A Post-Event Frontier in Jessica Strange

Tacoma after the Event

In Stephen Drake’s Jessica Strange, the West Coast has been emptied by a catastrophe called the Event. By 2074, Tacoma is the remaining population center, with a frontier character that brings Western elements into the science fiction setting. The change is personal for Jessica: the Event took her husband.

Jessica has been a police officer and an ambassadorial liaison. She now works as a freelance gun for hire. That combination of past responsibilities and current employment gives readers a particular kind of survivor to follow, someone whose professional life has changed along with the world around her.

An offer from the government

A federal government offer interrupts that life. Strange creatures found in vaults on Q’estiria extend the story's questions beyond Earth's damaged landscape. Jessica's immediate circumstances now sit beside discoveries from another place, giving the offer significance within a world whose possibilities she has not yet fully encountered.

That is the useful distinction for readers choosing a post-apocalyptic story here: the frontier setting is one part of a wider science fiction adventure. The premise includes government involvement and an off-world mystery, alongside the practical question of what Jessica will do next.

Continuing the Blackwing Saga

Jessica Strange is the second Blackwing Saga book. Readers interested in the Event’s wider background can consider its place in the series, while this installment centers their attention on Jessica’s changed circumstances and unexpected opportunity.