Talisman: Subterfuge follows a shattered war hero who becomes a secret superpowered vigilante after a cosmic force offers to resurrect his wife, if he can save one thousand lives before his darker self destroys him. What inspired the moral dilemma at the heart of Liam’s deal with the Aeterium Axis?

My first thought was that there’s something or someone that just won’t leave Planet Earth alone.  Either we’re the universe’s playground, or we just haven’t learned from previous lessons, and now we must do so again.  Liam “Foxy” Mayfield happens to get caught up in this conundrum, just as Jet and others were in the “Dissonance” saga.  I thought, wouldn’t it be interesting if there were someone sentient out there, far more galactically nefarious than the gorgons, who come with a seemingly innocent demand of restoring the balance?

The Zorander is terrifying. How did you approach crafting a villain who is essentially the hero’s twisted reflection? 

There’s always a backstory.  It’s a bit of “been there, done that.”  The Zorander used to be, for all intents and purposes, the Iskander / Talisman.  But he was betrayed, and you’re beginning to learn that the Aeterium Axis might not in fact be all that they claim to be; they certainly didn’t do the Zorander any favors, and that’s why he has become bitter and hardened.

Liam’s grief feels incredibly real on the page. Did you draw from any personal experiences or research when writing his emotional arc?​

Anyone who has been bereaved can relate to Liam. However, beyond that there is the earnest hope that he can essentially become UN-bereaved, and, taxing though his charge may be, he follows through on it and delivers the goods, pursuing that hope to its end.  I’ve been there…kind of a sunk-cost fallacy mindset: he’s too far in now to reverse course.  He’s too committed and has come too far now to abandon hope, even though on paper it seems that this pursuit is nothing more than a vain one.  Hope always pushes us on.  The question now is, is this hope tangible?  Trustworthy?  Or…even likely?

Are there hints about the larger universe or future installments hidden in the reporter’s storyline or the nature of the Aeterium Axis?​

Perhaps?  😊  That’s all I’ll say for now.  I will say that Liam Mayfield is a direct pull from the ‘Dissonanceverse,’ as Rosie Campion is – she has appeared in several of my other novels.  Liam seemed a natural fit for this spinoff series, but I’m not convinced there is another storyline for him or Onyx beyond this.  I’m a pantser, an organic writer, so I have to write it and see how it all plays out before I commit to anything additional beyond the end of this trilogy.

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