Cheryl's Book Nook

Settling on Settings by Susan Berliner, author of DUST http://www.susanberliner.com/ Since I write realistic (or urban) fantasies, each of my books contains just one supernatural element. But the novels are set firmly in the real world. I locate them in the northeast because that's the region I'm most familiar with. Since I don't want to be locked into factual details, I make my towns mythical places (but not fantasy worlds inhabited by strange creatures, where everything differs from the norm. No vampires, werewolves, or witches in my landscape). For the setting of DUST, I decided to choose a "Haven" name, figuring it would sound plausible because Connecticut already has so many of them—New Haven, East Haven, West Haven, and North Haven. That's how I came up with "Rock Haven." Even though the town of Rock Haven doesn't exist, it's still a typical northeastern suburb. The condo inhabitants are people we all know; their situations are recogniz...

Karen McKay lived a nice, quiet life. She has a place in the Rock Haven condos. Most of her neighbors keep to themselves. Karen was unloading groceries when a mysterious dust cloud appears. This dust cloud is not your typical cloud of dust. No this dust comes in the colors of red, green and blue. The dust picks up a collectable of Karen’s and it violently crashes to the floor, shattering in a bunch of little pieces. Karen thinks nothing of the incident…till later that night; she hears one of her neighbor’s dog barking. Karen goes to investigate. She finds her neighbor, Marion lying at the bottom of the stairs…dead. Karen calls her ex-husband, Jerry for help. Soon, other accidental incidents start happening to the other residents of Rock Haven. No one can figure out what is causing all these accidents. The only thing that ties them together is the mysterious dust. Can Karen and Jerry figure out what dust wants before it takes them out for good. I thought the concept for this book was di...