The Scotland Project follows an investigative journalist who finds himself knee-deep in conspiracies when he examines the mystery behind a terrorist attack in 2005 London. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?

Failure was my inspiration. I had made three previous attempts to write a novel and couldn’t get over the hump. All three were very different. With The Scotland Project, I decided to create a world I knew more about. I was determined to make the characters believable and the plot equally so. I started to look for threads to pull and came across the alleged fifth bomber of the London attacks in 2005. There was actually a person arrested years later but what happened to that person is a mystery. When I researched that, I knew I had my story.

Which character in your book do you feel you relate to most?

There is a little bit of me in Mathieu James and probably a little bit of me in Conan MacGregor. This was another change I made approaching this fourth attempt – the characters are all composites of people I know who do the things they do in the book, with certain liberties taken of course.

What draws you to write espionage thrillers?

I grew up reading everything. As a teen, I was drawn to westerns by Louis L’Amour and Zane Grey and thrillers by Tom Clancy. I loved getting lost in their worlds. Later, I started reading John le Carre, Ian Fleming, and others. Being a child of the late 70s/early 80s, the Cold War was very real. Spy stories were in the newspapers and on the evening news. It was captivating. But I’ve also written a literary fiction book called The Sunflower Widows which should be out next year as well. I’m drawn to great stories, interesting characters, and dynamic locations.

What is next for main character Mathieu James? Is there a follow-up novel in the works?

In order to answer these questions, I’m taking a short break from writing the second in the Mathieu James series. So yes, there will be another in 2025, and if you read The Scotland Project, you’ll find the clues on where the story may go!
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