A deeper look into how the dual-narrative structure, the psychological tension, and the shifting realities of Worlds Apart took shape behind the page.
Worlds Apart started as two separate concepts:
A man in a controlled institution experiencing visions that might not be delusions.
A detective searching for his missing wife across layers of political corruption and criminal networks.
The creative shift occurred when both stories revealed they weren’t meant to be separate. The tension between psychological instability and investigative grit merged seamlessly, creating two worlds that felt distinct yet connected through tone, atmosphere, and escalating consequences.
Peter’s storyline grew from the question:
What happens when a society decides medication is easier than truth?
Marsh’s storyline grew from:
How far will someone go to retrieve the one person they can’t live without?
The moment those questions collided, the book’s structure locked into place.
Peter’s world was designed to feel:
Clean but suffocating
Controlled but crumbling beneath its own rules
Familiar but emotionally off-balance
The medication law served as the anchor, a single policy that explains the numbness of the world and the deep yearning Peter has for clarity.
Peter’s visions, messages, and sudden appearances of figures he should not see were intentionally written not as hallucinations but as echoes leaking through from outside layers of reality. The reader is meant to feel uncertain, but not tricked.
Ali’s return was crafted as the emotional break in the world rather than the narrative break.
Marsh’s sections were designed around:
procedural logic
relentless forward motion
a slowly widening conspiracy
the creeping suspicion that everyone is lying
Toronto became the first step toward destabilization.
The lunar colonies became the moment the ground disappears beneath him.
Marsh’s story was built on realism until it cracks, mirroring Peter’s experience but from a different angle.
Sylvie wasn’t originally intended as a major character. She emerged naturally as the story grew, becoming the bridge between Marsh’s world and Robbins’ hidden infrastructure.
She represents:
information that comes with a cost
loyalties that shift under pressure
a window into motives concealed by fear and profit
Her scenes deepen the tension and widen the story’s scope.
Although Peter and Marsh start in different realities, their worlds share:
authoritarian structures
systems that erase inconvenient people
a lack of transparency
citizens who know “something is wrong”
a constant threat lurking beneath routine life
These parallels were intentional. The worlds are not meant to feel like alternate universes, they’re meant to feel like reflections, as if each world is another version of the same broken system.
Switching between Peter and Marsh allowed:
one story line to ask emotional questions
the other to ask investigative questions
the tension to build across scenes rather than chapters
the reader to uncover one part of the world while doubting another
The structure mimics the feeling of living in a world where truth is contradictory depending on where you’re standing.
At its heart, Worlds Apart is built around:
longing
loss
fear of the unknown
the need for connection
the danger of systems designed to keep secrets
Peter searches for clarity.
Marsh searches for Ellen.
But both are really searching for meaning inside collapsing realities.
