J. L. Reynolds
Southern Californians had long been accustomed to the occasional jolts of small earthquakes, and for the most part had come to ignore the small jolts and considered them as more of a reminder that they lived in an area that was dissected by the great San Andreas Fault along with many other smaller fault lines.
Vince Davis, the director of the Seismic Center located in San Diego, California, had been awakened from sleep at 2:00 AM the morning of August 18th, 2009 by the jolt of a small earthquake, not unlike many others he had experienced since moving to San Diego and taking over his position as director of the facility. He felt no urgency in regard to the earthquake, knowing the Seismic Center would be monitoring the quake. What he didn’t know, but would soon learn, was that the small quake was just the beginning of something more devastating and ominous. Something that he and his assistant, Jim Lewis, never imagined could happen. The two, caught up in the disaster, would band together with a group of new found and dedicated allies, forming a courageous force of defiant individuals. The government of the United States, no longer viable, crumbled and fell apart under the fury of the all-consuming disaster. Military and government officials alike deserted their posts, as Washington and the White House burned. If the group was going to survive, they would have to find their own way, and do so by their own means. In a short period of 35 days, they would find themselves in a constant struggle against nature and the enemies they would encounter along the way. He and his allies are ultimately forced to abandon their mountaintop headquarters and go to St. Louis, where they will have to make their last stand and face the power of the mighty New Madrid Fault.
J. L. Reynolds was born in Kansas City, Kansas in 1939. He lived and worked in the Kansas City area untill he retired from T.W.A in 1994. He was never trained as a writer, but has written many poems and songs over the years, none of which have been published.
This novel is his first attempt at serious writing. The completion of this novel marks a new path he has chosen to follow. At the time of this printing, he has written three other novels that will complete the story of The Continent of St. Louis. The subsequent novels that complete the story will be published and released in the months to come.
His philososphy on life is that a person is never to old to try something new or different. Success, he feels is not what others may say or think regarding your work, but rather the satisfaction the individual gets completing something they have started.
Southern Californians first felt the beginning of the end of their world at two in the morning, August 18th, 2009. The dreaded big quake, long anticipated from the San Andreas fault, began along the Imperial Branch and was recorded as a 3.0 on the Richter scale by the Southern California Seismic Network, located in Los Angeles and San Diego. The intial data coming in from seismic sensors placed in the Salton Sea area was noted, but caused little concern for seismologists on duty. Southern California had experienced many small earthquakes in the past including a series of minor cluster quakes that had occured in the Salton Sea area as recently as 2005. Earthquakes of that magnitude were common throughout Southern California and known to be of no threat to modern structures.
Area residents who were wakened by the minor shock wave were, for the most part, indifferent to it and were not prepared for the violent intensity of the aftershocks beginning just ten minutes later. The first massive aftershock sent residents not trapped inside their crumbling homes into the streets seeking safety, as the ground continued the merciless upheaval beneath their feet. The streets in every neighborhood were torn open, breaking gas mains that released spewing, pressurized gas upward. The panic, felt by all, turned to doom as the gas was ignited by downed electrical lines and erupted into massive fireballs of searing flames. No one still alive knew the significance of what was yet to come. With electical feed gone, radio, and television communication was lost. Area police, fire departments and other emergency personnel had been caught unaware. Unable to cope with the holocaust facing them, they became victims as well. By 2:30 a.m., those who were still alive and trapped inside their homes, died from the ensuing firestorms that swept through the cities consuming everything in their path. Death had come swiftly through the darkness like an unseen and vicious predator. There would be no avenue of escape or salvation for the thousands of victims trapped in its path of annihilation and destruction. As the shock waves intensified the bed of the Salton sea collapsed in a thunderous roar. Seconds later, a giant whirlpool formed and rapidly gained momentum. The inertia of the rotating water's force lay claim to all that lined its shores, taking all down, as the water funneled into the depths of the Earth. For the millions of unknowing, and so far unaffected, Southern California citizens, certain death now lay waiting at their doorsteps.
