1–What is the title of your latest release? FRIENDLY FIRE 2–What’s the “elevator pitch” for your new book? Newshound reporter Nik Byron races to unravel the mystery surrounding the death of Geoffrey Tate, one of the world’s richest individuals and the CEO of Yukon, the country’s preeminent AI company, at the hands of his young trophy wife. 3–How did you decide where your book was going to take place? When writing about intrigue, double-dealing, espionage, smarmy politicians and investigative reporting, the go-to setting is Washington, DC, where I once lived and worked. 4–Would you hang out with your protagonist in real life? Absolutely (and I feel like I do most days). 5–What are three words that describe your protagonist? Charming, flawed, determined. 6–What’s something you learned while writing this book? Listen to your characters. 7–Do you edit as you draft or wait until you are totally done? I constantly edit and revise. 8–What’s your favorite foodie indulgence? Anything salty – Cape Cod potato chips, popcorn and salty caramel ice cream. 9–Describe your writing space/office! It’s a converted sleeping porch in a 100-year-old house with three walls of windows and limestone mined from a local quarry. The other wall is bookcases….

Charlemagne is a historical figure you don’t see a lot of in thrillers. Katherine Neville is the only writer I can recall who’s made good use of him. But he’s fascinating. He ruled for 47 years, and lived to be 74, at a time when kings rarely reigned more than 5 years, and people died long before age 40. He unified a continent, laid the groundwork for the formation, centuries later, of a modern Europe, and many of his policies and practices became proven models for western civilization. He was a visionary who surrounded himself with smart people and, for the first time, placed the needs of his subjects before royal ambition. He was so progressive that it begs the question—did he have help? Was he privy to special knowledge? Both questions spurred my imagination. Within The Charlemagne Pursuit I utilized an actual artifact known as the Voynich Manuscript. It’s preserved in the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University . Supposedly created sometime in the 15th or 16th centuries, its folios are penned in a language that no one has ever been able to decipher. In addition, there are a multitude of colorful, odd drawings. By general…

I was scheduled to be in the staff car with White House Press Secretary Jim Brady on March 30, 1981 – the day of the assassination attempt against President Reagan. I was Jim’s Deputy at the time. At the last minute, Jim said, “There’s a lot of work to do today – a lot of press calls to return. Why don’t you stay back. I can handle this one alone – you go tomorrow. This is just a speech to some union group over at the Hilton. I’ll be back around 2:30.” As we all know, he never came back. That day, along with many others will always be seared in my memory, and when I sat down to write my first novel CHECKMATE, I spent time reflecting on those personal experiences, figuring I had a ton of material for a series of political thrillers. Authors are always asked, “Where do you get your ideas?” Of course, any daily newspaper offers a veritable Petri dish of plot points, but I decided that “being there” is even better. When I later took the job as Senior Director of the National Security Council, we were dealing with crises almost on a daily…