Showing results by author "Frank Tayell" in All Categories

A castle can be made safe from the undead, but not from the people inside the walls. It is seven months since the outbreak. In the anarchy and chaos that came with the undead, civilization was destroyed. In the wars that followed, the planet was nearly ruined. Billions died. Only a few thousand survived.

Even after the apocalypse, crimes must be solved. In 2019, the AIs went to war. It lasted three days, until the electromagnetic pulse from hundreds of nuclear bombs destroyed the infected circuits. Billions of people succumbed to radiation, starvation, and disease. But millions survived, and they rebuilt. Twenty years later, a ceremony is being held to mark the first transatlantic broadcast since the Blackout. The Prime Minister of Britain and two of the Presidents of the United States will speak to an audience of nearly 10 million people. Not all are celebrating. Crime is on the rise, and power is once again a prize worth murdering for. Ruth Deering, a new graduate from the police academy, doesn't care about ancient history or current affairs. She only joined the force to escape the smog-infested city. Those hopes are dashed when she is assigned to the Serious Crimes Unit, commanded by the disgraced Sergeant Mitchell. Her first case seems like a simple murder, but the investigation uncovers a counterfeiting ring and a conspiracy that threatens to destroy their fragile democracy.

Three months after escaping from London, Bill discovers the true extent of the global war that followed the outbreak. Most of the world has been destroyed, but though ruined farmland and abandoned cities are filled with zombies, there are other survivors and there is a safe haven - so he is told - in a small village on the Irish coast.

It’s been six years since Pete Guinn last saw his sister, Corrie. He always hoped to see her again, but feared she was dead. When an elusive billionaire reveals Corrie is living under an assumed name in the Australian outback, Pete unquestioningly jumps at the chance of a reunion...Together with a bush pilot, a flying doctor, and an outback cop, the struggle to maintain civilization begins. Supplies run low. Looting is rampant. Laws are forgotten, especially by the cartel who haven’t abandoned their search for Corrie and their quest for revenge. miraculous.

Three weeks after the outbreak, most nations have collapsed. An ever-increasing number of refugees flee, by boat and air, to the perceived safety of the remote Pacific nations. In Australia, every able body is conscripted, local and newcomer alike. The lucky few are put to work in the new factories, farms, and mines. The unlucky many are given tools for weapons, put aboard cruise-ships and cargo freighters, and returned to the ever-moving frontline. But even though the death toll rises, victory is still within reach.

As the much-depleted United Nations meets in Canberra, the scale of the global catastrophe becomes clear. The tsunami left Brisbane a flooded ruin. Vanuatu has disappeared. The Madagascan evacuation has failed. Vancouver has been reduced to a radioactive crater. For as far west as Mozambique, as far to the east as Chile, and as far north as Canada, the world is a catalogue of devastation. From the Atlantic, there has been no news since the early days of the outbreak, four weeks ago.

It is a week since the outbreak began in New York. The president has been betrayed. The vice-president is dead. The conspirators are close to victory. Having narrowly escaped agents of the cabal, Tom Clemens heads to Washington in the hope of warning the president, but it is too late. The highways are impassable, filled with millions fleeing from the cities. As refugees storm the towns, and zombies fill the smoking ruins, survivors become more deadly a threat than the impossibly living dead.

Fourteen months after the outbreak, 13 months after the nuclear war, the old world is gone, but a new world is emerging. The evacuation of Britain failed, but other evacuations were a success. In Canberra, a new civilization is being born, but in Canada, the search for lost communities begins. The journey takes Bill and Kim to the very end of the Earth, and to a meeting with familiar strangers. Crossing the border, Sholto endures a bittersweet return to the country he’d embraced so many decades ago.

In a post-apocalyptic world where food is treasure, pirates will kill for a meal. A month after the nuclear war ended, Commissioner Qwong and her crew of scientists and soldiers head north. Following a clue found in the logbook of a sinking ship, they search Mexico for a community trading safety for oil. As they follow garbled radio messages and breadcrumb-clues northward from one small band of survivors to another, a picture of the new world emerges.

For the alien towani, Earth is a holy site where their Last Prophecy will be fulfilled. They will do anything to protect the planet. Protecting humanity is an optional extra.

A year and a half after the collapse of civilization, pirates plague the Atlantic, the Saint Lawrence River is a radioactive dead-zone, and the forests of Quebec are succumbing to disease. With insufficient supplies to last until autumn, the survivors in Eastern Canada have no choice but to flee. A final evacuation is planned, to migrate across the breadth of irradiated North America to what they hope will be permanent safety on the Pacific coast.

As nations rebuild, democracy is under threat. In 2019, the AIs went to war. Millions died before a nuclear holocaust brought an end to their brief reign of terror. Billions more succumbed to radiation poisoning, disease, and the chaotic violence of that apocalypse. Some survived. They rebuilt. Twenty years later, civilisation is a dim shadow of its former self. Crime is on the rise. During the investigation of a routine homicide, Police Officer Ruth Deering prevents a group of Luddites from destroying the telegraph. This act of sabotage is only the beginning. As arrests are made, and criminals are caught, evidence emerges that the saboteurs are connected to the AIs, the counterfeiting, and to the assassination. The shadowy figure behind the conspiracy must be unmasked before their fragile democracy is destroyed.

Twenty years after the apocalyptic Blackout, steam-trains and the telegraph have replaced smartphones and satellites, but while some still fear technology, many dream of its return.

In 2019, the AIs went to war. Three days later, hundreds of nuclear missiles were launched. The electromagnetic pulse destroyed the machines, but the radiation and famine nearly destroyed humanity. By 2039, civilization had regressed to the age of steam, but newer technologies were on the horizon. The future looked bright until the warlords swept through Europe. Villages and towns were laid waste, the few thousand people who'd hacked out a life in the continental wasteland were butchered. It was only when the barbarians reached the British garrison in Calais that they were stopped.

2039, 20 years after the AIs went to war, plague and famine have reduced the global population to 100 million. Most of the planet is a wasteland, with only a handful of enclave-nations preserving a dim shadow of civilization. Christmas is only days away, but Constable Ruth Deering’s mood is anything but festive. In the walled city of Dover, a lonely chef is discovered dead, poisoned. What first appeared to be an accident is soon suspected to be the work of a serial killer who is certain to strike again.