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The Daybreak Playlist

Music plays an important part in my writing process, and I use a custom playlist for every book to help set the vibe for the story.  Listen to the Daybreak Playlist on Spotify for free:

The Real Mariupol

I took some liberties with geography to simplify the story, but Mariupol is a real city of almost 500,000 people in southeastern Ukraine, just a few miles from the border of the disputed territory.

I’ve spent over ten weeks in Mariupol since the summer of 2007. We have extended family in the city, and received firsthand accounts of the terror the residents of Mariupol and in all the Donetsk and Luhansk regions experienced during the conflict that began in 2014.

Ukrainian burial plots are assigned based on date of death, so the victims of the park bombing would generally be buried near each other. Families are responsible to maintain the graves, and they visit often — sometimes bringing a picnic, and always leaving candies on the grave for other passing visitors — so it would be normal for the families of the victims to be forever bound in their grief.

The concert (and crowd) that inspired the incident at Angel Gibson’s concert:

 

And Nika’s perch atop the hill to the west of the stadium:

Katya’s Crocodile is real — although it’s really an unknown reptile. He’s got the teeth of crocodile, but the blunted snout of an alligator. Katya will tell you so!

The unique statue Anna keeps remembering is real, too. But it actually stands outside the State Department of Adoption in Kyiv, not in Mariupol.

Adrien’s apartment building:

Pavel’s park, and the awesome ladies’ room that made Anna choke (and trust me, it smelled even nastier than it looks):

Nika’s streetcar from the prologue: