Random Trivia about COLLAPSE
SPOILER ALERT!!
If you have not read Collapse, STOP NOW! I'm going to be discussing the book at length and will no doubt give away key points about the plot.
Last warning! Don't spoil the book!
Okay, if you're still here, then you should have already finished Collapse. When I started writing the book, I made pages of notes, detailed character bios, and a chapter outline. As the story developed, I made a great deal of changes, whether it be cutting parts of the story out for editing purposes or I just went in a completely different direction and changed my mind. I read over my original notes and some of it just cracked me up. Figured I would share in the hopes that it might give you a chuckle or make you say "Hmmm, that's neat."
Chief Maxwell Harris
*The story of Chief Harris changed the most. I had an early chapter with him discussing his injury with his Dad and his father was going to provide the reader with some exposition on the horror and carnage of Hurricane Luther. The chapter was really slowing down the pace so I cut it and sprinkled the important parts in later chapters. I had another chapter that detailed the chief's time as a Texas State Trooper, mainly his failing marriage and the details of his injury. I figured it would be more dramatic to have the chief tell the story to Elizabeth and further strengthen their relationship.
*Elizabeth Reid, Chief Harris' desk sergeant and love interest, was supposed to die. I tried to kill her several times but just couldn't bring myself to do it because I was really enjoying the character. Elizabeth is modeled after my wife, who told me repeatedly "You better not kill me!" When Elizabeth got shot in the city garage, she was supposed to die. When Jack and his merry band of rednecks robbed the police station and left Max handcuffed to Charlie, Jack was going to find the command post and kill everyone there. Max would then chase after Jack and deliver some retribution. Max was spending too much time in Texas and I really needed to get him up to Colorado, so the idea was axed. I wanted to kill off Elizabeth to torture poor Max and really make his character sink as far as he could so the catharsis would be that much better. Max experienced enough anguish and torture in his life and Elizabeth was the only good and pure thing in his life. They needed each other, so I let Elizabeth live.
*Naming the Texas hurricane was an ordeal. The Florida hurricane that happened a month prior was named Luther for the obvious parallel to my favorite comic book villain. With a male name that starts with "L", that meant that the next hurricane had to be a female name that started with "M". My first choice was to name the hurricane after my wife, Mary. (Sound familiar? The book is dedicated to her) I thought it was a very cool idea and that she would get a kick out of it. She did not. She did not like the idea at all. LOL So I decided to use the female equivalent of Chief Harris's name as a little joke for Elizabeth to use against Max.
*The recollections that Max has about Hurricane Ike in his introductory chapter are my own.
*I wrote the majority of the novel with the intention of not giving Max's little Texas town a name. At the end of the novel when Max meets Howard Beck, I wrote myself into a corner and had to give Max's town a name. I decided on Santa Fe, TX, a real town outside of Houston. I did employ a little artistic license and made the town much smaller than it actually is.
*Max's cat is named Herbie after our first family cat.
*Elizabeth's cat is named Callie, one of the two cats in our home.
Howard's cat is named Nala, the other grumpy cat in our home that swats and hisses at everyone but my daughter.
*Chief Harris' badge number is a combination of my initials and my badge number.
*In the town of Truth or Consequences, NM, the lawman is named after my first true "fan," Eduardo Sanchez. When I released the sneak peek, he was the first person outside of my friends and family to respond about how much he liked the story. My wife saw something on the Facebook page for Collapse and asked me who he was. I was convinced I went to school with him, served in the military with him, or was an old coworker. Once it dawned on me that he was a perfect stranger, it was an awesome feeling to know that more than just my friends and family would read the book.
*Max is addicted to Vicodin. For the better part of six months in 2011, I had to take Vicodin for my back while I underwent physical therapy. I never battled problems with addiction, but I gained an intimate understanding of how and why Vicodin can be so addicting.
Howard Beck
*Howard's first name is a reference to Howard Hughes, the reclusive billionaire.
*Howard is a hardcore Star Trek fan just like me. I actually had a lot more Star Trek references in the book but my proofreaders and editor convinced me to cut the majority of it.
*Howard has Asperger's Syndrome as does my teenage son. I imagined my son as an adult when I wrote the character.
*In my original character bios, Howard wasn't the world's richest man or even a billionaire. He was a millionaire owner of a chain of camping and outdoor supplies. He was going to escape into the Rocky Mountains with his family and ride out the collapse.
*Howard's son, Marshall, was originally a bad guy that was going to invade Beck Castle and take it from his father. I changed this when I wanted to display Howard's growth as a person and his need to connect with others, especially his family.
*Howard's sister, is named after my sister-in-law. Her son and Howard's nephew is named after my nephew.
*Captain Butler and First Sergeant Bankhead got their names from my favorite commander and first sergeant in my military unit.
Richard Dupree
*The location for the Highland Valley State Prison is actually real place as described in the book. The prison isn't real, but the location for the prison is real. Log on to Google Earth and go fifty miles due west of Las Vegas and you will see the valley with mountains on three sides, the entrance to the valley is fifteen miles south and is the location of the town of Highland Valley.
*To make Richard stand out in contrast from the racist filth of the skinheads, he rarely uses vulgarity when he speaks. He never uses a racial slur to convey hate or intolerance.
*At my current job, I am active member of the employees union. The scene in the warden's office with the warden discussing the coming disaster with his executive staff was a nice little inside joke for me to write. The executive staff that run the prison are named after the union officials I have worked with for years.
*Dupree's escape from the prison was modeled after a real life escape that occurred at a Colorado state penitentiary. An inmate there actually made it over the electric fence in the same way I wrote it in the book. After the inmate conquered the electric fence, every prison in the country with an electric fence retrofitted their fence to ensure that it would not happen again.
*Before Tank's character even made it to the page, I knew that Richard was going to kill him at the end of the book.
I created the character of Tank as a monster. He started out as six foot five and three hundred pounds. I later increased it to six foot nine and three hundred twenty-five pounds. His disfigured eye is meant to evoke the image of a cyclops. Tank was the hardest character for me to write as I find racism the bastard child of ignorance and hate.
*The character of Head was written as a self-deprecating jab at myself. I have a very large head. Like Tank, before Head made it to the page, I knew that he would die during the escape.
*I am a fanatical fan of the TV show Lost. Writing Head's gross misinterpretation of the show was a lot of fun to write.
*In the chapter about Richard's first escape, my two favorite authors - Vince Flynn and Lee Child are mentioned.
*Dr. Diana Stone is modeled after my mother-in-law.
*Oswald Jefferson's wife is named Lolita in reference to the 1956 novel of the same name. In the novel, a college professor becomes sexually involved with a twelve year old girl.
*The murder of Oswald Jefferson was the hardest thing in the book to write. It took me hours and hours to write two pages. I had to constantly fight the image of my own children in the room. I stopped repeatedly for fear of having a panic attack.
*In early drafts, Richard and Tank were going to be captured by a gang of teenagers, Richard would recognize one of the gang members as his son.
The White House
*President Powers is named after my best friend. The president's chief-of-staff is named after my best friend's wife.
*The USS James Russell is named for my father. If the last name confuses you, he is actually my step-father that raised me from the age of two. He is the only father I've ever known and I've never in my life thought of him as a "step"
*In the meeting in the Clinton Room, almost every person in the room is named after one of my family members - my brothers-in-law, my father-in-law, and my sister.
*A fellow author friend of mine, Steve Konkoly, was in the Navy and gave me some advice on the Naval references and helped me fix some errors that would have been obvious to current and former Navy.
*Iran does in fact have a underground bunker in use right now that the United States in unable to penetrate with a bunker bomb.
*I knew from the start that a coup de tat would overthrow the government. It wasn't until I created the character of Simon Sterling that I knew who would be the architect.
Miscellaneous
*The creation of the Obama-Camps was not meant as an insult to President Obama, but rather to serve as a parallel to the Hoovervilles from the First Great Depression. I knew that the homeless couple was going to live in a "homeless town" of some sort and wanted to give it a name. I'm surprised that I haven't been criticized for the Obama-Camps and been called anti-Democrat or anti-Obama. Honestly, I'm neither Democrat or Republican, I think that both parties are seriously flawed. Sadly, most presidential elections for me come down to the lesser of two evils.
*In Super Bowl 2020, I created the fictional NFL team, the Oklahoma Sooners. I attended college at Oklahoma Christian in Oklahoma City. Also, one of my close friends is a die hard Saints fan, that fact that the Saints were losing to the Sooners was a little joke aimed at him.
*The General Manager of the Wal-Mart store, Chester Stephens, was modeled after a real supervisor I had many years ago. He was so dedicated and loved his job that he actually told me that he wanted to have the company logo drape his coffin at his funeral. I'm not talking military here, nothing wrong with your coffin being draped with an American flag to signify your military service. He wanted the company logo of our our employer to adorn his coffin. I thought he was joking. He was quite serious.
*William Sanderson becomes a lieutenant in the 519th Military Police Battalion, the actual unit I served under in the military. I had intended on killing William at the Port of Gibraltar when the Iranians took back the port. I decided that the battle would not take place until the next book and by doing so, William survived. Little tidbit on Resistance - William and Lindsay will play a major role.
*I wrote Lindsay Sanderson as a devoted mother that would go to the gates of hell and back for her children. I modeled her after a friend who is a mother of five. I'm constantly amazed at her devotion and tireless dedication to her children.
*The Sandersons were created for the sole purpose of witnessing the EMP.
*The EMP was originally a nuke that was going to strike DC.
*A third hurricane was going to hit the eastern seaboard and demolish New England in the same fashion that Luther demolished Florida. I didn't want to write a "hurricane book" so the idea was quickly scrapped.
Vist my blog http://rastephensonauthor.blogspot.com/
If you have not read Collapse, STOP NOW! I'm going to be discussing the book at length and will no doubt give away key points about the plot.
Last warning! Don't spoil the book!
Okay, if you're still here, then you should have already finished Collapse. When I started writing the book, I made pages of notes, detailed character bios, and a chapter outline. As the story developed, I made a great deal of changes, whether it be cutting parts of the story out for editing purposes or I just went in a completely different direction and changed my mind. I read over my original notes and some of it just cracked me up. Figured I would share in the hopes that it might give you a chuckle or make you say "Hmmm, that's neat."
Chief Maxwell Harris
*The story of Chief Harris changed the most. I had an early chapter with him discussing his injury with his Dad and his father was going to provide the reader with some exposition on the horror and carnage of Hurricane Luther. The chapter was really slowing down the pace so I cut it and sprinkled the important parts in later chapters. I had another chapter that detailed the chief's time as a Texas State Trooper, mainly his failing marriage and the details of his injury. I figured it would be more dramatic to have the chief tell the story to Elizabeth and further strengthen their relationship.
*Elizabeth Reid, Chief Harris' desk sergeant and love interest, was supposed to die. I tried to kill her several times but just couldn't bring myself to do it because I was really enjoying the character. Elizabeth is modeled after my wife, who told me repeatedly "You better not kill me!" When Elizabeth got shot in the city garage, she was supposed to die. When Jack and his merry band of rednecks robbed the police station and left Max handcuffed to Charlie, Jack was going to find the command post and kill everyone there. Max would then chase after Jack and deliver some retribution. Max was spending too much time in Texas and I really needed to get him up to Colorado, so the idea was axed. I wanted to kill off Elizabeth to torture poor Max and really make his character sink as far as he could so the catharsis would be that much better. Max experienced enough anguish and torture in his life and Elizabeth was the only good and pure thing in his life. They needed each other, so I let Elizabeth live.
*Naming the Texas hurricane was an ordeal. The Florida hurricane that happened a month prior was named Luther for the obvious parallel to my favorite comic book villain. With a male name that starts with "L", that meant that the next hurricane had to be a female name that started with "M". My first choice was to name the hurricane after my wife, Mary. (Sound familiar? The book is dedicated to her) I thought it was a very cool idea and that she would get a kick out of it. She did not. She did not like the idea at all. LOL So I decided to use the female equivalent of Chief Harris's name as a little joke for Elizabeth to use against Max.
*The recollections that Max has about Hurricane Ike in his introductory chapter are my own.
*I wrote the majority of the novel with the intention of not giving Max's little Texas town a name. At the end of the novel when Max meets Howard Beck, I wrote myself into a corner and had to give Max's town a name. I decided on Santa Fe, TX, a real town outside of Houston. I did employ a little artistic license and made the town much smaller than it actually is.
*Max's cat is named Herbie after our first family cat.
*Elizabeth's cat is named Callie, one of the two cats in our home.
Howard's cat is named Nala, the other grumpy cat in our home that swats and hisses at everyone but my daughter.
*Chief Harris' badge number is a combination of my initials and my badge number.
*In the town of Truth or Consequences, NM, the lawman is named after my first true "fan," Eduardo Sanchez. When I released the sneak peek, he was the first person outside of my friends and family to respond about how much he liked the story. My wife saw something on the Facebook page for Collapse and asked me who he was. I was convinced I went to school with him, served in the military with him, or was an old coworker. Once it dawned on me that he was a perfect stranger, it was an awesome feeling to know that more than just my friends and family would read the book.
*Max is addicted to Vicodin. For the better part of six months in 2011, I had to take Vicodin for my back while I underwent physical therapy. I never battled problems with addiction, but I gained an intimate understanding of how and why Vicodin can be so addicting.
Howard Beck
*Howard's first name is a reference to Howard Hughes, the reclusive billionaire.
*Howard is a hardcore Star Trek fan just like me. I actually had a lot more Star Trek references in the book but my proofreaders and editor convinced me to cut the majority of it.
*Howard has Asperger's Syndrome as does my teenage son. I imagined my son as an adult when I wrote the character.
*In my original character bios, Howard wasn't the world's richest man or even a billionaire. He was a millionaire owner of a chain of camping and outdoor supplies. He was going to escape into the Rocky Mountains with his family and ride out the collapse.
*Howard's son, Marshall, was originally a bad guy that was going to invade Beck Castle and take it from his father. I changed this when I wanted to display Howard's growth as a person and his need to connect with others, especially his family.
*Howard's sister, is named after my sister-in-law. Her son and Howard's nephew is named after my nephew.
*Captain Butler and First Sergeant Bankhead got their names from my favorite commander and first sergeant in my military unit.
Richard Dupree
*The location for the Highland Valley State Prison is actually real place as described in the book. The prison isn't real, but the location for the prison is real. Log on to Google Earth and go fifty miles due west of Las Vegas and you will see the valley with mountains on three sides, the entrance to the valley is fifteen miles south and is the location of the town of Highland Valley.
*To make Richard stand out in contrast from the racist filth of the skinheads, he rarely uses vulgarity when he speaks. He never uses a racial slur to convey hate or intolerance.
*At my current job, I am active member of the employees union. The scene in the warden's office with the warden discussing the coming disaster with his executive staff was a nice little inside joke for me to write. The executive staff that run the prison are named after the union officials I have worked with for years.
*Dupree's escape from the prison was modeled after a real life escape that occurred at a Colorado state penitentiary. An inmate there actually made it over the electric fence in the same way I wrote it in the book. After the inmate conquered the electric fence, every prison in the country with an electric fence retrofitted their fence to ensure that it would not happen again.
*Before Tank's character even made it to the page, I knew that Richard was going to kill him at the end of the book.
I created the character of Tank as a monster. He started out as six foot five and three hundred pounds. I later increased it to six foot nine and three hundred twenty-five pounds. His disfigured eye is meant to evoke the image of a cyclops. Tank was the hardest character for me to write as I find racism the bastard child of ignorance and hate.
*The character of Head was written as a self-deprecating jab at myself. I have a very large head. Like Tank, before Head made it to the page, I knew that he would die during the escape.
*I am a fanatical fan of the TV show Lost. Writing Head's gross misinterpretation of the show was a lot of fun to write.
*In the chapter about Richard's first escape, my two favorite authors - Vince Flynn and Lee Child are mentioned.
*Dr. Diana Stone is modeled after my mother-in-law.
*Oswald Jefferson's wife is named Lolita in reference to the 1956 novel of the same name. In the novel, a college professor becomes sexually involved with a twelve year old girl.
*The murder of Oswald Jefferson was the hardest thing in the book to write. It took me hours and hours to write two pages. I had to constantly fight the image of my own children in the room. I stopped repeatedly for fear of having a panic attack.
*In early drafts, Richard and Tank were going to be captured by a gang of teenagers, Richard would recognize one of the gang members as his son.
The White House
*President Powers is named after my best friend. The president's chief-of-staff is named after my best friend's wife.
*The USS James Russell is named for my father. If the last name confuses you, he is actually my step-father that raised me from the age of two. He is the only father I've ever known and I've never in my life thought of him as a "step"
*In the meeting in the Clinton Room, almost every person in the room is named after one of my family members - my brothers-in-law, my father-in-law, and my sister.
*A fellow author friend of mine, Steve Konkoly, was in the Navy and gave me some advice on the Naval references and helped me fix some errors that would have been obvious to current and former Navy.
*Iran does in fact have a underground bunker in use right now that the United States in unable to penetrate with a bunker bomb.
*I knew from the start that a coup de tat would overthrow the government. It wasn't until I created the character of Simon Sterling that I knew who would be the architect.
Miscellaneous
*The creation of the Obama-Camps was not meant as an insult to President Obama, but rather to serve as a parallel to the Hoovervilles from the First Great Depression. I knew that the homeless couple was going to live in a "homeless town" of some sort and wanted to give it a name. I'm surprised that I haven't been criticized for the Obama-Camps and been called anti-Democrat or anti-Obama. Honestly, I'm neither Democrat or Republican, I think that both parties are seriously flawed. Sadly, most presidential elections for me come down to the lesser of two evils.
*In Super Bowl 2020, I created the fictional NFL team, the Oklahoma Sooners. I attended college at Oklahoma Christian in Oklahoma City. Also, one of my close friends is a die hard Saints fan, that fact that the Saints were losing to the Sooners was a little joke aimed at him.
*The General Manager of the Wal-Mart store, Chester Stephens, was modeled after a real supervisor I had many years ago. He was so dedicated and loved his job that he actually told me that he wanted to have the company logo drape his coffin at his funeral. I'm not talking military here, nothing wrong with your coffin being draped with an American flag to signify your military service. He wanted the company logo of our our employer to adorn his coffin. I thought he was joking. He was quite serious.
*William Sanderson becomes a lieutenant in the 519th Military Police Battalion, the actual unit I served under in the military. I had intended on killing William at the Port of Gibraltar when the Iranians took back the port. I decided that the battle would not take place until the next book and by doing so, William survived. Little tidbit on Resistance - William and Lindsay will play a major role.
*I wrote Lindsay Sanderson as a devoted mother that would go to the gates of hell and back for her children. I modeled her after a friend who is a mother of five. I'm constantly amazed at her devotion and tireless dedication to her children.
*The Sandersons were created for the sole purpose of witnessing the EMP.
*The EMP was originally a nuke that was going to strike DC.
*A third hurricane was going to hit the eastern seaboard and demolish New England in the same fashion that Luther demolished Florida. I didn't want to write a "hurricane book" so the idea was quickly scrapped.
Vist my blog http://rastephensonauthor.blogspot.com/
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Daniel
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Aug 19, 2012 04:49PM
This is a really interesting insight into how you wrote Collapse.
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Daniel wrote: "This is a really interesting insight into how you wrote Collapse."I agree. Love how its set in the future yet made by things that have happened recently. And its good to know all about how you came up with these characters even the sweet kittys. Loved that part with Hal.
