Brave Men Run Podcast - Episode Eight Chapts. 24 - 26
Back again, dear listeners / readers, for another stack of notes and links from the Brave Men Run Podcast!
Chapter Twenty Four:
– “Abbeque Valley is a planned community in Orange County, in Southern California… The billionaires who designed the town did one cool thing, though. Most of the neighborhoods are broken up by these long, narrow areas that were never developed - they’re like woods. I don’t know if they call these places something different at city hall, but everybody I know just calls them the Glen.”
Folks, if any of you are trying to suss out the geographic region that inspired the settings of “Brave Men Run,” this is your biggest clue. This is the town I grew up in, in Orange County, CA, in the eighties, and I loved exploring and hiking in the Glen.
– “There’s a clearing in there, with these big California oaks on every side, and a big dead tree that makes a nice place to sit. It’s far enough from the street I can almost ignore the sounds of cars and stuff, too. I can think there.”
This location still exists — I was there this summer for inspiration as I finished writing the book — but I took some creative license. It’s much closer to the street and the traffic in real life.
Chapter Twenty Five:
– “He couldn’t give you a good grade since you didn’t really follow the directions. Half of this thing is what the Donner Declaration means to the rest of the world, not to you.” She handed the paper back to me. “You’re lucky you didn’t get an F. A C means he’s on your side.”
This is the very reason I was able to pass “Contemporary World Problems” in my senior year of high school. What can I say? Loved the class, loved the subject, loved the teacher… didn’t like homework.
Chapter Twenty Six:
– ” Press Secretary Speakes stood in front of the cameras…”
Larry Speaks was press secretary for the Reagan Whitehouse from 1981 to 1987.
– “My mother laughed and shook her head. “Who watches the watchmen…”
“Sed quis custodiet ipsos custodes?” Attributed to Juvenal
– “In the fifties, before the comic books were put out of business by the Wertham Act…”
Another reminder that the world of “Brave Men Run” is an alternate history. In our own universe, Fredric Wertham’s anti-comic book crusade culminated in the establishment of the Comics Code Authority. In the universe of “Brave Men Run,” comic books were effectively outlawed in the United States a decade before Nate Charters was born.
