The Savage Romantics

by Jason Daniel Chaplin

St. Jerome City is rumored to be under surveillance by someone, or something nefarious. Pollutions are scattered throughout the city… Strange animals and madmen wander the streets at night… And an anonymous gunman has been committing murders from the towers. A mysterious filmmaker; a self-defeating musician; a woman unsure about her pregnancy; and another woman searching to find herself after a separation must cross paths with a devilish engineer, a murderous artist, and a despotic business man to save St. Jerome City before its dangers can bring about the end of the world.

654 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 31, 2016

About the author

Jason Daniel Chaplin (b. 1990, Mission, Texas) is an American journalist and author known for his raw, unfiltered prose and bold storytelling. He made his literary debut in 2012 with A Rocky Existence, a semi-autobiographical satire that delves into the drug culture of the Missouri Ozarks in the late 2000s. With its outlaw spirit and unapologetic honesty, the novel quickly gained attention in online literary circles.
In 2016, Chaplin released his second book, The Savage Romantics, an epic, apocalyptic tale published fittingly on Halloween. His most recent work, The Fragment Color, Darkly (2025), is a collection of speculative science fiction short stories that explore themes of memory, identity, and collapse.
Though deeply rooted in the Ozarks, Chaplin has also lived in Texas, Colorado, and New Hampshire. In 2022, he dedicated his life to Christ and is an active member of the Independent Christian Church. He is also a vocal advocate for both gun safety and Second Amendment rights.
A distant relative of literary legends Herman Melville and Ernest Hemingway, Chaplin carries forward a tradition of fearless American storytelling—gritty, reflective, and distinctly his own.

Reviews

[Lorenzo Escobar · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is not a gentle read. The city of St. Jerome is a living, decaying labyrinth, full of crime, corruption, and surreal horrors. There are about 25 different characters navigating a world of ambition, obsession, and moral ambiguity, where desire, sex, and violence are depicted with clinical, surgical intensity.
The villains are psychologically intricate, deeply twisted, and unnervingly human, with motives and obsessions that can make the reader feel both fascinated and unmoored. The prose is dense, metaphorical, and experimental, blending gothic horror, noir, and dystopian cyberpunk in a style reminiscent of Ballard, Delany, and Dickens—but it’s never decorative; every image, every detail, pushes the reader into the strange, brutal heart of the city.
This book will challenge, shock, and haunt you. It’s excessive by design, morally complex, and utterly original—a literary experience for readers who dare to confront darkness in every form.
The Savage Romantics is surreal, erotic, violent, and psychologically relentless; a masterfully ambitious novel that rewards patience, intellect, and a strong stomach.
This is a young Jason Daniel Chaplin at the peak of his experimental phase and it’s such a sight to behold when you finally understand just how good this young writer went on to be.