SubscribeYou had me at “They ate Jorgensen first.”, the very first sentence of this book. This book is a roller coaster ride of excitement, and I could not put it down, dying to find out what would happen next.
In this book, nanotechnology that was designed to fight cancer goes terribly wrong. Instead of doing what it was supposed to, it kills nearly five billion people, in the first machine plague humanity has ever had to face. The few people left are struggling to survive on mountaintops that are over ten thousand feet high, the only place the nanotech seems unable to exist. The environment is crashing, as the nanotech monsters invade more and more species. Food is scarce. “They ate Jorgensen first.”
It is in this small group of people where the reader meets Cam, who turned out to be one of my favorite characters. Something about him is very likeable, and it is clear that this is a guy who just wants things to work out and everything to be okay again. He has made a friend named Sawyer, who is a bit more mysterious, and whose actions drive large parts of the story.
Humanity’s last hope rests in the International Space Station, where several astronauts, (and cosmonauts), are scrambling to find something that will stop this plague, “kill” the nano-technological beasties, and save the world. There are quite a few interesting characters here, but my favorite among them is Ruth. She’s super smart, and determined to do whatever she sets her mind to. I got the feeling that if there was an answer, Ruth just might be the one to identify it.
Of course, whenever you have a group of people involved with anything, it is not as simple as just finding the right answer. People, by nature, add complexity. I never knew what to expect the outcome would be as I read through this book. Sci-Fi fans will really enjoy this book, and so will readers who like stories with a whole lot of action and suspense. Readers who love apocolyptic story lines will love this book as much as I did!
Jeff Carlson was kind enough to do an interview with me for Book Sandwich.
Jen Thorpe: Hi Jeff! Thanks for doing this interview.
Jeff Carlson:Hi, Jen, and thank you for letting me be the pickle in the Book Sandwich.
Jen Thorpe: I love books about “the end of the world as we know it” and have read many. I’ve never read one that involved a nanotech plague, though. Very creative choice! What inspired you to write about civilization ending this way?
Jeff Carlson:In one sense I’ve been chewing on the basic concept of Plague Year since I was a boy. I grew up skiing and hiking in northern California, including the Tahoe area… and as a kid I was always fascinated by Donner Pass, near the site of the infamous, unlucky Donner Party.
The trick was building a scenario in which the entire world was trapped in the highest mountains. My first attempt with the idea was a short story. Originally the problem was a virus, but I couldn’t make a virus obey a barrier. It kept coming up over the entire mountain and killing everybody. There’s a story there, too, but it’s a story without much hope, whereas in the final version, the heroes have at least a faint chance of overcoming the plague.
What happened was that I hit upon the notion of a mechanical bug and gave it a hypobaric fuse as a control. Real labs do use air pressure and sealed chambers to contain biohazards. Then I threw in a little industrial espionage and shazam, the nanotech was loose, but I had my barrier at 10,000 feet where the bug self-destructs. After that I was off to the races.
JT:Do you have a favorite end-of-the-world book? What about a movie?
JC:Oh, absolutely. By my vote, Stephen King’s The Stand still ranks as the best ever, although Niven & Pournelle’s Lucifer’s Hammer is a very close second. Don’t let your impressionable kids read these books, though. They might grow up to be writers!
As for movies, I love the 1978 Invasion of the Body Snatchers with Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams, Jeff Goldblum, and Leonard Nemoy. It’s not quite an outright end-of-the-world story, but the tension and paranoia are extremely well done. I also think 28 Days Later is among the all-time best post-apocalyptic films.
JT: How did you learn enough about nanotech to write this story? It all sounded so real and possible as I was reading. Just the concept of these little tiny machines getting inside people is frightening!
JC: Unfortunately, it gets worse. The nanotech in the book is very, very real. It’s happening now.
There is a huge amount of eye-popping material being published in the field these days and I read as much as I could get my hands on. I also went to seminars and corresponded with the researchers afterward.
Yes, we’re still a few breakthroughs short of the nanobots featured in Plague Year, so far as we know… but there are dozens of private and military labs who aren’t publishing their work, like the science team in the book. Nobody has any idea how far those labs might have progressed.
JT: Do you think nanotech will bring on the end of humanity? If not, what do you predict will be the cause of the end of us all? Do you see the end coming from something we humans do to ourselves?
JC: There must be rat poison in this book sandwich!
Call me crazy, but I don’t predict the end of the world at all. I’m actually a happy guy. I enjoy what I do, I love my family… and sometimes my writing is a little dark. That’s just part of developing a thriller novel, especially in this case. Once you accept the premise of Plague Year, that people are no longer able to survive below 10,000 feet, you get to the Donner Party in a hurry and on a global scale. It’s a brutal, skin-of-your-teeth scenario.
I do believe that humankind is facing a lot of tough challenges. Overcrowding. Pollution. The increased spread of disease as our environment warms. But as in Plague Year, I also believe that we can outwit nearly any obstacle. People are tough and clever and the smartest of us are ultimately good at heart.
JT: What music, if any, did you listen to while writing this book? If not music, then what sounds were in the background while you wrote? Did you listen to the same stuff while writing “Plague Year” as you did while writing “Plague War”?
JC: I like it quiet when I work because I’m listening to my characters or listening for background noise in the world that I’m in, whether it’s a lonely breeze in a forest or the roar of attack helicopters…
I do know writers who listen to music when they’re working, and I’m envious, but I don’t know how they manage it.
JT: What is it like to write stories about a plague that kills off most of the world when you have small children at home? Can you keep your book and your life in separate places in your head, or do things get weird?
JC:Well, it helps that I’m not all kinds of normal to begin with. Ha ha. For one thing, I’m a part-time stay-at-home dad, which is the hardest and most rewarding job I’ve ever had. It’s definitely not a 9-to-5-in-the-cubicle sort of thing where you clock in and the boss tells you what to do. Plus, I’m usually the only man at the park during weekdays, or the only guy schlepping kids around the grocery store.
At the same time, I’m also a full-time professional writer, which is also an up-and-down business. For years you’re trying to break in. Next minute you’re signing six figure foreign rights deals for three books… one of which you haven’t even written yet! So my wife and I are insanely busy. And, I like to think, we’re happier for being so involved and overcommitted.
JT: This book had more than enough action to make one heck of an exciting movie! There are chase scenes, gun fights, crash landings… it’s wonderful! If there were a movie, what actors and actresses would you choose to play your characters? I’m wondering particularly about Ruth, Cam, and Sawyer, but would like to hear your selections for other characters too.
JC:You’re right that Plague Year would translate perfectly to the big screen or make an excellent mini-series. The situation is loaded with conflict as well as tough, intelligent characters caught in impossible situations…
Perhaps fortunately, casting wouldn’t be up to me (I’m just the writer), so I haven’t worried much about who to fit into which role. If I had my choice, though, they’d do the movie like the original Star Wars, with a cast that was, at the time, a bunch of no-names. Let the story be the focus, not the celebrity faces.
That being said, one easy rewrite puts Nick Cage or Will Smith into the role of Cam, which would be unspeakably awesome.
JT: In “Plague Year” we have a book that starts out with a small group of people stranded on a mountain top, fighting to survive, against an enemy they don’t entirely understand. Some readers are going to notice the similarity to the TV show “LOST”, especially with a character named Sawyer existing in both stories. Were you influenced by the show “LOST” while writing “Plague Year”? What can you tell my readers about how the two
stories differ?
JC:I’m flattered by the comparison. LOST is one of only two TV shows that I follow, and I think it’s incredibly well crafted.
The stories are very different, although I like to think the gripping suspense is the same. LOST tends more toward the mystical voodoo fantasy aspects of the genre, whereas Plague Year is a tech thriller in the Michael Crichton tradition, i.e., it’s supposed to be more scary because it could really happen, whereas LOST is more about wild coincidences and psychic weirdness.
As for similarities, well, the wheels in publishing turn veeeery slowly. I know it’s hard to believe, given an August 2007 release, but Plague Year was already done and making the rounds in New York before LOST came on the air. My Sawyer was first! (And, for that matter, my anti-hero has a receeding hairline instead of those floppy girl bangs.) No less than five editors said they loved Plague Year but couldn’t get permission to buy a first novel. First novels often don’t sell well, because nobody’s ever heard of you. So that ate up a couple years. Finally one guy put some money on the table and we had a small three-way fight for the book, with Ace/Penguin coming out on top. Even then, it was another year and a half before the book actually hit the shelves.
JT: Where can my readers go on the internet to keep up with you, your book signings, and other news?
JC: I have a nice web site at www.jverse.com that we’re looking to upgrade in the near future. One of those upgrades will be posting the cover art for Plague War, which I just got a peek at last week. There will also be a free excerpt of the book!
In the meantime, my book signings are always posted. Expect to see more tour dates for Summer 2008. There are also free short stories, fun photos, news, and a mind-croggling trivia contest—the prize being the chance to name a character after yourself or a friend in one of my upcoming novels.
JT: Can you give my readers some kind of a “teaser” or “trailer” about your upcoming sequel, “Plague War”? I just cannot wait to read it!
Thank you. I’m excited to see the book breathed into life myself.
Plague War works as a stand-alone novel but it is a direct sequel of Year, picking up the storyline just days after Year ended. Uh, there’s a war in it… 
Really I can’t say more for fear of giving too much away. Here’s an endorsement from New York Times bestselling author Sean Williams, who calls Plague War “A break-neck ride through one of the most deadly—and thrilling—futures imagined in years.” That sounds like a good time, right?
Next up for me are no less than three projects: a third novel to complete the Plague trilogy, an adventure novel entitled Colony High written in collaboration with New York Times bestselling author David Brin, and a big new thriller called Interrupt.
I’m a busy duck and having a lot of fun at the moment. Thank you for the chance to talk about it, Jen.
JT: Thanks, Jeff! This was fun!
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