Tag: all that chaz

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The Grinding Gears Edition

I refuse one billion dollars from Yoda! General chaos, rabid dogs and the sequester grind my gears as I do battle with Stitcher. I announce my new podcast, Cool People Podcast and give you a sneak peek (or should that be a sneak “hear”? That sounds weird. Go to CoolPeoplePodcast.com to hear the first episode with horror author and zombie-loving Armand Rosamilia.) Also on the show, a medical update of terror, special thank yous and (two, count ’em, TWO!) new chapters from the crime novel of comedy, sex and violence, Higher Than Jesus. If you’re offended by the last line of the chapter “Rope”, get your Lutheran grandma to listen to it. Lutheran Grandma’s okay with vulgar jokes, right?

Shout out to new newsletter subscriber: Karen Banes of ChangetheWorldwithWords.com.

Much love to Dave Jackson from SchoolofPodcasting.com and our sponsor, Kit Foster of KitFosterDesign.com.

Chapter 8 of Higher Than Jesus, “Rope” begins like this:

After locking the door, you find Samuel Clemont making a fish patty for himself in the kitchen. The counters and stoves are built shorter so he can reach everything. You feel taller. Then your shoulders sag when you consider that Willow sees you the way you see this Oompa Loompa kitchen. 

Clemont scrapes the burnt fish patty off the grill with a blackened spatula and dumps it on a stiff bun beside a pile of french fries on a chipped plate. “Shoulda set up shop in New Orleans. You burn your food in the Big Easy, you just call it Cajun and nobody complains. Just add hot sauce.” He bites into his sandwich and grimaces. “I grew up in Maine, so I hate fish. Ate too much of it when I was a kid. Sick of it. Still, this halibut is about to turn. Might as well eat the profits. Still better than most food I ever had as a grunt.” 

“Is the Marines where you learned to cook?”

His laugh has a cutting edge. “Hell, no!” He drops the fish sandwich back on the plate. “Though, that would explain a lot.” 

While Clemont focuses on the fries, you look around. The M4 Carbine is propped against the wall in a corner beside a table with a box of rounds. Clemont snaps his ketchup-stained fingers and waves you over to a stool by the counter.  “I talked to Paulie again. He said you’d come.”

“It sounds like you’ve got much bigger problems than Willow’s drug dealer.”

“I thought Gillie could take care of these guys. Apparently, I was misinformed, so I guess people can change. Should have seen what he did back in the day. Gillie’s still bad ass, but inflexible about what else I need done. Since you’ve already shot Willow’s supplier, I guess you’re up. You pass the test. You can help me with the Lone Wolf and his sidekick.”

“Maybe Gillie’s got the right idea — ” … Hear the rest of the chapter or grab the all the books from the links at AllThatChazz.com.

Thanks for listening! If you like the show, please leave a happy review on iTunes.

Cheers!

~ Chazz

 

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The Mean Streets Edition

It’s podcast #70! However, confidence shaken, join me as I go down the rabbit hole of angst and get past the ennui. Top secrets are teased; new podcasts, books and podcasts are launched; I talk about the glory of Cormac McCarthy’s No Country for Old Men; writing contests, fear and gratitude. We round out the podcast with some What’s Cool News about a new app called Vine and I read one of my favorite chapters from Higher Than Jesus, my crime novel with a funny, luckless hit man.

Insider Information

Very astute readers might notice that, except for the final two chapters, every chapter title is a movie, usually something noirish.

In case you missed it, here’s the synopsis to bring you up to speed on Higher Than Jesus:

Yes, it’s time for a reading by the author and Chapter 6 is called “Mean Streets”. So far in the story, Jesus has killed a man on Christmas Day in Chicago. The promised payment for the murderous deed doesn’t come through so he heads over to the God Eats Diner to see the client face-to-face and to get paid. Then our favorite funny hit man falls in love with the blonde glamazon Willow Clemont, the client’s daughter. Just as he’s about to ask her out, two guys with guns burst in demanding to speak to Willow’s father, Samuel Clemont, the wheelchair-bound former Marine. Jesus defends Willow, along with Chill Gillie, a very skilled bodyguard. We haven’t seen the last of the two thugs from the local gang, but in the meantime, Jesus walks Willow home and Cupid’s got them both in the cross hairs. 

In “Mean Streets”, we finally find out a little more about Jesus Diaz’s childhood after he escaped that basement of terrors and enslavement in Miami. (For more on Jesus’s origins, get Bigger Than Jesus by Robert Chazz Chute.) Today’s instalment details how Jesus and Denny De Molina survived in Havana on the Hudson…and how Jesus got a taste for killing to survive.

Our sponsor is Kit Foster of KitFosterDesign.com. Consult him for all your graphics needs. Special thanks to Dave Jackson of The School of Podcasting for his help this week. If you need a new website or a new podcast, I highly recommend you get Dave’s help.

Music for today’s podcast was “Truth of the Legend” by Kevin McLeod of Incompetech.com. Awesome royalty-free music there. Check it out.

Thanks for listening. If you like the show, please review it on iTunes, buy my books. If you care to donate, I sure won’t stop you. Thanks for listening, in any case.

Cheers!

~ Chazz

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Protect your home from thieves, ninjas and quirky assassins

I’m working on the next book in the Hit Man Series, Hollywood Jesus. Here’s a little excerpt from the first chapter. Read between the lines, and you’ll find some tips on protecting your home from burglars…or quirky assassins with mommy issues.

On TV, the hero slips a credit card into the edge of a door to pick a lock. That destroys the credit card — who needs that hassle unless it isn’t your credit card? —  and isn’t nearly as easy as it looks except with cheap motel doors. The next option is to pull out a lock pick set and get to work, hoping a nosy neighbor doesn’t spot you while you struggle to overcome the lock. It’s not just picky work. It’s nit-picky and plenty of locks are different so you have to take the time to learn the lock. More hassle. If Dexter episodes went down in real time, it would be a much longer and more boring show.

You’ve used the hockey stick and bicycle chain trick to rip off doorknobs, but since you’d look suspicious walking around with that sort of bulge in your sports jacket, you’ve left that tool at home. That’s your only complaint about West Coast weather: The sun always shines in Hollywood, so no stylish trench coat for you.

If you were a brainless thug, the quickest way into Fitzwald’s house is simply to kick in the door, making sure your heel connects full force by the lock. That’s almost always effective. Even paranoid homeowners may spend $1,000 on a security door, but they spend the least they can on the installer so the frame is $25 worth of wood and the screws that hold it in place are usually way too short. One or two kicks gets you in quicker than fumbling with a key. That makes plenty of noise, though, and that choice could end badly with you tying up the nosy old man from next-door with electrical cord. One heart attack that’s another murder charge against you. Who needs it?

The key to a happy life is less stress, so you do the brainy thug thing: You look. The key isn’t under the mat or on top of the doorframe. It’s under the second flower pot you check. The homeowner would have had half a chance of keeping you out if he’d thought to at least stick the spare key in the pot’s dirt. That would have stymied you easily, but since no one wants dirty fingernails, you’re standing in Fitzwald’s house, easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy. 

As you step into the living room, a motion detector shines red and a shrill alarm goes off, jangling your nerves. However, alarms are even easier to deal with than people who leave their house keys in predictable places…

~ Robert Chazz Chute is a crime novelist and suspense writer who podcasts weekly, but never weakly (see below for the latest podcast.) To begin The Hit Man Series, Bigger Than Jesus is for sale at the low introductory price of just .99 cents because the first taste is cheap. Once you’re hooked as a thriller fan, the second in the series is Higher Than Jesus. Enjoy.