Monday, February 3, 2014

The world of Halcyon Gate: Explained

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So I’m going to be starting a bit of a series on explaining how things work in the world of Halcyon Gate. It’ll help give me a bit of a break, and I’m sure that plenty of y’all have questions concerning the setting. Let’s get started!
SPOILERS ARE POSSIBLE. STOP READING HERE UNTIL AFTER YOU READ TIME JUMP AND (POSSIBLY) EUGENIC REPRISAL. PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK. http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0078832F2  http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00HL7ERMM
Okay, now that that is out of the way. Where should we started? I guess we’ll start with the base premise of the setting. It’s the future, right? 2150. My, how the world has changed.
What we’ve learned so far in Time Jump is that there was a technological revolution. Fusion power plus the advent of replicator technology has ushered in a new era. The question remains whether or not this is leading to a Utopia or a Dystopia. I’ll let you think on that one a little while.
How would the world economy react to such a thing? You have super cheap labor now anywhere that has a power grid capable of supporting these newfangled nano-factories. Essentially supply power, and voila, you have what you wanted. 
So what does this do to the world economy? I certainly believe that Wal-Mart would even have problems keeping pace with the price drops that would happen from this. With such cheap items flooding the market now, and more as new facilities get built, what is money actually worth? There are things that are still going to be bought with it, but now you will have a lot of essentials basically free. I’d like to think that stuff like hunger could potentially be eradicated. What’s the difference between replicated food and real food?
These are questions that I had to ask myself while writing Halcyon Gate. This is the future. How would a world change with that technology? How would society react? Would there be a cultural revolution? What are some of the social ramifications? 
I chose to put arranged marriages as being more of the norm now because maybe that would happen. You’d have a lot more of a segmented society showing up. Maybe the rich elites from before found a way to keep their social status. Who you know will certainly mean a lot in a rationed society. Imagine the millionaires of today that rub elbows with government officials managing to get more than their fair share of energy credits. Think of what they could do now that money really is no longer a concern. 
Just thinking these thoughts expands the world more than I can really describe in the confines of the Halcyon Gate series. I’m trying my best to give y’all more glimpses and backgrounds, and I hope that Eugenic Reprisal is an improvement on how Time Jump was. 
I hope that the more I write, the better I will be able to get. This is my job now, and y’all are my customers and followers. I have an obligation to get better and tell a story that we both enjoy.
So that got a bit rambling style at the end, but I think it delivers a point nicely. What do y’all want to learn about next? Please please please ask me about the universe. This is your chance to learn!