You had me at “They ate Jorgensen first.”, the very first sentence of this book. This book is a roller coaster ride of excitement, and I could not put it down, dying to find out what would happen next.

In this book, nanotechnology that was designed to fight cancer goes terribly wrong. Instead of doing what it was supposed to, it kills nearly five billion people, in the first machine plague humanity has ever had to face. The few people left are struggling to survive on mountaintops that are over ten thousand feet high, the only place the nanotech seems unable to exist. The environment is crashing, as the nanotech monsters invade more and more species. Food is scarce. “They ate Jorgensen first.”

It is in this small group of people where the reader meets Cam, who turned out to be one of my favorite characters. Something about him is very likeable, and it is clear that this is a guy who just wants things to work out and everything to be okay again. He has made a friend named Sawyer, who is a bit more mysterious, and whose actions drive large parts of the story.

Humanity’s last hope rests in the International Space Station, where several astronauts, (and cosmonauts), are scrambling to find something that will stop this plague, “kill” the nano-technological beasties, and save the world. There are quite a few interesting characters here, but my favorite among them is Ruth. She’s super smart, and determined to do whatever she sets her mind to. I got the feeling that if there was an answer, Ruth just might be the one to identify it.

Of course, whenever you have a group of people involved with anything, it is not as simple as just finding the right answer. People, by nature, add complexity. I never knew what to expect the outcome would be as I read through this book. Sci-Fi fans will really enjoy this book, and so will readers who like stories with a whole lot of action and suspense. Readers who love apocolyptic story lines will love this book as much as I did!

Jeff Carlson was kind enough to do an interview with me for Book Sandwich.

Jen Thorpe: Hi Jeff! Thanks for doing this interview.

Jeff Carlson:Hi, Jen, and thank you for letting me be the pickle in the Book Sandwich.

Jen Thorpe: I love books about “the end of the world as we know it” and have read many. I’ve never read one that involved a nanotech plague, though. Very creative choice! What inspired you to write about civilization ending this way?

Jeff Carlson:In one sense I’ve been chewing on the basic concept of Plague Year since I was a boy. I grew up skiing and hiking in northern California, including the Tahoe area… and as a kid I was always fascinated by Donner Pass, near the site of the infamous, unlucky Donner Party.

The trick was building a scenario in which the entire world was trapped in the highest mountains. My first attempt with the idea was a short story. Originally the problem was a virus, but I couldn’t make a virus obey a barrier. It kept coming up over the entire mountain and killing everybody. There’s a story there, too, but it’s a story without much hope, whereas in the final version, the heroes have at least a faint chance of overcoming the plague.

What happened was that I hit upon the notion of a mechanical bug and gave it a hypobaric fuse as a control. Real labs do use air pressure and sealed chambers to contain biohazards. Then I threw in a little industrial espionage and shazam, the nanotech was loose, but I had my barrier at 10,000 feet where the bug self-destructs. After that I was off to the races.

JT:Do you have a favorite end-of-the-world book? What about a movie?

JC:Oh, absolutely. By my vote, Stephen King’s The Stand still ranks as the best ever, although Niven & Pournelle’s Lucifer’s Hammer is a very close second. Don’t let your impressionable kids read these books, though. They might grow up to be writers!

As for movies, I love the 1978 Invasion of the Body Snatchers with Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams, Jeff Goldblum, and Leonard Nemoy. It’s not quite an outright end-of-the-world story, but the tension and paranoia are extremely well done. I also think 28 Days Later is among the all-time best post-apocalyptic films.

JT: How did you learn enough about nanotech to write this story? It all sounded so real and possible as I was reading. Just the concept of these little tiny machines getting inside people is frightening!

JC: Unfortunately, it gets worse. The nanotech in the book is very, very real. It’s happening now.

There is a huge amount of eye-popping material being published in the field these days and I read as much as I could get my hands on. I also went to seminars and corresponded with the researchers afterward.

Yes, we’re still a few breakthroughs short of the nanobots featured in Plague Year, so far as we know… but there are dozens of private and military labs who aren’t publishing their work, like the science team in the book. Nobody has any idea how far those labs might have progressed.

JT: Do you think nanotech will bring on the end of humanity? If not, what do you predict will be the cause of the end of us all? Do you see the end coming from something we humans do to ourselves?

JC: There must be rat poison in this book sandwich!

Call me crazy, but I don’t predict the end of the world at all. I’m actually a happy guy. I enjoy what I do, I love my family… and sometimes my writing is a little dark. That’s just part of developing a thriller novel, especially in this case. Once you accept the premise of Plague Year, that people are no longer able to survive below 10,000 feet, you get to the Donner Party in a hurry and on a global scale. It’s a brutal, skin-of-your-teeth scenario.

I do believe that humankind is facing a lot of tough challenges. Overcrowding. Pollution. The increased spread of disease as our environment warms. But as in Plague Year, I also believe that we can outwit nearly any obstacle. People are tough and clever and the smartest of us are ultimately good at heart.

JT: What music, if any, did you listen to while writing this book? If not music, then what sounds were in the background while you wrote? Did you listen to the same stuff while writing “Plague Year” as you did while writing “Plague War”?

JC: I like it quiet when I work because I’m listening to my characters or listening for background noise in the world that I’m in, whether it’s a lonely breeze in a forest or the roar of attack helicopters…

I do know writers who listen to music when they’re working, and I’m envious, but I don’t know how they manage it.

JT: What is it like to write stories about a plague that kills off most of the world when you have small children at home? Can you keep your book and your life in separate places in your head, or do things get weird?

JC:Well, it helps that I’m not all kinds of normal to begin with. Ha ha. For one thing, I’m a part-time stay-at-home dad, which is the hardest and most rewarding job I’ve ever had. It’s definitely not a 9-to-5-in-the-cubicle sort of thing where you clock in and the boss tells you what to do. Plus, I’m usually the only man at the park during weekdays, or the only guy schlepping kids around the grocery store.

At the same time, I’m also a full-time professional writer, which is also an up-and-down business. For years you’re trying to break in. Next minute you’re signing six figure foreign rights deals for three books… one of which you haven’t even written yet! So my wife and I are insanely busy. And, I like to think, we’re happier for being so involved and overcommitted.

JT: This book had more than enough action to make one heck of an exciting movie! There are chase scenes, gun fights, crash landings… it’s wonderful! If there were a movie, what actors and actresses would you choose to play your characters? I’m wondering particularly about Ruth, Cam, and Sawyer, but would like to hear your selections for other characters too.

JC:You’re right that Plague Year would translate perfectly to the big screen or make an excellent mini-series. The situation is loaded with conflict as well as tough, intelligent characters caught in impossible situations…

Perhaps fortunately, casting wouldn’t be up to me (I’m just the writer), so I haven’t worried much about who to fit into which role. If I had my choice, though, they’d do the movie like the original Star Wars, with a cast that was, at the time, a bunch of no-names. Let the story be the focus, not the celebrity faces.

That being said, one easy rewrite puts Nick Cage or Will Smith into the role of Cam, which would be unspeakably awesome.

JT: In “Plague Year” we have a book that starts out with a small group of people stranded on a mountain top, fighting to survive, against an enemy they don’t entirely understand. Some readers are going to notice the similarity to the TV show “LOST”, especially with a character named Sawyer existing in both stories. Were you influenced by the show “LOST” while writing “Plague Year”? What can you tell my readers about how the two
stories differ?

JC:I’m flattered by the comparison. LOST is one of only two TV shows that I follow, and I think it’s incredibly well crafted.

The stories are very different, although I like to think the gripping suspense is the same. LOST tends more toward the mystical voodoo fantasy aspects of the genre, whereas Plague Year is a tech thriller in the Michael Crichton tradition, i.e., it’s supposed to be more scary because it could really happen, whereas LOST is more about wild coincidences and psychic weirdness.

As for similarities, well, the wheels in publishing turn veeeery slowly. I know it’s hard to believe, given an August 2007 release, but Plague Year was already done and making the rounds in New York before LOST came on the air. My Sawyer was first! (And, for that matter, my anti-hero has a receeding hairline instead of those floppy girl bangs.) No less than five editors said they loved Plague Year but couldn’t get permission to buy a first novel. First novels often don’t sell well, because nobody’s ever heard of you. So that ate up a couple years. Finally one guy put some money on the table and we had a small three-way fight for the book, with Ace/Penguin coming out on top. Even then, it was another year and a half before the book actually hit the shelves.

JT: Where can my readers go on the internet to keep up with you, your book signings, and other news?

JC: I have a nice web site at www.jverse.com that we’re looking to upgrade in the near future. One of those upgrades will be posting the cover art for Plague War, which I just got a peek at last week. There will also be a free excerpt of the book!

In the meantime, my book signings are always posted. Expect to see more tour dates for Summer 2008. There are also free short stories, fun photos, news, and a mind-croggling trivia contest—the prize being the chance to name a character after yourself or a friend in one of my upcoming novels.

JT: Can you give my readers some kind of a “teaser” or “trailer” about your upcoming sequel, “Plague War”? I just cannot wait to read it!

Thank you. I’m excited to see the book breathed into life myself.

Plague War works as a stand-alone novel but it is a direct sequel of Year, picking up the storyline just days after Year ended. Uh, there’s a war in it… Really I can’t say more for fear of giving too much away. Here’s an endorsement from New York Times bestselling author Sean Williams, who calls Plague War “A break-neck ride through one of the most deadly—and thrilling—futures imagined in years.” That sounds like a good time, right?

Next up for me are no less than three projects: a third novel to complete the Plague trilogy, an adventure novel entitled Colony High written in collaboration with New York Times bestselling author David Brin, and a big new thriller called Interrupt.

I’m a busy duck and having a lot of fun at the moment. Thank you for the chance to talk about it, Jen.

JT: Thanks, Jeff! This was fun!

Luca Bastardo lives on the streets of Florence, Italy, in the early 1300′s. He has no knowledge of who his parents were, or how he became lost from them. All he knows is that he is different from the other homeless boys he befriends. His hair is blond (and a little red), and everyone else has brown hair. He is clearly smarter than the rest of the children, as well as many of the adults. Luca is strikingly beautiful, and being so brings him much grief.

For reasons unknown to him, Luca is very nearly immortal. But how? And why? His long life causes him to experience much more suffering than a “normal” man would have to endure. Sometimes, Luca believes God is laughing at him.

It is clear that Luca is a survivor. As a child, he becomes enslaved in a brothel run by an evil man named Silvano. This brothel is filled children who are forced into being sex workers. Silvano takes pleasure in terrifying, beating, and mutilating the children who work for him. Luca spends many years in this hell, and I found it really difficult to read about. This part of the book is not written in a pornographic way, but, it is abundantly clear what is going on anyway. Luca is suffering. Silvano won’t kill Luca, however. Silvano has noticed that Luca doesn’t seem to be aging, and is convinced he is a sorcerer. He tells Luca that he has a paper that talks about who Luca’s parents were, and that he is waiting for Luca to become “full grown”, so he can turn him over to the church, and gain prestige. Silvano needs Luca. So, when he wants to punish Luca, he chooses another child to beat and torture, and makes Luca watch.

Eventually, Luca escapes, creating a bitter enemy in not just Silvano, but all his future generations. Luca is free, but never safe. Readers who are knowledgeable about Italian art from the 1300′s to the 1400′s will find the rest of the book fascinating. The book becomes almost a work of historical fiction, as Slatton weaves in political events, famous artists who befriend Luca, and a vivid description of the artwork, the buildings, and the beauty of Italy itself. The good parts of Luca’s long life seem all the more beautiful in comparison to the hell of Luca’s past. Like all of us, Luca is who he is because of what he has survived. It colors him in the choices he makes, and how he sees the world.

Luca wants, more than anything, to find out who his parents were. Are they still alive? What happened that day he was lost? He also wants, very badly, to someday have a wife and child, and to be worthy of the love of a woman. Simple goals that keep getting diverted as Luca gets involved in the lives of his close friends.

He meets an alchemist named Geber, and a mysterious man called “the wanderer”, both of whom seem to have the answers Luca is searching for, but who will only answer his inquiries with more questions. They are his teachers, and are fascinating characters! Slatton does a wonderful job of making the characters in her book multidimentional, and incredibly real. I found myself becoming happy when good things happened to the people in her story, and incredibly distressed as I read about things going badly. Luca has a vision of the future, (of sorts), under the tutulage of Geber and The Wanderer, where he has to make an important choice that will affect the course of the rest of Luca’s long life.

I was delighted to find Leonardo Da Vinci appearing in this story, as well as several members of the Medici family. They are not just added for flavor, either! They direct much of the action in the later part of the book. Slatton brings her readers to the heart of the action throughout the story. You learn, firsthand, what it was like to live through the Black Plague, to be in a town sacked by an invading army, to dance and frolic at carnevale. Slatton describe the food the characters eat so well, I found myself getting hungry.

By the end, Luca does get what he has been longing for, but, only after much suffering, and for a short time. We know from the first pages of the book that Luca is doomed, because we learn right away that his story is written in a journal that was given to the church after his death. Despite that foreshadowing, it was still unsettling to see exactly how it all ended.

If you can’t get enough of stories involving Italy, the artwork that adorns it, and the artists who created it, you will love this book. Those of you that are especially sensitive to stories where children are abused are going to have a difficult time with the first part of this book, (as I did). However, overall, this is a wonderful read. You have to take the good with the bad in this story, which is something that Luca Bastardo learns is true about life, and God Himself.

It came from the Romance Section! This book had the words “Romantic Suspense” on the spine, which is what made me consider reading it in the first place. Mysteries can be interesting, but I just can’t seem to get into the books that are heavily about “romance”. Which way would this book lean? With much trepidation, I gave this book a read.

The story line is a twisted vine. Someone burns down a couple of churches in this small, southern town, and this brings in Jace Nolan, a policeman from “the city”. He doesn’t fit into this little town with its southern ways, and manages to basically anger everyone he encounters while trying to solve this case. He especially angers Lindsey Sloan, the woman who teaches what is essentially “the Gifted Kids” in the high school, by stating that he is certain some of “her kids” were involved in the church burnings. Lindsey is very protective of her little group of students, most of whom she has been teaching for years, and who she has gotten to know very well. Jace is convinced that only her kids would be smart enough to get away with these kinds of crimes, and that the same kids would get a rush off of getting away with it. He predicts that things will get worse before they get better, as the unknown killer seeks bigger and bigger rushes, involving more danger, and, eventually, deaths.

Lindsey and Jace basically butt heads for a while, until they don’t. Here is where the “romance” part of the novel comes in. The two find themselves attracted to each other, but both are fighting against it, making for all sorts of tension. I guess it would be good, if you were reading this because you wanted to read a romance novel, but I was gritting my teeth as I read it. To me, their attraction, and denial of it, came across a little too “high school” for me to find it believable. They think about how attractive the other one is. They wonder who around them can “see” how they feel. They act like they hate each other, to hide their attractions. Blah. Adults don’t usually act like this.

The mystery part of the book is pretty good. First, you have the church burnings. Some of Lindsey’s students wind up dead, (and so do some adults), in ways that, at first, appear to be suicides. There isn’t any clue as to who is behind it, but, the reader does get a few pages every so often from the viewpoint of the unknown killer. I had a few guesses about who the killer was, but, then I would read more, and change my mind.

Much of this book would qualify as a “thriller”. The action was fast paced, and there were many scenes where I was certain a major character was going to wind up dead. There is just enough “police work” going on to give the reader a sense that things are not as they appear, especially the parts where they try to find out what could have caused the apparent suicides. The killer seems to have left a fairly convincing trail of false evidence that made a lot of sense, if you think a suicide happened. Very detailed, but not quite in the realm of those CSI shows.

The ending, however, is where things fell apart a little bit for me. There is a big dramatic scene where the killer is finally revealed, and I found that scene, overall, to be really intense, and a great read. But, when I found out exactly who was behind all the deaths, and the reasons why… this is where things fell apart for me. I just could not buy it. The book spends such a long time pointing out how smart Lindsey’s students are… but, the ending contridicted that in many ways.

If you are looking for an interesting twist on the “school shooting” theme we are seeing in so many books lately, but, would rather read one that is somewhat removed from reality, this might be the book for you. The writing style was somewhat “dumbed down”, in my opinion, and many of the characters were a bit one dimensional, which I did not expect, considering that the author was a teacher. However, this sort of writing does match most of the books I find in the Romance Section, so, I guess I should have expected that. These are the “light and easy reads”, and I keep wanting more meat to the story.

What does come through loud and clear is Lindsey’s deep feelings about her students. She really does care about these kids, she defends them, she wants to believe the best about them, she truly grieves when they die. It is clear that the school “system” just doesn’t understand the struggles her students have, despite being so very smart, and Lindsey fights for them, to make sure their needs are being met. Only a former teacher would be able to write that part of the book so convincingly.