The Official Quarter - Worldbuilding for Murder in Heliopolis

The Official Quarter: Worldbuilding - Murder in Heliopolis

The Official Quarter is one of the districts in Heliopolis. Called a 'quarter', it's actually a very large area where most government agencies, commissions, and other important administrative buildings are located. I'll go over a few of the key buildings in this blog post.

Heliopolis Police Department HQ

The Heliopolis Police Department has its headquarters in the Official Quarter - and that's where Detective Laith Alazraq works. It is built in a large riad-esque style, with a courtroom in the middle featuring one of the oldest trees to have survived the terrible catastrophe which destroyed much of the Earth and its civilizations some 500 years prior. 

Settings in the HPD HQ which are visited often in the book include Laith Alazraq's office, Olivia Fox's office, and the courtyard. I'm still considering whether or not we'll be visiting Detective Ulv Lebben's office... Each character has decorated/designed their office to suit their tastes, so each office is a different visual experience. 

While it's probably the most commonly mentioned building in the Official Quarter in the book, it's not the only important building found there.

Heliopolis Assembly

This is where the Guides go to input their votes regarding certain legislation or otherwise represent the people of their districts. Meetings take place on a weekly basis, but most of the time they deal with minor issues. Votes are collected for all proposed changes and laws, and the majority vote (70%+) passes a motion. We're getting into political territory here and that's a blog post for another week, so instead let's focus on the building itself.

The Heliopolis Assembly building is currently a cylindrical building reminiscent of the Colosseum, though much smaller and mostly covered. The building is made of mycelium bricks and panels, which are taken down every couple of decades to be rebuilt with the help of the community, so that a different building design is created. Before the Colosseum-inspired design, there was a lion-inspired design, to celebrate the first sighting of a lion in over a century.

All Guides have their own office in the Assembly, which they can use whenever needed. However, Guides that are from far-away districts will usually work from the comfort of their district and travel to the Official Quarter for the sole purpose of Assembly meetings. The Heliopolis Assembly building also has a range of voting booths for citizens to use whenever a vote is active. Voting is managed by - you guessed it - PATET. 

Heliopolis Slate Commission

This particular agency handles all things Slate-related: the manufacturing, programming, distribution, maintenance, and updating of Slates. If you've  lost or broken your Slate, this is where you need to go. If your child is now old enough to have their own Slate, this is where they go to get it. If you're having issues with your Slate, this is where you go to get those problems fixed. 

The Heliopolis Slate Commission is part factory, part administrative agency. It's a relatively boring building, visually speaking, but it harnesses its energy using a combination of solar power and thermoelectric generators - a combination which may not be particularly efficient in today's world, but which I imagine will have been refined and improved upon in the span of almost 5 centuries. I'm not entirely sure what the end design will look like, but I imagine that visually speaking all one would see are the solar panels from the exterior of the building.

Of course, just like everything else in Heliopolis, the Slate Commission relies heavily on PATET to do its job effectively and efficiently.

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To learn more about Murder in Heliopolis, its worldbuilding, and its characters, check out its dedicated page here. Also, if you would like to be an alpha reader, please read this post.