In DON’T MESS WITH ANNA, an online troll meets his match after leaving a one-star review and antagonizing an author. Where did the idea for this novel come from?

About ten years ago, I had actually found a 1-star rating for one of my books on a reader site and there was no written review to explain why this person thought it was so bad. For a new author, it was gut-wrenching. Out of curiosity, I clicked on the person’s page and was astonished to see they had given close to a hundred 1 stars with no written explanation to a bunch of high-profile authors all within a matter of minutes and all on the same day. I could only laugh and say, “Wow! Mad at the world or something?” What’s an author to do but shrug and move on. I comforted myself by being included with these illustrious authors. Late last year, a newly minted author friend of mine received a 1-star with no explanation and gave him a little comfort over my own experience. In an instant I had this image of this irritating author troll down in his mom’s basement cackling like a loon while wreaking havoc in his anonymity. Then I laughingly wondered what my characters would think of someone so carelessly bashing their very existence. Milton was born that day. I let my characters have at him.

I found Milton Smith to be such an interesting character. What was the inspiration for his traits and dialogue?

Instead of presenting Milton as a comic book villain, I knew full well that the person who started this journey for me was just a simple human and probably had some sort of character flaw where he was only happy when trashing someone else’s day. What power they must have felt for causing me to hope for a boatload of 5 stars to offset what he’d done to the book in one click. It took me years for that 1-star to slowly get swallowed up by those who actually enjoyed the story. I envisioned Milton as very intelligent, yet socially ignorant. Something had to have caused him to lash out at the world in the only way he knew how. He had to have a way to explain himself out of the mess he caused. He had to have enough brains to finally catch on that you cannot stay hidden behind a screen forever. Karma always comes knocking at some point.

What was your favorite scene in this story?

Without giving too much away, it has to be Godric and Milton by the ‘wall of weirdness.’ I believe this is where the reader will fully understand the emotional pain Milton caused to others he’s never met. It’s chaos theory’s butterfly effect in a nutshell.

What is the next book that you are working on, and when will it be available?

I have a sequel to Don’t Mess with Anna in mind, but that might be a while before I can get it out. I want to adapt this first one into a screenplay. I did that with Visiting Darkness, my mystery thriller, and it made it to the semi-finals in the Hollywood Blue Cat screenplay contest. I basically freaked myself out when realizing I had gone up against close to 3,000 entries from seasoned veterans and placed in the top 3%. Even making it to quarter finals had been a shot in the dark, so going further was mind blowing. Just my luck, Hollywood went on strike shortly after and things in the works died on the vine. I’ve now gotten Visiting Darkness’s sequel screenplay in a lot of contests this year and fingers crossed. I’m also in the middle of completing book 16 of my romance series. My fans there are asking where the heck did I go and when’s the next one, so I surely don’t want to disappoint. Love my readers!

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