Abbot Lane follows a journalism student who’s recruited by his history professor and an intelligence officer to investigate a plot involving a rogue microbiologist, a clandestine Detroit laboratory, and a domestic extremist network. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?

Spy intrigue, combined with a love of heroic fighters for justice throughout the ages. Figures such as Robin Hood, Zorro, the Phantom (all horsemen), as is Kriel, the ghostly protagonist in Abbot Lane. 

Jesse’s background in journalism, with skills in observation, inquiry, and evidence gathering, makes him useful to Lee and credible as a protagonist. How did you develop a civilian recruit whose skills feel organic to the intelligence world rather than conveniently implausible?

Jesse Carlton, the protagonist in the story is a student of Journalism, who feels helpless to contribute anything to the world around him. Without denigrating the profession of journalism he finds himself basically relegated to the sidelines of world events. Jesse wants to contribute something more and was given the opportunity, when offered to assist on a terrorism file by an NSA station chief Lee Tondar. 

The novel explores questions of identity, duty, and institutional power. Were those ideas central from the beginning?

Primarily duty. Jesse was thrust willingly into action upon hearing that the fate an entire American city was in peril from a chemical weapon of mass destruction being, covertly constructed by rogue agent. 

Does Abbot Lane continue, and what does Jesse Carlton do with the intelligence station Lee left him?

Lee bequeaths the Intelligence Station to Jesse and his partner Taras.

If there is a willingness and interest to chronicle more of Kriel’s undertakings. There will be further tales unraveling from the shores of Lake Erie in the future.