A childhood memory inspired Northbrook resident Geoffrey Charlton-Perrin to write a young adult novel. His vivid imagination moved that incident a century in the future in “2121: The Battle for Survival Begins.”
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“I began thinking about something that happened to me when I was about 14,” related Charlton-Perrin who was born and grew up in England. “I had an air pistol and I liked to go out to the fields and shoot it at cans on a wall. I suddenly heard some squabbling. Then two boys emerged arguing with each other. One of them I knew was a boy to be avoided where I lived. He’d been in trouble with the police numerous times.”
When the boys saw Charlton-Perrin they stopped arguing and focused on him. The one with the bad reputation asked to try the air pistol. Charlton-Perrin resisted several times but the boy insisted he wouldn’t do anything wrong with it so Charlton-Perrin let him try it. That boy immediately fired the pistol at the boy with whom he was arguing.
“The guy dropped like stone,” the author related. The boy survived but “that haunted me for a while ’til I started to write it down,” Charlton-Perrin said.
That tale opens “2121: The Battle for Survival Begins,” as the main character Alec Brassington is also accosted while shooting cans off a wall. But, in his case, Alec is taken prisoner by a militant group, the Renegade Lords. His rescue is followed by Alec’s recruitment into the group that saves him, and eventually leads to him becoming a hero who helps save England from tyranny.
Life is fraught with peril in Charlton-Perrin’s 2121 England but the author insisted that it’s not his vision of the future. “I hope it’s just a bad dream,” he said.
The author decided that his novel would be of interest to young adults, particularly males, because it is an adventure story. In the past, he has asked his three grandchildren to look over his writing but, since they are now in college and too busy, he decided to ask his two sons for their input instead.
“Each came back with different points of view,” Charlton-Perrin noted. “I did take some of the points they made.”
The author noted that it didn’t take him long to complete “2121: The Battle for Survival Begins.” He said the book “was able to sort of write itself.”
Although the book is based on an incident in his life, The character of Alec is only slightly based on him.
“I was a fairly well-behaved boy and I was pretty shy. So I supposed those aspects of Alec are me,” Charlton-Perrin said. “But he does things that I would never do.”
When we spoke, Charlton-Perrin was about to postpone promoting his book while he took a road trip with his wife Junie to — of all places — Southern Indiana and East Kentucky.
“I have two grandsons that play college football,” he explained. “And they play in the most out-of-the-way places.”
Charlton-Perrin, who has worked in advertising in New York, Pittsburgh, Atlanta, and Chicago, is also the author of a children’s book, “Little Lord Blink and His Ice Cream Castle,” which is being translated and published in France.
“2121: The Battle for Survival Begins,” which is self-published, is available in eBook format on Amazon. It will be available in paperback on Oct. 27; it can be preordered on Amazon.
Myrna Petlicki is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.