Even Climate Change Can’t Stop Love and Murder received a 4+ star review, making it an IndieReader Approved title.
Following find an interview with author AES O’Neill.
What is the name of the book and when was it published?
Even Climate Change Can’t Stop Love and Murder, published on November 2022 to great professional reviews!
What’s the book’s first line?
Ginger, the lead protagonist of the novel, asks: “If she poked them with a knife, would they bleed?”
What’s the book about? Give us the “pitch”.
Love story, thriller, odd mix of both. The book pulls the reader into a uniquely American vision of love and murder, trauma, and healing around 2026, “Even Climate Change Can’t Stop Love and Murder,” is the highly-anticipated romance suspense thriller and follow-up to last year’s critically acclaimed, best-selling “Even A Pandemic Can’t Stop Love And Murder.”
Barely surviving the climatic run-in in “Even A Pandemic Can’t Stop Love and Murder” with Jagger, the golem-like mob killer antagonist, Alby and Ginger, the series’ reluctant protagonists, are being relocated by government agents from New Jersey to Sedona, AZ. A dark episode in Iraq has left Alby permanently in hiding—a threat of death that follows him from the deserts of the Middle East to the deserts of Arizona.
The two cross a country straining at its social seams against climate chaos, insurrectionists, and white supremacists—deadly threats are at every turn as they search to define their love for each other—unaware that Jagger is still alive and after them.
Stuck in Alby’s truck for days, Alby and Ginger slowly get to know each other. Alby is quiet, with a wry sharpness. Ginger, a professional dance instructor, who is both tough and righteous with a hair-trigger temper, feels safe with Alby in ways she doesn’t understand. Their conversations range from deeply emotional to darkly funny and irreverent, reminiscent of the snappy patter used in the 1930s “Thin Man” classics.
Jagger is also heading West, fighting against poisoned lungs and an unseen force stronger than himself—his uncanny ability to use facial recognition to read his victims is rendered useless against this new enemy. Battling this unseen foe and his mob “Owners,” has him metamorphosed into something even more dangerous than the professional killer he was before.
Suffering from droughts, fires, storms, secessionists, and a gun-loving culture, the couple navigates their new home in Sedona while Jagger, having avoided death, waits for his moment to exact revenge on Alby. In a deadly climax that brings them all together with jihadists on the hottest day ever recorded at the national pueblo monument, Tuzigoot, the terrorists who forced Alby into hiding finally catch up with him. Adding a heightened level of evil into the mix, Jagger’s own battles have changed him… but to what?
What inspired you to write the book? A particular person? An event?
The Even Love and Murder series is loosely based on my own childhood experience with my father being tailed and wiretapped by the FBI. One time over lunch, he told me about chasing down something stolen from a mob bank in southern New Jersey; he knew the story because he was here. I had to create new characters because of the details he told me – that door stays shut. Ginger and Alby charmed me with their pain and need for love and they simply took over; that tale blossomed into a three-part series. I am proud they chose me to capture their adventures.
What’s the main reason someone should really read this book?
Several reasons, each appealing to a different reader. If you like a good road trip, killers and action, and the blood and bones of a thriller, it will take you for a ride — this book is funny and entertaining. Thriller readers enjoyed it, but also commented it was not the typical kind of thriller they read; the focus on love and healing of past traumas was unusual in the thriller genre for them. That was the more meaningful part where trauma and healing were the themes. This was what two of my Beta readers focused on, who are deeply involved with healing. They intentionally avoid negativity or violence in what they read.
What’s the most distinctive thing about the main character? Who-real or fictional-would you say the character reminds you of?
Jagger, the psychotically, methodical mob hitman is a Golem. The Old Testament described it best — they spoke of a thing made of clay, which was both lifeless and held life but was not truly alive. He scares me. Telling his story was unnerving but thankfully my editor helped me past it.
Then there is Ginger — the willful, beautiful, angry, impatient, lovable protagonist – who does have the essence of someone real. My wife Nadine, who passed in April 2020, was a huge Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire fan and inspired these elements in the character; she had a secret rebel in her, which is now deep within Ginger.
When did you first decide to become an author?
When I was 14. A very compelling voice told me. While I did get a writing degree, and then film school masters courses at Stanford, and then became a copywriter and public speaker for decades, it just took a bit longer than I thought.
Is this the first book you’ve written?
No, it is volume 2 of a 3-part series with the same protagonists, Ginger and Alby.
What do you do for work when you’re not writing?
I am a marketing consultant – I have had a long and winding career, mostly working in Manhattan.
How much time do you generally spend on your writing?
At least six days a week, probably two hours of musing and two hours of writing…then there are times when my mind just wants to wander around the characters and story; those times, I tend to use a recording app and tape and transcribe what I record.
What’s the best and the hardest part of being an indie?
Knowing your readers are out there but finding them is Herculean.
What’s a great piece of advice that you can share with fellow indie authors?
Write what you have a passion for, it will help with the rough moments when your tank is empty.
Establish a routine, whether it’s thirty minutes or several hours a day.
If you believe you have a story that needs to be told, don’t let anyone or anything stop you; not the least, yourself.
Have a routine that has nothing to do with writing to clear your head and heart.
Which book do you wish you could have written?
So many! “All The King’s Men” by Robert Penn Warren or “The Reivers” by Faulkner, Pablo Neruda’s first volume of poetry, Dashiell Hammett, Douglas Adam’s “Hitchhiker’s Guide” series… The struggle and tension between character development and the plot is an ever-winding twisted path. My approach (so far) has been to delve into the main characters’ traumas and history, which define their actions in the present. Yet, I’m careful not to leave behind the required mystery or thriller genre elements that drive a plot hard and fast. Since I obsess about balanced dualities and seeming contradictions, this is a fun part of the work.