Introducing Chantelle Atkins
Where did the idea for the story come from?
It’s set where I live, a semi-rural village we’ve lived in for 14 years. We have some busy roads cutting through us, a few tourist attractions, and an airport nearby but a few years back developers wanted to build a fake waterpark/lagoon on the land behind our house. This land is rich in wildlife, with a copse, field, and hedgerows and all the lanes would need to be widened to accommodate the increase in traffic it would bring. In short, it would change the village completely, hedges would be ripped up and ancient trees felled. This still might happen and it upsets me a lot. We are lucky to have so much wildlife on our doorstep but it’s so fragile and under threat constantly. The UK is one of the most nature depleted countries in the world and our rivers and seas are polluted too. It just got to me and I felt like if Mother Nature were a conscious entity, she would want to get rid of us. She would want to kill, cull and destroy us just as we have done to nature for so long. In order to survive, she ought to get rid of us… That’s where the idea came from!
Give a quote from the books, one that says little but speaks volumes.
What is going on out there? From the back window, she squints up at the sky and all she can see is crows. Hundreds of them. Flapping across the sky and back again. Their cries differ, she realises, from an angry ‘Caaww’, to a desolate ‘Ark, ark’. She blinks and rubs her eyes and wonders if she is dreaming. She knows that crows live in large groups, and she remembers seeing the gamekeeper out with his gun, instructed to control them. But this? The sky is almost black.
Give a short summary of what the book is about.
It’s about a group of children in a semi-rural village learning to survive after multiple viruses have wiped out the adults. First, they deal with everyday survival, then rival gangs and territory wars, but after a series of strange and sinister natural events, they pull together when they realise that Mother Nature is not finished culling yet and they might be next…
Why do you think the readers will want to read it?
I think a lot of people are concerned about what we are doing to our planet and where it will take us. I also think people have always been curious about how kids would survive with no adults around!
What genre is it?
YA post-apocalyptic/horror
How many pages is it?
305
Where are you located?
Hurn Village, Christchurch, Dorset!
Description
The adults are all dead. Society has collapsed.
Two groups of teenagers emerge on either side of a rural village, traumatised, bereaved and determined to survive.
As tribes form and territorial lines are drawn, can they overcome their differences and find a way to rebuild?
Or will gang warfare end this emerging new world before its even begun?
Each of them have their theories about what killed the adults and as the dust settles on the old world, a far bigger, darker, and angrier threat is bursting to life all around them.
World of Stories 
This was a brilliant book, I was hooked into the story from the first page.
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I was privileged to have read the next one, and all I can say is, Wow!!
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