I love writing humor into the stories. This is why I wanted to make sure I wrote Alison as a real Jersey girl who grew up at the Shore. She has a lot of attitude and will tell people the natural language of New Jersey is sarcasm. She speaks it fluently.

I don’t remember what exactly made me pick up the first book by Greg Iles that I read (MORTAL FEAR), but I’ve been a fan ever since. He’s one of my...