Endemic by Robert Chazz Chute follows Ovid Fairweather as she tries to navigate a world ravaged by a disease that turns people essentially braindead. As with any collapse of society, a power vacuum develops, and various individuals group together to seize that power….Can Ovid find a way to survive in a world that aims to take whatever she has left? And can she do it while reconciling with her troubled past?
Ovid endures a great deal in her past and present life. The author does a fantastic job incorporating her past experiences into the main plot points, thus keeping readers guessing and gasping as they read. I would be happy to read more from this setting, and its characters in the future, so here’s hoping there’s a sequel on the way soon.
Endemic is a suspenseful and thrilling science fiction novel with a dystopian twist. Readers will be drawn into the world that at times is almost too real and plausible and left with an eerie feeling of could this happen to me.
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 Dayscontain 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.
Since Dec. 21, Bird Box has been viewed by over 45 million Netflix accounts (as I write this). Judging by some of the reviews I expected a movie with more gore. Perhaps because of that expectation, I was pleasantly surprised by how suspenseful it was. I also don’t expect to see a lot more properties like it anytime soon.
They did several things right with Bird Box. The key to a great monster movie is not to show the monster until you absolutely have to. They hit that target better than any horror movie I can recall. Also, the acting is great. John Malkovich and Sandra Bullock are only two actors but they make up a dozen reasons the movie did well. Though I predicted how the story would end, I thought it ended well enough.
The movie had some of the creepiness and imagination I enjoyed in last year’s Annihilation. However, don’t expect Bird Box to kick off a powerful uptick in apocalyptic movies. Unforgiven is a great movie, too, but it did not herald the return of a bunch of Westerns.
Bird Box was fun and profitable, but it’s a blip. Don’t expect another huge franchise to emerge from it. Here’s why:
The apocalyptic genre is in trouble
Bird Box is a successful movie, certainly. (Good on you, Netflix!) I could easily see this being made into an ongoing series like The Walking Dead. Unfortunately, that would probably beat the idea to death. There’s a trend afoot: people might enjoy a taste of horror like Bird Box or The Haunting of Hill House or Stranger Things. However, they don’t want too much of it.
In recent months I’ve been made aware that the appetite for apocalyptic stories is dwindling. A fellow author who has been very successful in this genre is going back to the day job. I have several apocalyptic/dystopian epics* and I’ve seen sales decay over the past year. This Plague of Days is my most successful series but most of my IPs are taking me on a wander outside the apocalyptic genre as I hunt for my next hit.
Why is this happening?
The wax and wane of trends in consumer tastes has always been opaque to me but I think I’m beginning to get it. There are several possibilities why this is happening to apocalyptic narratives now. Here are a few:
Most books in the genre are too repetitive. I’ve noticed that even among the positive reviews of This Plague of Days, some reviewers mention that they love it because it defies expectations of the genre. The tropes are there but it’s not the same story over and over (I’m looking at you, Walking Dead.) Readers get tired of a steady diet of the same thing, even if they liked the taste in the beginning.
Speaking of The Walking Dead, times are tough and, until recently, TWD didn’t offer much hope. The relentlessly grim and humorless tone is probably why viewership of the series has lessened. Times are tough right now and a real climate change apocalypse is here and/or coming (depending on where you live). With all the bad news, people want something to cheer them up or allow them to forget real-world dangers. Instead of confirming their suspicions that most of humanity sucks and deserves a grisly fate, readers want a different kind of escapism.
Zombie and apocalyptic horror don’t necessarily have a huge fan base. It’s historically a vocal and devoted following but it’s not as big as we might hope. If it were as big as I’d like, there’d be as many zompoc movies as there are mystery/suspense movies with titles with “Girl” in the title. (Note: Those aren’t girls. They’re women. Catch up!)
The popularity of genres has always waxed and waned naturally and it goes in cycles. Some of those cycles are long and others are short. There’s even a strange hypothesis out there that zombie and vampire stories are more or less popular depending on whether the Republicans or the Democrats control the US government. Hardboiled, as a genre, hit its peak with Mickey Spillane. Elmore Leonard kept the coma patient on life support with Chili Palmer. Westerns used to be huge but they really haven’t recovered from John Wayne’s death. In my lifetime, the vampire genre has been declared dead repeatedly. That alarm is always false. Vampires always come back. That might be the next trend. I’m counting on it, actually. I have a big vampire book in the works.
If you’re a zombie fan, what can you do?
Give fuel to what you love. If you dig apocalyptic fiction, keep on buying it, reviewing it and tell your friends. The fanbase for any genre never completely goes away but if you want more of what you love, you have to double down and support your love.
Give new writers a chance and if they delight you, please do spread the word.
If you’re a creator, be excellent and also dare to be a little different. The joke in the horror writing community is that there are no horror writers anymore. They’re all called science fiction writers now. Consider crossing and mixing genres to find new readers. (For instance, the engine that fuels my latest zombie apocalypse (AFTER Life) is nanotechnology. So yes, it’s a sci-fi zombie trilogy.
What’s next?
That’s kind of the point: No one really knows. As my writing idol, William Goldman famously said, “Nobody knows anything…… Not one person in the entire motion picture field knows for a certainty what’s going to work. Every time out it’s a guess and, if you’re lucky, an educated one.”
But what’s my educated guess?
My next book that is apocalypse-adjacent will be a big stand-alone book about a vampire cult. Meanwhile, I have two crime thrillers coming out in the next month. (Watch for The Night Man, releasing next week!)
I know there are writers trying to find underserved markets in which they enjoy writing. When writer Chris Fox wrote Writing to Market, he enthused about the need for more stories that take place in space. He is successful writing his own books that way. Using his research methods, he determined a niche where readers had a big appetite but not enough books.
Rather than follow his advice and do research to find their own unique niche, a lot of writers only sort of followed Chris’s advice. They wrote a ton of books in the genre that was his example. Boom! Space marines and covers featuring spaceship ass everywhere!
Some writers dream of making a big play and doing something new, forging ahead and breaking trail. They point to JK Rowling’s astonishing success with the Harry Potter books. It is indeed an amazing series. The next few years after Rowling hit it big, tons of knock-offs appeared that tried to follow the magic kid trend. Many mimics, but no duplicates. I actually have no objection to that. All those hungry Harry Potter fans naturally found something more to feed their new addiction to apprentice sorcerers. Nothing wrong with that as long as the attempt is not cynical. There is still joy and profit in smaller niches if those readers can be reached, their brains tickled and their hearts touched.
As for me, I have a lot of books in my editorial pipeline at Ex Parte Press. Are they written to market? I can only say that they are what I want to write. Will any of them hit big? No one knows and the market will decide. Hitting singles is much more common than hitting home runs, but I’m at bat and I take a lot of swings. This is not a three-strikes-and-you’re-out situation. This is a keep-swinging-for-the-fences situation.
Is this the end of the Apocalypse? I don’t think so but I’m not betting as big on it as I did in 2012. I don’t know where all the zombie readers went and what they’re enjoying as I write this. However, books are forever. Genres do come and go but they never fade away entirely. These are lean times for the genre but we’ll still be here when a wider readership decides their new tastes have become old and stale. We’ll be here when they’re ready to come back. In the meantime, we write and write and write.
*I’m Robert Chazz Chute, suspense writer and maker of fine salmon sandwiches. My apocalyptic epics are This Plague of Days, Robot Planet, The Dimension War Series and AFTER Life. You can find all my books through the affiliate links to the right or click here for the universal book link. Thanks for reading and please do subscribe to my newsletter for more.
