BOOK ONE in the NEW AMERICA series.
America is falling, ready to join the Roman Empire as a distant memory in the annals of history. The year is 2027. Tired and desperate, the American people are deep in the middle of The Second Great Depression. The Florida coastline is in ruins from the most powerful hurricane on record; a second just like it is bearing down on the state of Texas. For the first time in history, the Middle East has united as one and amassed the most formidable army the world has seen since the Third Reich. A hidden army of terrorists is on American soil. This is the story of three men: Howard Beck, the world’s richest man, also diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome. Richard Dupree, ex-Navy SEAL turned escaped convict. Maxwell Harris, a crippled, burned out Chief of Police of a small Texas town. At first they must fight for their own survival against impossible odds. Finally, the three men must band together to save their beloved country from collapse.
BOOK TWO in the New America series, entitled "Resistance" is slated for a summer 2013 release.
AUTHOR BIO
Richard Stephenson was born in 1975 in Denison, TX and spent his childhood in North Texas. In 1992, he graduated high school after only three years. He then pursued his degree at Oklahoma Christian University, once again accomplishing the task in three years. Richard then married his best friend before going off to basic training to be a military policeman with the US Army. With his new wife joining the adventure, they spent the next four years at Fort Polk, LA and had two children.
Just before his son turned five, Richard and his wife were told that their oldest child had Asperger's Syndrome. Nine years later, Richard's son would become the inspiration for the character of Howard Beck.
After leaving the armed forces, Richard continued his law enforcement career in the federal sector and has been with the Department of Justice for eleven years.
Richard enjoys many things. He reads constantly with the thanks of his trusty iPad. When he can find the time, he can be found playing Mass Effect, Fallout: New Vegas, or Modern Warfare 2. When a friend or a friend of friend needs a computer fixed, Richard is on the case.
Richard has always had a passion for writing. His first novel, Collapse, will be released this summer.
REVIEWS
Format:Kindle Edition
Author Richard Stephenson has hit one out of the park with his novel, Collapse. Watch the America we know literally collapse under the weight of natural disasters, rouge nations and damned scary power-hungry politicians.
I found Collapse to be entertaining, intriguing and scary as hell. To say that the premise of the novel is believable would be an understatement. Although it takes place in 2027, there is not reason that most of this (except Beck's AI technology) couldn't happen in the next six months. Keeping that thought in the back of my mind helped to propel me through reading this book in just a few sittings.
Richard counts on us embracing the characters and that's easy enough to do. The Navy Seal is iconic as one of the protagonists and is balanced nicely by his cell-mate and cohort Tank. It poses an interesting contrast. And while Beck (The world's richest man) is initially a spoiled and prissy little turd, he eventually steps up and does the right thing.
Collapse is rich with sub-plots that seamlessly converge and everyone ends up where they're supposed to be. I enjoyed reading the book and was excited to see that the ending leaves the door wide open for a sequel.
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
A rumbling maelstrom churning until the last word...
There's something very wrong, more than the Second Great Depression plaguing this new America. Within the first few pages of Collapse author Richard Stephenson quickly draws us into a world teetering toward collapse. Blame it on a failing education system. Blame it on bickering leaders in Washington. Blame it on extravagance. Blame it on Americans who had a chance to do something and could not, or made the wrong choices.
Presence, after all, is the requisite for causality. Who participates and conversely who does not greatly influences outcome. We see that played out everyday in our headlines. So often we credit the people sitting at the bargaining table for their ability to defuse or devise the next step. Timing, Stephenson suggests, is far more basic: a series of junctures linked through causality dependent on mavericks and managers to navigate circumstances already set in motion. Call Collapse a Tom Clancy and Roland Emmerich mash-up: a clear case of too many off switches and a predictable enemy on foreign soil.
Classify Collapse under dystopian? Not quite. I'll explain. The story doesn't awaken within a dystopian state. That's key. What Stephenson does clearly establish are the events that would create a dystopian future--a prequel, if you will--in which we see men and women determined to prevent democracy's wholesale slaughter. Distracted by the threat of nuclear war, destruction brought about by a hurricane, the Second Great Depression, it's a cocktail of just too many off switches. Powerless to prevent the downfall, our heroes remain resolute (yes, even reckless) as the story hones in on each character, hope blazing. They believe hope is within reach. And because they believed, I cheered them on.
OTHER WORKS
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