January 14, 2021
Broken World Post Four
Welcome to Broken World Day Four!
Week 2, Day 4 – Broken World
Genre: Post-Apocalyptic Science Fiction
Release Date: July 2, 2014
Cover Design: Jimmy Gibbs
Formats: ebook, audiobook, and paperback
Amazon US
Amazon UK
Universal
Audible
Goodreads
As a deadly virus sweeps the country, Vivian Thomas teams with brothers, Angus and Axl, in hopes of making it across the country to find the daughter she gave up for adoption. By the time they make it to California, most of the population has been wiped out, but when the dead start coming back, they quickly realize that no electricity or running water are the least of their concerns.
What can you tell us about the setting and characters in Broken World?
I have a lot of stuff to say about this question, so get ready!
Let’s start with the setting. Like I’ve said a few times, I was living in California when I wrote Broken World, specifically Fairfield, CA, which was where Vivian grew up and where she was headed when Axl and Angus pick her up on the side of the road. This isn’t the first or last time I chose a place I’ve lived or been as the setting for my story. It’s something I love to do, because if I’ve actually been there, it’s easier to make it feel real. I once read a book – which I will not name – that was set in Summerville, SC, which is another place I’ve lived, and it was immediately evident to me that the authors had never been to the area. They referenced cotton plantations, but the area is known as the low country because of how wet it is, which was why the plantations in and around Summerville had rice fields. The author also talked about Summerville being a small town and made it sound very secluded, but it’s a booming area because of Joint Base Charleston and it isn’t even a little secluded. It was so strange reading about this town that I’ve actually lived in and trying to wrap my brain around these fake details that I swore to myself I would never do that as an author.
Okay, tangent over.
After the group reaches Fairfield, they head to the Mark Hopkins hotel in San Francisco, which is another place I’ve been. In June of 2012, my husband and I celebrated our 10 year anniversary at the Mark Hopkins hotel, and I chose it specifically for the book so I could describe it accurately. Here are a couple pictures from our dinner at the restaurant in the Mark Hopkins:
I’ve never traveled Route 66 the way my characters have, so when I was writing Broken World I read a lot of blogs written by people who had take a road trip on this historic highway, which was where I got a couple other settings. In chapter 8 the group camps in the town of Texola for the night, specifically in the parking lot of an old bar called Water Hole #2. Like I said, I’d never been there, but when we moved from California to Oklahoma in February 2014, we took a quick detour through Texola so I could snap some pictures:
After leaving San Francisco, the group heads to the Mojave Desert where an underground luxury condo waits. I’ve shared this many times in the past, but this, too, is based on an actual location. You can find out more about the Survival Condos by heading to their website. Like in the book, it was built in an old missile silo, although I did change the location from Kansas to Nevada. These silos exist all across the country and there was even one near us when we lived in Oklahoma – which as my readers know, will pop up in a later book.
