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Jun 19, 2013, 9:21pm

Post-Apocalyptic Forums :: Post-Apocalyptic Media :: Creative Writing :: The Crying House

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Topic: The Crying House (Read 306 times)

davidbryan81
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The Crying House
« Thread Started on Aug 9, 2012, 7:45am »

Hi All,
I hope this is the right place to post this but I have joined these boards as I recently finished my first story and wanted to discuss it.
It's set in our world and time but in a senario in which the problems we have now are just a little bit worse and we do not recover from them.
Fuel prices continue to rise, compounding the global recession, people lose their jobs, the budget is cut to the police and law and order break down.
An alcaholic good-for-nothing man finds out that the girl he loves has fled to the mountains in search of her old family farm and tries to follow her along with some of her friends.
His journy explores every area of the meltdown, in the world and in his life too.
What do you think so far?

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matov
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Re: The Crying House
« Reply #1 on Aug 9, 2012, 2:01pm »

Like the idea and having had my own fictional alcoholic take a stroll through a post-pandemic England and Europe then I am all for such tales.

Too much post-apoc fiction centres on the hero who saw it all coming and did the right things and can sometimes veer towards nothing more than a fictionalised 'told you so'. But I like damaged characters and nothing is more flawed than a British piss-head trying to make good the havoc they have unleashed in the lives of those around.

Throw in a societal break-down and a drunken meander through the carnage that comes with it and all in pursuit of a fair maiden and you have something potentially very interesting.

If you have not read it then seek out 'The Death of Grass' by John Christopher. For my money the best British societal collapse novel out there, abliet caused by crop failure, and it has a brutality to it that is second to none. That should get the old crust turning over.

« Last Edit: Aug 9, 2012, 2:02pm by matov »

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davidbryan81
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Re: The Crying House
« Reply #2 on Aug 21, 2012, 3:15am »

Hi, I plan to read the Death of Grass next as a friend told me about it and said my idea sounded quite similar.
I also find stories about the one person who saw it all coming and was prepared and knew what to do fairly boring. I based alot of this adventure on my walk across the Pyrenees a few years ago. I was totally unprepared and inexperienced but learned everything I needed to along the way. It seemed like this would be a more realistic and interesting way to develope a caracture in a novel.
It also seemed to be a good way to tell the wider story, through the eyes of someone who is powerless to prevent it.
Tell me more about your own novel. The story sounds similar.

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davidbryan81
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Re: The Crying House
« Reply #3 on Sept 4, 2012, 6:55pm »

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Alone-With-The-G....6802201&sr= 1-1

Well it's here. It's out and for the next 48 hours or so it's free to download.

I have been thinking more and more about the topics I tried to cover in the book.

One thing I did to try to point out how fragile our economy and society are was to have the characters live through the fuel protest of 2000 which we had here in the UK.

Drivers and people annoyed with the high tax on fuel blockaded all of the major refineries. The pumps ran out and it turned out that even emergency services were not able to cope as they had no stockpiles as everyone expected. The problem is petrol evaporates and cannot be stored for long.

The protests brought the UK to a standstill within 48 hours. Supermarkets began to run out of food as they don't want it rotting on the shelves or in store rooms. Everything depends on "Just in Time deliveries."

Does anyone else remember these protests? Do you think they highlighted a fragile link in our society? Let me know what you think?

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matov
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Re: The Crying House
« Reply #4 on Sept 5, 2012, 10:08am »

The fuel protests in 2000 co-incided with the birth of my first child and I can remember filling up and knowing that I had to be careful for the first time in my life when it came to worrying about not being able to get petrol. It certainly bought things home.

And I do think, and I know its a concern of HMG as well, that we a potential SHTF senario could bring chaos a lot sooner than people realise.

I have heard of concerns about how long emergency services could be relied on in terms of people coming in for work, especially in the bigger citys where most people who work in the Police, Ambulance and fire-brigrades tend to live some distance away from their place of work.

The tipping point in terms of staff absence rates has been shown in various exercises to have been far more dramatic than previously considered and that whilst they expect numbers to hold up intitally once absence rates pass a certain level then they effectively go into free-fall. So you could go in 48-72 hours from being able to maintain a level of cover to having almost none at all.

Having experienced a little bit a form of societal breakdown in the former Yugoslavia in the early 90's I sometimes think people are a little to pessimistic about human nature and that people can be a lot more co-operative than some think so its not all doom and gloom but here in Europe we are heading into some interesting times.

Oh and check your private messages.

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