Some of you may already know, but I was just a teenager when my mother remarried and moved us to California. Leaving the small town I grew up in, (less than 3,000 residents) and moving to Los Angeles was one helluva culture shock for this country grown boy. From the females introducing themselves, to the size of the city, it was a great adjustment. I personally witnessed the Watts riots and the turmoil that accompanied it. The fear that spread to the surrounding areas would spill over into our communities. I witnessed several business owners taking their weapons to protect their property, but lucky for everyone, it was contained in Watts. Over the years, I witnessed more riots including the East LA riots where the Hispanic community exploded. Up to that point I only wrote mysteries, but the last riot made me think. What if a real catastrophic event hit Los Angeles and the authorities were unable to rush in and keep things under control. There had been many stories about earthquakes, but I knew when they occurred it would not be total collapse because outside services would rush in and stabilize the situation. It had to be an event where others were occupied, unable to respond. I picked a nuclear war as the backdrop of my story. With the armed forces occupied fighting a war and protecting the home land, they would not concern themselves with activities in one big city that was nuked. So that was the side story. Next I had to create my main character, which I did by creating Brad Phillips, a handsome man and a survivalist that makes the story more believable. His beautiful sexy wife, Vicki and their three children, Cindi (17) Brian (16) and Brad junior (9). A perfectly normal family that starts to become dysfunctional when Brian joins a neo-nazi type group, dumping his old friends and making new friends. Brian is extremely jealous of his perfect older sister and starts to hate her. His willingness to do his sister harm becomes part of the story. As an added part of the story I had Brad and Vicki trying to survive in different locations. They, with their neighbor Phil, built a bomb shelter on their property lines planning to survive there, but like all plans, it didn’t occur when they expected. The story centers around Brad and Vicki, but being in different places, they each had their own problems. As an added twist, I had Brad surviving alone with a sexy, partime actress, Michele Davies. To add to Brad’s woes, she was falling for him. So there you have it. I will write more in a day or two, I didn’t want to make this post too long. The picture on this post is the cover of the first story of this series.
Talk back, I’m listening as always. Have a great day.
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