Skip to main content
Author Chuck Tingle first began to make a name for himself a little over 10 years ago by prolifically writing and self-publishing fantastical queer erotica e-book novellas (which he calls “tinglers”), with titles such as My Billionaire Triceratops Craves Gay Ass, Glazed by the Living Gay Donuts, and Blown by This Handsome Sentient Bubblegum Who Is Also a Successful Landscape Architect. He gained wider fame in 2016 after a Hugo Award nomination (possibly a coordinated mass voting prank) and has continued to gain fans (whom he calls buckaroos) online with his self-published tinglers and active posting on social media while also, in the past few years, publishing the full-length novels Camp Damascus (2023) and Bury Your Gays (2024) with the Macmillan imprint Tor.
Tingle, who describes himself as “a mysterious force of energy behind sunglasses and a mask” will appear at Powell’s Books at Cedar’s Crossing next week to promote his new novel, Lucky Day (Macmillan, 240 pages, $27.99). Four years after the deaths of millions in highly improbable ways—strangulation by balloon rope, attacks by chimpanzees with typewriters—a former statistics and probability professor and a special agent must work together to discover what an impossibly lucky casino reveals about a world that just doesn’t seem to make sense.
Tingle agreed to an interview by email, signing off each exchange with his catchphrase, in all caps, “LOVE IS REAL.”
WW: How did you pick the pseudonym Chuck Tingle?
Chuck Tingle: I honestly can’t remember. I wish I could.
Can you talk about the face covering you wear at events?
When I’m in public, I wear a pink bag over my head and sunglasses to cover my eyes. I write “love is real” across my forehead. There are a lot of reasons I conceal my identity. I’m usually tackling political topics in my work, so I partially do this out of safety, but I also find that presenting myself as a symbol instead of a person has a lot of power. In a lot of my erotica work, there are living objects, and in some ways this turns me into a living object.
Probably the most significant reason is because I’m on the autism spectrum, and I spend a huge amount of time neurotypically masking, which can be exhausting. The space I carved out to express myself under the pink bag has helped with all these things.
Who are your main writing influences?
My main writing influences aren’t writers at all. I think it’s one of the things that gives me a unique voice. Sometimes the approaches you’re told not to take are the ones that will make your creations special. There are five people I would consider my biggest influences, none of them primarily known as novelists: David Byrne, David Lynch, Andy Kaufman, Andy Warhol, and Jordan Peele.
Can you talk about your experience with self-publishing?
Self-publishing is wonderful because of its speed. I can see something in the news, process it through art, then release an erotica short about whatever the topic of the day is within 24 hours. As far as art forms go, it feels particularly uncharted. There are not many folks analyzing cultural events through the lens of short-form queer erotica.
How would you compare Lucky Day to your previous published work?
Each book that a writer puts out is part of the shape of who they are, and eventually you’ll discover that everything within these borders makes up their expression. I think Lucky Day is a very far out point in that grid and as blatantly existential as I’ve gotten in my horror novels, and I tend to get pretty existential already.
What experience do you hope readers have with Lucky Day?
Existence is chaotic, and there’s a lot of art built to convince an audience the world has some kind of hidden order. Lucky Day posits that maybe there is no hidden order, but it’s OK to find hope and joy in the chaos.
GO: Chuck Tingle appears at Powell’s Books at Cedar Hills Crossing, 3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd., Beaverton, 503-228-4651, powells.com. 7 pm Tuesday, Aug. 19. Free.
