What is CROSSING CASCADIA about?
Martha Beckstead just started a new job, but today will be her last day. She thinks it's because her husband ordered her to quit and stay home with their two young daughters—their fundamentalist religion discourages women working outside the home.
What neither of them knows is that today the long-feared Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake will devastate the entire west coast from Canada to California. Martha will be a hundred miles from home when the bridges fall, the roads buckle, and the mountainsides collapse in a rush of mud and stone.
She’ll be alone as she battles to survive the harrowing journey through the Oregon wilderness to discover if her family has survived the quake and the massive coastal tsunami. The trek will threaten her life, erode her belief in the god she’s always known, and transform her into someone she never expected.
The Science Behind the Story
The Cascadia Subduction Zone is a massive fault line off the Pacific Northwest coast, capable of triggering a powerful earthquake and tsunami.
Scientists predict this "big one" could devastate the region, reshaping landscapes and lives—a haunting backdrop for Crossing Cascadia's story of resilience and connection.
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What readers are saying...
"This would make a great movie."
"This is the best written disaster story about an earthquake I have ever read. The journey of the main character is harrowing and so well written. I think this would be a great book for book groups to read. This would also make a great movie."
- Bill
"Fantastic and terrifying and glorious."
I could not put it down. Martha's journey through Oregon is fantastic and terrifying and glorious. I became Mo, and by the time I turned the last page, all I wanted to do was erase it from my mind, just so I could experience it all new again.
- Zai
"Wow. Just WOW."
"I haven’t sat and read a book in one sitting in years. This is the first one to completely suck me in and keep my attention so completely that I couldn’t stop reading it until I was done. Beautifully written. I felt like I was beside Martha as she went through the trek to return home.
- Tae
SPOILER ZONE BELOW!
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Slideshow of photos from the places in Oregon that inspired the events of the story
Interview with Brad about Crossing Cascadia
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Did you know that almost every scene in the book was based on a real location?
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