Forced Apart follows two teens bound by first love and fierce loyalty as they struggle to stay connected through upheaval, grief, and the painful process of growing up. What inspired the introspective, dual-perspective style that lets readers live inside Cali and Sky’s thoughts?

Cali and Sky have been the key figures in this series on two kids growing up in a suburb of a large American city. I wanted boys and girls who read the series to relate to Sky and Cali and to try to make some of their concerns (Sky’s and Cali’s) typical for American teens. So, logically it seemed fruitful to present the thoughts and emotions from the female and the male point of view.

Luckily, these two fictional teens have knowledgeable and invested parents as do many of their friends, and consequently some of the teen challenges, especially sexual developments, are addressed with insight by the parents. Those adult perspectives were more pronounced in the earlier books because young teens need more parental input. In the two books in the series when Cali and Sky are in ninth grade (Not Just Another Brick in the Wall and Facing Revenge), they are more on their own, depend more on consultation and advice from peers as, typical for teens, they break away from a desire for parental involvement.

In Forced Apart, there is the gradual growth on the part of the teens in forging a more adult-to-adult relationship with parents. Examples of this new relationship are evident in Forced Apart when Cali and Shelly Snipe form a supportive bond as they face adjusting to a new life separated from their personal relationships back in Ohio. Sky has a similar supportive and working relationship with his mom and his stepfather as he deals with living closely with Marcie Meadows.

How did you balance the emotional core of the story with the background elements of danger and past trauma, such as the kidnappings?​

Sky and Cali would hope that kidnappings are a thing of the past, but what they learned from their traumatic experiences has made them resilient, crafty, and determined to help anyone else who’s path they might cross who is faced with injustice and criminal intent. Although they are now dealing with emotional despair over their separation, they continue to find ways to support and encourage each other. Their bond has been built on more than teen romance.

The friend group feels like a second family. How did you approach writing their loyalty and messy humor to keep the story from becoming too heavy?​

The fact of teen suicide looms too large in today’s teen world. Kids who forego suicide as an answer to emotional isolation and humiliation are usually ones who have a network of supportive and knowledgeable friends.  Sky and Cali give insight and support to their friends and in return receive the same. Humor helps grease the friendship wheels but there has been a growing unshakeable support when Sky and Cali desperately need it. Teens need to value friendship and to invest personally in building and maintaining friendships.

If you could add one more scene to further highlight the theme of “surviving change,” what moment would you explore?​

I should have had a scene where Cali and Sky meet again, during their separation, and before the need to rescue Solina. Probably they would meet again at the stadium of their high school. They needed a face-to-face where they could vent their frustration over being apart but have a chance to express why they were experiencing such emotional loss. To express the ways that their friendship has been important and undeniably crucial in their successful transitioning from teen to adult. Maybe if there is one final book in the series, Sky and Cali may have that conversation when they graduate and go separate ways.

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