About TWILIGHT'S LAST GLEAMING

It may sound trite, or bogus, but it came to me in a vision. Over the course of an eleven hour work day --never mind where-- bits and pieces of this future history started coming to me unbidden. By the end of the day, I had over ninety percent of the fictional events I recount in the short version of Twilight's Last Gleaming. I wrote the short version and sent copies to some friends, solely for their and my amusement. I thought that was the end of it. But in the months that followed, more and more details of this imagined future began to reveal themselves to me. Finally, I felt I had enough to undertake the writing of a novel-length chronicle. Over the next year, I did just that.

An imaginary future history depicting the world-wide ascendency of Islam, and the fracturing of America along ethnic and religious lines, cannot help but be controversial. That's okay. So long as my fictional future prompts people to think, "That's not what's going to happen, this is...", then it's done its job. I intend for my chronicle to be a provocative work of dystopian fiction, alarming regardless of one's position on the political spectrum, but it is not my purpose to give offense. I honestly believe that most people everywhere would prefer to live and let live, lead normal lives, and go about their business. The strife in the world stems from comparitively small groups of determined trouble-makers. Such is the sad story of humanity. The sole point I wish to emphasize is that we, as a nation and a civilization, cannot be as stupid, lazy, and complacent as we want and still expect to be around. If we are supplanted by a younger, more vigorous civilization, the fault will lie with us and not with them.

So if it helps, just think of this as The Road Warrior without Mad Max. It's fiction, after all. As time goes on, I hope to add additional tales using Twilight as a background. I've always wanted to create my own fictional universe, ala Baum's Oz, Burroughs' Barsoom and Pellucidar, Howard's Hyborian Age, Tolkein's Middle Earth, Roddenberry's Federation, Lucas' Galactic Republic. Well, now I have. I intend for my fictional timeline and post-US America to serve as a backdrop big enough for any type of story --action-adventure, techno-thriller, war, drama, Dickensian social commentary, suspense, mystery, and possibly even comedy and romance.

The first chapter of the first novel set in what I might as well call "the Twilightverse" appears on this blog. It's a pulp fiction action saga called Guns of the Border Region. More chapters will follow as I create them. I have also included sample chapters from the opening, middle, and concluding sections of the full, book-length version of Twilight's Last Gleaming.