SPARK follows a 16-year-old foster kid who runs away to a virtual reality theme park, where he meets another runaway and uncovers more than an escape from reality. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?

We’ve known foster parents and foster kids. Everybody means well, but the system is so overloaded that kids fall through the cracks and are left in situations that are not good. These kids often have issues that the parents cannot handle and the environment turns adversarial. Will is an example of that. He is a great kid whose past sets him up to fail in the system.

As a child, I always wanted to spend the night in Disneyland – to look behind the scenes and explore. Will figures out a way to do just that in Spark.

I find the world you created in this novel brimming with possibilities. Where did the inspiration for the Solar Prime Augmented Reality Park come from, and how did it change as you were writing?

Solar Prime Augmented Reality Park was inspired by Pokémon Go. My daughters were both playing, so I gave it a try. The concept of a Pokémon being projected onto a real background captured my attention. One of the problems with virtual reality is that you lose all touch with your actual environment and can easily crash into walls, tables, and TVs while playing. It’s also easy to step on things, like pets. Augmented reality blends the best of the real and the virtual.

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

I wanted to look at the foster care system, education, artificial intelligence, and a post-war world.

Where does the story go in the next book, and where do you see it going in the future?

The second book in the series, Fire, is now available! It follows Will and Feral as they fight their way through the aftermath of Spark’s events and the notoriety that they’ve gained. Some social media themes play out and they get caught between competing factions and find themselves counseling an AI that has learned that violence can be an effective tool.

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