Worlds Collide by S.M. McEachern
(Sunset Rising #2)
Publication date: March 3rd 2014
Genres: Dystopia, Young Adult
Synopsis
In a desperate attempt to escape execution, Sunny O’Donnell and Jack Kenner find a way out of the Pit and into a world still believed to be toxic with radiation. Under the brilliant sun for the first time in their lives, they not only discover that the earth has healed from nuclear war, but there are people outside the Dome.
In Worlds Collide, the second book of the Sunset Rising trilogy, Sunny and Jack must continue a life of subterfuge in order to stay alive and find a way to free the Pit. But in their attempt to save the urchins, they uncover the horrifying truth about President Holt and the evil he could unleash on the world.
Purchase
Sunset Rising:
Barnes and Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/sunset-rising-sm-mceachern/1113845787
Worlds Collide:
Barnes and Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/worlds-collide-sm-mceachern/1119952432
Excerpt
The drops soon gathered
speed and turned into a downpour, as if someone had turned on a showerhead. It
made a drumming noise against the hard-packed earth, which came as a surprise.
I had no idea rain made a sound.
Everyone on the training
field carried on as though there wasn’t a storm in progress. Dena continued
with her tour. It wasn’t until a flash of light lit up the sky that Dena said
it was time to go inside. The unexpected flash was blinding, but it was the
booming noise that followed that sent me careening into Jack’s side. For just
an instant I wondered if it was an attack.
Jack’s shoulders shook with
barely concealed laughter. I shot him a look. “As if you’ve ever been in a
storm,” I said.
The trek back up to the
courtyard was a little trickier on wet ground. As we went, the lightning became
brighter and the thunder louder. Jack’s sunglasses weren’t much protection. I
never thought I’d be relieved to go back inside a mountain again, but I
was.
Pausing inside the
entranceway to shake the water off, I took in the big empty room—what was once
the lobby of the hotel. The grotto was made entirely of stone tile with high
arched ceilings. The ghostly outlines of bygone furniture hinted that the hotel
was once quite grand, but now crumbling tiles and dark stains ground into the
stone had robbed it of its beauty. I rubbed the toe of my boot against one of
the dark spots, wondering what it was.
“Human misery is a stubborn
stain,” Dena said. “A lot of skeletons were found here, the floor darkened by
their decay.”
A shiver went down my spine
when her meaning registered. How many people had sought refuge here after the
war, only to die a slow horrible death? Were they from the valley? Were they
the same people who had been turned away from the Dome by the bourge? The
stains of decay were everywhere. For a moment I closed my eyes against the
mental image of what they must have had to clear out of here in order to
reclaim this building.
Behind me the door opened
and a few people entered the lobby. They glanced in our direction and continued
to the far side of the room.
“The entire hotel is built
inside the mountain, hidden to the outside world,” Dena said.
I watched the small group
open the bags they carried and spread out blankets on the floor.
Jack pointed to the
artificial lighting. “You’ve made your own light?”
Dena smiled. “It’s not
nuclear science. It’s just a filament.”
Jack looked a little
embarrassed by his question. I had thought the same thing until Jin-Sook had
corrected me. As much as I professed that these people weren’t heathens, I
still made assumptions about them, as though they wouldn’t be as smart as we
were. But as we walked through the reclaimed ruins, I was reminded of the
ingenuity of the human spirit. As someone who came from the Pit, this was not
something I should’ve forgotten.
AUTHOR BIO
S.M. McEachern was born in Nova Scotia, Canada. She attended Dalhousie University in the 1990s where she earned an Honours Degree in International Development Studies. She worked in the field of International Development for several years, specializing in ocean development.
"Sunset Rising" is S.M. McEachern's first novel. She says the idea for the story first came to her in the 1990s when she researched a Bio-Dome experiment in Arizona for an academic paper. The thought that the world might one day need a Bio-Dome to escape a global catastrophe set her imagination into overdrive. And the ethics behind such an idea formed the backdrop for Sunset Rising.
Her goal in writing the novel is to entertain the reader with an interesting plot and colourful characters.
"Sunset Rising" is S.M. McEachern's first novel. She says the idea for the story first came to her in the 1990s when she researched a Bio-Dome experiment in Arizona for an academic paper. The thought that the world might one day need a Bio-Dome to escape a global catastrophe set her imagination into overdrive. And the ethics behind such an idea formed the backdrop for Sunset Rising.
Her goal in writing the novel is to entertain the reader with an interesting plot and colourful characters.
Author links:
This sounds like a great series - I am looking forward to reading it. Thanks for sharing the excerpt!!
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