(Aired January 30, 2019.)
To join the Inner Circle in the Inner Sanctum for daily updates, the Name a Character Raffle and assort whatnot, join the Fans of Robert Chazz Chute Facebook Group.
All That Chazz: Your Brain Tickle Destination
Apocalyptic Epics and Killer Crime Thrillers by Robert Chazz Chute
(Aired January 30, 2019.)
To join the Inner Circle in the Inner Sanctum for daily updates, the Name a Character Raffle and assort whatnot, join the Fans of Robert Chazz Chute Facebook Group.
Newsletters are hard. I wasn’t enthusiastic about writing them for a long time. I only wanted to write killer thrillers and apocalyptic epics. When I finally got my Facebook fan page going, I changed my mind. Touching base with readers personally on Facebook turned out to be a fun thing I enjoy.
(NOTE: If you want to join the Fans of Robert Chazz Chute, this is that link.)
Now that I’m over that mental block, putting together a newsletter is more fun, too. I don’t want to bother people with newsletters too often, though. The Facebook group is really for those readers who are curious about what goes on behind the curtain. People check in and find out what’s up on daily: progress with the writing, excerpts, sneak peeks, notice about advance sales, free books, fun
The newsletters are about providing value to more casual readers. That’s peachy with me, too.
In my latest newsletter, I let subscribers know that I am making ten of my ebooks free for everyone on Friday, December 21. These are gifts with no strings attached. I hope everyone downloads them all. I also announced a Facebook Live Event. I’m popping on tonight and popping off starting at 8 PM EST. I hope subscribers see that as big value.
Though the newsletters are easier, they still aren’t easy. How often should I send them out? To use the industry jargon, “How much is too little to keep the list “warm”? How much contact is so little that when you do hear from me I’m a stranger? Hardest of all, how can I get more people on my crazy train (besides writing more books?)
I hope subscribers understand the balance I aim to hit. I won’t bother them often but I will be more regular about checking in than I have been in the past. I always try to have something for you that isn’t just a waste of time or a hand in your pocket.
That’s my deal on newsletters and the Facebook group, FYI.
I hope to see you on Facebook tonight! I’m taking questions and you can always contact me at expartepress@gmail.com.
On Wednesday, Dec 19th at 8 PM EST I’ll be doing my first Facebook Live. Let me show you how to do it wrong. I’ll be taking questions and chatting. If I cry or throw up on Facebook Live, well, I’ll just keep going cuz that’s good TV. Do I really look to you like a guy with a plan
Oh, and did I mention free books? A giveaway is the only plan, I have.
Yes, Christmas will come early this year. I’ve got a big giveaway coming up and I’ll tell you about that, too. That’s right, free ebooks are coming before Christmas. Take that, Santa, you milk and cookie mooch!
Please email me at expartepress@gmail.com with FB in the subject line. I might do my Joker impression. Haven’t decided yet.
To save you some time, my favorite color is turquoise but only as paint. I only wear black. A black turtleneck says: He might be a spy. A turquoise turtleneck says: He’s in a fashion magazine modeling a shirt no one wears in real life.
Since this will be my first FB Live, really, please do tune in. It should be an entertaining disaster. Don’t worry, I’m not going to say anything more than I have
We’ve got plenty of movies about superheroes and cops tracking down serial killers. We need more good movies about writing. Here are my top picks (and why) plus a few runners-up.
Wonder Boys is one of my favorite movies. Based on the book by Michael Chabon, Michael Douglas stars as a college professor who can’t seem to bring himself to finish writing a massive manuscript. (The manuscript is called Wonder Boys, too, by the way.)
There are a lot of fun moments in that movie and Toby Maguire is cast perfectly as the weird and aspiring young writer, James Leer. There’s a great scene where three drunk writers make up fictional histories of fellow bar patrons. I do that, too (the making up part, not the drunk part.) Great characters and intrigue are everywhere.
Reading Wonder Boys, I find the interiority of the main character is interesting in its depth. There’s plenty to admire in Chabon’s imaginative use of language. In one scene, students stand by an open door blowing “bored clouds” of cigarette smoke. I found myself wondering how many editors would cross out that line and sneer in the margin: “bored clouds? Really?” (Typical editors, not all editors. In context, it’s a great line.)
If a book description includes the phrase, “beautiful language” I’m usually suspect that it will be a literary novel in which nothing much will actually happen. When critics of old felt they had to give a pulp writer any credit, they’d grudgingly observe that the prose was “muscular” or “workmanlike.” (They often used to say sort of thing about Stephen King and Dashiell Hammett.) From the mouths of snobs, they damned fun books and good writing with faint praise. Readers ate it up and couldn’t wait for more. In Wonder Boys, Chabon finds the middle ground. The use of language is often innovative but the guy can paint a picture and there’s lots of fun and hijinx going on.
I love the line about James Leer’s second-hand smelly overcoat. I’m going from memory but it goes something like, “Standing nearby you could feel your luck change for the worse.” Beautiful.
I won’t spoil what happens with Professor Grady’s overlong manuscript but it’s memorable if you love books at all.
Sean Connery plays the successful recluse whose novel hit huge (like To Kill a Mockingbird huge). He mentors Jamal Wallace, a young writer with promise played by Rob Brown. The student is ready, the master appears. The apprentice writer finds the old man has critiqued his work savagely, exing out page after page in red ink. Jamal has talent and his prose is visceral but needs refinement.
That’s not the moment that really sticks with me, though. What resonates is a moment when the young man walks home at night past a burning car. Cops slide past in a cruiser, giving Jamal the evil eye. It could have been a throwaway scene but it’s not. Jamal is intelligent, observant and vulnerable. That one short scene is a nod from the director that connotes: yes, he’s young but his experience of the world is complicated, painful and worthy of being written.
I never had to walk home past a burning car but that hit me hard. In my twenties, I worked in Toronto’s book publishing industry. I was part of an army of underpaid professionals filling editorial positions and working in the sales force.
We were young, often underestimated, underappreciated and sometimes even belittled. I met smart people in that profession but the smart ones weren’t all in charge. The industry valued us only as cheap labor. In one job interview, my prospective boss told me I wouldn’t get to have an opinion for seven to ten years. I told him I may as well go to med school because they’d let me perform cardiothoracic surgery faster than that.
In Finding Forrester, it was nice to see a movie that didn’t undercut the young simply because they’re young. I had lots to say back then but unfortunately, I believed I had to wait. If you’re a writer, don’t wait. Gather experience. Read more. Write now.
As Sean would say, “Punch the keys!”
There are several runners-up for my top three. Throw Mama from the Train stands out, especially when Mama comes up with the crucial word (“sultry”). That’s the moment Billy Crystal, playing the writer frustrated and blocked, decides he’s willing to murder her.
In Bullets Over Broadway, the struggling playwright played by John Cusack gives up. He announces, “I am not a writer!”
It’s devastating. As Cusack walks off-screen into The Future of Abandoned Dreams, I thought, No! Don’t give up! I was a child when I saw that but I wanted to be a writer. I took his failure personally.
Adaptation is pretty great. Nicholas Cage plays twins with an appropriate level of weirdness. The portrayal of Robert McKee is spot on. Playing the famous writing teacher, Brian Cox gives a blistering speech in which he eschews the notion that a plot point is unbelievable. That’s worth the price of admission. It’s also fun to watch the writer who insisted on no car chases ends up writing about a car chase.
Misery is a good movie but I prefer the book. I read it in fascination because most of the action takes place in one room. King keeps it going and flowing. In several of my books about global apocalyptic conflict, the settings are quite expansive, more like the structure of The Stand. (As in, “Meanwhile in Jakarta…) By comparison, watching Stephen King keep a whole novel to one claustrophobic space is almost a stunt.
I don’t think Barton Fink is a great movie. However, John Goodman screaming, “I’ll show you the life of the mind!” Gold.
Stranger Than Fiction was good for me in part because of the great character work by Will Ferrell. However, it’s Emma Thompson standing on the desk that makes it for me. She’s imagining stepping out on a ledge and looking down, figuring out what it would be like to feel the wind between her fingers before she leaps to her death.
We don’t have to experience everything nasty in order to write about it. I forget who said that by the time we’ve gone through high school we’ve experienced enough trauma to write for the rest of our lives. Writers observe and imagine. We put ideas through the brain blender, bake it up and, if done well, the fiction souffle rises.
Imagination allows me to write crime thrillers packed with murders. I have rage. I am vindictive. Still, I keep it to the page. Somehow I’ve avoided killing anyone in real life just for the sake of experimentation. The truth is, I think about murdering people in imaginative ways quite a lot. I mean, a lot.
Writing novels allows me to make an acceptable living of which my family disapproves. It’s also a healthy and entertaining outlet. I never have to taste prison coffee.
Are you a fan of my strange fiction? If you dig my sling, please leave a review. Even better, join my Inner Circle on Facebook. My Facebook group is Fans of Robert Chazz Chute. I share more about the writing life and assorted fun and nonsense daily.
Membership has its privileges: Fans get free ebooks to review and, with your permission, you will be entered in a raffle to get your name on a character in a future novel. Join us here.
There’s more to the writing and publishing process than swilling coffee and banging your head against a keyboard. Those caffeine injections behind the eyeball do help immensely, though. (Ask your doctor.)
Here’s how I do the deed, from words to action.
Compose in Scrivener > revisions > Grammarly > Scrivener > Google Docs for Editor & Betas > Word Doc > Vellum > publish > exalt briefly > repeat until they nail they casket shut, squelching my screams of protest that I am immortal.
Writing and publishing is not a race but it is a marathon. When searching for editorial support, find people who notice your clever turns of phrase and aching awesomeness. Editing is more than scolding what you did wrong. When you see what your audience likes, you get clues on how to repeat those awesome feats of prose in the future.
By the time I’m deep into making editorial decisions with other people, I’m becoming sick of the book. A cheery LOL in the margin is energizing and the odd “Attaboy!” gives me the strength to persevere and run to the finish line.
Some authors claim they want their manuscript torn apart savagely. I suspect those folks are either lying, posing, preaching, masochistic or maybe they’re just really bad writers who need a spanking. It’s true that you could learn a lot from a thoughtful savaging from a good editor but eventually, you’ll tire and find an editor who treats you like a human being with feelings. The editorial process is best when it’s a collaborative effort of the likeminded. I do learn from my editor and I know she’s trying to make my books (even!) better. She never makes me feel worse about the process than I do already.
I mention this because I have met editors who think they’re in the mock and scold business. And yes, too many of them worked for traditional publishing houses and held the authors in their stable in contempt.
Expectations:
Gari keeps a style guide written just for me. My idiosyncrasies include:
~ Hi! I’m Robert Chazz Chute. Thanks for reading this far down! You’re a keener, aren’t you? I like that! Maybe you’re willing to go a little farther and meet me in
Zihuatanejo, Red?
About me: I escaped the 9 – 5 for the 24/7/365. I construct apocalyptic epics and suspenseful crime fiction. My next killer thriller, The Night Man, will be released soon. Please subscribe to be alerted when Easy’s adventure in darkness is available. Thanks!
More about The Night Man: Wounded in Afghanistan, Earnest “Easy” Jack returns home to rural Michigan to train guard dogs in the family business. His high school sweetheart is on the run from a very bad husband. His father is kidnapped by a dirty cop. Easy thought his war was over. Trapped in the middle of America, the Night Man is still in a war zone.
Are you a fan of my work? If you dig my sling, please leave a review. Even better, join my Inner Circle on Facebook. My Facebook group is Fans of Robert Chazz Chute. I share more about the writing life and assorted fun and nonsense daily.
Membership has its privileges: Fans get free ebooks to review and, with your permission, you will be entered in a raffle to get your name on a character in a future novel. Join us here and exalt at length.
I started watching The Flash on Netflix as a stress reliever. I wasn’t too invested at first. In fact, given the names of the villains and the source material, I mistook the series for something breezy to help me chill out. I was wrong. Though much of the dialogue is jokey, the characters are earnest and there’s a whole lot of death going on for a CW show. The show is not just bubblegum for the eyes, after all. I picked up on a few details which made it better than I expected (and useful to writers.)
1. The Art of the Cliffhanger
These writers are the masters of cliffhangers that advance the plot. If this were a novel, each chapter would be a page-turner. They often throw in a double cliffhanger.
It’s great for Netflix viewing because the narrative makes you want to surf straight into the next episode to find out what happens next. Someone will curse imaginatively and shout that they hate cliffhangers. I know. The details of dealing intelligently with cliffhangers is a blog post all its own. I’ll give that objection a short answer here, though: We’ve been trained by decades of serial television to endure cliffhangers. Everybody hates pop ups on websites, too. But they work.
BONUS ANSWER: Lots of people say they hate cliffhangers but they will be back after the obligatory performative rage quit. It wasn’t the cliffhangers that drove people to wander away from The Walking Dead. It was the brutality of Glen’s death and the relentlessly grim outlook that left viewers questioning the value of surviving the zombie apocalypse. Since the producers of The Walking Dead seem to be bringing hope back, I suspect the show will regain some viewers who walked away.
SIDE NOTE:
The Flash springs from comics, obviously. I used to collect comics but I didn’t understand the art of comic book writing very well until recently. I aspire to write a graphic novel based on some of my previously published work. In Words into Pictures by Brian Michael Bendis, the author points out that a truly well-written comic has a cliffhanger at every turn of the page. That could be twelve cliffhangers for one twenty-four page story! Writing comics suddenly sounds more daunting, doesn’t it?
On the surface, it was a little too easy to dismiss a show that kept hammering a couple of solutions hard: “Run, Barry, run!” and “Believe in yourself.” I began watching carelessly so I popped into the show midway through the first season, just for a taste. Later, after watching the rest of the run, I circled back to the beginning. That’s when it hit me how much forethought seems to be involved. I’m impressed.
There are seeds planted early on that grow to mighty trees later. In the first season, the camera pauses on a shot of a cage labeled Grodd. The gorilla is a fixture later but the writers don’t answer all questions immediately.
If you’ve ever taken a writing class or watched comment threads devolve into insanity, you’ve seen someone demand that all the answers come front loaded and quickly. Long story arcs are for readers and viewers who like a little mystery. Quick answers are for impatient people who aren’t losing themselves to the narrative (AKA not in the reading/viewing demographic. If you’re into it, you’ll wait.)
I’m guessing that since the creators of the TV show had decades of original material to draw from, they could plot and plan far ahead using the source material. Sometimes you can get there the way Breaking Bad found their ending: pantsing it. Still, I do appreciate that the creators of The Flash appear to have planned well ahead (even if they didn’t).
After saving the planet (or at least Central City) from utter destruction over and over, you might finish a season of The Flash and think: Where can they go from here? The villains get even more interesting as the series progresses. They become more dangerous and meaner. The characters you’ve grown to love, or at least like, suffer more. When the hero is up against a villain and you’re thinking that the good guys can’t possibly win, you’ve got a compelling story.
SIDE NOTE: You know that famous hallway fight scene in Daredevil? Of course, you do. On The Flash, Neil Sandilands as The Thinker has a scene where he uses a conglomeration of powers to take out a SWAT team that is epic. When they composed that epic fight scene, I’m sure they had the Daredevil scene in mind. It’s a lot of fun.
The Flash is a series that isn’t afraid to be complex. You know a time travel plot is difficult to deal with when you have actors drawing timelines and flowcharts as if they’re teaching metaphysical physics. But they’re also brave enough to be silly and good for them for having fun with it. If Christopher Nolan had more of a sense of humor, he could be the greatest director of his generation instead of one of the greatest.
With The Flash‘s multiverse packed with so many versions of one character, it is a joy to see Tom Cavanaugh play Harrison Wells et al in many hilarious iterations. He goes from cold and deadly to a stereotypically comedic German scientist to Matthew McConaughey parody to a French detective named Sherloque. When Vibe charges off to save the day, Tom Cavanaugh gets to deliver the gleeful line: “Good luck storming the castle!” Classic!
SIDE NOTE: The actor Tom Cavanaugh is a Canadian national treasure. Candice Patton is so gorgeous I’m not absolutely positive she is real. She might be CGI.
BACK TO THE POINT, ROB:
I appreciate The Flash‘s flexibility of tone so much. Too many shows (and books) have one note and hit it as if they’re playing triangle in the high school’s junior band. I want ups and downs and loops on my story’s roller coaster. The Flash delivers. As a guy who dared to include whales as part of the solution to a zombie apocalypse, I love that.
It’s interesting to see how the characters have evolved on The Flash. When the series begins, Jesse L. Martin plays Detective Joe West a little like he’s still NYPD Detective Ed Green on Law & Order. Later, we learn he’s a big softie. In his first appearance, Wentworth Miller plays bad guy Leonard Snart more seriously. Later on, his portrayal is looser, more fun and unexpected. It’s as if the show runner took the actor aside and said, “Have more fun with it.” And so we have more fun watching.
I love James Bond movies and I read all the books, too. However, that character is so iconic, he doesn’t change. He could be an android programmed with a very narrow range of emotions and a list of one-liners. I like when fiction is more connected and characters develop over time. History affects the future (or on The Flash, the future can rewrite the past).
Characters develop and change on this show. They don’t have to change much to be compelling but their ability to change over time makes them human and relatable. The transformation doesn’t have to be a preachy, “I learned this” moment, either. When Cisco hates Barry for a while, he doesn’t really have a big “I forgive you” moment. He just does what we all do when a good friend pisses us off: We get over it eventually.
What makes a hero? Barry Allen believes in empathy and the willingness to sacrifice. What’s more interesting is that he does not save the world alone. Unlike most other superheroes, he can’t do it alone. That’s where the heart of the show comes through. They’re friends. They’re family. They get annoyed with each other but love keeps them together and in the fight for the rest of us.
I know. It’s just a TV show and some of the lesser villains can be childish. However, this moment in history feels like a great time to be childlike. We need more empathy and hope. This is a great time for love so strong it keeps us together despite the fact that sometimes we hate each other.
We all want to be heroes but we can’t do it alone. I love the writing life, but sometimes I feel very disconnected from our current reality. I came to The Flash looking for a distraction from the endless scroll of bad news in my news feed. I grew to appreciate the writing. Then I forgot about the mechanics, left my stress behind and simply enjoyed watching the show. I didn’t expect to become a fan but I did.
P.S. I saw Grant Gustin on Glee before he sang on The Flash. Yes, the star of the show sure can sing. The musical team-up with Supergirl star, Melissa Benoist was a delight. However, the actor who plays Cisco is a singer as well as an actor. Carlos Valdes oozes charm all over the place. The show made it to its 100th episode on December 4th. I hope Carlos gets to sing a bunch on the show before The Flash finishes its run.
I couldn’t get into the Dark Tower stuff but I’ve read everything else. I love how he provides an ordinary context that sets the scene for the extraordinary. His heroes are normal people and I enjoy finding out how they deal with extremes.
There’s a scene in Tommyknockers that hit me between the eyes. A good guy with a gun is about to use the weapon to save himself. The handgun misfires. Later I read an interview with The King. He said something to the effect of, “The girl is holding a knife she will never get to use.”
In other words: Good stories come from providing no easy solutions. The wide and easy road out of town isn’t wide and easy. It’s a gauntlet. Things get tough for your characters. Then they are made tougher and the noose tightens.
2. Kurt Vonnegut
I saw him speak once a long time ago. I like Vonnegut so much I made him a character in my time travel novel, Wallflower. What appeals to me is his humor and his humanity. He was a kind and decent human being as well as a writer who had fun and got his readers to enjoy themselves. He dealt in big ideas but viewed them through the lens of the individual. Good fiction feels personal.
Some of my fiction is pretty grim and gritty. Even so, I emulate Kurt Vonnegut’s work in that there remains a note of hope amid the rubble. Characters often make great sacrifices but they do so for good reasons and ultimately there is always payoff and a point. I think that’s an important role in fiction, to provide order to chaos. There’s enough chaos in real life. That’s what we’re trying to escape when we open a book.
3. William Goldman
He just left us recently but what a life and legacy. I’ve often said that people know him for his screenwriting. Everyone knows Goldman for The Princess Bride. We should all know him for his novels. The Color of Light is the best novel I’ve ever read. His non-fiction also happens to be hilarious. Want to work in Hollywood? Try Which Lie Did I Tell? and Adventures in the Screen Trade.
Lawrence Block said of Goldman’s writing that reading him “is like watching card tricks while I’m drunk.” Goldman had a method that has always guided me. He makes you think you knew what was going to happen next. Then he pulls the rug out from under the reader. You’re never safe. I was on the 28th floor of an apartment building in Toronto one summer night when I got to the end of one of Goldman’s books. I thought I was safely in the dénouement. The tricky bastard laid a trap for me in the last line that changed everything in the novel. I threw the book across the room in surprise.
Exhilarated and laughing, I knew what and how I wanted to write for the rest of my life: everyday people suffering suspense through funny, twisty plots.
In Bigger Than Jesus, the beat where you find out how Big Denny met my hitman Jesus Diaz? That moment was written by me. It was brought to you by William Goldman. (That hairpin turn caught me by surprise as I wrote it, too. The twist wasn’t in the outline. It rose organically. I’m mostly a pantser.)
In This Plague of Days, when the surreal becomes real and we discover the villain’s true motivation and ally? That’s a big idea made personal. That’s a Vonnegut moment. So is the last scene and the Afterword from the titular author.
In Brooklyn in the Mean Time, the main character is an ordinary guy in extraordinary circumstances. Saddled with a very problematic family, he ran away and turned to crime to survive. Coming home, he’s on a journey toward redemption but he’s barely got the right tools for the job. That character (who happens to be named Chazz and sounds a lot like me) could have stepped out of a Stephen King novel.
Sadly, two of my literary heroes are dead. Long live the King!
Who are your literary influences? What book changed your life?