Top o' Mornin' To Ya: Author Interview

So, are real-life people featured in the book? Yes! In addition to Lee Harvey Oswald and Jack Ruby, there are a host of other characters. Political ones: President John F. Kennedy, his wife Jackie Kennedy, Vice President Johnson, former VP (and later president) Richard Nixon, and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. Foreign Leaders: Fidel Castro of Cuba, and Nikita Khrushchev of the Soviet Union.

In addition, Oswald’s wife Marina is in the book, along with Mrs. Paine, the woman who Marina lived with. And, the police officer who Oswald killed after the president was assassinated—Officer JD Tippit.

Pretty much everyone is a suspect.

How did you come up with the title? Wow, it was a long process. I brainstormed all different kinds of keywords related to the Kennedys and the JFK Conspiracy. Then I strung them together in hundreds of different combinations to best communicate what the book was about.

After spending hours evaluating the list, I realized all the titles stank, so I threw them away and used what had been the working title all along.

Did you write SAVING JACKIE K to entertain or to educate? Or to make us think “what if?” Without a doubt, my primary goal was to entertain. I want readers to have fun.

That said, it’s an interesting and informative topic, and I hope the book sparks thought and debate. It’s intriguing to speculate “what if,” and I got a chance to explore those scenarios when writing the novel.

What makes readers care about your characters? The heroes of my novel all have strong personalities, each with his or her own character flaws. So they butt heads and argue quite a bit as they are planning the mission to save Jackie K. But deep down, they each have a personal motive that propels them forward, and makes them vulnerable.

In spite of their faults, throughout the novel, the characters develop a deep affection for each other, and a fierce protectiveness of each other. Ultimately, they want to right the wrongs of the past, and they relentlessly work together to make that happen.

I’m hoping that readers cheer for the team’s successes, and mourn their failures along the way.

Tell me about your characters—both heroes and villains. The heroes of SAVING JACKIE K are stubborn, loyal, self-reliant, dedicated, and feisty. They all have a strong moral compass, and feel a righteous obligation to change the past for the better. However, one feels that the “ends justify the means.”

The main villain is the mastermind behind the plot to assassinate President Kennedy. Equally powerful as this real-life person is evil, the antagonist stops at nothing to achieve personal objectives, offering up innocent people as pawns and scapegoats.

Some might say that your character Jay is somewhat, well, annoying. He seems to embark on long-winded explanations, while spewing out factoids right and left. Is he based on someone you know? Oh, not at all. More like an amalgam of every geeky kid you’ve ever met who trips over himself to explain things to you. But Jay is so earnest and committed to the mission that even the other characters find him endearing, in a frustrating sort of way.