jungle, was a real bird that his niece owned and Hungary Jack, the hobo, is someone Smith knows and even made an appearance in his second novel, In the Path of Falling Objects.[4] The title of the novel comes from Smith's hobby of running; one of his favorite places to run is a small hilly area near his home. Every August that area would become infested with grasshoppers so he nicknamed it Grasshopper Jungle.[3] The area of Grasshopper Jungle that appears in the novel is based on an area very similar to one that Smith would play around during his childhood.[4]
Smith has said that Austin Szerba, the main character of Grasshopper Jungle, is probably 85% autobiographical and that Austin is based on his feelings during the time.[5] Smith also stated that Austin's last name, Szerba, is actually not a real Polish name and that he made it up because he liked the way the S and Z looked next to each other.[4] After a quick investigation, Smith found out that the name could have been used as an Americanization of the real Polish name Szczerba; this inspired Smith to include flashbacks of Polish history in Grasshopper Jungle.[4]
