Tag: Amid Mortal Words

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Hollywood Book Festival Winners!

Four new book awards in one day!
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Happy News!

I was pleased to be informed today that the Hollywood Book Festival chose four of my books for awards and recognition! Endemic took first place in the science fiction category (just as it had at the New York Book Festival) while the This Plague of Days Omnibus won runner-up. The Night Man placed first in the genre category and Amid Mortal Words received honorable mention in sci-fi.

Writers work long hours in solitude and obscurity. Novelists toil away at keyboards making shit up, often not knowing where we’re going and doubting what we’re doing. Reviews and fan letters fuel our fervor. Recognition of our work by book contests gives a rare and wonderful boost.

We celebrated the wins with a feast of Chinese food. The shrimp har gow and sweet butter coconut buns were delicious.

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Guess which apocalypse will kill you

There is an apocalypse coming no one talks about. Try to guess which end of the world scenario I’m not writing about before you get to the end of this post. My books will help you with the process of elimination.

  • Endemic (coming soon) is a nerdy and neurotic person combatting sociopaths while trying to survive a viral apocalypse.
  • Citizen Second Class is about poverty and starvation amid a climate catastrophe and greed.
  • AFTER Life is about artificial intelligence weaponizing medical technology to take over the world.
  • This Plague of Days is a zombie apocalypse (and other species evolving to take over the world).
  • The Night Man is about PTSD, societal failure, family drama, war, poverty, and regret.
  • Wallflower is a time travel novel about second chances after a lot of bad decisions.
  • The Dimension War Series is a coming-of-age story amid a war story.
  • Amid Mortal Words is about the loss of control and taking chances on a better future.
  • Brooklyn in the Mean Time is about vengeance, absolution, and redemption.
  • Robot Planet is about technological revolution and failure versus the human spirit.
  • The Hit Man Series is about violence, vengeance, and escape amid a broken America.
  • All Empires Fall is an anthology of five end-of-the-world stories and the common denominator is dealing with other people while everything falls apart.

Have you guessed the missing apocalypse yet?

Climate wars are a big deal, but I touched on that in Citizen Second Class. We could talk about the Misinformation War or new civil war scenarios, but Endemic has that covered. I dealt with extinction by killer asteroid in All Empires Fall. If you guessed the nuclear threat, Amid Mortal Words has that, too. You might have guessed the looming threat of antibiotic resistance. But, no, I’m thinking of something utterly devastating to the future of humanity. It’s close and almost no one ever talks about even beginning to deal with this extinction-level event.

The apocalypse that haunts me is this: In 60 years, Earth will have insufficient viable topsoil to grow 95% of all crops.

Read that last sentence again and ponder its significance. My kids will be alive for this. Coffee, bananas, and almonds will disappear first. Then everything else.

Sixty years and we aren’t dealing with the threat. There are no massive contingency plans. Unless helpful aliens are waiting to swoop in, no one is coming to rescue us. We’ll probably run out of soil before we run out of usable water, but it feels like it’s all a race to the end, doesn’t it?

So…call me Mr. Sunshine and read my books now, while you still can.

COMING THIS MONTH!

What happens when a pandemic never ends? Find out in Endemic.

Neurotic and nerdy, former book editor Ovid Fairweather is trapped in New York as everything falls apart.

All her life, she’s been a nail. To survive the viral apocalypse, she’ll have to become a hammer.

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What to Read in the Apocalypse

THE NIGHT MAN COVER

As we get through this pandemic together (and apart), I anticipated a bump in sales of my apocalyptic stuff. I write crime thrillers, too, but I’m better known for the sci-fi about our world’s end. AFTER Life is about a weaponized plague. In This Plague of Days, the first book is about where we are now: governments struggling to cope, systems breaking down, and people sheltering in place.


Though apocalyptical stories strike a chord with many readers, having “plague” in my titles has not boosted sales as expected. Those in isolation have more time to read, but perhaps they’re doing other things. Maybe they’re sleeping and eating more,  bingeing Netflix or focusing on feel-good stories. A startling number of people seem to have taken up baking bread. Sure beats watching the news until depression kicks in. 

I totally understand the impulse to retreat into comfort food and comfort media. When my kids were little and I was a stay-at-home dad, we watched iCarly together. I have a rather dark worldview. iCarly was a kids’ show with low stakes in which everything would always work out just fine. No threats, no death, no worries. Silliness can be an antidote to bad moods in tough times. A couple of nights ago, we watched Nailed It. It’s a show where amateur bakers are set up to fail with sometimes hilarious results. The show titled “Failure” was great for a laugh. I needed that.

With my palate thus cleansed, I went back to reading Weep by Eoin Brady, a zombie novel set in Ireland. I bought it because (a) I find the disaster genre interesting, and (b) Contagion, the prequel to This Plague of Days I’m writing, is also set in Ireland. Weep is clever. Mr. Brady writes well, with an elegant descriptive power that isn’t overdone. I suspect he’s worked in the hospitality industry for the little details that give his novel such an authentic context. One of the main characters reminds me of a prepper friend of mine, too. If zombies are your thing, I highly recommend Weep.

I wouldn’t enjoy stories of such doom and gloom as a steady diet, of course. (People who know me well would say, “Even Rob wouldn’t enjoy stories of such doom and gloom as a steady diet.”) Variety in all we consume makes for better nutrition for the body and mind.


That’s one of the reasons AFTER Life, Citizen Second Class, Amid Mortal Words and This Plague of Days contain hopeful notes (to varying degrees). I’m not interested in false hope or happily-ever-afters that don’t ring true. I prefer satisfying endings that linger with readers. And jokes. Surprise and defying mundane expectations is key to a good plot. It’s also required for a solid joke. In the brain tickle business, it’s fun to make your reader’s mind bounce around its bone case. Even amid utter mayhem, well-placed wit can take a story up to the next level. That’s a roller coaster ride readers want.

People read what they read for many reasons. Those reasons are often opaque to us. We simply like what we like. Recently, a kind reviewer included this note to her review of This Plague of Days, Season One:

One might ask why am I reading this book at this time. It’s like when I watched the “Exorcist” before going in for a job interview. My reality might have been scary had I not been prepared by scaring myself worse than a job interview. The series I know will be scarier than what I’m prepared to live through, should I survive this pandemic. Stay safe everyone.

If you feel the need to vary your media diet, please do so. It’s okay to protect your psyche and forego the news, for instance. Many of us finally have the time to get to our To-Be-Read piles. There’s plenty of room to enjoy all kinds of inky adventures. If you aren’t into end-of-the-world stories right now, check out The Night Man. Scary cover, sure. However, though it is not an unserious book, I packed a lot of jokes in there, too. Want a funny romp set in New York’s underworld in the ’90s? Try Brooklyn in the Mean TIme. There’s fun to be had in all kinds of escapes and we all need a break from existential dread, right?

Escapism comes in many forms. Enjoy what you enjoy.

Stay inside if you can.

Read what you want.

Love as much as possible.

~ Robert Chazz Chute writes science fiction, horror, and killer crime thrillers. cropped-Photo-Credit-to-David-Redding.jpg

 

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My Top Ten List of Books

Yes, if you look closely you’ll see my autographed photo of Kevin Smith.

Please note: What follows is a post from my Facebook Fan Page. If you’ve read my books and dig what I do, you could join us for daily updates, peeks behind the curtain, excerpts from my work in progress and assorted fun bits of nonsense from Ex Parte Press.

I have revised 20,000 words of Bright Lights, Big Deal. I have 93,000 to go. I’ll probably end up cutting a lot of that down. For every book I write, I keep an ODDS file. In this file, I put all my deleted passages, the boring bits, the inappropriate bits and stuff that doesn’t work or serve the story.

I wrote Bright Lights, Big Deal a very long time ago, before This Plague of Days. It’s been interesting to see what I did then and how I’d do things differently now. The differences are fairly subtle most of the time. The later, genre stuff is more action-oriented. I’d say my main sin from back in the day is that my prose was too Canadian. By that I mean there was too much emphasis on character rather than plot movement. I like it when a lot of stuff is happening and character is revealed in reaction to the action.

Same thing happened with This Plague of Days. Originally, it was a plague novel but it was not a zombie novel. I wrote the first book with no zombie content. It was more about society falling apart and how the disaster affected one family. As I wrote and revised and wrote and revised, I added more action because (shrug and smile): too Canadian. (I wanted to write something commercial with the literary aspect in the background.)

There isn’t much Canlit I really like. I have a Robertson Davies reference in Amid Mortal Words. I liked Atwood’s Oryx and Crake but couldn’t get through The Handmaid’s Tale. The Canadian sci-fi I read was Spider Robinson, Robert J Sawyer, and William Gibson.

The writing I love is mostly from American writers: Heinlein, Truman Capote, Stephen King, and William Goldman. (I went through a Norman Mailer phase in university but got past it.)

Who are the authors you most admire? What books are on your must-read or must-read-again list?

My top ten list is:

1. The Color of Light by William Goldman.
2. The Stand by Stephen King.
3. In Cold Blood by Truman Capote (loved all the movies, too, but especially the version with Phillip Seymore Hoffman.)
4. Boys and Girls Together by William Goldman.
5. The Princess Bride (Goldman again for the win.)
6. Portnoy’s Complaint by Philip Roth.
7. Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood.
8. The Hot Zone by Richard Preston (the only book that ever truly scared me)
9. The Tommyknockers by Stephen King (wild card choice a lot of fans wouldn’t put in their top ten but I loved it and learned a couple of writing tricks from it, too.)
10. Stephen King On Writing, more for the biography than the writing advice. I’ve read it once and listened to it twice.

I’m looking at favorite books I didn’t write, of course. Choosing favorites from my backlist is like asking me to choose a fave child.

~ I am Robert Chazz Chute, a writer from Other London. I pen killer crime thrillers and apocalyptic epics. Want a binge read? Click the links to the right. Want to join us on the Facebook Fan Page? Here’s the link to Fans of Robert Chazz Chute.

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Story Tensions

You ever have one of those dreams where you have to do something but something else keeps getting in the way? Maybe you’re running from a monster but you’re waist-deep in mud? Something like that happened to me last night. I hosted a party at a remote farm. The setting was perfect for a sorority party massacre a la bunches of bad ’70s slasher B-movies. As the last car was leaving, I called to the woman in the landrover, “Can I get a ride back to civilization?” She nodded but waved for me to hurry. That’s when it turned into a nightmare as the last-minute tasks were loaded up. If I didn’t finish locking up quick I would lose my ride.

As I recall, the list of scenarios was something like:


1. Check the barn for lit lanterns.
2. Check the house to make sure the water was turned off.
3. Solve the Mystery of the Old Mill with the Hardy Boys.
4. Confront a huge monster lurking in the cattle stalls.
5. Wash and dry the dishes and put them away.
6. Deal with a snake in the basement.

The tasks went on and on and, always in the background, the pressure built. I was going to lose my ride and be stuck on this Hell Farm of Eternal Night. The woman waiting in the landrover really amped up the tension and put a clock on the plot. It’s conflict and tension among believable characters that get the story engine chugging.

Anyway, all that nonsense got me thinking about the underlying themes and worries beneath the main action in my books. What’s the big fret our heroes and heroines have to deal with when other missions and side-missions are done?

Here’s my list:

1. This Plague of Days: How’s a mute kid on the spectrum going to save the world from a global pandemic of zombies?

2. AFTER Life: What’s a SWAT officer and a nanotech research scientist to do when they tap into the collective consciousness of a zombie uprising about to invade the United States?

3. Brooklyn in the Mean Time: How is such a flawed protagonist going to solve the mystery of his father’s criminal past?

4. Bigger Than Jesus: How does a hitman get out of the mob and overcome his past?

5. Higher Than Jesus: How does a hitman get past his addictions to save the girl?

6. Hollywood Jesus: Can a hitman go legit? How does he become a hero when everyone, including the FBI, is after him?

7. Wallflower: How does a failed comedian go back in time to save the world?

8. Haunting Lessons: Why is it that a young woman can see ghosts and what does a secret society of assassins have to do with it?

9. Death Lessons: The woman who sees ghosts must return to her home town find a secret weapon to deal with unearthly forces? What’s the weapon?

10. Fierce Lessons: How does a secret society of assassins deal with incursions from another dimension?

11. Dream’s Dark Flight: Why are people around the world dying in their sleep in bizarre ways? How can an NSA analyst, a doctor and a physiotherapist stop the killings from an isolation tank at Berkeley?

12. The Night Man: When a wounded warrior returns home searching for a life of peace, how can he untangle himself from dirty cops, bomb plots and the criminality of his own family?

13. Robot Planet: When the last few humans combat a robot uprising powered by the Next Intelligence, how can they win against such a powerful enemy?

14. All Empires Fall, Self-help for Stoners and Murders Among Dead Trees: How can a writer sell anthologies? Sure, there are several award-winning stories in the mix but literary anthologies aren’t huge sellers. (Self-help for Stoners is really kind of a novelty bathroom book that sells some paperbacks in the run-up to Christmas each year, so there’s that.)

15. Amid Mortal Words: If you had a book that could eliminate all the people who make the world a more dangerous place, would you? How many dead innocents would be acceptable to you?

~ I’m Robert Chazz Chute. In that dream I mentioned at the top? I missed my ride. Alas. I spend my waking hours writing apocalyptic epics, killer crime thrillers, and assorted science fiction and horror. Please click on the links to the right to pick up your next binge read. Cheers!

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The War is Here

People often ask writers where their ideas come from. My answer, no matter how crazy the premise of the book, is real life. Here’s a look behind the curtain with a couple of my most recent books and why their origins are relevant to you.

Earlier this year, I released The Night Man, a thriller set in rural Michigan. It’s about people who go outside the law because of crushing medical debt and medical bankruptcy. (Think: Breaking Bad but with more German Shepherds.)

I believe medical care is a human right. Insurance agents with profit agendas shouldn’t get in the way of diagnosis and treatment by doctors. Nobody should be condemned to death or poverty because they get a scary diagnosis. No one should have to choose between seeing their doctor or paying rent. I was recently diagnosed with pneumonia and have seen many doctors for several problems over the last few months. I’d hate to think where I’d be if I had to choose between financial security and health!

In the United States, the richest nation on Earth, universal health care is often rejected out of hand because of the stigma of socialism. This is despite the fact that every other First World nation provides some form of universal health care to protect their citizens at lower cost and with better outcomes. Some patients even opt for suicide rather than burden their families with debt. How can this be? How can this still be?

Reality often fuels fiction. Unacceptable and challenging situations provide a context that readers can relate to. Powerful motivations make people do things they wouldn’t ordinarily do. So it is in The Night Man. Easy Jack’s father turns to smuggling to try to escape medical debt. Complications ensue and events spiral out of control.

Then came Amid Mortal Words. It is a story I did not intend to write. I have several books in my editorial pipeline and I thought I was done with apocalyptic books for a while. I was supposed to work on revisions to those stories first. However, Amid Mortal Words woke me at 4 a.m. every morning. It was a story that pestered me, insisting on being written. Writing the book was the only way to get some sleep and it turned into a wild story. I like it a lot and I hope you will, too.

The plot to Amid Mortal Words springs from a lot of anger I’ve observed in real life. Everywhere you look on social media, there’s a war on. It is a domestic war in the United States but it is not confined to American borders. Political norms have been shattered. Expectations have been lowered.

The currency in this war is hatred and fear. The consequences often translate into physical violence. Sexism is still thick on the ground and women’s rights are more endangered, not less. When called out for their racism, racists cry foul. Voting rights are suppressed and the democratic system undermined. Climate change isn’t a far off theory. Climate breakdown is here. As one character tells another in Amid Mortal Words, “It’s a fuckle.”

There are solutions to our problems. Some stand in the way. Thinking selfishly and short-term, there are many who believe that saving the planet, practicing empathy and accepting equality is too expensive, too impractical and bad for business. These folks act like the idea that we should care for each other is suspect. Ideals are out the window and it’s every mad dog for himself.

All this in 2019? We could have done better by now. We should have, but for those who are only out for themselves, sexism, racism, and many other ills are a feature, not a bug. It’s not that they don’t know better. It’s that they don’t care.

Personally, I’ve made a transition in my thinking. I used to believe that rational debate and better education would save everyone from the worst of us. I thought good ideas would win because it was in the common interest to have a society that works for everyone. I now accept that, in a strange way, I was underestimating people’s intelligence. Many people who support the actions of Donald Trump knew what they were doing when they elected him. They weren’t all fooled. They knew his long history of sexism and racism. It wasn’t that they were deceived. They got the candidate they wanted.

Now the United States is divided, not exactly down the middle but close. The rhetoric is harsh. I’ve heard Alex Jones call for decapitations (and then pull back from that call later, subtly.) I saw a comment on a thread where some nutbag called for a “cleanse” of libtards. There’s a fascinating podcast called It Could Happen Here that gives the odds of a new American civil war serious analysis and consideration. Subversion of the due process of law has turned a lot of conservatives into Banana Republicans.

And no, the vitriol is not equal on both sides. You can point to one or two lies by Obama while Trump is north of 10,000. He’s dangerous and is not in control of all his faculties. One day, assuming we’re lucky, we will look back on these days as very dark and dangerous times. America is not headed toward a constitutional crisis. It’s in one right now. The Democrats are, in general, responding weakly. The Republicans will back their guy right to the brink. It is so sad this devolution is happening because so many of us love America and its people. This is the nation that produced a top-notch space program, Iron Man and Spider-Man for God’s sake!

And so it came to pass that Amid Mortal Words posed the question: If you could get rid of everyone who is making the world a worse place, would you? What if you could do it simply by reading a book or reading the book to someone? And what if there is collateral damage? How many deaths of innocents are acceptable on the way to utopia?

I never set out to write a theme. Themes emerge in the writing. Otherwise, the story would devolve into preachy and boring. Though Amid Mortal Words is not a straight-up liberal revenge fantasy. It’s packed with action and mysteries. Respect is given where it is due. There are answers but they aren’t all easy answers. I’m talking about impact. AMW will move you. Some of those answers are going to leave readers thinking a long time after they close the book.

I think there’s something in these books for people no matter where they are on the political spectrum. Heh. I guess I do still hold out some hope that I’ll be able to change some people’s minds by bypassing their fear responses and entertaining them. No matter. You don’t have to agree with me to have a great time staying up all night, pulling your head into my books and turning pages.

I am, first and foremost, in the brain tickle business. My priority is telling an action-packed and interesting story that entertains you. My books can take some very fanciful turns at times but the core ideas are often rooted in reality. That foundation in what’s happening now is what makes the characters real, motivated and relatable. That’s certainly true of Amid Mortal Words and The Night Man. Despite all the violence, twists and mayhem in my books, there’s heart and meaning in the subtext that propels the plot.

I hope you take the time to check them out and enjoy them.

FREE EBOOK OFFER

For the next week, one of my books will be set to free each day. Check back each day to check out my Amazon author page to see which ones you want to pick up. Here’s the link.

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Coming soon: A New Apocalyptic Thriller

What if mere words could erase all the bad people in the world? What if billions of innocents would also die in the cull? On a night train bound for Chicago, Lt. Col. Zane Salvador meets an odd stranger who leaves behind a dangerous book. Now the future of the human race is in Zane’s hands. You’re in danger, too, Dear Reader.

Quick update:

Fighting a cold, I’m busy writing and revising my next apocalyptic thriller, Amid Mortal Words. Unlike the others, this one is a stand alone. It should be out next month. This is really fun and as the plot unfurled I figured out, hey, this falls under the categories of Lovecraftian/cosmic horror. I’m putting up excerpts in the private Facebook group, Fans of Robert Chazz Chute if you’re a reader who enjoys sneak peeks.

Does anyone remember John Carpenter’s In the Mouth of Madness? My story is very different but at its heart is a book that drives people mad. There lies the connective tissue.

I’m off to dive back into more revisions. I love this story. I think you will, too. In the meantime, enjoy this look back at a sorely underrated Carpenter movie: