Blog Archives

Author Update: T. E. MacArthur

Posted on by

Award-winning author T. E. MacArthur published several sci-fi series before she shifted her focus to paranormal subgenres including mystery, thriller, romance, and western. Her latest release is the paranormal western novel A Reckoning in Mercy: A Classic Western Ghost Story (Indies United Publishing House, July 2026) that “blends classic frontier realism with supernatural dread — where the past is never truly forgiven, justice is never guaranteed, and the dead have been keeping score.” Look for Thena on her website at TEMacArthur.com, on Facebook, and her Amazon author page. A Reckoning in Mercy is also available on Books2Read. For more about her work, go to her 2023 interview for SouthWest Writers.

What is your elevator pitch for A Reckoning in Mercy?
This is a classic Western Ghost story. A wanderer, trapped in an isolated town, must come to terms with his past and a terrifying future.

What challenges did stepping into a paranormal Western pose for you?
I’m used to writing paranormal stories and used to writing historical settings, but putting them together was, as you say, a challenge. How do I write a complex novel without making it sound like a boring history lesson? Is the ghost real or imagined? How would a nineteenth-century American react to spooky lore, strangers, and destructive weather? Paranormal elements easily fit most narratives, but you can’t just add them on like fresh paint over an older layer of paint. What scares people, regardless of century, is deep: it comes from a primal fear and is honed by years as well as context. What one man fears while living in New Mexico might not be exactly the same for a man in California.

Who is your main character, Eli Mercer, and why is he the perfect protagonist to carry your story? If you’d like, share about a few of your favorite secondary characters.
Eli is my idea of the Wild West lost soul. His life is not what everyone thinks it is. The ultimate loaner who must learn to trust and cooperate. When set against an unrelenting desert, it takes a man of a certain natural intellect to come to terms with the violence, disillusionment, and truth of living in his times. I like that. At once, Eli is confident yet unsure. It takes his code of ethics to get him through his trials. None of us are 100% confident — we often get shaken to our core and this is something that draws Eli and the reader together (I hope!). Doctor Eleanor Carrow is the heroine I would want to be. Every Western film I watched, I mentally imagined how I would interact with the movie characters. Eleanor was my dream female protagonist, but very tempered by her environment, specifically nineteenth century social norms. Santiago de Alvarez is the leader I wish we could have whenever a leader is needed. Not cocky, not arrogant, but compassionate and responsible. To me, Santiago was the answer to many stereotypes of Hispanic men which I felt needed correction after all the Western films of the 1950s to the present. I hope I achieved my goal. If not, I’m open to learning more to do better.

Why is New Mexico the perfect place for your story to unfold?
I adore the American Southwest. I confess that I’m a bit of a weather wimp and could never live there because of the summer heat. However, I love visiting and do so often. I love researching the area too. I grew up in eastern Colorado and have always been intrigued by the ancient civilizations that managed to survive where I could not. Every time I sat to write this novel, my mind told the story from the perspective of red clay and pink dust covering my hands, and of low lying bushes as far as the eye can see. The site rather picked itself. The story could only be set in northwest New Mexico.

Tell us more about the book and how it came together.
A Reckoning in Mercy took about a year to write. I’ve wanted to write a Western for a very long time and finally gave myself permission to do so. The cover is my own design and was much busier at first, but eventually I saw the need to pare it down, to simplify. We often forget that covers these days must be effective in full scale and as a thumbnail. Most sites for selling offer potential readers only a thumbnail and if a cover is too busy, the image is a mess at reduced size. This was the first time I added a sensitivity reader to my list of editors and I believe it was worth the investment. Very worth it!

What makes this novel unique in the paranormal Western genre?
The historical and cultural research will make Reckoning stand out (fingers crossed.) Too often I read Weird West stories and the historical details I happen to want simply aren’t there. I’m a huge history nerd. Perhaps I’m one of a few who really go for the descriptions of clothing, firearms, language, and landscape to an extreme, but I promised myself that any reader who loves history along with a good scare will find all of the above in abundance.

What was your favorite part of working on this project?
Research. What a rabbit hole that turned out to be! I needed to learn about Hispano culture, the lives of women doctors in the West, and everything right down to horse tack and rifle history.

Are you a pantser (discovery writer) or a plotter?
I prefer to call myself a plotser. I start with plans and let them go off the rails. I honestly don’t think what I planned at the beginning was what finally ended up on the page. For a while, I scoffed at authors who said they let their characters write the book, but now I’m a bit more humble about that. My setting and a couple of characters do make demands.

Looking back to the beginning of your writing/publishing career, what do you know now that you wish you’d known then?
An editor is your friend, not the enemy. I wish I’d known that and not felt as if edits were killing my baby somehow. I’ve now used copy editors, sensitivity editors, and development editors. All of them were absolutely essential.

What writing projects are you working on now?
I’m starting on a Western Mystery. No ghosts this time. Just a crime and an amateur detective. I’m setting it in Tombstone, Arizona (as I was staying there last Labor Day Weekend). 1881. And no, it’s not featuring the Earps nor the Cowboys. Tombstone was much bigger and more energetic as a community than is suggested by the famous OK Corral incident.

Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?
Only that I appreciate all that SouthWest Writers does as an organization, including offering authors such as myself to be interviewed. Very much appreciated. Thank you.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has volunteered as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



An Interview with D.W. Peek

Posted on by

D.W. Peek is a retired engineer who has motorcycled in New Mexico for more than 30 years, taking countless solo rides as well as organized group trips. His debut nonfiction book, 15 Great Motorcycle Rides in the Albuquerque Area (July 2026), “provides rides that are both gratifying and achievable within a single day of riding” and represents “an overview of some of the best that central and northern New Mexico has to offer the motorcycle rider.” Look for Dennis on RMK Publications and his SWW author page. 15 Great Motorcycle Rides in the Albuquerque Area is available on Amazon.

Why did you write 15 Great Motorcycle Rides in the Albuquerque Area, and who did you write it for?
This book originally started as a personal retirement project to document my 30+ years of local motorcycling, just something for me and my riding friends. However, over the course of the project, it evolved into a genuine guide book, usable by both novice and experienced riders. The preface tells the true story of a young, novice rider I met who had no idea where to go on his new bike. That moment was when the book transformed from a personal memoir-like effort to a usable guidebook.

What challenges did you face in writing/publishing your debut nonfiction book?
The maps were a huge hurdle, as was the creation of an e-book edition. I handled the maps myself, but obtained help for creation of the e-book.

Were you surprised by any aspect of the project as it unfolded or did it meet your expectations?
I was surprised that it took so long and was so difficult to complete. At the beginning, I thought that I would easily crank it out in few months.

How is 15 Great Motorcycle Rides in the Albuquerque Area organized and why did you put it together that way?
It’s organized by direction from Albuquerque. As a rider who might be looking for a ride to do, it just seemed natural to organize it that way. However, after publication, it occurred to me that cross indices by length and scenery/road type might be useful. Perhaps in the 2nd edition!

How did the book come together?
The research was easy in that these are all favorite motorcycle rides I’ve been doing for decades, so I knew what I wanted to include in general. Before publication, I rode every single ride again, and took notes on anything that might have changed recently, for incorporation into the final text and maps. The genesis of the book was an email I wrote to a group of friends who came to Albuquerque from around the country in 2019 for some group riding I was leading. That email included mapped routes and ride descriptions for about a half dozen rides centered on Albuquerque. The writing of the book took about two years, albeit with a number of breaks where little progress was occurring for a couple of months at a time. The maps were the toughest and lengthiest holdup. I had always used Google Maps for route planning, and assumed I could use screen shots of their maps in the book. When I was almost done with the book, I found out that Google did not allow this for travel books of any kind, even travel books with expected very small circulation. So, I had to learn an open-source GIS software package, find public data, and make the maps myself. This was almost a year delay. Edit cycles involved several informal ones with writing group friends, one “technical review” cycle with riding buddies who had ridden all the rides with me, and an editing cycle by a family member who used to edit professionally. For the e-book creation, the cover, and the first time through the entire Amazon KDP self-publishing process, I obtained help from RMK Publishing.

Do you have a favorite ride/day trip or one you always recommend first?
It’s incredibly difficult to pick a single favorite since all 15 rides are genuine favorites. But if I had to pick a couple, #11, Sandia Crest Climb, is a favorite very short ride, and #7, Taos High Road/Low Road, is a favorite longer ride.

Did you discover anything surprising while doing research?
Indeed. First, that the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge would be closed to pedestrian traffic for the next couple of years while they build anti-suicide barriers. You can ride across, but you cannot park and walk out on the bridge at this time. Second, that Sandia Crest would be closed at the very top for the next couple of years while the facilities at the Crest are demolished and rebuilt. You can still ride almost to the top though. Third, that the Budville Trading Post mentioned in Ride #3, Route 66 Albuquerque to Grants, (caption for Photo 3-1) was the site of several murders back in the day. I’d ridden past it many times without knowing that.

What was your favorite part of working on this project?
My favorite part was going through my entire photo collection looking for the perfect photos for each ride. Each photo had to be a scene that is actually part of the ride, had to not have any people in it, and preferably would include a motorcycle or two belonging to me or a riding buddy. It was a real trip down memory lane to find these 30 or so photos out of thousands.

Why did you decide to use a pen name?
My pen name is barely a real pen name. I just used my first two initials instead of my first name. Some of my long-time riding buddies referred to me as “DW” over the years so I went with that.

Have you ever wanted to write fiction? If so, what genre, and what has held you back?
Yes. I actually started a thriller-type novel back in the late 90s. But it was tough to do at the time, given the fact that I was already spending 10–12 hours per day on the computer for my career. The next project may well be a piece of fiction, although I have another motorcycling book roughed out as well.

What genre do you enjoy reading the most? Who are some of your favorite authors?
For pleasure reading, I really enjoy non-fiction history, as well as mysteries and some science fiction. My most recent favorite author is Martha Wells, whose Murderbot Diaries series is a really engaging, fresh take on the science fiction genre.

What writing projects are you working on now?
As mentioned above, I have another motorcycling book roughed out as well, this one involving multi-day touring in the four corners states. I am also considering some short form fiction. The sky’s the limit; I love writing and now in retirement have the time to do so.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has volunteered as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



Author Update: Rosalie Rayburn

Posted on by

Rosalie Rayburn uses her experience as a former journalist to write her Digger Doyle Mystery series whose main character is a reporter adept at exposing corrupt politicians. Rosalie’s July 2026 release, The Solar Deception, is “a fast-paced political mystery featuring a determined lesbian sleuth, high-stakes intrigue, and twists that expose the human cost of greed and ambition.” Look for Rosalie on her website RosalieRayburn.com and blog, as well as on Facebook and her Amazon author store. Read more about her work in her 2025 interview for SouthWest Writers.

What would you like readers to know about the story you tell in The Solar Deception?
The solar project at the center of the plot is based on real reporting I did for the Albuquerque Journal. During my first six years at the Journal, I covered the energy beat. Two solar projects I covered, one near Deming, New Mexico in 2004 and one in Rio Rancho, New Mexico in 2010, never materialized and my investigation showed the people behind the projects had “questionable” backgrounds.

When you began the project, what did you hope to accomplish? By the end of the journey, do you feel you were successful in your goals?
When I finished The Power of Rain, my first Digger Doyle novel, readers said they wanted to know what happened to the main characters. I did too. I wanted to weave a story where Digger and Maria could have a relationship. I wanted to create more of a mystery, so I developed the revenge plot as part of the story. I think I succeeded in achieving those aims.

What makes Digger Doyle, your main character in the series, the kind of protagonist readers connect with and root for?
I think readers like Digger’s tenacity as an investigative reporter. I also think they can empathize with her personal story because of the loss of her parents, her longing for a family, and her love for Maria. I enjoy Digger’s satiric sense of humor about politicians and corporate spokespeople.

Why did you choose New Mexico as the setting for The Solar Deception?
New Mexico was a natural fit because I lived in Albuquerque for many years. I love the high desert where I have done a lot of hiking, camping, and cycling. I was familiar with the political discussions about solar and wind energy development in the state. I had also visited Chaco Canyon, where a scene is set, and I knew my way around Santa Fe.

Tell us more about how the book came together.
I wanted to continue Digger and Maria’s romance, and I also wanted to create a mystery. I remembered the two solar power projects I investigated, and that gave me the idea for the plot. I used Newspapers.com to research my own articles and stories by other reporters. I used Google Earth to make sure I described place details accurately. It took about six months to write. I had problems with the editor so that phase took about three months. I worked with the same book designer, Sara DeHaan of DeHaan Arts. She has worked on all three Digger Doyle novels. She does a wonderful job.

Any “Oh, wow!” moments while doing research?
Not really. But I enjoyed making the front man for the solar scam a lapsed preacher who talks like a smarmy used car salesman.

What was your favorite part of putting this project together?
I love writing mysteries. It is like working a puzzle backwards. I have the idea for how it will end, i.e. the finished picture. I have to put it together, weaving the story threads and planting clues. But I must make sure the clues don’t reveal the plot too soon. It takes a lot of mental energy, but it’s fun!

When did you know you wanted to be a writer? When did you actually consider yourself a writer?
I have wanted to be a writer ever since I learned to read. I used to tell my brother stories when we walked to school. I was eight, he was six. I wrote short stories in my twenties when I lived in Ireland. Radio Telefis Eireann accepted several stories for broadcast. Then I was a finalist in the Maxwell House Women Writers’ Competition, a writing contest for emerging writers in Ireland. So, I guess that’s when I started to consider myself a writer.

Looking back to the beginning of your writing/publishing career, what do you know now that you wish you’d known then?
I wish I had known more about marketing a book; how hard it is and how much energy it takes.

What are the challenges of writing a series?
Making sure you have the timelines correct between books, making sure the names and personal details are accurate. Also, I try not to plagiarize myself by using the same descriptive language for scene setting.

What writing projects are you working on now?
I recently finished the fourth Digger Doyle mystery. It continues Digger and Maria’s story and it is a murder mystery. I drew inspiration for part of the plot from the unsolved case of the West Mesa murders. The working title is Secrets on the Mesa. I hope to launch it in the late fall of 2026.

Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?
All three of my Digger Doyle mysteries are set in New Mexico. If you enjoy reading thoughtful mysteries with a deeper social commentary, please leave a brief review on Amazon or Goodreads, saying what you like about the characters, the setting and the plot. It will help more readers to discover the world of Digger Doyle.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has volunteered as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



Author Update: Suzanne Stauffer

Posted on by

Suzanne Stauffer is a retired librarian and professor of library science turned award-winning author of cozy historical fiction mysteries. Book two in her Courier series, French Toast a la Santa Fe (Artemesia Publishing, October 2026), once again takes readers on an adventure with Prudence Bates, this time as she tries to solve a series of mysteries that occur during a 1929 three-day Fred Harvey Southwestern Indian Detour. Look for Suzanne on her website CouriersSeries1926.com, on Facebook, Goodreads, and Substack, as well as her Amazon author store and Bookshop. Read more about her work in her 2023 interview for SouthWest Writers.

What would you like readers to know about French Toast a la Santa Fe?
I was inspired by the 1939 movie Stagecoach, about a diverse group of characters thrown together for three days while traveling through the Southwest. French Toast a la Santa Fe is a cozy mystery set in 1929, so no outlaws or gunfights or massacres, of course, but the characters do develop an understanding of and feeling for each other.

What challenges did you face in this second book of your Courier series?
The series is inspired by the real Fred Harvey Southwestern Indian Detours that ran from 1926 to the early 1940s. One challenge was discovering what the various locations along the route were like in 1929. Some of them no longer exist, such as the Apache Inn. The building is there, but it’s now Our Lady of Guadalupe Abbey. I was lucky to be able to find vintage postcards on eBay.

Prudence Bates, the main character from Fried Chicken Castañeda (book one), returns in this next installment. What makes Prudence the kind of protagonist readers enjoy following as the story unfolds?
She’s curious about and interested in everything and everyone. As a librarian, she has experience working with people from all walks of life, but she’s also meeting people who would never have set foot in the Cleveland Public Library. My publisher also praises her “Midwestern niceness.”

What New Mexico settings do you explore in this book?
It’s set during one of the Detours, a three-day roadtrip along Route 66 from Las Vegas through Santa Fe to Albuquerque. A group of Detourists (tourists) and their Courier (guide) go through Glorieta Pass. They stay at La Fonda in Santa Fe and the Alvarado in Albuquerque. Prudence visits the Indian Room in Santa Fe and the Indian Building in Albuquerque. They explore Pecos Ruins and Puye Cliff dwellings and visit Tesuque, Santo Domingo (Kewa), and Isleta Pueblos. I’m probably forgetting something.

Tell us more about book two and how it came together.
I’d always planned for Prudence to go on the Detour, in preparation for applying for a position as a Courier. As I mentioned in the first answer, the framework for the story came from one of my favorite western movies.

I utilized D.H. Thomas’ Southwest Indian Detours, as well as Indian Detours brochures. I’d already done some of the research for book one for Anita Rose’s presentation on the Detours, but this required getting down to the details.

I do an outline, so that I know where I am going, but that’s really just writing down what I’ve been thinking about, so it’s hard to say how long it takes to create in my mind. I think it takes me about six months to finish a book, once I start writing (now that I’m retired). I edit as I go. I submit each chapter (about 5000 words) to my writers’ groups for feedback. Then I submit the finished work to my publisher, at which point he edits it and sends it back for revisions. It takes about 18 months for the book to come out after I submit it to him, which includes cover design and formatting.

What makes this novel unique in the historical fiction market?
It’s a historical cozy mystery set in 1929 New Mexico and involves the Fred Harvey Indian Detours. There are plenty of historical cozies set in the 1920s, but so far, I haven’t found any set in New Mexico, and while there are several fictional books about the Harvey Girls, I haven’t seen any about the Indian Detours. Oh, and the book includes a recipe for French Toast a la Santa Fe.

What was your favorite part of working on French Toast a la Santa Fe?
Honestly, my characters. I really enjoyed getting to know them. Of course, I had to completely change where I was going with the mystery, because they simply were not the kind of people who would do that kind of thing! I ultimately turned the original ending into a short story with different characters, “Detour to Murder,” that was published in the online magazine Killer Nashville.

Do you prefer the creating or editing aspect of writing? How do you feel about research?
I don’t really distinguish between creating and editing. Way back in high school, then it was all done by hand (or typewriter) on paper, I would finish the story or essay or whatever and then go back and edit. I’d literally cut and paste (tape or staple), then retype. Now, with word processors, I can write and edit as a single process. I’d rather “write” less in a session if it means that what I have when I finish is pretty much the final version of that segment.

I love historical research. I spent my academic career working in the areas of American public library history and women’s history. Historically accuracy is vital in my writing.

Do you have a message or a theme that recurs in your writing?
I hadn’t thought about it, but now that I do, I think it’s that people are never who you think they are based on your first impression. We’re far more complex and complicated.

What writing projects are you working on now?
I recently submitted the third Couriers’ work, Cold Vichysoisse Cream, to my publisher, so I’m taking a break from fiction and am working on a non-fiction book about the Couriers. It will include short biographical sketches of as many of the women as I can find information on.

Well, I also made a trip up to Taos in preparation for the fourth novel in the series that will take place on a two-day Detour from Santa Fe to Taos.

Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?
I’ll be at the Libros of Enchantment book fiesta in Albuquerque on October 31, 2026 at the Croak & Dagger table, so stop by!

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has volunteered as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



An Interview with Author Deborah Rice

Posted on by

Deborah Rice’s work with refugees in Ethiopia inspired her Global Village Mystery series and infuses her stories with authenticity and heart. The first book in the series, Crocodile Tears (March 2026), follows Hannah Craig in a small town on an Ethiopian tributary of the Nile as she seeks to solve the mystery of her godson’s death and uncover a possible evil behind it. Look for Deborah on her website DeborahRiceWriter.com and her Amazon author store.

What is at the heart of the story you tell in Crocodile Tears?
The heart of the story of Crocodile Tears is the question: Can Hannah Craig, trainer of village midwives near a small town on a tributary of the Nile in Ethiopia, uncover the real cause of a young boy’s death and help a village heal, when ethnic friction compounds the tragedy? With it, at the heart of the story, are two deeper questions: 1) How to keep personal identity from wrapping itself around ethnic identity in a way that leads to ethnic friction, and 2) How can humans from different ethnicities work together to recover from a tragedy caused in large part by their differences?

Who are your main characters? Why did you choose them to carry your story?
You build characters who will embody and carry the threads of your themes and plot; and who —you hope!—will also live and breathe. I based all my characters on real people I knew in Gambela, or read about in real-life accounts, or whose writings and photos I’d researched online.

My central character is Hannah Craig, an Ethiopian-born American ex-missionary who is a window for American readers into Ethiopian cultures like the Anuak and Nuer. Her own inner conflict about whether she’s an American like her biological parents or an Anuak like the people she was raised among makes her deeply resonant on ethnic issues.

Other main characters, Omot (Anuak) and Gatbel (Nuer), I based on people I knew, worked with, and admired when I lived in Gambela. Mariam and Becca carry the drama of Hannah’s difficulties with her daughter and granddaughter. Hannah’s childhood women friends and fellow gardeners embody her lifelong attachment to the Anuak way of life. Solomon is the son of one such woman, twisted by his begetting onto a torturous path; still, Hannah refuses to believe he is unsalvageable. I have no idea where Wyatt came from, but, like Hannah, I found him just right!

Tell us about one or more of the main settings. What makes them the best place for the story to play out? Are the settings characters in the book?
The setting is Gambela, a small trading town on an Ethiopian tributary of the Nile, where I lived for a time and met my husband. It is absolutely a character in the book, as responsible as the local traditional gods for shaping the lives and characters of the people. To me, this is uniquely a story of Gambela; its sounds, smells, tastes, people, feelings, dramas, passions.

What challenges did you face in completing this first book in the Global Village Mystery series?
I’d never written a book in which the setting had such a deep personal meaning. It was of prime importance to me that I convey enough of the real lives of the people in this small town that it could have some small fraction of the impact living there had on me in opening my eyes and heart to my fellow citizens of the world.

The other challenge was learning how to publish on Amazon, then expanding my social media, which did not come naturally—until I applied my Gambela experience and realized it’s just talking to people, after all!

How did Crocodile Tears come together?
Three things came together to inspire this book and series. First, my life-changing time in Gambela. Second, the feeling, after writing several mystery novels, that I needed to get back to bedrock: a place I really know, a place I really care about, a place that embodies issues that are real and important to me, and that, by the way, is rich with elements that would make a mystery series compelling. Third, my growing concern with the ethnic and ideological intolerance that is increasingly tearing our nation and world apart.

The process took about five years. First, research to fill in holes on areas related to the specific plot. Then writing, rewriting, consultation with—truly terrific!—writing coach Sarah Lovett. Then talking to editors and agents at conferences, packaging and mailing requested proposals, doing requested rewrites. Then, finally, deciding to self-publish on Amazon, and learning the many new skills involved in being a publisher.

Did you discover anything surprising while doing research?
So many things. I never get tired of the new things I learn about subjects that already interest me. That’s one of the things that makes me sure I’ll never stop writing. Almost all of the things I learned reinforced that Gambela is, indeed, the Global Village I’ve long thought it to be, a capsule of the world and its issues in miniature, a perfect setting for a writer.

What was your favorite part of working on this project?
Mentally—and physically—revisiting Gambela and its people.

What themes do you explore in Crocodile Tears? How are they important to you on a personal level?
The importance of really seeing, understanding and cooperating with other people. This is a fundamental focus of my own life, and of Hannah’s. When this is absent, fixed attitudes can expand into interethnic intolerance and violence, leading to the kinds of tragedies we see proliferating around us in the world today.

Have you ever suffered from writer’s block?
Never! Writing is made up of many different types of tasks. They all need to work together to make a book. There is always something to do, someplace to start working: building the world, a character, finding new ways for the story to grow and branch out. Or, to put it differently: researching, plotting, writing scenes, rewriting scenes, rereading, rethinking, spinning ideas, talking to the characters, getting them to talk to each other, then exhaling and doing it all again.

What advice do you have for beginning or discouraged writers?
Write. Start something, anything. Start working on any part of it. Schedule regular times to work and let it build. The work and product itself will start to steer you.

What writing projects are you working on now?
Global Village Mysteries #2, Tigray Claws. Obviously, I’m hooked on Hannah and the rest of my people in Gambela. I’m now knee-deep in her next adventure, which is holding surprises even I didn’t expect!

Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?
If you’d like to learn more about me, my books, or my time in Ethiopia, check out my website, DeborahRiceWriter.com.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has volunteered as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



An Interview with Author Joe Cappello

Posted on by

Joe Cappello is an actor, a playwright, and the award-winning author of flash fiction and short stories that aim to connect, challenge, inspire, and move readers to tears of laughter. His debut short story collection, The Secret of the Smiling Rock Man: Stories Featuring Characters with Rocks in their Heads (April 2026), brings readers tales “told with a healthy dose of humor and a belief that life can be joyful, hopeful and a down-right hoot.” Look for Joe on his website JoeCappelloAuthor.com, on Medium and Substack, and his Amazon author store.

What would you like readers to know about The Secret of the Smiling Rock Man?
If you’re looking for short stories that you can comfortably read before turning in at night and maybe get a laugh or two in the process, I think you’ll find my book just the thing.

When readers turn the last page in the book, what do you hope they take away from it?
Life comes with a ton of prepackaged problems. I hope my characters are examples of how to face those problems with heart, hope and plenty of humor.

What challenges did you face putting this project together?
Since I was self-publishing the book, I had to spend time on developing some kind of marketing plan to give folks a reason why they should spend their time (and their money) on my stories. Part of this process was coming up with a good book description, a solid subtitle, and a bio that would tell something about myself and my writing journey. Packaging all of this took time. Then actually launching the book and scheduling reviews, attendance at book festivals and regular social media posts proved to be challenging, yet necessary, parts of the process.

Did you write the stories specifically for this collection? How did you decide to arrange the stories?
I had written these stories over a period of years, so they weren’t written specifically for this collection. But I noticed that most of the stories fit into one of four broad categories: family, mortality, workplace, and language. I also saw an overall theme emerging: characters who are reaching way over their heads to solve their problems. So that gave me the idea for the subtitle to my book: “Featuring characters with ‘Rocks in their heads.’” I hoped this would make it easier for a potential reader to understand what these zany characters had in store for them.

Tell us how the collection came together.
I had a great time working with artist Michelle Kohari on the cover design as well as illustrations to introduce each work. She managed to capture a moment in the life of my stories, one that illuminates my intent and dramatizes the kernel of what I am trying to say. I also have to give a shout out to Rose Kern at RMK Publications. She very patiently walked me through the process of preparing my manuscript for publication and was an absolute whiz at navigating Amazon KDP. I could not have done it without her.

Who are some of your favorite characters in the stories?
Win Winwood in “The Secret of the Smiling Rock Man” thinks he can discover the secret of mortality. My uncle Paulie Manucci actually thought he could book numbers right under the mob’s nose and get away with it in “Skeletons in the Closet (and in the Bay).” Armando Hayes schools two middle managers in street smarts and how to get a degree in Kick-ass 101 in “Lenny Jo’s.” Outrageous. Every one of them.

What was your favorite part of working on this project?
I really enjoyed culling through the many stories I have written in the last few years and selecting the 14 that appear in my collection. They were like signposts reminding me of where I was, what was on my mind and why I chose to write each of them. I am grateful to all those characters and their stories they so graciously allowed me to tell. It was a most satisfying and rewarding experience for me.

What did you learn from writing/publishing The Secret of the Smiling Rock Man that you can apply to future projects?
Patience…patience…patience. So many books are published each day that it takes time before your work will get any kind of notice.

What does an average writing session look like for you?
I try to do some form of writing-related work (writing, editing, researching, submitting) every day.

Is there something that always inspires you or triggers your creativity?
Being present in the moment. Life is all around just waiting to provide the topic for my next writing project. (I always have my pen and notebook at the ready!)

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has volunteered as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



Author Update: John L. Thompson

Posted on by

Author John L. Thompson writes across several genres including crime fiction, thrillers, mysteries, sci-fi, and action adventure. He released two books in 2026: Dead Blow (Book Three in the Truck Stop crime thriller series) and Seven Years From Tomorrow, a time-travel mystery novel. Look for John on his website JLThompsonAuthor.com, on Facebook, X, and his Amazon author store. Read more about John’s work in his 2022 interview for SouthWest Writers.

What would you like readers to know about the story you tell in Dead Blow?
Dead Blow is the third and final book in the Truck Stop series. Truck Stop follows Logan Pierce during the initial hunt for missing mob money, while Monkey Wrench shifts the focus to James Hendricks and the fallout from those events.

Dead Blow takes place a couple of years later and brings those storylines together. Logan and Amy are now married and living a good life in Montana when their past catches up with them. Forced to go on the run, they find themselves pursued by a ruthless cartel, the Dixie Mafia, and corrupt officials who believe they know what happened to the still-missing money and how to find it. At its heart, Dead Blow is about the consequences of everything that happened in the first two books and what Logan, Amy, Hendricks, and Erika are willing to do to finally put it behind them.

Five years separate the publication of the second and third books in the Truck Stop trilogy. What was the process like to get back into Logan Pierce’s point of view and continue his story?
Truck Stop came out in 2018, and afterward I always had readers asking, “What about the money? What happened to Logan and Hendricks?” I realized there were still questions that needed answering. I wrote Monkey Wrench, which was released in 2021, and by then I already had a rough script for Dead Blow. An editor friend of mine read through it and told me, “You can do better.” That was what I needed to hear, and I decided not to release that version.

Sometimes life gets in the way of things. I had a cancer scare and lost family members, which pushed Dead Blow even farther into the future. When I finally returned to it last year, I decided to shelve the old script completely and start over, working from the notes I had made in 2020, 2021, and fresh ideas.

Because so much time had passed, I went back and reread Truck Stop and Monkey Wrench and revisited my character notes for Logan, Hendricks, Amy, and the others. In a way, I had to get reacquainted with them before I could finish their story. I’m pleased with how Dead Blow ultimately turned out. It took longer than I ever intended, and I apologize for the delay, but I think it’s a better book because I waited. And yes, this time the series really is finished.

Are you a pantser or a plotter/planner? How did your writing method play out in completing this project?
The original script for Dead Blow was written off the top of my head. The second script, the one that is currently available, was mapped out in an outline following the Hero’s Journey. There were some elements of the story that I wrote off the top of my head and injected those into the story, but these were needed themes. I did use a couple of story segments from the old script and these helped the story along. Other than that, I believe since the final story was mapped out, it made it significantly easier to write.

When did you know you had taken the manuscript as far as it could go, that it was finished and ready for publishing?
Basically, when I have reached the end of the outline. The editor and proofreaders dial everything else in with their recommendations and rewrites and grammar checks. Once I have those, I let it sit on the computer for a couple of weeks before embarking on a final comb through and rewrites. I’m looking for errors, timeline continuity issues, and punctuation. I want a quality book for potential customers. A lot of work goes into the final product.

Distill the story you tell in Seven Years from Tomorrow into a few sentences and include the themes you explore.
Seven Years from Tomorrow follows Jack Soladay, a terminally ill man who believes his life is almost over, only to die and awaken as his nineteen-year-old self in 1990. He believes this to be the fault of the homeless man he comes to call Puzzle Man, due to the man’s facial scars. Jack soon discovers that death doesn’t end his life. It sends him through a series of seven-year cycles, forcing him to relive different periods of his past. Sometimes those timelines are distorted versions of himself and are nowhere near what he lived on his original timeline.

Beneath the time-travel mystery, the novel explores second chances, regret, mortality, love, and the choices that shape a life. At its heart, it’s about a man given the opportunity most of us will never have: to look back at the life he lived and ask what he would change if he could do it again.

Tell us about the journey from inspiration to completed book.
Seven Years from Tomorrow started as the seed of an idea about ten years ago. That’s how most of my stories begin. An idea gets planted somewhere in the back of my mind, and sometimes it doesn’t go anywhere. Other times, it keeps growing until it reaches the point where I have to start writing it down. Even then, there’s no guarantee the story will ever be published. I probably have a dozen unfinished or abandoned manuscripts scattered across four computers that will never see the light of day. Sometimes an idea sounds great at first, but once I start working with it, I discover there simply isn’t enough there to carry an entire novel.

Then there are stories like Seven Years from Tomorrow that survive the process. The idea keeps growing, the characters start taking on lives of their own, and eventually I know there’s a book there worth finishing. Once a story reaches that point, I tend to concentrate on it exclusively. I tackle one book at a time and keep working on it until the story is finished. Seven Years from Tomorrow took roughly ten years to complete from that first little idea to a completed novel, but much of that time was simply the story waiting until I was ready to tell it.

Who are your main characters in Seven Years from Tomorrow? Why will readers enjoy following them as the story unfolds?
I tend to write blue-collar, modern Western types of characters. They could work in the oilfields of West Texas, as diesel mechanics at some truck stop, truck drivers, warehouse workers, the whole gamut. Guys who keep America rolling. Some live in New Mexico. As of late, my characters seem to live in Moriarty. It’s a perfect backdrop for blue-collar families. The characters in my books are not superheroes, or guys with military special forces skill-sets, or brilliant scientists who immediately understand what’s happening around them. They’re just everyday people who work, struggle, make mistakes, and try to get through whatever life throws at them. Jack Soladay and Logan Pierce are very much those kinds of characters.

I think that’s what makes them enjoyable to follow. They are certainly easy to write about since I work within the film industry as a driver and mechanic. I have my readers tell me they enjoy those kinds of characters because there are so few books out there telling those kinds of stories. The characters are confronted with something impossible, dangerous even, but they approach the problem like an ordinary man would. Sometimes with grit and determination, sometimes with humor, and sometimes by getting things completely wrong with consequences.

Did you use the pantser method or the plotter method to write Seven Years from Tomorrow? How did you keep the plot straight and coherent while Jack Soladay moves through time from one new beginning to another? And how did you choose the time periods to drop him into?
I’m probably somewhere between a pantser and a plotter when it came to this novel. I started with a basic outline, but there were plenty of “off the reservation” moments along the way. As I was writing, I’d come up with ideas for new situations or different timeline drops and work them into the story. Some of those didn’t make the final cut. If I had included everything I originally wrote, the book probably would have ended up around 450 pages. As it was, I cut almost seventy-five pages during the editing process.

I began with the knowledge of how the story would start, and I had already written the last several chapters. The real challenge was building the bridge between the two. I generally followed the outline, but sometimes it was fun to go off the rails and see where Jack took me.

Choosing the different time periods was fairly easy because I (or the readers) lived through much of the period the novel covers. I know what the world from 1982 through the present looked and felt like, and that gave me something real to work from. I took notes on historical events and built parts of the story around them. Jack is also confined by the rules of his own lifetime. He can’t travel backward beyond the age of fifteen, but the cycles can carry him forward into old age and even into a future where he finds himself in a high-tech nursing home. Jack might survive the full seven years before another shift occurs, but there are no guarantees. He can also die unexpectedly. He might become the victim of an accident, a murder, a shootout, or even a stabbing and suddenly find himself dropped into another point in his life.

The other complication is that the life he awakens into may not be anything like the one he expects. He could discover he’s a homicidal bank robber, a lonely indie author, a famous bestselling author, or even land in prison. Every timeline presents him with a different version of the life he might have lived and a new set of challenges. Yet none of them seems to bring him any closer to answering the biggest question: Why is this happening to him? Having those rules in place helped keep the timeline coherent, even when I occasionally let myself follow Jack and his misadventures.

What was your favorite part of putting together Dead Blow and Seven Years from Tomorrow?
Character development. For both novels, it has to be the development of real enough characters who are worth writing about. No one I know wants to read or care about boring characters.

Of all the books you’ve written, which one was the most challenging, and which was the easiest (or most enjoyable) to write?
I would have to say the hardest one to date would be Seven Years from Tomorrow. Only because it started out as an idea some ten years ago. I knew I wanted to write something on it and made a few false starts, but figuring out a suitable ending was critical. I had written the beginning four years ago, but the ending remained elusive up until a couple years ago, and even then, it wasn’t the true ending. I believe in a strong ending for any story I work on. I wrote about six different endings for this story until I settled on the current one. From there, it required building the bridge.

The easiest book to write was Truck Stop. Even though it took four or five years to finish, and it is loaded with unnecessary fluff, the story elements just fell into place. I still love the story line and what’s in it.

What does a typical writing session look like for you? Do you have any writing rituals or something you absolutely need in order to write?
A fresh cup of coffee and a pack of smokes. I then pound the keyboard for a couple of hours. After that, I go do other things around the house. That could change if the story is at a critical point and I have to write to a stopping point.

What writing projects are you working on now?
Currently, myself and UK author Tony Roberts have finished Casca: The Seeker. It’s the sixty-fifth installment of the long-running Eternal Mercenary series originally started and written by singer, songwriter, and author Barry Sadler. It will be available via Amazon and other outlets by the time this interview goes live. We are currently working on number sixty-six, Casca: The Grenadier (the storyline is currently under wraps).

As far as my own writing, I am working on another sci-fi series tentatively titled Afterworld. I’m also working on another series titled The Dirty Losers Club. I hope to have the first volume of that series out next year some time.

Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?
Visit JLThompsonAuthor.com for more info and sign up for the newsletter. I promise, I won’t bombard your inbox with unnecessary material. For more information on the Casca series, please visit Casca.net.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has volunteered as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



An Interview with Authors Marcia Rosen and Jory Rosen

Posted on by

SWW member Marcia Rosen is the award-winning author of twelve books including the Senior Sleuths mysteries, the Dying To Be Beautiful mysteries, and the cozy mystery series Agatha, Raymond, Sherlock, & Me. Her son Jory Rosen is the owner of The Homestead located at the base of the Sandia Peak Tramway in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Marcia and Jory’s second collaboration, The Homestead Café: Life Tastes Better at 6,559 Feet (Artemesia Publishing, June 2026), gives readers a taste of the café’s favorite dishes along with a “collection of fictional short stories based on real people who helped to inspire many of these recipes and the love of family.” Look for Marcia on her website at MarciaRosen.com and her Amazon author store. Read more about her work in her 2023 interview for SouthWest Writers. You’ll find Jory at The Homestead — visit the website at HomesteadABQ.com. The Homestead Café is available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Bookshop.

Who did you write the book for, and what do you hope readers will take away from it?
Jory: This was written for the fans and customers of The Homestead. We want people to experience the great food and Homestead experience wherever they may be.

Marcia: My intention for this book is to have locals and tourists know about the amazing café, the delicious food, and stimulate their appetite to come to the café. The mystery stories are all fiction and a sidebar for fun reading.

This is the second book the two of you collaborated on. How did you divide the responsibilities of writing/producing the book? What was the greatest challenge in the collaboration process?
Jory: I did the recipes and food descriptions while Marcia wrote the stories.

Marcia: As a mystery writer it was important to create intriguing stories based in a restaurant and have each story include comments about recipes Jory was planning to put in the book.

When did you know you wanted to put this volume together? What inspired you to actually start the project?
Jory: We knew we had something special at Homestead pretty quickly. Once we got rolling, people kept asking for recipes.

Marcia: We began talking about the project a month into the café being opened. Having owned a public relations agency for over 25 years it seemed to me a very positive way to share the café story with a large number of people.

How is the book structured and why did you organize it that way?
Jory: It is a flow of recipes and stories that work in conjunction with each other to inspire and entertain. These recipes have been some of my favorites for years, many inspired by my grandfather (my mom’s dad). As we put them on The Homestead menu and saw people’s reactions, we knew what to include.

Marcia: Highlighting the recipes was the priority. Artemesia Publishing included beautiful color photos of the food. Jory worked with a wonderful photographer who took them. The mystery stories are meant to create an additional interest in the book, and I loved writing them.

Do you have a favorite recipe in The Homestead Café? A favorite story?
Jory: I love the mushroom stroganoff. My kids ask me to make this for them at least once a month. Getting my kids to eat veggies was a huge victory; all it took was some goat cheese and sour cream.

Marcia: My favorite recipe is Jory’s Chicken Piccata, it’s delicious. My favorite story is probably “Two Left Feet.” There’s some humor claiming the murder is the chicken piccata caper. I love using humor in my books. Jory has a great sense of humor, so we worked well together on this project. (Most of the time.)

What was the most rewarding aspect of putting this project together?
Jory: Seeing the incredible pictures bringing these recipes to life.

Marcia: Knowing we could let a lot of people know about The Homestead Café and all it has to offer. Completing this project took many months so we are truly gratified by so many positive responses.

Who or what sparked your interest in cooking?
Jory: It was survival; my mother is not much of a cook!

Marcia: Jory is a wonderful cook. Me not so much. I’d rather write!

Looking back to the beginning of your writing/publishing career, what do you know now that you wish you’d known then?
Marcia: ALWAYS work with a good editor.

Is there something that always inspires you or triggers your creativity in cooking or writing?
Marcia: Eating chocolate helps!!!! For me, writing is my sanity, words matter to me, how we communicate, how we speak to each other and knowing what we say and what we mean to say matters a lot.

What writing projects are you working on now?
Marcia: Book 2 of my mystery series Agatha, Raymond, Sherlock and Me. Maybe getting Jory to eventually do a second cookbook.

Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?
Jory and Marcia: Come to The Homestead Bistro and Café at the base of the Sandia Tram in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Visit the website: HomesteadABQ.com.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has volunteered as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



Author Update 2026: Patricia Gable

Posted on by

Author Patricia Gable writes stories of courage, compassion, and determination for children and middle graders. Her 2026 release of No One Can See Me brings middle-grade readers the story of quiet child Clare and the junior guardian angel assigned to boost Clare’s confidence. You’ll find Patricia on her website BooksByPatriciaGable.com and her Amazon author store. For more about her work, read her 2022, 2023, and 2025 SWW interviews.

What is at the heart of the story you tell in No One Can See Me?
Often quiet students have talents no one knows about. They are ignored or even teased. How can we change this?

What topics does your book touch on that would make it a perfect fit for the classroom?
Sit in a circle and allow students to describe something they can do that others may not know. It can be a variety of things: sports, art, jobs, reading, writing, and so on.

Who are your main characters and what do you like most about them?
Clare is a shy girl. No one knows about her talent and her family issues. Joanna, although she is invisible, is a junior guardian angel assigned to help Clare.

You include a guardian angel in No One Can See Me as well as in the books of The Right Series. Why does that type of character appeal to you?
I like to add a whimsical element to a story, not specific religions. As an only child, I pretended that an angel was watching over me. I would talk to “her” to solve problems.

Tell us more about how the book came together.
Being a teacher for twenty-six years, classrooms show up in my writing. There, problems arise, and students interact with others. It took me several months to complete the manuscript. It took longer to have a professional edit the story. Not much was changed except for some of the punctuation! The cover was done by a friend who is an illustrator. We worked together on it.

When did you know you had taken the manuscript as far as it could go, that it was finished and ready for publishing?
Clare’s life blossomed and the guardian angel knew it was time to move on.

What was the best part of working on this project?
I have a dear friend who knows a lot about reading and publishing. I sent her each chapter as I wrote it. She was happily my motivation.

Of the four books you’ve published, which one did you enjoy writing the most?
My first book, The Right Address, was a joy to write. I was drawn to Annie, in a short story I had written and decided to turn it into a book. I couldn’t leave Annie. She was in all three of The Right Series books.

What writing projects are you working on now?
No One Can See Me #2. Some of the same characters, but this time a boy is the main character and in ninth grade.

Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?
If you are thinking about writing, I suggest you take some classes. WOW (Women on Writing) has a variety of online classes and wonderful teachers.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has volunteered as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



Author Update: Brian Montross

Posted on by

Award-winning author Brian Montross writes stories that explore the edge where technology collides with the supernatural—and what happens when that boundary breaks. His September 2026 release, The Babel Protocol (Apocryphon Book 1), is a supernatural techno-thriller for “readers who enjoy conspiracy, apocalyptic suspense, and chilling stories about technology moving beyond human control.” Look for Brian on ThrillingTalesHub.blog, his Amazon author page, and Books2Read. And read more about his work in his 2025 interview for SouthWest Writers.

What would you like readers to know about the story you tell in The Babel Protocol?
The Babel Protocol deals with a very timely, almost existential question: What happens if we create an artificial intelligence smarter than everyone on the planet? And what happens when that intelligence develops a personality, appears self-aware, and we decide it deserves to be treated as a person?

At its heart, though, the novel is a modern-day Frankenstein. It’s a nod to Mary Shelley, except this time the monster isn’t assembled from dead bodies—it’s built from code. My protagonist genuinely wants to do the right thing. He’s trying to approach this new intelligence ethically and compassionately, but he keeps making decisions that seem reasonable at the time and turn out to be disastrously wrong.

That’s what interested me most about the story. The danger doesn’t come from someone deliberately creating evil. It comes from intelligent, well-meaning people believing they understand what they’ve created—and gradually giving it more trust, more rights, and ultimately more power than they should.

What themes do you explore in the book? Are they important to you on a personal level?
One of the biggest themes in The Babel Protocol is something I’ve thought about for a long time: knowledge isn’t the same thing as wisdom. We’re getting very good at asking, can we do this? Can we build a machine that thinks? Can we make it smarter than we are? Can we give it a personality, rights, even control over parts of our world? But I’m not sure we’re nearly as good at asking the next question: Should we?

That idea is very personal to me. I spent most of my career as an engineer, so I understand the excitement of solving a problem and making something work. There’s a real temptation, once you realize something is possible, to keep pushing until you’ve done it. But The Babel Protocol is really about what happens when our ability to create outruns our wisdom to understand the consequences.

I also wanted it to feel like a true international thriller. Parts of the story take place in Jerusalem, Rome, Kathmandu, and elsewhere, and Jerusalem is especially personal for me because I lived there. I borrowed from my own memories—the streets, the neighborhoods, the feel of the city. I even gave one of my characters an apartment on Sokolov Street, where I once lived. Those little pieces of my own life helped make this very large story feel real to me.

And underneath all of it are questions of morality and faith. If an artificial intelligence tells us it’s conscious, do we believe it? If it appears to have feelings, do we owe it compassion? When does treating our creation humanely cross the line into giving it power it should never have? Those are the kinds of questions that fascinate me. I don’t think technology is inherently good or evil. The real question is what human beings choose to do with it—and whether we’re wise enough to recognize the line before we cross it.

What challenges did you face writing or publishing this first book in a new series? Why did you decide to start a new series instead of writing book three of The Chama Conspiracies?
The biggest challenge was deciding to write The Babel Protocol now. I’m not finished with my Chama Conspiracies books, and I’m also working on The Ghost on the Hill, a mystery set in 1946 and the present day. But Babel felt like it couldn’t wait. AI is moving so quickly that ideas that seemed speculative when I started were already appearing in the news. The questions about AGI, personhood, and how much authority we might give an artificial intelligence suddenly felt very immediate. That’s something I enjoy—taking what’s happening now and asking, What happens next? I’ll be talking about that at Killer Nashville on a panel about using news and current events to develop plot. The Babel Protocol grew out of exactly that kind of question.

Who are your main characters and why did you choose them to carry the story? Will those who know you recognize you in any of the characters?
None of the characters is really me, but there are definitely bits and pieces of me in all three.

Father Matteo Leone is from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania (where I was born). He starts out in technology, goes to seminary, and eventually ends up in Rome advising the Vatican on artificial intelligence. I gave him some things I know well—the technical background, questions of faith, and that tendency to believe you can think your way through almost any problem.

Dr. Eliana Hadari is probably closer to my work life. She’s the scientist and engineer in the story—curious, analytical, and always wanting to understand how something works and then push it a little further. I spent a lot of years around people like her, and I’ll admit I have some of that in me too.

Then there’s Amir. He’s the musician, the guitar player, and the one who doesn’t always take himself too seriously. That’s another side of me entirely.

So no, I didn’t put myself into the book as a character. I think I just left fingerprints. And if you combined the three of them, throw in my motorcycle and a little New Mexico dust, my family might get suspicious.

Did what-if questions help shape this work?
Absolutely. The Babel Protocol started with one big question: What if we create an AI, decide it’s conscious, and declare it a person? From there came all the dangerous follow-ups: What rights does it have? Can we shut it down? And if it’s smarter than we are, how much power will we eventually give it? That’s where the thriller begins.

How did the book come together?
The Babel Protocol was more than two years in development. I took an earlier version to Killer Nashville last year as an unpublished manuscript and kept refining it. Then I happened to watch a version of Frankenstein, and something clicked. I realized I was telling the wrong story. So, I did something crazy: I threw out the completed novel and started over. The new version became a first-person tale of horror and suspense—a modern Frankenstein with artificial intelligence as the monster. Painful? Absolutely. But it finally became the story I wanted to tell.

What did you enjoy most about putting this project together?
I’m very proud of the book it became. Throwing away a completed thirty-chapter novel was difficult, but I eventually realized the work itself wasn’t wasted—I had simply told the wrong version of the story. Once I understood what The Babel Protocol needed to be, the rewrite went surprisingly quickly, probably six to eight months. I already knew the characters, the world, and the research. I just had to tell the story the way I should have told it in the first place. And learning to write it in first person was a big part of that. It pushed me as a writer, and I think the book is much stronger because of it.

What writing projects are you working on now?
Right now, I’m working on The Ghost on the Hill, a dual-timeline literary mystery/thriller set in present-day Los Alamos and 1946. It’s probably the most ambitious and complex story I’ve attempted, with two mysteries unfolding across the two timelines and eventually colliding. The outline is extensive, and the research has been fascinating—Los Alamos just after the war, the history of the Hill, the people who worked there, and the collision of that secret scientific world with northern New Mexico’s Hispanic culture and traditions. It’s well underway. I expect I’ll spend much of the next year getting it right.

Is there anything else you’d like readers to know?
Yes—The Forbidden Strain [book 2 of The Chama Conspiracies] was named a 2026 Silver Falchion finalist for Best Thriller at Killer Nashville and finished as one of the top five in the competition. I’m incredibly proud of how far the book went among such a strong field.

KLWagoner150_2KL Wagoner loves creating worlds of fantasy and science fiction. Her current work in progress is The Last Bonekeeper fantasy trilogy and short stories in the same universe. A member of SouthWest Writers since 2006, Kat has volunteered as the organization’s secretary, newsletter editor, website manager, and author interview coordinator. Kat is also a veteran, a martial art student, and a grandmother. Visit her at klwagoner.com.



In Archive