Peter Welmerink's Grand Rapids: Altered History: MICHIGAN SPACE EXPLORER RETURNS TO A STRANGE STATE

Captain Paul Wells, aka Space Voyager, has returned home from ten years in deep space. He finds his beloved state of Michigan, and his home on the shore line of Lake Michigan, not how he had left it.

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In my new SciFi Michigan-based series, I drop the main character into his homeland that has become barely the place he recognizes or remembers. 90% of the inhabitants of Michigan (at least the lower peninsula) have vacated the Mitten state after a man-made disaster, disagreements between the government and the mega-corporations who rule the roost, and a incursion of robotic beings, spawned from a rogue AI system in Grand Rapids, change the landscape of the place.

After the robotic Synth-Units, or Sues, attack and destroy his lake shore home and base, and curious about this "strange home" he's returned to, Captain Wells decides to venture deeper inland to the source of the Sues and the massive AI system called RAS. (rass)

His wanderings will get him into a heap of adventure... and trouble.

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An excerpt from RETURN TO STRANGE HOME:

"From the data I had reviewed upon descent, the Earth was the same as I had left it. The United States was still in turmoil over a power struggle between the government and the megacorporations. I could never keep up with every merger and dissolution of businesses into one huge company. Most big business moved south of the border and overseas, making the Tri-State area an industrial dead zone.

Michigan was still a forest realm, except on the east side of the state in what remained of Lansing and Detroit. West Michigan had returned almost fully to nature, the government keeping the area quarantined ever since a madman bathed it in a lethal cloud of bioagents over a decade ago. Last I’d heard the state was clean, but the government had struggled through innumerable lawsuits over the tragic incident, refusing to let people repopulate the area; which led to more lawsuits. The military kept it free from curious folk who wanted to venture into its reacquired natural state..."

Q&A with Peter Welmerink

Q: Why, in these currents stories and books, do you write Michigan as some sort of post-apoc No Man's land?

A: Because it's fun. Seriously, ever since I was little and could venture out into the "wilds" of my surrounding neighborhood, in my mind, there was always ADVENTURE there. Fictional and non-fic alike. I simply put my crazy writer's idea hat on, and came up with several challenging "doomsday" scenarios for the city and state I love.

Why should New York City, LA, Tokyo and Atlanta GA have all the fun?

Oh, and really, I am an upbeat, positive person.

Q: When did your Space Voyager character come to life? Are there any differences between the character from back-when to now?

A: Space Voyager came into being roughly 1978-1979. I did over 100 "issues" of a "comic book" drawing him as a stick figure. His ship, The Wild Blue, was part of his storyline even back then. His adventures were mostly cosmic, off-earth and very, very strange. He did have some planet-side adventures, though these meandered into tales with dinosaurs and other oddities. I was 14-15 after all.

The current rendition of Captain Paul Wells/Space Voyager was done by the talented Tim Holtrop. Not a stick figure any more, Captain Wells is a fully fleshed out character. No comics done of him though... for now.

The current Space Voyager tales have the character on Earth, fighting the good fight, trying to right things if possible. And the tone is much more serious.