#644 - Jack Carr - What Has Happened To The Love For America?

25:54So it's a think and man's game. That's what I've been in my last in the blood. That's what I wanted to write a sniper centric novel last time without that Scene of two snipers on opposite hillsides or buildings that are looking for each other and then they're looking and then they find each other The last second the one guy shoots and it goes through the other guy's scope just before he can shoot or you know That's seen that we've seen in a bunch of movies and books up to this point So I thought how do you do a sniper centric novel without that scene and that was the thinking man's part of it like how do you out think this other sniper And this one, that was the fun part for me writing that book, but it's similar to what you're what we're talking about right here is out thinking the enemy.

26:34And you're doing that in the battlefield and that's what I'm doing on the page, are in the pages of these books. You're a guy who's been through selection, who's been in Connecticut, Woffa, newly been hit by mortars, been in cars that have been attacked by machine guns. How does that compare to being in the middle of a cancellation furore when the terminal list hits Amazon Prime. I can't like people that weren't too excited about it, like the Daily Beast. I guess it was to be expected. You can't expect everyone's going to love it, especially certain segments that might already have it out for maybe your lead star or the subject matter in particular or have read one of the books and already hate you or have looked at your Instagram and already hate you.

27:16So that's just how it goes these days and that's okay. I mean, there is a large segment of the population who it does resonate with, thank goodness, and Amazon has all those numbers, though they'll never share them. And that's why we have a spin -off and a... Many sequels. Yeah, the terminal list is an attempt to valorize the same toxic tenor of military culture, a culture that's long protected rather than prosecuted those who engage in immoral and illegal behavior. This valorization of vigilantism is a rising tide in pop culture. to me, vigilantes don't seem like a rising tide. I think back to movies like The Punisher that I think's been remade at least two or three times.

27:56Now I think about John Wick, perhaps, which is kind of like, I mean, that's pure vigilantes, I don't fuck with his dog. But I don't think that that is the case. And I think that we have seen a resurgence of relatively uncomplicated, not simple, but uncomplicated storylines where the good guys are the good guys and the bad guys are the bad guys. Top Gun Maverick last year I think one of the highest grossing movies if not the highest grossing movie of the unbelievable to watch. Even other things like bullet train which was complex but also it wasn't subversive in trying to get across some strange kind of political commentary.

28:33So yeah man I mean my house mate absolutely loved it. He stayed up, he completely fucked me. We watched the first couple of episodes and then he stayed up all night and completed the season, woke up the next day. I was like, dude, you've got this, you need to stay up and watch it. And I thought, well, we would, this was a nuts thing. And now I feel betrayed because you've stayed up all night and watched it. But yeah, you know, I think you're right. For as long as the market has desire for this stuff, I'm sure people have got problems with succession. I'm sure that there's some tropes in succession and the reinforcement of white, cis -hatternormative, patriarchal capitalism or something.

29:10But the The season and the series is absolutely fucking fantastic. And for as long as it's good, people are going to watch it. And you're not going to be able to shame people out of watching something entertaining. And you're also not going to be able to guilt people into watching something that shit. That's it. And I mean, death wish in the 70s with Charles Bronson. I mean, these things have been around for quite some time. And it's really about for us, it was all about telling a story. Like it is for me and the novels. I don't look at Amazon reviews and say, look at this person. didn't like this in the last book.

29:41I'm going to have to change this or what I wonder if I'm going to alienate an audience and never. It is 100 % only about the story. You have to honor that story. I never think about an audience. I never think about a critic. I never think about a comment. It's all about the story. That's what I have to do because people are trusting me with this time. They're never getting back. So that's something I take extremely seriously. So every part of me, my heart and soul has to go into every single word, but it has to be about the story. And in every single meeting we had with Chris and Antoine, Fuqua and the whole executive production team, Chris always would remind us that we're making this.

30:13We're not making this for critics. We're making it for this person who went to Iraq and Afghanistan over the last 20 years so that when they sit on that couch and crack a beer and turn this thing on, they at least know that we put in the effort to make something for them. There was rooted in the realities of modern warfare that explored the mindset of a modern day warrior with this skill set who now has nothing left to lose. So we're making it for you. We're not making it for the daily beast. That's for sure. And some of those critics, like some of the ones that you read and the way you just described looking at succession or something like that, it's, gosh, that's a horrible way to go through life, it seems.

30:46There's plenty of other things you could read if this isn't yours, if this isn't the thing that's speaking to you. We live in a time where there's so much. But let's just say it was just books and movies. There are plenty other ones out there. Why would you waste time just trying to ruin someone else's day or to apply a filter on a show that a lot of people are enjoying, but you want to just speak for themselves. I think how nasty it is and it just says something about you I think rather than, oh, it's subjective. Guess what? It's art. Art is subjective. Move along. You'll be able to much happier life, but that's just how it goes these days.

31:23What would have been an easier way for you to compromise the screen adaptation. For instance, what was some of the decisions that keeping it in were always going to cause problems. And there is, I'm sure there wasn't a discussion because you wanted to stay true. And it seems like Chris was also on board with this also being super, super aligned. But what was some of the things that you think this would have gotten rid of most of the criticism, but also compromised the show? Oh, if we got rid of most of the criticism, it would be awful. So we never really thought about that. I can't really, I can't think of it as disemboweling.

32:06Maybe the disemboweling with a Tomahawk axe. I don't think they were that upset with that, but Amazon was nervous about it. That's for sure. And it was one of those ones where we had the scripts go up to the top Amazon and they come back down with notes. And this is a very collaborative process, whereas the novels just me 100 % creative control, no guidance on my agent, they never even hint. When I come good, yeah. It's 100 % me, which is great because if it doesn't work, I have only one person to blame. That is 100%. Yeah, exactly. Now, the other side of the house here was screenwriting. This is a very collaborative team -oriented process.

32:43So just like in anything where politics are involved and by politics, I mean interpersonal relationship type politics when you're trying to create something special. But everybody wants that to be the end goal, but everybody's bringing their past experience to it. Everybody's bringing something different, which can be wonderful. But I can also see when you hear these stories about writers rooms devolving into chaos or things just going off the rails on set or whatever it might be. I can see how that can happen. We got very, very lucky here, but very collaborative. So once you get the outline for the scripts done and then you get the scripts done, then and they go up to the top of Amazon and then they come back down with notes.

33:23And one of those notes was about the disemboweling scene and there were some, I guess the best way to put some concerns that that might be a little much and we lose the audience. So that was one we fought for and the Amazon's credit, they went with us, they went with us on, I think everything that we wanted. Every time something came up, those little contentious, they sided with us and kind of went, And all right, you know, we're in a trustya. And for a penny in for a pound, we'd say in red. Yeah, but luckily we had Chris and we had Antoine and we had the showrunner. And so all of us as a team would very thoughtfully discuss how we were gonna deal with this.

34:01And so we filmed it. I think Amazon thought that we were just gonna let them film it and we're not, we're never gonna let them put it in. And then it ends up being the shot that's on every billboard in LA when it launches is Chris Pratt holding that top of a hawk, right? Like that shot from the side. And yeah, so if we didn't have that in there, we probably would have lost a lot of the core audience that we're fans of the book because enough has to change anyway where people that are going to get upset about changes, they're going to get upset anyway. But if you lose a couple of these scenes, you're going to really lose the people that are even understanding of the fact that there are going to be changes.

34:40So so a few of those things like that had to really had to be in there and we're we're important to keep in there. So so that was that was one of them. There was an ending. I think we talked about it on the podcast. We did a terminal list podcast. So I think we talked about it on there, but there was another ending that that Amazon was fond of and it just wasn't going to work. We were going to lose everybody we'd taken along this ride and sufficiently And so once again, they went along with it. We did film two endings. Well, I will ever be released in a DVD thing. I don't think so. I don't think so.

35:19The other one's not good. And I don't think we really put our heart and soul into that one. I think everybody involved in Christ turned up in half. It wasn't even. Yes, not even. He's not even in it actually in that one scene. But yeah, I think we would have really lost everybody if, but once again, Amazon amazing went with us and we pulled it off even though it's different than the book. The whole, though, what was really important to Chris and Antswan and me and the showrunner was to stay true to the spirit of the novel. Knowing we have eight hours to tell this, it's a team process. You have budgets.

35:53You have set pieces. You have travel restrictions. There's all these things that aren't in a novel. I can do anything I want in a novel. But all those other things are at play in a script. A lot of rules for screenwriting, which if they exist for writing a thriller, I don't know them because I'm just doing what I love to do and telling a story. But in screenwriting, there are rules. So we ended up pulling it off and Amazon went with us on every single one of those contentious decisions and it paid off. Fuck yeah. What is a daily routine, a morning routine, a daily routine like for you, when you are deep in the writing process?

36:35Well, I just get more tired because I'm staying up later and later, but I still have to get up to get the kids to school and get everybody fed. It's just like any other parent out there that's like trying to get their kids to school and saying, where's your back back? Where's your violin, is it a violin day? Like all those things, can the car were late? So all those things are at play as well. So once that chaos has subsided, then dive into the work. And for me, it's all about uninterrupted time, uninterrupted time. And it has to, I don't need a great view. I just need quiet, quiet uninterrupted time.

37:07So each of the novels I've written in a different place, the first one was off our, in a little office, off our bedroom, rental in Coronado, California during my last year in the seal teams between about 10 at night and three in the morning, because that's the only time that it was semi quiet in our household with three kids, dog, wife, and all the rest. And this one before this, well, two before this, I went to the local library and was using one of those little study rooms that they have there, but you can only stay in them for like two hours if someone else is waiting. So as soon as high school got out, I could bump out for kids working on history projects and that sort of thing, but that worked for a little bit and then I rented Airbnb's for the last one for in the blood and that was fantastic.

37:44Found a little cabin not too far away. And I thought I was gonna do it for this last book for only the dead and then I got up there and it's about a mile from our house. I can actually see the house from this little cabin and I just didn't feel right. It didn't feel right. And I was realizing that kids are 17, 15 and 12 and I realized that I was going to miss the interruptions when they were gone. So I decided to embrace the interruptions, which probably pushed this writing process about two months, maybe two and a half months to the right. But I realized that this is just how it's going to be.

38:16And I'm going to miss these interruptions when they're gone. So it's just what life is like right now. That's okay. So I wrote it at the house and just tried to write it when the kids were at school and then I pulled some really late nights and pulled a couple of all -nighters which are getting harder to do the older I get for Savage Sun a few books back. No problem, no problem pulling all -nighters. This one, oh yeah, failing it. Roodle, yeah, feeling it now. But eventually I will get a much more disciplined approach but right now from the beginning it's felt like an entrepreneurial type of adventure, meaning I have to, I'm the CEO, I'm the CFO, I'm the CMO, I'm the creative, I'm the social media manager, I'm all of those things, but and I have to also say yes to everything.

38:57People have to know that whatever this widget is if you're an entrepreneur, you have this you've created this thing, people have to know that it exists. So what do you have to do? What are the supporting efforts to this product that are going to allow you to get this out in the world and allow you to continue to do what you do in my case? That's writing, that's what I love, that's my passion. My mission is taking care of my family, writing as the passion they come together and form my purpose going forward. But I didn't realize, I thought you could kind of just go to a cabin in the mountains, write, send it to New York, maybe do an interview, and then start your next book.

39:24That was totally not it, especially today. You could have gotten away with that in 1985 if you were one of the last names that we all know like King, something, or D 'Amille, or Morale, or these last names, Clancy from back in the day. But today it's different. There are so many more platforms that you can take advantage of and they're sure are Outliers of course, but if you're just gonna do the work and get in there and get dirty and figure this thing out Well now you can take advantage of YouTube and Instagram and Facebook and Twitter and a web page and a podcast and do all these other things that support your main effort of the book and still that product that book has to be the best that it can possibly be But then everything else also has to be on that same level so that podcast has to be the best that it can possibly be any Blog entry any post on Instagram Because all those things people are trusting you with that time that we talked about earlier not just with the book whether it's an Audio book or they're actually reading it But just scrolling through and stopping on your Instagram post and reading a little history or whatever it might be on there You have to add value to people's lives throughout the year and then there's this connection piece that wasn't available in 1975, 85, 95, even really 2005.

40:33Really after that, when things started to change and where it became important to know the person behind the product, in this case, a book that wasn't really as important 30 years prior because you didn't really know it was behind that book or that movie or whatever else will now. Now people want to know. And that authenticity piece is so important today to everyone overuse term, but it's really there's not a better one. And so for me, that authenticity piece, It's as it's part of the novel, but it's also this it's us talking and you it'd be tough to not be you today I know people try but their lives must be miserable Because if you're not you and you're active on social channels eventually it'll come out correct and It's got to be awful to try to do that But but if you don't and you're just open and honest people respect that and you have a product that is top tier and everything else You're doing is also top tier that supports that product Anyway, that's how I looked at it How do you avoid the main thing, not being the main thing anymore?

41:32There's lots of these other ways that you get pulled. You've got to do the podcast and the interviews and oh, there's a screenplay and I've got this meeting and there'll be a Zoom call and we've got to make sure there's emails and all the rest of it. And yet, the highest point of leverage that you need to get done is to put words down onto paper. How do you avoid distraction from the main thing and what is your process for staying motivated and disciplined when it comes to writing? The last really, that's really what I'm working on right now. So I hadn't happened working on it since the beginning, but really more so over the last year, it's become unsustainable to keep the pace up that I've kept that I've been on since the beginning.

42:08And there are more projects out there with this origin story with the next book coming out with Chris Brad. So those two separate series writing for those, I'll write the finale episodes on both those this time around. Repencils down on it because of the writer's strike right now. But there's and there's some other projects out there in the works as well have a nonfiction book coming out on Beirut the 1983 Bayer Barrett bombing if there's a pod just all those things and so there really is I mean you are being pulled in a lot of different directions So I'm gonna have to get at this stage turn from the Started the computer company migrage in 1976 77 into like a more into the in the little enough a space outside the garage type of a thing.

42:53What does your team look like at the moment? It was me only from the beginning, but now for the last few months. Now I have not just one literary agent, but I think there's six different agents now. Each one has a different specialty, which is fantastic. Another generic payment attorney that overlooks all of that, kind of the umbrella, overall of those different agents. There's a manager to make sure business manager, but not the kind that goes out and looks for things, but makes sure that you're keeping out of trouble with the IRS. So that's who I could never, my brain does not work that way.

43:27So that is totally outsourced because now you have merchant 50 different states, 40 different countries, each one of those states changes their tax laws by the year. So yeah, so that's, so there's that. My publisher Emily Bessler, amazing, has been incredible from the very beginning. It's I'm an issuester. My publicist David Brown. He's been with me from the beginning as well. My agent, Alexander machinist, literary side of the house, she's like the umbrella agent over all the other ones kind of. So the team's, I know an assistant now who schedules everything because I was just spending, I mean, untold hours just trying to keep these different interviews straight and different appointments straight and all that stuff and that was taking away time that wasn't going into the book.

44:10So this is the year to kind of figure all that out. but I think now that's the team. That's the team and really they're gender ironclad who does the podcast production and does my book trailer videos and deals with any business side of the house with merch or whatever else. Like it's outsourcing all those things. Trusting that maybe some of it might not be done exactly the way you want it. And that's the price that you pay for being able to dive all into the book is something else, something smaller or not being exactly the way you would like it. But it's okay. Okay, you're probably the only one that's gonna notice.

44:44So, but for me it's like the Instagram thing is still me, Twitter is still me, all those because it's such an important connection that I have with this readership because, you know, leading up to the third novel. I was kind of hoping that Chris Pratt would tweet or put something on Instagram about the show. I was kind of hoping that Joe Rogan would invite me on. I would be hoping that, to have known him for a while. I was hoping that Tucker would invite me on, but it didn't happen. But now I'm so thankful that none of those guys asked me on and tell that third book hit the New York Times list.

45:15And then the first two bumped on after that because now even in my mind, one, one, yeah, you don't have to worry about people saying, oh, must be nice. Only reason you do this is because you got on Rogan or whatever else. Like that's off. And also for me, saying, well, wow, could I've done this without going on Rogan? Could I've done this without a book? That's not even part of my, that's not even part of my calculus. I'm not taking up any bandwidth in my head because it was all grassroots and it was all people taking a risk on me as a new author and telling a friend at work or telling a buddy on social media or telling a family member who in tour and told another family member.

45:50So that made it so grassroots and so powerful from a foundational standpoint. point. So now I'm thankful that Chris didn't say anything until after that, that Rogan didn't ask me on till after that, and that Tucker didn't have me on till after that, because those were the three that in the lead up, I was kind of like, oh man, be really nice if one of those three, have two of them, fall three happened, but none of them did until after the New York Times. You still made it work. Yeah, I remember hearing about Eddie Herne, who is a boxing promoter from the UK and he manages a ton of huge, huge fights.

46:22And his father was very successful in boxing promotion too. And they were talking about the challenges that Eddie had been through as a byproduct of his father's success. And he'd grown up with wealth and stuff which you know is both positive and negative. One of the things that Eddie said was he almost resented his father's success in a way because he would never be able to prove whether or not he could have done it without him. And that's a big mirror, I think, to the scenario that you're encountering. Another thing that I've been thinking about a lot over the last two weeks, Bill Perkins guy who wrote, Die With Zero, the very short book about how to use money to enjoy life as opposed to saving indefinitely.

47:06It's fantastic. I highly, highly recommend it. It's three hours long. Die With Zero. He's also been on the show, so I'll send you a link to listen to that episode once So I spent a good bit of time with him. He has a holiday home here in Austin and I've been wake surfing with him four times since he's been on the show in the last 10 days. I've got really good at wake surfing, but I've also got to spend a good bit of time with him. One of the things that I realized is there's lots of content on the internet about how to become rich and almost no content on the internet about how to be rich. There's lots of content on the internet about how to become successful and almost no content about how to be successful.

47:42Most people are on the come up toward getting toward the size of a jack, oh, one millionth of the size of a jack car, right? Once you're there, all of the lessons, do I need an assistant? Do I need to do I need a personal? Do I need an executive? What about a manager? Do I need a chief of staff? Should I get an operations manager first? Or do I need a chief of operations? What about the chief of staff? How do they work with the agent? And you know, It's a problem that the cohort who has this issue is so small that it's not surprising because the incentives for writing is sort of stuff and creating this content online is to appeal to a wider audience.

48:19How many people have the problem of trying to juggle multiple fiction and nonfiction best sellers with an Amazon Prime deal, right? It's a pretty small cohort, but that doesn't make it any smaller of a problem. And you don't have anybody there to try and teach you. So spending a good bit of time with Bill, somebody who is incredibly wealthy, very successful and uses it as far as I can see in a very smart way. And looking at his systems, how dialed in all of the things that he has in his life, he's got an EA, he's got a PA, he's got a person that does his diet and nutrition, his chef speaks to the nutritionist and then cooks his meals based on what that is.

48:58The assistant makes sure that his schedule is done and the driver makes sure he's there on time and the blah, blah, blah, blah, everything is dialed in. and he calls them neuron cycles and he protects his neuron cycles as much as possible. Says, for him, it's making money for you. It would be right in great words. I make money with my mind, the more neuron cycles that I take up thinking, I haven't put petrol in the car or have we got milk for the coffee in the morning or all of those things are taking away from my highest point of leverage. And yet, like having that conversation online opens you up to so much cynicism around people saying, you know, what a luxurious bourgeois, wanky, must be nice.

49:35Yeah, exactly. Yeah. But the bottom line is that there are people out there who have these systems in place, and I've started to hang about with them. And to see that is just really inspiring to see how high the ladder can go, just how good the efficiency can get, how much can be outsourced, how much can be delegated. And it's cool to see that you're beginning to turn pro in Stephen in press field of language, I suppose, to get to that level. Exactly, and it's, I'm just started on that path to figure out how to become more effective and efficient, which means you have to let go and you have to trust all those people also to make sure they got the right date on the calendar and the right time.

50:12Something as easy as that and to know that you don't have to double check or go back in your email, it's just a confirm because you're like, wait, that didn't sound quite right. That has to be all the way off. You never have to have that thought and that thought has to go into whatever that profession is for me writing. So I mean, there are definitely some tweaks that need to happen, but I'm starting down that path. And then eventually I'll have to add sleep nutrition. Nice back on my list because those fell to the bottom of my priority list. It's because you're doing all those other other things and this is the time to do it.

50:43And this is what I love. I've always wanted to write since I was a little kid. So I know that right now is my time to do that. But also it's time to introduce some more of those efficiencies so that I can take that breath. because right now it's just family and work, that's it. And so I can need to introduce some more of that, and some of those efficiencies in there so that I can operate at optimal performance, I guess, get the right fuel in there. I've seen it, I've seen people now first hand operating at unbelievably high levels, very effectively and efficiently and enjoying life because of how much they've been able to outsource it.

51:23Now, you know, the bottom line is that much of this is a function of money that if you have the capital to be able to spend, then you can afford the bits that this gets put together. But also it's a function of being able to relinquish control, being able to delegate, being prepared to do that, being able to put faith in other people, to allow them to learn through failure, to pay the price, the existential, like, I miss that fucking meeting. Oh, it's because they put the meeting on for the wrong day or they didn't check the email or whatever, like those are just prices that you're going to have to pay.

51:54So one of the other things that I imagine is a big chunk of your time must be research for the storylines, for inspiration for the book and presumably not everything can be inspired by personal experience. So what does the research process look like for this? Well, a lot of them, it shifted with COVID because I couldn't go anywhere. My initial thought out of the gate was that I would at least go to one trip, maybe multiple countries, but one trip focused on research for a novel. So I'd for the first book, I'd been to Iraq, been to Afghanistan. I chose places in the United States that I'd already been, so I wouldn't have to travel to them to do that research, so that was the first one.

52:35Second one, now I'm out of the military, start that second one about a month after I'm out of the military. And I fly to Mozambique because I know that this is going to be a very important part of the storyline I don't know that any money to be flying to Mozambique or doing any of these things But I thought of that John Grisham story about he wrote a time to kill first And he couldn't give that book away and then he writes the firm and we've had a John Grisham novel every year in some years Two John Grisham novels every year since but I always thought of like what what if he'd stopped? What if he'd stopped and not written the firm then he'd probably just now be retiring from some law practice that he'd hated and he'd always it would have We wasted some sort of bandwidth thinking about what could have been or maybe I should have written another book, but he did.

53:16And he, from all indications, he loves writing and loves the life that he has built. So I always thought about that. So hence my reason for being on a plane to Mozambique without any means to do so. And so that was fantastic. But in boots on the ground, I learned so much over there talking to the professional hunters and the trackers and talking to them about the politics in their country and Chinese influence both legal and illegal mining operations. There's all these poaching, all these things that I incorporated into the storyline. So much so that I went back before that was published to South Africa, did your research for my third novel and a little bit for the one that I was just finishing up.

53:53I also went to Comchakup in insular Russia for that third novel for Savage Sun because once again, that was going to be a very important part of the storyline that I didn't want to just get information by zooming in on Google Earth and looking up something on Wikipedia. I wanted to go there and really know the sights and the sounds and the smells. Yeah, and what are you looking for there? You're in this place. Are you taking down notes? Are you doing voice recordings? Are you taking videos and photos? And what are you looking out for? Videos, photos. I had a whole stack of questions in a notebook that I had written out for the Mozambique trip for that first one.

54:26And I had a lot of phrases that I wanted to get translated into different dialects. So I had maybe nine, I think nine different dialects that I wanted things translated into. Just in case, I know which ones I'd use. but just in the off chance that I would use some of them and I didn't want to go back like I should have gotten that other thing Translated because now it makes more sense to have this other, you know, whatever Involved so there's a lot of that there's a lot of questions like some basic stuff that I was gonna ask about But then once I got over there and started talking to people then I wrote down and took so many notes on things that I never Would have even thought to have asked for acting this air -conditioned room taking down notes because one thing leads to another You get to know people you're having some drinks you're having a cigar or you're having a shared experience together You're learning about their background and you would never have thought to create a background because this is someone real And it was telling you a story about their childhood or about how they got to this place in life or what their time was like in the military in Africa or whatever it might be And you wouldn't have gotten that just by reading an article or typing in Mozambique on the in the search bar So when I went to Kamshaka, I took a lot less.

55:29I had a couple things I wanted to make sure I I touched on or asked about, but a lot less because I learned so much that wasn't even in my notes. But then when I went to Russia, it was very different. I thought it was gonna be, because I didn't take the time to think about it ahead of time, but I thought that everybody was gonna be open just like they were most of them being everyone wanted to talk to me about their country and the politics and their background got to Russia and I thought it was gonna be the same and very quickly realized that no, everyone was very guarded. And I think that's because for most of Russian history of someone who's asking you the types of questions that I was for a thriller, political thriller, espionage, though, that you weren't long for this world, off to the gulag with you type of a thing.

56:05So they were just inherently more guarded over there, which was interesting as well and also made it into the storyline. So for the next one COVID hit and so everything was shut down for the fourth novel. So most of my research was online. Luckily it was a domestically based storyline. So I'll let a lot of interviews just on Zoom or on the phone or via email. And so that's same thing with the next one. I couldn't get to Israel, because you get to Israel in middle of COVID, it was tough. Even if you were an Israeli citizen, it was tough to get in and out of there. Everything kept changing. So I had to do a lot of research for that one, just on my computer and reading books.

56:42And then I sent those chapters, though, the whole middle part of that last novel in the blood is in Israel. And I sent it to a family in Israel who had three generations read it. And someone in their 90s, someone in their 60s, someone in their 30s. and they all came back and said they couldn't believe that I hadn't been there. So that was... That's right. But research, a lot of times you don't know ahead of time, even in the outline, where something's gonna lead. And for this last, what a few points out a few rabbit holes. And I had people on the podcast who I wouldn't have normally read their book because there's so much else going on, but they're coming on the podcast.

57:15So I had to read the book, had to come up with questions, and then had a great conversation. And because of that, they made it in here. Made it into this last... Wow. So that's Brian Moore. That's a real content engine to have the podcast that I do to connect with the audience so that I can sell my book, facilitates conversations with people who end up becoming inspiration for storylines within the book, which I then sell to the audience that listen to the podcasts that I spoke about it on. Want more cross over than I initially anticipated and for the podcast. I thought podcast was just going to be something I did to, I can see a lot of questions on on social media that didn't really lend themselves to a one sentence answer.

57:55And so I thought, well, people are interested. I'll just have a guest on and talk about this issue. And it'll be a discussion and that'll be great and provide something of value. But there really is a lot of overlap in the last two books between the podcast and things that have made it into these stories. And in this one in particular, it was able Archer in this event in 1983 where he almost had nuclear exchange with the Soviet Union. And it was just, I knew a little bit about it, but not nearly as much as I did after I read those, that book which led me to two other books and then multiple conversations with Brian Moore about it.

58:25So good. What about national security issues when writing and getting clear and some stuff? Do you ever encounter problems with that? It's like what if you accidentally come up with a fictional strategy that the US is actually trying to use at the moment or something? I guess you can always run into something like that, but for me it was really the... Out of the gate, I wanted to make sure I was just doing the right thing. So I submitted the first one for review to the Department of Defense, Office of Pre -Publication and Security Review. It's called. And I was just close to my time, wrote it during that last year that I was in the military, that protagonist is a seal.

58:59But people think that seals are special operations guys in general, know a bunch of secret stuff. And that really wasn't my experience. My experience was that we're doing essentially what every major city SWAT team is going to do tonight. They're going to go serve a warrant. They're going to knock on somebody's door or not go in, grab them, bring them back. And that's really what we did, but we did it in places like Kabul or Mizzoul or Baghdad or Ramadi or whatever it was But very similar. I mean, you're going out with a group with a team. You have a target you go in you grab them You come back and do a little interrogation and go back out again So there wasn't really much secret about that But I want to be safe so I submitted it They took out nine sentences.

59:37I think it was not very many and I thought it was pretty good They said they'd get back in 30 days and they got back in 45 and I thought well for a huge bureaucracy That's great. So I submitted the second one, True Believer, and they took out, they took, well, I had to push the publication date because it wasn't 30 days, it wasn't 60, it wasn't 90. It was creeping up on seven months when they got back. So I had to push my publication date, which was not helpful. And they took out 54, I want to say 54, either sentences or paragraphs or words. And this time though, now I have lawyers. And so I had them tie each one of those redactions to a publicly available government document document.

1:00:14not something that's on Wikipedia or somebody else's book or somebody's interview, but things that anyone anywhere on the planet can get on a government website and download or see. And so they tied every single one of those, all 54, to publicly available US government documents. So that defended you against having them removed? It's an appeal. So they removed, go to publication with them removed, but now you have a certain amount of time to appeal. So I appealed and then I won on 37 even though they were all tied they let me win on 37 So then when the paperback came out I unredacted them So now people can compare the hardcover to the paperback It was so worried about And so next book salvage time I do the same thing This one they get back I think it was like six months six and a half five many five months at least So I almost had to push publication date got it back I think they took out let's say 30 or something like that and blinds So I did that same thing.

1:01:09I was going to planning on doing the same thing. I was planning on having the paper back and unredacting what I won on, because we tied all those things to publicly available government documents. But then they didn't let me appeal. This time they came back and they said we were, even though we were on time, it was all done properly. They would not look at the appeal. So now I took that as them telling me, hey kid, put bugging us with this fiction stuff. We have important government work to do here. So yes, now I don't submit, which I'm really glad I don't now, because for the last few books, all my research, if it's been into national security space, has touched on things that I had no experience with in the military.

1:01:46So for the devil's hand, that's BioWeapons Research or what they call BioDefense Research to get around certain conventions that were signed in the 70s. And then the one book right before this into AI and quantum computing from the national intelligence kind of apparatus, how that's being used there. So now I'm really glad that I don't submit them because they would probably be taking out things that they shouldn't be taking out because I didn't learn it through my government service. How interesting. It's so cool that people can get the paper back in the hard back and do their own investigative private eye thing to work out what it was that maybe the government was a bit concerned about and now they've worked it back and forth.

1:02:24Yeah, that's so fascinating. Yeah, there's one location in particular that's and I chose the location because I've been there before my time in the military And I'll can tell you what it is now because I won on the appeal But I put a CIA black site in Morocco and I chose Morocco because I'd been there before my time in the military I had such great memories of it. I loved it. Marrakesh I just remember the sights the sounds the smells it worked out geographically for my character to get where he needed to go So just it just works like created it out of whole plot I had never been to Morocco in uniform or through an intelligence service or anything like that.

1:02:57So they took out all the references to Morocco. I won these. That's why I'm talking about it. It's unappeal. But they took out references not just where it said Morocco. They took out Mourish architecture. They took out Alice Mountains. They took out anything that could give a hint. So what does that tell us? It tells us that there is probably a CIA black site in Morocco. And if they, but if they hadn't even done that, I would, I would, I was thought, and the reader or thought that I just made it up anyway. So I think they, or maybe, maybe this is them playing five dimensional chess. And it's a, I'm pretty sure it's flagging a CIA black site in Morocco.

1:03:33Yeah, I don't think so. I think I experienced government service tells me that they don't think that far ahead. Yeah, yeah, that's a nice, just way to say it. Wow. Yeah, I find that, I find that so interesting. Something else that's been fascinating to me, and I noticed this, are you familiar with Sean Ryan? Have you been on his show? I haven't been on his show, I know who he is, but we don't know each other. Yeah, he's an absolutely fantastic guy. And he did, he moved through a number of different military services and stuff. And I've noticed this, if I bring somebody that is a Navy SEAL or a Green Beret or a Marine or whatever on the show, there is one particular type of interpretation of that person's career, of what they do for a job of their role, et cetera, et cetera.

1:04:22And broadly, it's positive. If you bring somebody on that's X FBI or X CIA or X NSA, very different, very, very, very different, especially given the fact that many operatives phase out of their more kinetic first job into one of these three letter agencies to do something that, to be honest, as for all that I know as a British civilian, doesn't sound that dissimilar. Like it's the same skills, it's maybe slightly better kit or slightly cooler kit and it's a bit more clandestine and there's different security levels. What is it? Why is that the case? Why is the public's interpretation even in a broadly sort of pro patriotic, pro military, veteran audience?

1:05:11What is it do you think that's triggering those people to have a little bit of skepticism or distaste for the three letter agencies compared with people who could have gone on to three letter agencies but just happened to stop at Marine or Green Beret or whatever? I think we're naturally suspicious of authority, particularly when it comes to agencies in the federal government that operate under mandates that have a cloak of secrecy attached. I think there's generally, generally, a more positive outlook on the military because I'm going to get mad at the 18, 19, 20 -year -old, they just went over and did their job serve food in the choweline or whatever, and now they're back and whatever it might be.

1:05:54But then you get into some of these government agencies and we can go back to not too distant in our nation's history and go back to the church hearings or the Pike Committee hearings of the 70s that unveiled a lot of overreach by different agencies in the federal government in particular, the CIA, and kind of got the dirty laundry out there for all to see. And then of course, there are changes made and things that were put in place to supposedly keep some of those things from happening again. So I think there's a natural distrust of large government in general, and then you add to that, oh, this agency over here that's doing things in secret.

1:06:33Oh, you know what else they did in the past? They did these experiments on US citizens. Yeah, they may have been in a mental institution or a prison or a part of the military or college students, but they did them. And here's the documentation to prove it. Here's the testimony in front of Congress in the 70s. So I think there's this natural skepticism and distrust there that's not unfounded that isn't really there with the military. with the military, it's more like ineptitude when we look at the withdrawal of Afghanistan. And I think really when people look at that, they can say, you guys had 20 years to prepare for this and this is your best you could do.

1:07:13Like I don't have any experience in the military. I've never seen a military movie. I've never read a book on strategy or tactics, but I can look at a map and I can apply common sense to this problem and I can ask, wait, why are we giving up essentially the high ground here in Bogrum and putting our are young men and women at a tactically disadvantageous position at this airfield. Why didn't we just leave out of this other one that seems much more easily defendable? And that's a valid question to ask. So I think when we look at the military, it's more, and I mean, we as a whole, it's more that an aptitude that stands out to us, not necessarily a cloak and dagger type of secret operations using citizens unbeknownst to them or surveillance against US citizens or anything like that.

1:07:58I think it's more ineptitude on one side when you're looking at the military and then government agencies as a distrust. Yeah, like malice. Yeah, so it's like Hanlon's razor falls on either side depending on whether your military or intelligence service like do not attribute to malice that which can be explained by stupidity. The military is stupid and the intelligence services are malicious. It's interesting. Yeah, I find that very, very fascinating to think about, you know, So people who join, especially tons of people that join the CIA or the NSA or the FBI that I'm sure believe that they are serving their country in the best way possible.

1:08:37It's not easy necessarily to get into these agencies, hardworking individuals. And yeah, there's a branding problem, man. They need to get somebody in to sort out the branding and the interpretation. I found this stat earlier on, only 29 % of Americans aged 18 to 29 think that patriotism is very important compared to 62 % of those aged 65 or older and that is a very recent study. What do you think is happening with the state of American patriotism at the moment? Well, when I hear those stats, I attribute that to not attribute, but I think about it in terms of a younger generation who hasn't gone back into the pages of history to understand why we have the options and the opportunities and the freedoms that we have today.

1:09:24And what was sacrificed for us to have this amazing country. And then there's a lack of appreciation and a lack of respect for people from the inception of this country up until today who sacrificed everything so that we could be here making these decisions that we're making today really not for us but for the next generation and the next generation and the next generation and what's happening now I think and you're so easily manipulated today. So at the same time that we're not going back in the pages of history books and you know might not have a touch point with, let's say the World War II generation because they're dying off so fast now.

1:09:56There's not that many of them left. So you can't sit across the table and have a meal with somebody and hear that story from your grandfather who was there going over the beach in Iwajima or Normandy and you realize that wow this person did that at age 18 and then what they do they came home and they got back to work and he worked for all those years so we could provide for my father who in turn went to college who then allowed us to live in this house so that And I could go to like there's just that that chain there's a break in the chain as far as that as that Appreciation goes in that respect and just learning from the pages of history.

1:10:29So So that when we talk about that that's that the U .J. for just read right there those percentages anyway So I think that's that's a part of it. There's just a disconnect we're farther away from A generation that really did save the world for all for all intents and purposes And so there's that disconnect there. And then you add the social media to it and they easily, how easily reminipulated because of these things that we carry around right now in our pockets. So it helps to have a little bit of cynicism, I think, when you, when that thing buzzes and Twitter tells you something and influencer tells you something, a politician tells you something, a news organization tells you something.

1:11:07What do they want to get out of that? They want to response. So you're being manipulated right there. So at least just to recognize that, I think, before immediately getting angry and retweeting something. Well, hey, take a breath. You owe it to that person who sacrificed everything in the Revolutionary War, in the Civil War, in World War I, in World War II. So you could have these freedoms. Well, take a breath for them and study the issue a little bit. Put in that requisite time, energy, and effort. Ah, now make that decision. Not for you, but for your kid, grand kid, for those next generations.

1:11:41So I think a lot of that is lost in the generation that we have right now, not even the generation, in this fear that we're living in right now, where we are. So dependent on technology for our very mood, for our thoughts and behaviors. And so I think recognizing it first, and then taking action to correct it. If you want to, and then the sad part is, people might not want to correct that. They might be very happy, being manipulated from essentially cradle to grave. And that's not the way I want to live. But it might be once again, different strokes who knows. Well, the incentive is also a line to encourage people to be catastrophic or overblown or cynical in a negative light or cynical in a patriotic light or whatever about a number of issues because that's what resonates online.

1:12:31I'm really fascinated by this sort of pervasive culture of cynicism that we have, not skepticism, that's different cynicism. The world is bad, it's not going to get better and the people that believe that it can get better are the ones that are really the problem because they're giving everybody false hope and you're a piece of shit and you shouldn't listen to you. I'm fascinated by it, particularly because it seems so self -defeating. It seems electing to choose pessimism or cynicism when optimism is a chance to me. It just seems like a very odd road to go down yet. I understand why people do that because that's what's rewarded on the internet.

1:13:11It's very easy to look naive on the internet. If you have hope, if you believe that things can get better, if you encourage people to have faith that things are going to improve, it's very easy for somebody to bring that up in a couple of months or years time and say, look, see, it was you that was really the problem all along. There's this almost like intellectual immaturity that can be thrown at you, that you didn't really understand the truth about the world, it's much easier to get cynical and call it realism because no one's ever going to accuse you of being naive. No, that's exactly right.

1:13:45But it's a tough way to go. I was talking to somebody about this not too long ago, maybe a week or two ago, and they said, hey, you have to remain optimistic because then you'll never be able to manifest that in the future. And I thought, oh, that's an interesting way to put something thinking a lot about that because you can't, it's easy. It's easy to think, oh, geez, how are we ever going to pull ourselves out of this? We're destroying ourselves from the inside. That's what my fourth book was about essentially. It started being about what the enemies learned on us tactically on the battlefield in a rac and Afghanistan over the last 20 years at the time.

1:14:18And so that's what it started as. And then I started moving, then COVID hit. And I thought, oh, well, the enemies learning something about our response to COVID, how are How are they going to incorporate that? How are they going to use that in their future battle plans? And then a summer of civil unrest hit hard. And I thought, well, they're not just taking this in casually as they walk by the news feed. They're thinking about how they can exploit this, how can they exploit this division? Then we had a very contentious political season. And once again, they're figuring out how to how to widen those divides and those fissures and work those.

1:14:49So in doing all that research and writing that book for about a year and a half from the enemy's perspective, of the might take away was that, geez, if I was the enemy, I might not be doing much right now, except watching. Because we're doing a pretty good job of destroying ourselves from the inside. Let me fucking, let me give you this. I've been thinking about this for so long. There's two potential explanations for what is occurring to Western anti -Westernism, right? One of them is that these are seeds of discord sewn by malign foreign actors. It's the internet research agency coming out of Russia.

1:15:24It's Chinese, misinformation agents and all the rest of it That's the first one The second one is that Western anti -Westernism is coming endemically and intrinsically and endogenously from the West itself Which one is more fucking terrifying? Like is it more terrifying that you can be manipulated by a foreign actor that sets up 100 ,000 fake Twitter bots and then creates a cascade of anti -patriotism. Or is it even more terrifying that they're stood on the sidelines, ringing each other going, was this thing, was this movement where all of these riots, oh, they weren't. Oh, they're doing it to themselves.

1:16:07Oh, well, yeah, grab a coffee, let's go for a drink. And, yeah, those those are the two options. And both of them are pretty terrifying to me. And I don't know which one it is. Yeah, though, if it's the latter, then the enemy recognizes that by the enemy. I mean, Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, a super empowered individual or individuals, terrorist organizations. What do they need to give a little nudge just to help it along? It's got a little poke in the back. Yeah. What do you think, you mentioned China a couple of times that? I know that you've had Pete Desayan on the show. He's been on my show too.

1:16:40very impressive and terrifying individual. What is your read on the Chinese threat given the research that you've done over the last few years? Yeah, well, I like the way he articulates it because he still comes at all these scenarios from a position of hope and optimism, even when he's deep down into these numbers and he's looking at the China one -puch -I -one child policy and the same thing in Russia and what they're doing in their demographics and it knows, die for ethnic Russians and all of this. But when it comes to those like, Doomsday type scenarios, I really like how he is very logical about it.

1:17:18And when we hear once again, it's that manipulation side of the house when you're people throw that nuclear weapon in there, talking about Russia, Ukraine, and he talks about it from the perspective of, well, you want to take over Ukraine, you don't want to turn it into a nuclear wasteland if you want it. and you're going to get to the negotiating table at some point. The question is when, and that's the question. Then what are you going to negotiate out of it? What are they going to get? What is Ukraine going to get? What is Ukraine going to use? What is Russia going to lose? Everybody wins, everybody loses, but it's a negotiation.

1:17:49You're going to get there eventually, but you're not going to be able to get anything who will use nuclear weapons of any sort in Ukraine. So I like the way he brings, he talks about that and brings a very sane perspective to it. same thing talking about microchips in China versus microchips in Taiwan and and if they were to take over Taiwan, they wouldn't know how to continue to create microchips at the same level because there's differences between the ones made in China and the ones made in Taiwan. So I like that he brings things down into these kind of foundational elements that make sense logically rather he takes the hysteria out of it in a way that only began.

1:18:24So he's fascinating and the accidental superpower was one that I read on the way to Mozambique back then in the summer fall of 2016 when I got out of the military and really informed my second novel, True Believer. But I love his stuff and I love the way he presents it and he's just a fascinating individual. So he is probably the most certain man that I ever met in my entire life. For the people that haven't listened to this guy, you can go back and listen to the episode of Monom wisdom search Peter Zion. It's about ZEIHAN or I think you've had him on your show too. And he never speaks in caveats.

1:19:01He never speaks with, there's never any hedging, there's never any uncertainty. He is the most committed man ever. And there's a degree of comfort. I can kind of understand why he's got such a, it's almost rabid, his audience online. Like they follow him around the internet. They really love Peter. And I think that in a world where everybody's quite uncertain and very few people are prepared to do the original research that obviously he has, or it seems like he has to have arrived at the conclusions that he has done. What he does is he provides a degree of safety, almost like a comfort blanket, because he gives in a world of chaos he is able to create some order.

1:19:43He is able to say, this is what's happening, this is what will happen, this is why, these are the stats that back up the reason why it's occurring. There's no ifs, ands or buts about it, no hedging, no nothing. But it is very, it's very odds to hear in a way to hear somebody that convicted about anything. It's like, yeah, because you know, I can't counter him. I just want to learn through our conversations. He's been on twice. I think both of them are my most downloaded podcasts, I think. But he's so certain and very rarely can I come back and challenge him on anything because he has done that research.

1:20:19and put in he knows those numbers and not only does he know these numbers, he knows the history behind them and where they're going and how they relate to these other factors and it's, I don't know anybody else that can do it the way he does it. It's very unique. What is the message that you hope people take away from the book? I know that it's supposed to be thrilling and entertaining and all the rest of it, but deeper philosophically, ethically, symbolically, what is it that you're hoping people take away from when they read your series? Yeah, so there's each one you can read at a few different levels.

1:20:53And at its base level, I want these just to be time well spent for someone who's not getting that time back. So that's the main thing it has to be about, it has to be about that story every single time. But it can be a different story for a different person. If you grab this thing off the shelf and a Hudson News on the way to your flight and just read it and it's action and adventure political intrigue, espionage awesome and then you move on to the next one or get back to work when you're when you're home. That's one way. The other way is to read it a little bit deeper and that first one especially but all of them to some extent are really about someone who becomes the opposite of what he was.

1:21:27So in this case he becomes the terrorist, he becomes the insurgent, he becomes that person that he has been training to kill and going out into Iraq and Afghanistan over these years and meeting on the battlefield. He becomes that person now on home soil. So they're about that. And then a little deeper than that, they're about somebody who brings the war from Iraq and Afghanistan back to the front doorstep so people who have been sending young men and women to their deaths for those 20 years that we were in Afghanistan. So there's a few different ways that you can read it. And then for me growing out reading all the masters, reading AJ Quinnell and JC Pollock and Mark Olden, Tom Clancy and Louis Lamore and David Morrell and Nelson DeMille and all these guys in the 80s who had these amazing books.

1:22:11I would always find these sentences or maybe it was a paragraph and it would speak to me in some way like, oh, I should know more about that or I'd like to know more about that. But it's just thrown in there. I understand it because of the context that it's in. But obviously, the author has done some more research. It's in there for a reason. And now that's leading me down another path. It's a research this and lead a richer, fuller life because of it. So there's that side of it too, but there's not an underlying message of trying to sway someone. If there is anything like that, it's looking at the protagonist, looking at the thing through his eyes and realizing that he's a student.

1:22:48And in this case, he's a student of warfare. For me, I'm a student of warfare. I'm a student of this craft. I'm going to say is there are a lot of you do you find a lot of you in the protagonists? I mean he's got a background similar to mine. He's a former Navy seal and listed sniper who became an officer and then I was a sniper and I became an officer and The reader meets him at this stage in his life when he's probably not going to lead guys tactically on the battlefield anymore And that's what it was like when I got back from my last Iraq deployment I realized that was the last time I tactically maneuver guys on the battlefield and going forward It's me in a staff job somewhere which I would hate and then coming back as a team commanding officer which sounds impressive, but in today's military that you're really back in a tactical operation center, you're allocating papers or you're more of a manager, but it sounds impressive.

1:23:31But somebody has to do those jobs. Just wasn't me. I came in to do that tactical level job right here. And did that came home and that's when I picked my head up, looked around and realized my family needed me. We have a middle child with severe special needs who needs 24, 7 full -time care forever. So I realized that that's my mission, making sure that he's taking care of I remember him into an Ulta next, turned him into an Ulta. Right, and then it was no choice. I was, there it is, and yeah, just gave me that. So my mission was essentially handed to me, but my passion was writing, and I got to combine those two.

1:24:04But yeah, I would say there's, yeah, there's definitely a lot of me in James Reese for sure, but he's faster than I am stronger than I am, a better shot than I am, better to do, better boxing. He's better at all those things than I could ever have hoped to have been. But he's a student and has a mind. So I think that if there's anything that one could take away from these other than the underlying underpinnings of the story, that is the importance of being a student, because that is the way we continue to build on whatever foundation that we have up to this point, is by always being a student, whether it's of an industry or of life in general.

1:24:38And that's just the way I look at things. Jack Ha, ladies and gentlemen, why should people go if they want to keep up to date with all of the stuff that you're doing at the moment? Oh man, you're awesome. It's officialjackar .com. That is the website and you can link there to Instagrams, Jackkar USA on Instagram and Twitter, which are still me and I try to say thank you to everybody and hit that little heart button because it means so much to be that people really took a risk on me and allowed me to do what I love, which is the writing. So I look at it as a way to do that. So yeah, that's the website that and then Danger Close Podcast of course.

1:25:11And then the next, the next novel is only the dead is out now. and as soon as this week is over, I dive back into number seven and start putting some more tweaks on the the Bay Area Barric's bombing, nonfiction work that comes out in about a year and a half. Time right. Good luck mate. I appreciate you. Thank you. Hey, thanks so much. Take care.