Nothing Comes After Z follows an investigator who rescues a trafficked girl only to realize that the cartel that paid for her wants her back at all costs. What was the inspiration for the setup to your story?

I drove to Mexico in July of 1991 in my /v/w bus with my German Shepherd mix. At dusk on a lonely stretch of the PanAmerican Highway, I was threatened by narco thugs brandishing weapons (pointed at me) as the cabin of the bus filled with the odor of ripening marijuana. During my stay in Mexico, I read Desperados and learned about the cartels and their many activities.

JadeAnne Stone is a strong and intriguing character. What were some driving ideals behind her character’s development?

JadeAnne, a rescued orphan brought to the US during the Vietnam Babylift, was adopted into a white, upper-middle class family and raised in a wealthy suburb of San Francisco. She didn’t fit in to her society and needed to get away to look at her life. When she arrives in Mexico she’s pretty ignorant and has to toughen up fast. As she learns how things work in Mexico, she finds her true values and her place in the world.It isn’t unusual for adopted kids to feel out of step with their families and environments. I wanted to explore that.

What were some themes that were important for you to explore in this book?

First, I was interested in the process of self-actualization—how people (outside of therapy) come to know themselves and change. Second, in my opinion, slavery of all kinds are the greatest and most insidious evil in our world. I wanted to develop a story that exposes this evil in a way that took trafficking out of news articles and commentary and put it into an emotional context, which might grab readers in the gut and make them think.

Will there be another book in the JadeAnne Stone Mexico Adventure series?

Absolutely yes. Book 4, Coyote, Pursuit and Terror Across the Border publishes on November 16th. This book completes the story of the trafficked teen, but doesn’t end the cartel threat to JadeAnne. That’s all I’m going to say!

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