Review Fix Exclusive: Chad Dundas Talks ‘Champion of the World’

Review Fix chats with author and journalist Chad Dundas, who discusses the inspiration, process and goals his new cook, “Champion of the World.” Known for his work with ESPN, NBC Sports, Bleacher Report and the Associated Press, Dundas puts a historic and polished spin on the fiction genre for his look at the professional wrestling industry in the 1920s.

About “Champion of the World”:

This evocative debut, set in the world of wrestling in the 1920s, features a husband and wife set adrift in a place where everyone has something to hide and not even the fights can be taken at face value. When Pepper and Moira are ejected from their lives in the carnival circuit, Pepper returns to the world of wrestling as a trainer for a down-and-out African American heavyweight contender in search of a comeback and a shot at the world title.

Review Fix: What inspired this book?

Chad Dundas: The idea for Champion of the World came from a couple different places. The book marries two of my great loves: professional wrestling and fiction. I was lucky enough to grow up during two of wrestling’s modern “golden ages.” First during Vince McMahon’s “rock n’ wrestling” revolution during the 1980s and later during the “Attitude Era” of the 1990s. So, I’ve always been infatuated with the spectacle of wrestling and as I grew older I became equally fascinated by the sport’s bizarre, still very murky history.

As an aspiring fiction writer and avid reader I used to look around and wonder: Where were all the wrestling books? Literature is crowded with boxers, but there were almost none—at least that I knew of—about wrestlers. Perhaps in the back of my mind, I wanted to see if I could write the great American wrestling novel. I doubt I succeeded in that lofty goal, but maybe I ended up writing a pretty good one.

I’ve also worked the last half-dozen years as a sportswriter primarily covering mixed martial arts fighting. I like to think the athletes competing in that sport today are the closest things we have to turn-of-the-century wrestlers.  Their attitudes, their toughness and their struggles helped inspire many of the characters in the book.

Review Fix: How did your experiences as a sports writer help this book?

Dundas: At the sentence level, I certainly learned more about writing and simple clarity of language from working as a journalist than in any English class. I’ve been lucky to have good teachers and mentors both in fiction and news reporting. With writing, like anything, I think the best way to get better is through experience and sheer repetition. Journalism has certainly helped with that.

Working as a sportswriter also gives me access to and perspective on athletes that a lot of fiction writers might not have. I’ve had the tremendous opportunity to see their lives and understand their stories. Their life experiences are rife with the stuff that makes fiction go—grit, struggle, desperation, triumph, defeat. I think all that makes athletes, and especially combat sports athletes, natural subjects for literature. I’ve been very lucky to get to know them a little bit.

Review Fix: Why do you think professional wrestling is still so relevant in our society?

Dundas: In its modern form, pro wrestling is just storytelling and I hope there will always be a place in our society for good stories. Wrestling obviously paints with a fairly broad brush, stays close to well-worn tropes and keeps its themes as straightforward as possible. All of that makes it very accessible to a wide audience. Once you add the physical spectacle of it all, it becomes a natural landing spot for some people—especially young men.

There’s a new layer to professional wrestling fandom now that I find interesting. I think it gets to the heart of why wrestling makes such good fodder for stories. With the internet and the rise of “smart” wrestling fans—who are obsessed with behind-the-scenes gossip and the business end of it all—it has heightened the drive to “figure out” wrestling and separate the fact from the fiction. I count myself among that group. Yet, the truth is, you can never really straighten it all out. The more you try, the more it muddies the water between what is real and what is “fake.” From a storytelling standpoint, I find that balance between fact and fiction—and the deception that goes with it—to be pretty irresistible.

Review Fix: What authors have had the biggest impact on you?

Dundas: I’ve always read a lot of crime fiction. Like a lot of people my age, I discovered James Ellroy when I was in high school and geeked-out over his work for a decade or so. I’ve also been impacted by Montana crime writers like James Crumley and James Lee Burke. As I got older, I’ve enjoyed the new masters of the genre—people like George Pelecanos, Dennis Lehane, Megan Abbott, Laura Lippman and Tana French.

I’ve also been influenced by more literary-minded writers like Cormac McCarthy, Michael Chabon and Denis Johnson. Additionally, it’s been a great blessing to have some great writers as teachers as I made my way through school—people like Kevin Canty, Deirdre McNamer and Brady Udall—and they’ve had as big an impact on me as anyone.

Review Fix: What are your goals for it?

Dundas: When you sit down to write a historical novel about professional wrestling in the 1920s, you don’t exactly think, “This is going to be huge!” My initial goal was just to finish a novel—something I’d never done before—and whip it into the sort of shape I could be proud of. From there, I was very fortunate to land with a literary agent and later an editor and publisher that cared for the work so deeply. So, in many ways, the book has already met and exceeded my early goals.

I’ve been bowled over by the initial positive critical response to the book. I don’t really know what to expect from the publication process or what will happen after the book is actually out there in the world. So far, I’m really enjoying the ride.

Review Fix: How do you want this book to be remembered?

Dundas: I hope people are entertained by the book. The whole trick of writing it was to try to make it interesting both to people who like wrestling and people who don’t—because that second category includes almost everyone. I hope people who don’t know anything about the early history of wrestling can engage with the characters and come away feeling not only like they’ve had a good time spending a few hundred pages in that world but also that they better understand the genesis of what has become a uniquely American art form.

I hope that people who do like wrestling come away from the book feeling like I did justice to those wild early days. A lot of the people who I come in contact with as an MMA reporter—on social media and elsewhere—don’t think of themselves as voracious readers. One of my outside hopes for this book is that it can be accessible and enjoyable for people who feel like “literature” isn’t really marketed toward them or who don’t really find the idea of reading a novel all that appealing. I hope this is a book they can get into and ultimately feel like, hey, I liked that. Maybe I’ll try another one.

Review Fix: What’s next?

Dundas: I’m at work on my second book for my publisher, G.P. Putnam’s Sons. This one is a contemporary mystery about a soldier who comes home from Iraq believing he suffered a traumatic brain injury in an IED attack during his final days at war. His biographical memory has been damaged and he remembers almost nothing about his childhood. On one of his first nights back in his Montana hometown he reconnects with his childhood sweetheart and the two of them witness a mysterious house fire. A young woman dies in the blaze and that kicks off a series of events that complicate the soldier’s journey to relearn who he is and where he comes from.