Know Your Neighbor: Chris Vavra

Last week, local writer Chris Vavra published Sideswipe, the third book is his Oak Villa series.

Vavra’s Oak Villa series are crime novels set in a fictional Chicago suburb and centered on the Mafia. They are published under the pen name C. R. Jakes and available through amazon.com in the Kindle Edition.

Vavra is a lifelong Chicagoan who freelances in Oswego. His fictional Oak Villa is set between Aurora and DeKalb.

“I decided to set it in my own backyard. It’s its own little world with its own geography. I’m not bound by the laws of geography,” he explained.

“The Mafia has quite a history with Chicago, so writing crime novels that include the Mafia are a natural extension,” he said.

Thus far, Vavra has published three novels and three novellas in the Oak Villa series. The novels are approximately 300 pages while the novellas are 50 to 70 pages long. Vavra said each story can stand alone and don’t need to be read in order.

 Vavra said his interest in writing has always existed and that he’s been writing since high school. The Oak Villa Series are the first novels that he’s published.

Coercion, released January 2012, is the first in the series. Vavra said it took him about two and a half months to write this novel.

“Thirty pages into writing it, I decided it wasn’t quite right. I had a corrupt cop as the main character and I switched it to a two-character-story, written from both perspectives. This approach seemed to infuse the story with the energy that I was looking for,” he explained.

Vavra chose to publish under the pen name C. R. Jakes for various reasons.

“No one pronounces my last name correctly and I enjoy the anonymity,” he said. “Writing is like your subconscious persona talking to you. The way I write is not the way I converse. It’s a role play in a way,” he described.

For now, Vavra’s work is only available through the Kindle market.

“It has worked out well,” he said. “I have the freedom to call my own shots.”

Vavra said he writes at least one to two hours each day, aiming to write 1,000 words each day but insists that he has no strict quota.

Vavra has various ideas for future writing endeavors.

A fourth Oak Villa novel is in process and Vavra has written 70 pages of a spy story set in the US. Vavra said he is interested in trying other genres and doesn’t want to focus solely on crime novels.

Adam Mirkiani grew up with Vavra and they have worked together. Mirkiani described Vavra’s writing style:

“He takes a real world environment and creates scenarios of espionage and real world crime. There is a dynamic value to his crime stories,” Mirkiani described.

“Chris is a sponge who just soaks up his environment. He really likes to learn,” said Mirkiani.

Vavra earned his BA in English Literature from North Central College in Naperville. He minored in writing. He works full-time as a content specialist editor for a manufacturing magazine. Vavra said his writing style is most influenced by Elmore Leonard and George V. Higgins.

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