While on assignment in Utah, Christine Temetri isn’t surprised when yet another prophesied Apocalypse fails to occur. After three years of reporting on End Times cults for a religious news magazine, Christine is seriously questioning her career choice. But then she meets Mercury, a cult leader whose knowledge of the impending Apocalypse is decidedly more solid than most: he is an angel, sent from heaven to prepare for the Second Coming but distracted by beer, ping pong, and other earthly delights. After Christine and Mercury inadvertently save Karl Grissom—a film-school dropout and the newly appointed Antichrist—from assassination, she realizes the three of them are all that stand in the way of mankind’s utter annihilation. They are a motley crew compared to the heavenly host bent on earth’s destruction, but Christine figures they’ll just have to do. Full of memorable characters, Mercury Falls is an absurdly funny tale about unlikely heroes on a quest to save the world.

Robert Kroese: Saying "The Bible" is cheating, right?

I guess I’ll go with Douglas Adams’s Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. That book provided the template for novels like Mercury Falls. Adams demonstrated that you could get away with putting your characters on a spaceship without ever describing what the spaceship looked like. Adams’s attitude was: "Okay, now they’re on a spaceship. You all know what a spaceship is, right? Good." And then he would move on to something really important, like a character’s quest for a good cup of tea.

Question: What is the worst lie you've ever told?

Robert Kroese: When I was maybe ten years old, I was up late reading when I was supposed to be in bed. I heard my mom coming down the hall toward my door and I knew I was going to be in big trouble if she caught me out of bed. So I flicked off the light, took two steps and dove headlong into bed. About a half second later, while the bedsprings were still creaking, my mom opened the door. I was lying diagonally on bed, spread-eagled on top of the bedspread as my mom peered in at me. Feeling the need to reassure my mother that everything was kosher, I blurted out, "I’M JUST SLEEPING THIS WAY!"

That was the worst lie I ever told.

Question: Describe the perfect writing environment.

Robert Kroese: A clean, well-lit place. With high-speed Internet access and MS Word.

Question: If you could write your own epitaph, what would it say?

Robert Kroese: "If you can read this, you’re too close."

Question: Who is the one person living or dead that you would like to have dinner with?

Robert Kroese: I think I’d really enjoy watching Woody Allen eat lobster.

Question: If you could have one superpower what would it be?

Robert Kroese: I’d like to be Super-taster, who can identify all the ingredients in any food he eats. "What is this, paprika? I knew it."

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