Idea for a book

[HazardousCube]

I have this idea for a book kicking around in my head.
The book takes place in the year 2037 and the setting is California years after the big one struck (huge earthquake). What resulted was that the nuclear reactors that got struck by the big one got destroyed and now whatever land was surrounding the reactor is uninhabitable. My main character is a guy who works as a security guard for a community of survivors in a subway system. He gets called to the surface because the people they trade with haven't shown up and will starve unless they return. His adventure starts off as expected as in he tries to resolve obstacles with the least amount of violence, but as his journey goes on, he starts to go mad and gives into violence until he just devolves to the point where he doesn't care about the consequences of his actions and just wants to be done with it.

So can I work with this or not?
P.S. I know this sounds a lot like Metro 2033 meets Spec Ops: The Line

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

A bit overdone? Every disaster film uses bunkers, even when it doesn't make sense.

If we're talking hazardous coolant water waste, why not make the ground itself unsafe? Instead, make it a story about contaminated ground water forcing people to create vertical societies with the repurposed towers of the cities. With rooftop gardens, converted tower floors into water capture tanks with juryrigged filters. Solar power glass panes (they exist now, so by 2037 I could see entire towers made with them). Moreover... instead of a bleak mystery, actually have it revealed at the start. Like big repurposed future-tech towers transformed into 'villages' ... with various floors dedicated to various subsistence projects. Different towers hooked up by piton wire bridges.

The story could literally start off with a fabricator tower full of mechanical engineers and machinists prior thr quake... and this particular tower can be seen with the naked eye. People living and working in it can be identified with a telescope ... These engineers were helping repair some solar batteries in exchange for so many bushels of vertically and horizontally grown tomatoes and wheat.

The security guard sees what happened to his tower being attacked by an unidentified faction, the wire transport ziplines cut... and that's how it starts off. The security guard has to navigate the decaying ground level and underground carparks now that the safe transport systems they did have are gone.

An interesting idea to play with is thd idea of disquieting silence. Tidbits on the news suggesting a far worse disaster, but no one knows the full extent of the story. The towers creating a 'quietude policy' ... preferring the idea of quiet subsistence rather than broadcasting their situation on the open air which may attract others looking for refuge.

You could enhance that by the security guard guy simply being known by an alias they use with specific tower societies. A mercenary paid to procure materials, but is sworn to secrecy in order to operate and maintain the quietude doctrine in exchange for their employment and residency within the towers themselves. So the tower he works orders him to deal with this sudden threat, and told to clean up the situation as quietly as possible while generating the least amount of 'grounder' knowledge.

I think the descent into madness works better when you show some whimsical, majestic, almost fantastic concept of aerial garden (relative) paradises... and juxtaposing that to irradiated cement of the carparks and streets.

 

[Kyrian007]

Maybe rework the premise a bit, why would the survivors still live in California at all? I understand the idea is not natural to west coasters, but other parts of the US are actually habitable. Plus how would the destruction of the west coast somehow bring the destruction of the US Government and infrastructure? Why didn't the government step in and help rebuild (in a better way than survivors digging into a subway?) Why weren't the survivors evacuated from the danger zones? Basically, "the big one" isn't enough to drive humanity into surviving in abandoned subway systems.

 

[JoJo]

It's good to remember that an idea is only one small part of a work. It's the execution of the idea that really counts when the chips are down, and so if your heart is set on this, then I say go for it.

All that said, my thoughts on the idea itself? I have to admit that as presented in the OP, it doesn't really set my interest alight. We've all seen near-future post-apocalypses before, what sets this one apart from the rest? It doesn't even necessarily have to be the setting, an interesting cast or plot can make up for a more generic world. From the paragraph we've been given, though, we get very little sense of what the main character is like, beyond the fact that he's a security guard. Background? Personality? Motives? I'm sure you have these thought out, it's just not clear to us what they are, and whether they might be interesting. The plot does have potential, since it has a clear motivation for the MC and a potential mystery wrapped up in the traders' disappearance.

I like Addendum's suggestion a lot, actually, but again, write the book of your heart. If you're set on a world of bunkers and subways, then you can make it work.

 

[245971]

There are currently tow operational nuclear plants in the state of California and they are both supposed to be decommissioned by the year 2025. I suggest having a look at this map https://www.nrc.gov/info-finder/reactors/ and researching where plans to open new nuclear power facilities. Here is a chart showing what countries are intending to construct new plants. https://www.statista.com/statistics/268154/number-of-planned-nuclear-reactors-in-various-countries/
Here is a map showing where new plants may be built in the United States. https://www.nrc.gov/reactors/new-reactors/col/new-reactor-map.html

I hope this helps in some way, but I really think California is a really bad setting for a nuclear power plant based apocalypse.

 

[Tiger King]

I think it sounds ok, needs fleshing out more but yeah it's a good base for a story.
I live in California and if anything went down I have to admit it's not a place that would be easy to survive. It's overpopulated, generally very hot, the resivours around here are all empty from the summer that just went by. There would be a struggle for resources that's for sure unless aid was dropped in.

All this could help create a rather desperate environment which may be what you're looking for.

 

[gigastar]

Fundamental problem with this premise, why are the survivors still in Cali at all when theres a whole other 51 states they could be moved to?

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

I like Addendum's suggestion a lot, actually, but again, write the book of your heart. If you're set on a world of bunkers and subways, then you can make it work.

It was actually the basis of a World/Chronicle of Darkness game I ran. A Hunter game set in Singapore in 2080 that constrained itself mostly to 4 different towers where I could populate the entire world as just being offices/apartments/laboratories/etc with accessible entrances and exits, and atypical means of ingress and travel. Mini-helicoptors, drone surveillance...

Rarely did the scenes actually have much to do with ground level, either above or below. Singapore as it is now is already a pretty vertical citystate. It's a pretty cool thing to experience knowing you spend most hours of your day being above and below other people, and often more people on a vertical plane than on your immediately horizontal planes of view.

Feels like you're in a beehive.

 

[HazardousCube]

I would like to thank you all for your suggestions on this topic. The reason I was setting the story in California is because I am from California and things aren't looking so well due to our huge population, lack of water, heat, and a pretty visible divide in ideologies so I thought it be a perfect spot for "desperate survival" as carlsburg export mentioned.

I was planning on a sort of "Escape from LA" scenario where the earthquake ruined the state(like its infrastructure and communications)and the Government found it more expedient to just close off the state and various factions appeared with their own ideas on how to run the state or another idea was that some marauders found a liking to their new home and are bound to keep it that way by fighting off any threats that come in the way of a destroyed California. I didn't like those ideas since it relies way too much on the reader's suspension of disbelief.

But that is why we crowd source don't we. Once again thanks for the criticism and I'll see what can be changed.

 

[Ender910_v1legacy]

Hmm. Needs more Cheeki Breeki I think.

 

[Squilookle]

If we're talking hazardous coolant water waste, why not...

Can you write that story?

Please?

It sounds great- like Die Hard and Mad Max had a kid and that kid hung out with Snowpiercer all the time.

As for the OP, a few questions-

how widespread is this uninhabitable land? It kinda sounds like as long as you're far from a reactor you can exist on the surface just fine, with no need for underground society. Also no matter how bad an earthquake in California could be, wouldn't the rest of the US sweep in with relief efforts and swiftly restore order? Unless they just flat-out cordoned off the radioactive zones and everyone inside was quarantined and could never leave- that would explain the underground societies, but would raise the question of what life is like outside these exclusion zones.

Also the descent into madness angle sounds much more like Heart of Darkness, which Spec Ops The Line was essentially an adaptation of, as was the excellent Apocalypse Now. Check out HoD if you haven't already.

 

[maninahat]

Why bother specifying the date and location of this post apocalyptic setting? Most of the questions you are getting here are a natural consequence of you setting your post nuclear hellscape in a very localised place, not too far into the future. Inevitably, people are going to get bogged down in the realism of you picking that time and place. Other books, like Wool, deliberately makes its setting vague (a giant survival shelter, somewhere, sometime in the future) because the specifics about time and place aren't as important as the story it is trying to tell, and would only be a distraction. By keeping it vague, you are given licence to have more fantastical situations.

That said, as others have pointed out, nuclear bunker societies, post nuclear wastelands, and mad survivors have been done to death. I suggest you go back to the drawing board and find a more original looking apocalypse, or something that will make your story distinct from all the other Metros, Fallouts and Wools.

EDIT: And one more thing! For a "protagonist going crazy" story, you need for them to start off in a stable, orderly life so that we can see the character progression. So if you want to tell that kind of story, your post apocalyptic society would have to be a fairly well established and orderly thing where people have had chance to settle.

 

[HazardousCube]

If we're talking hazardous coolant water waste, why not...

Can you write that story?

Please?

It sounds great- like Die Hard and Mad Max had a kid and that kid hung out with Snowpiercer all the time.

As for the OP, a few questions-

how widespread is this uninhabitable land? It kinda sounds like as long as you're far from a reactor you can exist on the surface just fine, with no need for underground society. Also no matter how bad an earthquake in California could be, wouldn't the rest of the US sweep in with relief efforts and swiftly restore order? Unless they just flat-out cordoned off the radioactive zones and everyone inside was quarantined and could never leave- that would explain the underground societies, but would raise the question of what life is like outside these exclusion zones.

Also the descent into madness angle sounds much more like Heart of Darkness, which Spec Ops The Line was essentially an adaptation of, as was the excellent Apocalypse Now. Check out HoD if you haven't already.

I was planning on there being above ground societies since I was planning on the story to take place on the surface. Also there are areas surrounding the reactors that are dangerous to go into but these "hotspots" as I call them aren't an issue as long as you don't plan on traveling through there and can be avoided easily. The only issue with them is that no one wants to live near these hotspots for fear of radiation poisoning and build their towns as far away as they can.
I'll also try to find a copy of Heart of Darkness.

 

[Ravenbom]

There are currently tow operational nuclear plants in the state of California and they are both supposed to be decommissioned by the year 2025. I suggest having a look at this map https://www.nrc.gov/info-finder/reactors/ and researching where plans to open new nuclear power facilities. Here is a chart showing what countries are intending to construct new plants. https://www.statista.com/statistics/268154/number-of-planned-nuclear-reactors-in-various-countries/
Here is a map showing where new plants may be built in the United States. https://www.nrc.gov/reactors/new-reactors/col/new-reactor-map.html

I hope this helps in some way, but I really think California is a really bad setting for a nuclear power plant based apocalypse.

This, but according CA.gov, there's only one nuclear reactor in California since 2012. I thought there was that one between LA and SD that was still working, but not according to ca.gov.
http://www.energy.ca.gov/nuclear/california.html

Anywho. A more realistic disaster is that of the 7 states that pull from the Colorado River have allocated 1.4 trillion gallons more water than the river currently produces,
https://www.propublica.org/article/california-drought-colorado-river-water-crisis-explained
so disaster that cuts off California from the Colorado might make California politically give up the rights to the river and turn it into a dust bowl and the Central Valley big agro which includes a lot of livestock could be a huge disease vector if those animals had to die of thirst...

Make a fictional disease and you can basically craft any story you want. You can get to a Mad Max type of world pretty easily because a big quake would cut off rails and many roads and might ruin the few deepwater ports in California, so off-road Mad Max/Smuggler's Run type vehicle mayhem might be this future California for a few years, especially if you make the government and some California based mega-corporation fight for control in the background over the fate of California leaving the people to figure out how to survive on their own.

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

If we're talking hazardous coolant water waste, why not...

Can you write that story?

Please?

It sounds great- like Die Hard and Mad Max had a kid and that kid hung out with Snowpiercer all the time.

I'm not even remotely clever enough to write a novel. I just think of an awesome movie I'd like to see... with fey-like 'floating gardens' populated by beings that are aloof, cruelly indifferent and elusive, and a broken, poisonous world of 'below' ... and the inversion of the questing knight of a fantastic realm in the growing technocratic reality of us poisoning the world and the inevitabilities of hardship that the poor will suffer.

Also the kid while hanging out with Snowpiercer spent many a late night with 80s and 90s Schwarzeneggar and Stallone films like Cliffhanger and Commando...

 

[Squilookle]

Doesn't have to be a full novel- could just be a short story. Worked for Phillip K. Dick, afterall...

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

Doesn't have to be a full novel- could just be a short story. Worked for Phillip K. Dick, afterall...

Short story works. After all, I purposefully want to keep the world vague. A tangle of secret tunnels, left over treasures of the world and artefacts being simply unreplicable technologies in the final days of civilization. A.I. programmed nanorobotics keeping these tower communities as if a pinnacle of alienesque humanity that none understand how it actually all works anymore... the purposeful vagueness of how this tech works giving it a sense of magic and inhumanity from the more tangible concepts of human mundanity from the tech and brutish tactics and organization of the groundet assailants of one of the towers.

Kept to a handful of towers, and a a few square miles of the surface/underground. The focus should be a fairy tale. Aspects of 'near-now' fantastic leading to fantastic lives and experiences, with a morbidly realistic transformation of the 'Dark Forest' troupe being infact a forest of metal, broken cement and the tangled of abandon office spaces on the lower levels.

Okay... I could see it now. I'll try to write up a proof of concept. I love fairy tales, and a sci-fi post-apocalyptic fairy tale sounds like fun.

 

[Squilookle]

a pinnacle of alienesque humanity that none understand how it actually all works anymore... the purposeful vagueness of how this tech works giving it a sense of magic and inhumanity from the more tangible concepts of human mundanity from the tech and brutish tactics and organization of the groundet assailants of one of the towers.

Kept to a handful of towers, and a a few square miles of the surface/underground. The focus should be a fairy tale. Aspects of 'near-now' fantastic leading to fantastic lives and experiences, with a morbidly realistic transformation of the 'Dark Forest' troupe being infact a forest of metal, broken cement and the tangled of abandon office spaces on the lower levels

Right, you need to check out City of Ember for your research. I hear the book is a lot better naturally, but the film does show some of those 'we don't remember how this tech works' elements as well. See also The Giver.

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

a pinnacle of alienesque humanity that none understand how it actually all works anymore... the purposeful vagueness of how this tech works giving it a sense of magic and inhumanity from the more tangible concepts of human mundanity from the tech and brutish tactics and organization of the groundet assailants of one of the towers.

Kept to a handful of towers, and a a few square miles of the surface/underground. The focus should be a fairy tale. Aspects of 'near-now' fantastic leading to fantastic lives and experiences, with a morbidly realistic transformation of the 'Dark Forest' troupe being infact a forest of metal, broken cement and the tangled of abandon office spaces on the lower levels

Right, you need to check out City of Ember for your research. I hear the book is a lot better naturally, but the film does show some of those 'we don't remember how this tech works' elements as well. See also The Giver.

I was also thinking of taking what I know from psych and applying near-now concepts like BCI and neuroprosthetics. How these fabricators can put them together, and engineers are engineers in name only... they're merely taught how to read the manual and only the manuals.

The effect of a society that is integrated into a network, but they treat it as if as common as dirt... living in partly automated worlds where there's been enough time since grounders have seen these surviving technologies and long enough these tower communities just treat it as if a birthright.

Kind of trying to liken the A.I. to the Arthurian Lady Nimue (a hologramatic being who truly resides with a supercomputer server bank within a coolant pool). A queen who begifted orphaned humanity and raised them high. And just like Lady Nimue, she raised knights from common mortals.

City of Ember works as per mythologizing their situation and making the mundane fantastic. Also the system of its division of labour is precisely my idea of the state of affairs as well. Haven't read The Giver.

 

[Zen Bard]

I've been writing and submitting short stories for awhile. While some of gotten published, mnay have gotten rejected. And the number one reason the editors have given me is that my narrative isn't strong enough. Oftentimes, I tend to use my characters as vehicles to explore a cool idea.

So I worked up a little formula to help me every time I write;

1) "A" tries to do "B" because of "C" = plot
2) "D" prevents "A" from doing "B" = conflict
3) How (or if) "A" resolves D" = story

If your protagonist just goes mad and doesn't care, there's no story.

But what if he does? What if he actively tries NOT to go mad? What does that entail? Who does it impact? What if there's a small permanent physical change every time he gets violent? How would people react to seeing it? What if you wrote it in first person so everyone (including the reader) knows he's going nuts EXCEPT him?

Every idea can make a good story. It just depends on what that story is.