Walking the Fine Line

DYSTOPIA : an imaginary place where people lead dehumanized and often fearful lives.

Participating in Brenda Drake’s Show Me the Voice blogfest was fantastic and thank you to everyone who commented on our first 250 words of FATUM.  One comment we received repeatedly was that the opening “didn’t feel like a dystopian”.  Actually, we are very glad you pointed this out because it’s a very important aspect of FATUM, one that really deserves its own post.

Dystopians are often characterized by a futuristic setting, the events sometimes taking place hundreds of years or more into the future.  The decay of civility and social order is often brought about by a man-made crisis and humanity is subjected to a new regime. . . often a corrupt one. 

FATUM does not adhere to these guidelines.  In fact, it walks a fine line between Contemporary and Dystopian. . . taking place in current day and after a massive solar storm wipes out the earth’s communication systems.  In other words, it takes a natural phenomenon and speculates on what would happen to our earth, to humanity, to life as we know it, if it took place on an unimaginable scale.  What would happen if Earth really was plunged into darkness and we were unable to rely on technology to communicate with the outside world.  How long would it take humanity to turn on itself, and what kind of character, what kind of moral fiber does it take to rise above that?  Those are the questions Fatum poses, the answers . . . not as rosey as you might think.