There are two facts I want you to keep in mind about my dystopian fiction series as you read this post. First, yes, the books are set in a world where a deadly flu epidemic sweeps a climate-changed planet Earth. But second, my characters don’t experience the pandemic. They’re living outside the affected area and are desperate to get the cure to all those who need it. But is that enough to make you even think of reading it?
Pre-pandemic, I, along with a host of others would consume en masse pandemic and other dystopian fiction books, series, and movies. Our need for books like The Hunger Games, The Handmaid’s Tale, zombie series like The Walking Dead, and environmental dystopian tales like The 100 became almost insatiable. But when did you last want to read a dystopian novel or watch a dystopian film?
And how does a dystopian fiction writer make a living anymore? Are our books doomed to suffer dismal sales for generations to come? Scientists warned us that another worldwide pandemic was possible, but did anyone believe it would happen in our lifetime? Did anyone think we’d lose over 7 Million people and live in isolation for months on end? That we’d fear stopping to talk to our neighbors at the mailbox?
I know I couldn’t imagine 2020 and 2021 unfurling as they did. And I haven’t watched or read a dystopian themed book or show since the beginning of the pandemic. I can’t even revisit the draft I began to end my dystopian series and bring my characters to their happily ever after. Am I alone?
Why would I even start such a post? Because I love my characters and their story. In Lovelock Ones, published in 2018, two teens are thrust into adulthood when a flu epidemic threatens the North American continent. Shipped to a desert military research base, the duo finds Jema’s sister has contracted the disease. With little to do but twiddle their thumbs, the two take matters into their own hands, setting out for the one person that may be able to save her sister.
What unfurls is a race against time, a deadly encounter with countrymen, and a battle against shifting alliances. Who can you trust when the people who say they want to protect seek to use you? What do you do when the one person who was your compass turns out to be the bad guy?
Lovelock Ones finds Jema and Troy in a fight to save themselves, and the rest of the world’s population, from a ruthless tyrant. The follow-up novel, Torch, sees the teens at odds with the evil regime that refuses to share the cure. Living off the land, the couple and their friends seek to right the wrongs of the current isolationist movement. But can they do it before the rest of the world decides to end everyone on the North American continent?
If you take the pandemic out of the equation, pretend our heroes are only fighting tyrannical rule, social oppression, unfair distribution of wealth, or climate change would you read these books? Or is any account of the world dissolving into chaos too true to life to experience?
Books in the dystopian genre with challenges like climate change, destroyed technological advances, AI domination, attempts to colonize other planets, and biotechnological advances like cloning have been making ground in the past year. The Hunger Games series is continuing their saga in 2025 with the release of Suzanne Collins’s Sunrise on the Reaping. Is the dystopian genre making a comeback or has it been lost to this generation?
Perhaps only time will tell. Will our children’s children not fear worldwide pandemics? Will this genre have a resurgence in popularity like some other fan fiction? It’s been twenty years since the first Twilight book was published and the Twilight Saga is continuing with a movie about the next generation of Cullens. With Nosferatu hitting theatres in December of 2024, we could be seeing a resurgence of popularity of vampire fiction. Could the same be true for dystopian fiction?
I would love to let go of my aversion to thinking about anything pandemic related and finish my series. Maybe I only need a month’s vacation on a deserted island to reset my psyche. But for now, I’ll leave my characters in the world of the unknown, somewhere between winning their last challenge and facing the next one.
If you’ve got to know how Jema and Troy discover how to cure her sister, how they escape being blown up, or how they sneak into the capital to rescue Jema’s sister and mother from her tyrannical Uncle’s grasp, then you can find Lovelock Ones and Torch on my website at triciacopeland.com or on Amazon, Kindle, and KU.
Happy reading!
To be a Fae Queen (Realm Chronicles, Book 1) by Tricia Copeland
The last of her line, a faerie princess prepares to take the throne. But multiple forces plot against her, some trusted friends…
After losing her brothers, Titania studied and trained to rule Aubren. But she hadn’t planned on becoming Queen at fifteen. Now with her reign challenged from within the castle walls, she must decide what is best for her kingdom. Should another rule in her stead? Or has fate led her to this moment?
Only she can decide a path that becomes littered with choices. Will a marriage shore up her reign? Could naming a successor be enough? And what of the creatures of the deep and a tale of one who can end all evil? Faced with a choice to aid beings of Upper Earth, she must weigh whether to believe her inner compass and face charges of treason. Accepting the edicts of the High Council may be a safer route, but is it the best choice for the realm?
Titania’s emerging power lies just beyond her reach. Will it manifest when she most needs it? Or do they face an eternity in darkness?
Super excited to talk all things dystopian!