Glennville Series

Genesis Earth is a trilogy of books that document the plight of the peoples of the Earth as she faces a mighty battle of super powers rarely glimpsed by mankind. Facing complete global destruction small groups band together to fight the powers that seem to be pushing the earth toward her final destruction. Will it be a case of too little too late? For some it will be the end of everything, they will give all they have and pass from life into death. But the battle may not be over for them, for many will find themselves rising from the sleep of death only to be pulled back into the battle to save earth and her people. There seems to be no peace in life or in death. No answers for humanity, but faith only in the things they have followed and embraced. On a faraway planet two armies face each other. This battle would determine the outcome of the battle on Earth, and there were no guarantees how it would finish up. In the Heavens, God reigns, offering the paths that can be followed. A beast locked within a pit for eons is bought to the surface in chains to stand before him, and is ultimately loosed on the world. In the first book, Armageddon the foundations begin to crumble and armies amass both on and off the Earth to fight. The battle is set, the lines are drawn, and the people must choose their own paths and then follow those paths to wherever they might lead. When the dust settles, will there be any true winner or only more strife and hardship for the survivors? Genesis Earth is the last chance for mankind to get it right, to start over, before everything is gone forever...

The year is 1969: In the small city of Glennville people tend to stay to themselves. Neighbors matter. The streets, even in the poorest of neighborhoods are safe for children to travel on their own: Play kick the can after dark. But the city has its secrets, and those secrets have their dangers. Under the city, a series of caves cut from the limestone by the Black River attract visitors, children, some have entered and never come out; maybe lost, maybe part of Glennville's secrets. Something else lives in the cold, dark caves. Something some have suspected but refuse to believe. After all, it's 1969. Things are rational, safe. Kyle Stevens in the Sheriff of Jefferson County, his office is in Glennville, since Glennville is the seat of Jefferson County. He likes his job. He likes the city. He came from Manhattan where crime was much worse; here he might have a serious case once every few months. Sure, even small places like Glennville have their share of run-aways, bar fights, mysteries, but in the summer of 1969 the body of a young woman is found dead in a weed choked field, and Kyle's world changes forever...

Genesis Earth: Gods and Devils is the second book in a trilogy of books that document the plight of the peoples of the Earth as she faces a mighty battle of super powers rarely glimpsed by mankind. Facing complete global destruction small groups band together to fight the powers that seem to be pushing the earth toward her final destruction. Will it be a case of too little too late? For some it will be the end of everything, they will give all they have and pass from life into death. But the battle may not be over for them, for many will find themselves rising from the sleep of death only to be pulled back into the battle to save earth and her people. There seems to be no peace in life or in death. No answers for humanity, but faith only in the things they have followed and embraced. On a faraway planet two armies face each other. This battle would determine the outcome of the battle on Earth, and there were no guarantees how it would finish up. In the Heavens, God reigns, offering the paths that can be followed. A beast locked within a pit for eons is bought to the surface in chains to stand before him, and is ultimately loosed on the world. In the second book the destruction has begun, and the lines have been clearly drawn. Those who are left alive, and those who have risen from the dead will begin to follow the paths that they have chosen, some reaching for salvation, some bent on complete destruction, others only long for the end of the fight and the peace they hope it will bring.

Genesis Earth: The Roads Out Of Eden is the third and final book in this trilogy that document the plight of the peoples of the Earth as she faces a mighty battle of super powers rarely glimpsed by mankind. Facing complete global destruction small groups band together to fight the powers that seem to be pushing the earth toward her final destruction. Will it be a case of too little too late? For some it will be the end of everything, they will give all they have and pass from life into death. But the battle may not be over for them, for many will find themselves rising from the sleep of death only to be pulled back into the battle to save earth and her people. There seems to be no peace in life or in death. No answers for humanity, but faith only in the things they have followed and embraced. On a faraway planet two armies face each other. This battle would determine the outcome of the battle on Earth, and there were no guarantees how it would finish up. In the Heavens, God reigns, offering the paths that can be followed. A beast locked within a pit for eons is bought to the surface in chains to stand before him, and is ultimately loosed on the world. In the third book the battle is racing toward conclusion. There are no guarantees of the outcome, those that fight, fight with the knowledge that they may fall and stay fallen forever, but that they might also rise to a new life. Those that have risen from the dead and those that abide in life will make their choices and the final battle will decide.

The summer of 1969 in Glennville New York had settled in full tilt. The July morning was cool and peaceful, but the afternoon promised nothing but sticky heat. Bobby Weston and Moon Calloway worked furiously on the go-cart they had been planning to race down Sinton Park hill, in the old garage behind Bobby's house. Both boys had grown up in Glennville. Bobby on upper Fig, Moon on lower Fig. And even though they had gone to the same schools and grown up just a block apart, they had only recently become friends. The Go-cart was a project they had devoted the last two weeks to, and it looked as though today would finally see it finished. A short story that goes back to a time when life was simpler. This short story is set in the fictitious city of Glennville where the Earth's Survivors Settlement Earth series is set. It introduces Bobby and Moon who play a part in the Earth's Survivors Settlement Earth series in books four and five. This short story closely follows a real incident from my own youth...

Joel has lived and worked his whole life in the small town of Glennville, but his life is about to change forever; only time will tell if it is for the better or the worse. He goes to work at the mill, drinks with the few friends he has at a local bar on the weekends. He's got his truck packed for an off-grid adventure he's planed for his vacation. Fortunate for him, because when he awakens to leave for that trip, everything has changed permanently... Haley is in Glennville because her husband was stationed at the nearby base. In a few hours her life is also going to change forever. She will find herself taken from her everyday boredom, living in a small town where no-one knows her, and she knows no-one. In a few hours. A short rest, she will step outside her life to a changed world, and no idea who she can trust or count on... Two people thrown together via circumstances. As they begin their journey they draw others to them, as the trek across what used to be the greatest country in the world looking for life, or a place to begin again... Hi, this is Dell. This book is set in two of my favorite places: Glennville, my fictitious town in upstate New York, and Alabama where I once spent some of the happiest years of my life. I hope you enjoy the story...

“Easy... Easy, Boy.” I lowered my hand to the dog's head and patted affectionately, trying to calm him. He whined low in his throat and looked around at the darkness that closed in on us. We were in a garage that much I could tell. Just a nondescript, average run-of-the-mill garage. I had had this dream many times. Some leftover thoughts, spike on the imagination line, something like that. The dog lived here. Not the garage specifically. Specifically he lived with, or was owned by, the people that lived on the ground floor of the nearby house. I knew that was true because I lived on the top floor of that same house, even though I had only ever set foot there once or twice, and then only in dreams. I still knew the place. It looked the same. Familiar. The dog, Bear, slept in the garage. The dog squirmed under my calming hand, whined once again, and then darted out of the garage toward the lower floor of the house. Maybe the first floor. Maybe the basement if he had or could find a way into it. Either way, he was safe now. A kind of exit stage left. Still, I waited a few long minutes to see if he might return, when he didn't I turned my attention back to the grocery cart I had just pushed for the last few miles to reach the garage. It wasn't mine. Well, technically it wasn't mine, but everything in this world was mine if you came right down to it. I had entered what looked to be an abandoned house and found the cart, already loaded, and sitting in an attached garage just off the ground floor apartment. I remember thinking... “So... This is how it begins... It always begins some way and I suppose that sometimes the ends justify the means, and here was the end... I mean to say that I took the cart, loaded as it was, no more thought involved, pushed it out of the garage at a run and went blindly down the rain-slicked dirt road in front of me. There was one bad part when I nearly got stuck, but I saw the problem from a long way off, put on a burst of speed and made it through the mud hole and out the other side. It was only a matter of minutes later that I had come in sight of the house and knew what the deal was. I had been contemplating the cart and its contents, feeling ears of corn through the side of a large sack, about to check some other stuff, when the dog had appeared. When the dog came, memories came with him: The house; the people that owned the dog... Returning from work... or? I don't know. Work or something else. Daily? Was it before things got bad? If so it had to be work: There was nothing else but work before. So work, or something like work... Coming home... The people downstairs... The family upstairs that I knew so intimately, but had never actually seen... Other memories... Leaving to go and get the cart... Knowing it would be there somehow... Getting there... Looping back to here and the present time...

The summer of 1969 was winding down. The warm air held a smell 13 year old Bobby Weston couldn't quite identify but nevertheless acquainted with going back to school. An end of summer smell, he decided. Or maybe an end of summer feeling. He couldn't make up his mind, and it really didn't matter, as soon enough summer would be gone and he'd be back in school. He had permission to go camping today, but camping by yourself was no fun at all, he thought gloomily. So he had come out and sat on the front porch and watched the trucks at Jackson's lumber run back and forth delivering lumber to who knew where. Bobby had been sitting quietly on the steps wondering who ordered all that stuff and how they could possibly pay for it-when his mother had said the country was going broke, when Moon Calloway and Lois Tibbet walked up. All three of them were good friends and had been since they had met the summer before. They were also the same age and would be starting eighth grade together in just a few weeks. Back to the City of Glennville and three friends in the summer of 1969...

Once we had liberated a truck, it had still been slow going until we reached El Segundo Boulevard. The stalled traffic had been much lighter there, and we had been able to drive part of the way by cutting into the parking lots of fast food restaurants, that dotted almost the entire length of the highway. We had followed that to Willmington, and picked up another truck that had seen better days. Getting that truck had not been a problem; there were several used car lots along the road. We had used the parking lots to swing around the worst of the traffic, and that had worked well until we had intersected Compton Boulevard. It was hopelessly packed with stalled traffic. We had left the truck, which had sounded as if it was close to dying anyway, and struck out on foot again. Lana led the way as we cut cross lots through Compton Woodley Airport. Crossing the dead airfield had been unnerving for both of us. The runways had cracked, and either lifted skyward, or tilted down into the ground. Blackened skeletons of large aircraft dotted the airfield. Most of them were so badly burned that we had been unable to tell what they had been before. I thought a couple of them may have been military aircraft, but as badly twisted as they were it was impossible to be sure. Luggage, some burned, some untouched, was scattered across the airfield in every direction, and many of the suitcases were burst, with papers and clothing scattered everywhere along with other personal effects. There were bodies there too...

Far below the small city of Glennville New York, Richard Pierce sat working before an elaborate computer terminal. He had just initiated the program that managed the small nuclear power plant hidden deep below him in the rock. A small handset beside the computer station chimed, and he picked it up and listened. He did not speak at first, but as he listened a smile spread across his face. "Very good," he said happily, when the caller was finished, "keep me advised." He set the small handset back into its cradle and turned his attention back to the screen in front of him. The plant had powered up just as it was supposed to, no problems whatsoever, and that made Richard Pierce extremely happy. Two more days tops, he thought, and then maybe I'll get out of this dump. He supposed he should feel honored that he was even here. It was after all one of the biggest projects in the country, albeit top secret, but he could not help the way he felt. He was close to a mile underground, totally cut off from everything and everyone, and he hated it. If he had a choice, which he had not, he would never have come at all. But he had written the software that handled the power plant, as well as several other sections of the underground city, and that made it his baby. There were a couple of small bugs, mainly due to the fact that no one had been allowed to know what the entire program was supposed to do. The way the rewrites were going however, it looked as though he would not be stuck here anywhere near as long as he had originally thought, and that was something to think about. He had begun to feel that he would never leave this rock bound prison, and wouldn't that be a real bitch. - 3 - At a large gravel pit on the outskirts of Glennville, Gary Jones carefully maneuvered the wide mouth of the loader bucket over the dump box of the truck, and pulled back on the lever closest to him to release the load. Ain't this something, he thought as he slowly topped off the dump box, barely 10 AM and we've already sent out twenty seven truckloads of gravel to the base. Six men out sick, and another forty truckloads to deliver before five tonight. What in hell are they doing with all this gravel? He wondered. It was a question he had asked many times before, and still had not gotten an answer to. Uncle Sam paid well though, and on time to boot, so he guessed he probably shouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth. He signaled the driver, and he pulled away with a whoosh of air as he released the brakes. Another dump truck lumbered up to take his place, and he pushed the questions out of his mind as he began filling the box.

He got up, padded through to the kitchen and turned the TV on, went back and got dressed. He was on his way back to the living room when a commercial ended and a news break came on. A pretty blond, probably not much older than he himself was, smiled into the camera and began to talk as he yawned deeply. "Good morning: Coming up on News Fifteen in ten minutes, your local headlines, sports and weather. Topping our local headlines this morning the grisly discovery of the body of a young woman earlier this morning on Lott road; police are releasing no details, but a source has told News Fifteen that they do suspect foul play. The body was discovered in a drainage ditch by a passing motorist. In world news, Mieka Petre, USGS lead seismologist tells us that everyone can release their collective breath over the news that DX2379R, the errant meteor that was said to be on a collision course with Earth early next month, will actually miss us by thousands of miles." "Whew," the lead anchor, a young man named James, with jet black hair said and laughed. "Had me worried." "Had all of us worried, James" the female lead agreed. She returned the laugh before she began speaking once more. "Cable Corp has issued an apology for the wide spread internet outages of the last several days. They are blaming it on faulty satellite down feeds, hinting that maybe the government has been messing with their transmissions." She nodded toward the handsome anchor somewhere off camera. "Cue the conspiracy theorists," she joked. The anchor chuckled briefly off screen as she turned back to the camera with a serious expression on her face once more. "And this from a small village in Ecuador, the jungle of the living dead? The locals claim their relatives are returning from the dead. All that and more inside of 10 minutes: But first these messages from our sponsors..." Billy closed his mouth. Well, he thought, it wasn't the first body to be found out here. Just before he had moved here they found the body of a local prostitute whose throat had been cut. She'd been dumped nearly in front of his house. He headed back toward the bathroom. Probably the same thing again, he thought. Welcome to your night off, Billy...