The actual designation of the Sentinels developed long before any real story. It came with the original kernel of an idea, back when I was 20 or 21, and was still watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the TV series. I suppose the name came from that. Slayer, Sentinel. It was a long time ago.

Yes, it’s very exciting! Perhaps morbidly so. Back in 2017, just before I left for Prague, I read about an Italian man’s sky-diving suicide story on MSN news. He called his girlfriend and told her what he was going to do, and then he jumped. Nobody knew why.

Another example has to do with Amanda’s first assignment, to stop the psychic assassination of an Italian politician. I was inspired by both the assassination of Aldo Moro in the 70s and a mysterious, improbable accident that ended the life of a Ukrainian politician in the 80s. In Book 2, the villain says, “I’d like your head on a stick,” which is something Ed Kemper, an infamous serial killer, said. In a later book in the series, I’m already incorporating Jeffrey Epstein’s “suicide”.

A writer’s characters are a part of themselves. They’re rarely created out of thin air. There was animated movie titled “9”, in 2009, that illustrates this concept quite well: the creator in the movie breathes in parts of his soul into each of the nine characters.

But at the same time, some of my characters, especially the villains, are inspired by real people. As an example, in Book 3, there is an evil girl with a burn on her hand and a snake ring on her finger. Totally inspired by a real person. Another villain is very loosely based on my ex. Shh… Don’t tell him. Haha.