Kyle, a successful cosmetic surgeon, is punishing himself with a sprint up a mountain. Charlotte, wife of a tech tycoon, is combing the farm belt for local cheese and a sense of purpose. Back in the city their families go about their business: landscaping, negotiating deals, skipping school. Its a day like any otheruntil suddenly its not. When the earthquake hits, the city erupts in chaos and fear. Kyles and Charlottes families, along with two passersby, are thrown together in an oceanfront mansion. The catastrophe and conflicts that beset these wildly different people expose the fault lines beneath their relationships, as they question everything in an effort to survive and reunite with their loved ones stranded outside the city. Frances Pecks debut novel recalls the humanism of Ann Patchett while interrogating the excesses of the nouveau riche like Emily St. John Mandel and Douglas Coupland.
Frances Peck wrote fiction and poetry until her early twenties, when the realities of adulthood and rent steered her toward a career as a freelance ghostwriter, editor, and teacher. Best known for her workshops and presentations on the finer points of language, shes the author of Pecks English Pointers, a collection of lively essays. She is a co-author of the HyperGrammar website, and an essayist and blogger whose work has appeared in The Editors Weekly, West Coast Editor, Language Update, and Geist. Frances has been steadily making her way across Canada. She grew up in Cape Breton, NS; spent nearly two decades in Ottawa, ON; and now lives in North Vancouver, BC. In her off-time she has been a campus radio deejay, a taekwon-do practitioner, a bass player, and a backcountry hiker. She is a long-time member and volunteer with Editors Canada and spent five years on the board of the BC and Yukon Book Prizes.