Jack of Harts

The United States of America when Jack grew up was different from the nation we live in now. Three centuries had passed. Political alliances like the Republic of California, Republic of Texas, the Indian Nations, and the Confederation of Dixie had arisen. Those pseudo-sovereign alliances of States maintained many of their own policies and generally ignored the Federal Government’s wishes as long as it didn’t try to interfere with them. I draw much inspiration from Pre-Civil War America in that way, where people were Minnesotans or Texans first, and Americans second. Jack was proud to grow up a Minnesotan on the wilderness border with Canada, acting as a tour guide for rich city slickers. America was a highly divided nation in many ways, but when the Shang attacked and killed millions of Americans all over the Western half of the nation, they united the United States of America in a way that only an outside threat can. Much like after our own 9/11, America stood back up and challenged all comers to come get some. That is the America Jack grew up in, and the America he volunteered to defend.

The Peloran made Contact with us a century before the main story in Jack of Harts. Aliens are normal and accepted in Jack’s worldview, and so is the effective immortality of humanity. He wasn’t even alive when the Peloran made their Treatments available to anybody who wanted them for free. They are like a superboost to the human immune and repair systems that massively slows down the aging process. Jack does not remember a time when people died of old age. It is a foreign concept to him. Yes, he has read about it. He knows it used to happen. Just like people use to get the flu. Or cancer. Or small pox. The Black Death. Addiction to drugs. Overweight. Underweight. Diabetes. They are all artifacts of the past, eliminated by a combination of Alien and Human medical sciences that have literally changed the world. Jack is healthy, and he has every expectation that those around him will also be healthy until the day they die.

The United States of America in my writing is not like the one we live in now. It has many similarities of course, but it has been through three centuries of changes between our time and the time of my writing. It has collapsed and rebuilt. It has expanded. From Alaska to Panama, from Midway to the Virgin Islands, it includes former enemies like Cuba, former failed states like Mexico, and expanding states like the Indian Nations. It’s a far more diverse nation than our current one, but it has a power structure many would recognize now. Literally. Many of the people alive right now in our world are still alive in Jack’s time. And for all the changes in America, that brings an interesting core of stability that many readers recognize. The similarities are not always good ones. This is on purpose.