I’m delighted to chat today with Joseph Carrabis, author of the military psychological thriller, The Augmented Man.

Can you tell us a little about your novel’s backstory?

The Augmented Man is set in the near future and deals with the aftermath of the US’s involvement in an unwinnable war in South America. Public opinion is greatly against the war for several reasons, chief of which is returning soldiers are strung out on drugs (the war started because the US wanted to gain control of the cocaine fields) and suffering massive, crippling PTSD.

The US works at an “honorable” solution and a Captain Donaldson suggests getting recruits who already suffer from massive, crippling PTSD arguing “Nothing happening down there will affect them, so they’ll be operable without losing efficiency.”

Great idea. But where do we get such recruits?

Donaldson answers that, too. “Let’s get kids who come from such horribly dysfunctional homes they’ve already developed the psychological armor necessary for survival. All we need do is modify their bodies to match where their heads already are and set them loose.”

So begins The Augmentation Project, essentially taking young people who already believe they are monsters due to their life trauma and finishing the job by turning them into physical monsters who’ll never again consider themselves human.

Can you pinpoint when in your life you decided to be a writer?

Pinpoint, no, have a good guess, yes. My sister, Sandra, got me hooked. We were doing dishes when we were kids. She (seven years my senior) told me about a book she was reading for a book report. She was captivated, enthralled, what marketers call “engaged,” and I’d never seen her like that before. That book – James Blish’s Mission to the Heart Stars – gave her so much joy in its reading I, still in grade school, realized I wanted to give the same joy to people that my sister got from Blish’s book. I’ve written about this in https://josephcarrabis.com/2018/04/18/mission-of-the-heart/.

Who are your favorite authors?

AJ Budrys stands out as author, editor, and teacher. I learn quite a bit from the classics. They’re challenging for modern readers and if you’re reading for craft, they’re gold. Edgar Rice Burroughs is a graduate course on describing character through action and dialogue. Some but not all of Michael Crichton. Ditto Ursula K. Le Guin. More recently, Charles Frazier and Truman Capote stand out. Katherine Mansfield is a must read for anyone studying how settings and character description move a story forward.

What was your path to publishing for this book?

I detailed my path to publishing The Augmented Man in https://josephcarrabis.com/2021/03/17/31-years-to-publication/.

I wrote the novel in April of 1990. Some agents took notice and the book never went anywhere. I put it on a shelf and got on with life. Susan (wife/partner/Princess) and I closed a company we’d run for too long in 2016. Susan said, “I’ve never seen you happier than when you write, so I want you to write the rest of your life.”

I took out The Augmented Man and some other work, and sent them out. The publishing world’s changed in thirty-one years and my work is being published. Yippee!

What’s a piece of advice you’d give to aspiring authors?

Write, Write, and write more. But before you do, read, read, and read more.

What inspired you to write this book?

In the early 1990s I was active in the psychotherapeutic community and studied trauma. My specialty was childhood trauma and my studies often overlapped with other types of trauma, specifically combat PTSD. There were so many connections between how these trauma were demonstrated by survivors, I started sharing my findings with others. These findings were largely ignored, in part because society wasn’t yet comfortable looking at itself through the necessary lenses.

Because I couldn’t get anyone to pay attention, I took my findings and wrote The Augmented Man. Now the findings are part of the therapeutic literature.

What is your pitch for this book?

What do you do when the perfect weapon falls in love?

What makes your book different from others in your genre?

My responses to that question would be necessarily solipsistic (I’ve openly and repeatedly stated I write autobiography). You’d have to read the reviews of the book and ask readers their opinion.

Which character is your favorite?

Each character has aspects that stand out. Not everyone’s children are the same, and a parent who favors one child over another is a poor parent.

Describe your main character in three words.

Frightened, terrified, alone.

What is the central message you hope readers take away from the novel?

They can heal. It is possible, no matter what they may believe about themselves or their situation, they can heal if they’re willing to put in the work.

What’s your favorite scene in the book?

Challenging question. There are several scenes which are, to me, outstanding. The opening scene in the biker bar, for example, because it shows the protagonist’s isolation. The first helicopter gunship scene because it shows comradery obedient to the chain of command. The protagonist meeting the shaman. The protagonist on the farm. Each of these scenes and many others are, to me, outstanding for their craft and storytelling.

But if I had to pick a single scene from the entire book? A scene I find breathtaking (and few people comment on, interestingly) is when the protagonist uses the bio- and genetic-engineering done to him to intentionally and actively change his behaviors in real-time. As one of the other characters notes, “He’s changed his own state. He used the tools we gave him to change his own state.”

Do you hide any secrets in the book that only a few people will find?

Easter Eggs? They’re all over the place. Terry Melia, author of Tales from the Greenhills, caught most of them.

What is your writing process?

My process? I sit and write. A lot. Is there another way and nobody told me?

I’ve been observing my process a lot of late. I encourage all writers/authors to do so because it’ll reveal solutions to any challenges you may have. There are so many elements involved, though…Recently an editor and publisher asked if I’d co-author a book on the psychology of writing and the psychological demands of being an author/writer.
I’m flattered and honored. Why me, though?

“Because nobody works as hard as you do to be better.”

Again, I’m flattered and honored, and if I do work harder than most it’s because I want to improve. I don’t like sitting still (odd statement for a full-time author, don’t you think?). I’m a researcher and explorer by nature. It’s part of my training.

And I know not everyone needs to be, nor can they be. So it goes.

What are you working on now?

Search, a fiction novel based loosely on a triple murder which occurred in Maine back in 1973.

What’s one thing readers would be surprised to learn about you?

That I fly kites. (from Susan).
That I’m a closet Nora Roberts reader. (I’m not. Susan said that as a joke and I laughed too hard to leave it out).
I make a hell of a pizza from scratch (shell and all). (This is also from Susan).
I don’t think there’s anything surprising about me. Do remember, I’m boring and dull.

What’s your favorite personal quote or motto?

A single one? Sorry, no. I’ve collected quotes since I was in my teens. There’s too many good ones to pick a single one.

Where can readers purchase your published work?

http://nlb.pub/amazon has all my books and anthologies in which my work appears.

What is your official author bio?

I’m boring and dull. Hopefully my stories aren’t.

A more detailed bio can be found at https://josephcarrabis.com/about/.

And finally, where can readers find you on the web?

My official site is https://josephcarrabis.com/ and I can be found on these socials:

Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Goodreads, Pinterest, Instagram, BookBub, YouTube.

Synopsis of The Augmented Man:

The US is involved in a Vietnam-like war, this one in the South American coca fields. The war is unpopular largely due to the number of returning vets suffering PTSD and on drugs. The US wants to end the war with a decisive victory but doesn’t know how to go about it (there’s a fair amount of politicking going on). Captain Donaldson comes up with a solution: Let’s get soldiers who are already so horribly traumatized nothing they experience or do in combat will affect them.

Great idea, Captain. Where do we get them?

Get children who’ve already been emotionally, physically, spiritually, and psychologically traumatized. Any who’ve survived have already developed the hardening necessary to ignore what they do and is done to them. All we need do is augment what they’ve already done to themselves, continue the hardening of their minds, emotions, and spirit, biologically and physically change them so their bodies match what’s inside, and give them mental conditioning to match.

Thus The Augmented Men are created. At the end of hostilities, it is decided they can’t return home. They’re monsters in all ways, so they are betrayed and sacrificed to the enemy.

Except one who escapes, survives, and comes home.