Aftermath: Into the Unknown received a 4+ star review, making it an IndieReader Approved title.
Following find an interview with author Lena Gibson.
What is the name of the book and when was it published?
Aftermath: Into the Unknown, publication date December 19th, 2024.
What’s the book’s first line?
Robin’s youth ended three years ago when the asteroid smashed into the Earth.
What’s the book about? Give us the “pitch”.
Unlikely acquaintances, brainy Robin and brawny Kory trek across the post-apocalyptic country toward the safety of a bunker city as they battle the elements, encounter other survivors, and fall in love.
What inspired you to write the book? A particular person? An event?
Robin’s character was mentioned in one line in the previous book in the series. A group traveling to Vita xTerra, a bunker city in South Dakota, say they’d stopped in Idaho for almost a week, trying to get someone’s father to join them. He’d refused, saying he was waiting for his granddaughters to come through the mountains. Robin is one of the granddaughters.
What’s the main reason someone should really read this book?
The two characters who are so different on the outside, want the same things. Like most people, they want connection and to belong, which is more than just surviving. I wanted to write another story about finding love, no matter how unlikely, in the midst of the danger and chaos.
What’s the most distinctive thing about the main character? Who-real or fictional-would you say the character reminds you of?
I have two main characters with alternating chapters.
Robin reminds me most of my youngest daughter (I didn’t plan it that way and only realized it now), who is also twenty and a Swiftie. Kory reminds me of slightly younger Opie Winston from Sons of Anarchy. He’s huge and hasn’t had an easy life, but he doesn’t want to be in a biker gang and has a softer side.
Is this the first book you’ve written?
This is the fifth book I’ve published and the second in this series though it stands alone, only connecting to the other characters very late in the story and is not dependent on having read the first book (The Edge of Life: Love and Survival During the Apocalypse).
What do you do for work when you’re not writing?
I’m a fifth-grade teacher in Canada.
How much time do you generally spend on your writing?
I try to write every day for at least an hour. When I’m on holiday or have a new edit to work on, I prefer to work in extended blocks of time, like 4-6 hour chunks. Writing the first draft of a story usually takes me 4-6 months. Then, editing and revisions take a few more.
Is there something in particular that motivates you (fame? fortune?)
Getting my stories out into the world motivates me. It makes me proud that I write stories and have a growing base of readers who enjoy my books.
Which book do you wish you could have written?
Both writers I’ve chosen are also Canadian. I wish I’d written almost everything by Guy Gavriel Kay. His writing is beautiful, his stories complex, and there is a lot of space for readers to fill in the gaps in the story. I love that he assumes readers are smart and will put together the more subtle aspects of his stories.
I also wish I’d written The Winter Sea by Susanna Kearsley. I love the idea of ancestral memories coming out as visions as her main character writes the story she sees in the past.