Reader’s today we are getting a ‘two-for-one’ author special. Please welcome Charles Breakfield and Rox Burkey to the blog. They are the co-authors of The Enigma Series, a fast-paced series of techo-thrillers. First, give our readers a look at your real life and your writing life.
Breakfield and Burkey, as a team, bring a unique blend of expertise and personal interests to their writing. As the Enigma Series’ CTO, Breakfield leverages his decades of technology expertise to bring innovative technothriller elements into storytelling. His deep knowledge of World War II history, extensive world travel, and cultural exchanges provide multidimensionality to the people, places, and journeys readers discover in the stories. Beyond writing, Charles enjoys wine tasting, winemaking, Harley riding, cooking new recipes and extravaganzas, and woodworking, which adds a personal touch to his work.
Enigma Series’ COO, Burkey, uses her extensive professional knowledge to optimize technology and business investments influencing character experiences and situations within the stories. Readers can discover the distinctive characteristics of people she has met woven into contemporary situations between the covers. Rox treasures her family (including the puppies) and friends, reading and reviewing books, and traveling whenever possible. But one of her most cherished activities is meeting readers at various events, including book clubs. This interaction with readers is what truly makes her work meaningful.
Where you’re from, where you live? Is writing your full-time job?
We work and live in Texas, primarily Dallas. Rox has a full-time job but manages to help craft short stories and novels while helping her business customers. Charles is fulltime working for the Enigma partnership to build and ship new stories through our publishing arm ICABOD Press.
How long have you been writing?
Rox Burkey is the catalyst for the series. She got us into writing non-fiction for Auerbach back in 2010. When we tired of doing tech manuals, she postulated, why not techno-thrillers? Then, she challenged Breakfield to work with her in cozy mysteries. The mantra is, “Why can’t we do that genre too?” We’ve been at fiction since 2012. We have 12 novels in the Enigma Series, 2 novels in the Enigma Heirs series, 3 novels in the Magnolia Bluff Crime Chronicle series, and gobs of short stories. We’ve been at it a while.
What does your typical writing day look like?
We scan the technical horizon, looking for the next element to explore or learn how it can make people vulnerable to power or greed. It isn’t challenging to find new material for cyber thugs to use to their advantage, and the cyber heroes who say no then stop them. Life situations are a portion of the stories that make them relatable to contemporary people in our connected digital world. We usually speak once a day to discuss our character or story plot findings to see how they might work.
Tell us about your latest release? Where the idea came from? Perhaps some fun moments, or not so fun moments?
The Ransom Enigma will be our newest thriller mystery with a release date of Aug 20th, 2024. We were on the road to an author book signing and Rox was driving while Charles took notes. Rox drives too fast for Charles, so he distracts himself by talking about the upcoming novel and scribbling down notes rather than look at the road. By the time we got to our destination, The Ransom Enigma had been fully sketched out. It will be the 27th installment of the Magnolia Bluff Crime Chronicles that we participate in with the Underground Authors.
Could you share one detail from your current release with readers that they might not find in the book?
The backstory of JoAnn Wagner (now Mrs. Rodreguiz) is that she is a world class supermodel from Brazil. She and her husband JJ, who works in cybersecurity, need a place to go where the fawning public can’t ruin their couple quiet time. They’ve come to Magnolia Bluff to spend quite time as regular people in a small Texas town. The thing is they keep bumping into crimes being committed and end up usually helping the local police. This will be their third crime discovery but with a twist.
Who has been the most difficult character for you to write? Why?
Breakfield and Burkey have an unfair advantage in this area. There will always be characters that we each struggle with from time to time but when one of us is having a problem, we hammer on it together. Rox is very strong on character development and will often infuse the extra secret sauce needed to craft the villain or reluctant hero.
If you could be one of your characters for a day which character would it be?
Actually we each write better when we do become one of the characters. It is quite fair to report that we have each become one of the characters, sometimes for days at a time. The storytelling output yields some amazing results.
What’s your take on research and how do you do it?
At no time do we take information being inserted into our novels for granted. Everything is researched to either confirm what we think we know or give us a factual background for the storytelling to insure there are no non-factual, heroic statements that cannot be defended.
What’s the most fun thing about being an author?
Rox has assured Charles on more than one occasion that we can kill people in our books and not go to jail.
Do you write multiple books at once, or one at a time?
Frequently we will focus on our main novels for the year but slip in a short story or two just because. We like to build two main novels a year but to do that we usually sketch out the one for the second half of the year while cranking on the first novel of the year.
What’s your favorite writing tool? — software, app, notebook, etc.
We sketch out an outline for the manuscript in an Excel spreadsheet to capture chapters and characters to be used. Then work off our standard Word doc template and sort of follow the outline. We leverage our patent pending technique of “literary ping-pong” to bat the draft document back and forth until it is done.
Are there any particular authors that have influenced how you write?
For Breakfield it would be Kevin J. Anderson and for Burkey it is J.R.R. Tolkien.
Do you have a secret talent readers would be surprised by?
Charles’ love of wine tastings, cooking, woodworking, and Harley riding. Some of these elements are found throughout the tales. He continues to try to teach Burkey humor. Rox enjoys family, learning, people-watching, travel, and cooking.
Your favorite go to drink or food when the world goes crazy?
Charles and Rox both enjoy sampling the fermented grape varieties.
What is your writing kryptonite?
For both of us – interruptions with lots of drama.
What is the one question you never get ask at interviews, but wish you did? Ask and answer it.
We really like telling people how proud we are to have Derek Shoales as the voice actor who helped us bring to market our audiobooks. We have snippets on our website and book trailers as well.
Quite a fascinating background on you both and the series! Thank you for joining us today. Readers, here’s a look at the latest book in the Enigma Series – THE RANSOM ENIGMA:
Jo and JJ Rodreguiz finished their vacation dream home in Magnolia Bluff. To celebrate their accomplishment, they invite the town residents to their housewarming.
Emails are sent. Lily offers to provide all the side dishes to complement the barbeque. Chief Tommy Jager bartends until the last guest leaves. The teenagers act as servers. Guests dance outside until the wee hours. Toasts are made to honor JJ and Jo’s dearest friends. Max the Labrador will clean up the crumbs.
After the last guest departs, JJ finds a housewarming gift addressed to Jo. She excitedly opens it and gasps with dismay. Someone left behind not a present but a blackmail letter. Jo crumbles into tears, fearing they must sell and never return. Her outraged husband swears to kill the wretched blackmailer. Unfortunately, the Chief of Police cannot unhear the threat.
- Two days later, the police find JJ unconscious next to the dead blackmailer suspect.
- Can Jo clear JJ’s name as the murderer while preserving their anonymity?
- Who will help her navigate this investigation?
- Who knows the blackmailer?
All the world’s problems rest on her shoulders as her greatest love and husband lie in a coma.
Learn more about the Enigma Series::
