Inspiration
I began Mad World on a whim in 2004. You can still read the first version of this story at the Fiction Graveyard. I was watching the day Ric and Alexis got married in the chapel, and I wondered what would happen if Elizabeth walked in on the wedding. And then somehow, I wrote a prologue that got into the Kristina paternity mess, the Sam baby drama, and put Jason and Elizabeth into a secret relationship, revealing him as the father of Cameron. Of course, if you’ve already read Mad World in its current form, you know that none of that exists in the series now — in fact, the only aspect of the story that exists now is that Brooke Lynn Ashton’s sexual assault. In 2004, it was at the hands of Diego Sanchez (later Alcazar), and today — well, you’ll have to read it to see how it works out.
I wrote a lot in that first draft, but eventually abandoned it. When I started writing again 2014, I knew I wanted to rewrite this story. Until 2016, I had intended for this story to be set in 2004 and address the same things the first draft had — Kristina, Sonny/Carly, Sam, Cameron — but the story wasn’t working. The only aspect that spoke to me was connecting Brooke and Elizabeth through their sexual assault.
At the same time, I was playing with the idea of rewriting the panic room fallout, and just like that — I figured out the problem with Mad World was the setting. I moved it a year earlier, and, well, now here we are, a half a million words later.
Dedication
To the Crimson Glass Patreons, who keep the lights on.