Ajay gives away the whole game in Beyond the Lost Assault when she endorses a strong central state, albeit a smaller one. She doesn’t want the Left’s version of the State, complete with its endless domestic programs, social engineering, progressive bureaucracy, or whatever moral crusade happens to dominate the universities, corporate HR departments, and cable-news panels…
The phrase sounds clean enough if you say it from a distance: Necessary casualties. There ya go. All nice and tidy when you say it out loud. Easy to say when there’s no screaming, burning skin, fathers searching rubble for children, or a hospital hallway filled with people who never cared about the flag, the…
Property rights are easy to praise when they protect your camp. But they get a lot less popular when they block your plan. That’s the tell. Everyone loves property rights in the abstract. Small-government conservatives talk about them constantly. Ditto for preppers and so-called patriots. The same people who hate Washington, zoning boards, bureaucrats, eminent…
Emergency power never stays in the emergency. That’s the lie normies keep falling for, and the COVID fiasco drove that home. They hear “temporary” and relax, or “fifteen days to stop the spread,” and make allowances. The normies hear “extraordinary circumstances” and accept rules they would’ve mocked six months earlier. They tell themselves “this is…
A chain of command makes sense when bullets are flying. That’s the part libertarians should be honest about. But there’s a catch. If a colony’s hiding in the woods while terrorists, drifters, and desperate people move through the ruins of the old world, someone needs to know who’s guarding the road, treating the wounded, cooking,…
Faith can steady a person. That’s the part cynical people miss. Power weaponizes the institution, and it can use faith as a proxy. A girl lying in a makeshift hospital bed after getting shot three times doesn’t need some sneering atheist telling her how stupid prayer is. Nor does she need a lecture about historical…
Book burning is easy to condemn when the wrong people light the match. That’s the trick. But do you feel the same when your side does it? Everyone hates censorship when the censor hates what they love. The second the censor shares their worldview, suddenly the excuses arrive with polished boots, clean fingernails, and a…
A lot of small-government conservatives hate centralized power until they get a little power of their own. Then the speeches change. The excuses arrive, and the man who spent years complaining about Washington suddenly discovers the beauty of rules, hierarchy, enforcement, approved beliefs, and everyone knowing their place. That’s where Martin Richards becomes one of the…
While there’s no prison lurking in the backwoods of Ohioville, Pennsylvania in real life, it made for one heck of a setting in Beyond the Lost. Mystery Mile is a colloquial name for this allegedly haunted-ass stretch of road in Ohioville, Pennsylvania — the first mile of Kelly Road (which connects Ohioville to Industry) or sometimes Wolf Run Road….
Martin Richards may be the most complex character in Beyond the Lost Assault. Is he a small-government conservative or something more notorious? Parents: Unknown Children: At least one unnamed son Fun Fact: Martin was the brains behind the colony Hogwarts House: Slytherin Occupation: Colony leader Birthday: April 20th, 1983 Quinn Cozens met Martin Richards years before Beyond the Lost’s events. Quinn and…
Erika’s colony may be more than the ultimate primitive survival camp. It’s one where the people live in constant vigilance from outsiders. Few saw the terrorist attacks that upended America and the West coming. Even fewer believed a young woman would serve as a small town’s lifesaver. Erika didn’t have much, but she had a…
Erika doesn’t show until Beyond the Lost Assault. But she makes an immediate impact in the book, and her presence becomes a focal point in Book III. Parents: Third Generation Inbred Couple Sibling: One unnamed brother Fun Fact: Erika educated herself Hogwarts House: Ravenclaw Occupation: Colony committee member Birthday: Unknown, likely between March and July 2012 Very, very few people…