Pre-Apocalyptic Science Fiction
Date Published: January 15, 2025
Publisher: Manhattan Book Group
The year is 2360. A select group of a half million humans, the only
survivors of global warming and the “Race Wars”, are living a
Spartan lifestyle and exhibiting loss of memory and emotions resulting from
mind-altering drugs created by world leaders known as the Orchestrators. The
drugs markedly slowed metabolism and aging, making them ideal for prolonging
the lives of humans requiring long periods of travel in space. Henry Shannon
is being groomed as the next Orchestrator who will lead a mission to
Jupiter, hoping to find an inhabitable moon that can accommodate the humans
remaining on Earth. After discovering that the moons of Jupiter are
uninhabitable, Henry reluctantly agrees to return to Earth, ultimately
bolstered by news that global warming somehow has given way to global
cooling. During the return trip home, his wife is killed when an asteroid
collides with their spaceship. Depressed and increasingly concerned about
survival of the human race, Henry presses on and successfully lands his
group back on Earth, which bears little resemblance to the planet they
remembered. The returning passengers encounter strange new animal species
and are stunned to find that Earth has been repopulated by a group of humans
previously known as Tunnel People because of their subterranean lifestyle.
Their Supreme Leader, Lillian Goodman, a long-time opponent of the
Orchestrators, somehow alters the Tunnel People who now have advanced
technologies, an above-ground life of opulence, and apparent immortality. As
Henry unravels the nefarious means employed by the Supreme Leader to create
this Utopian state, he discovers why these new humans remain desperately
dependent on his passengers for maintaining their immortal status, and must
decide whether to cooperate or resist and face his own mortality.
EXCERPT
I WAS REGAINING consciousness. Cartoon figures danced on the
backs of my eyelids. As I strained to open my eyes, streaks of dazzling
yellow light passed up and down and side to side. Shiny globes, varying
in size and looking like Christmas tree bulbs, whirled around me. It
seemed psychedelic. Maybe I never lost consciousness and was just
given a hallucinogenic drug. I was aware of my body but had no sense
of space or time. It felt as though something other than my brain was
controlling my mind and my sensations.
Psychedelic drugs were not involved in this revival of consciousness.
The yellow lights were nothing more than sunbeams stimulating
my retinal nerves. The whirling globes, sometimes just a few, but often
several dozen, turned out to be little machines with cameras and sensors
that could monitor vital signs and other bodily functions while delivering
streams of data to…someone. The sensors moved rapidly like
silent drones, always in some formation that suggested a network of
communication between the bulbs. Sometimes the bulbs would hover
almost within reach. At other times I could see them whirling twenty
feet away but still monitoring, still watching.
This experience, this reawakening, may have lasted minutes, hours,
or days. I couldn’t tell. However, it was an experience that occurred
repeatedly, usually ending with me waking up to my familiar surroundings
in the New World.
About the Author
Donald Hricik is a physician who was born in Ohio, currently living in the
Cleveland area. He is Emeritus Professor of Medicine at Case Western Reserve
University and the former Chief of the Division of Nephrology and
Hypertension at University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center. He has
authored or edited over two hundred medical manuscripts or medical text
books. He has published six novels: Racing to Pittsburgh (2010), Nothing to
Confess (2013), and Escape from Cleveland (2016), Our Great Escape; Part 1:
Dumbers and Part 2: Return to the Tunnel People (2017, 2018), Toxic Affairs
on Hidden Lane (2021), a memoir about his wife – Lynne’s Last Christmas: A
Battle with Dementia (2021). All of his books have medical themes. Aside
from writing, Dr. Hricik is a painter (mostly acrylics and oil) and enjoys
cycling, gardening, and occasional attempts at deep sea fishing
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