The Evolution of “Reacher”: Andrew Child on “Exit Strategy”

0:00Exit Strategy, the gentleman that made that first phone call requesting for help, there's more to this guy and he's actually a little bit of a badass. The exit strategy is the 30th in the series, which is mind-blowing, really. We came up with the idea of having this person essentially reach out to Reacher for help. That's something that I think people can relate to, you know? Because despite everything that's going on in the world, people fundamentally still want to help one another, want to be decent to one another. You brought a lot of current things into this novel. You know, Lee, my brother, started the series.

0:35He wanted me to help to kind of nudge, reach it more into the current world. If you are existing in the world today, doing the kind of things they're doing, what else would be involved? The social media, the monetarization, all of that would be part of it. It takes the book to another level. That right there just grabs me even further and pulls me into the pages. And that's what you've done for me so far in this book.

1:04What's up, everybody? I'm here today with Andrew Child. He is the author of the Reacher series. What I'm talking about is a book today called Exit Strategy. And I've had the pleasure to preview this book before it's out. And I'm going to tell you what, this man, this writer had me going from Word 15. So, Andrew, welcome to the show, man. Well, thank you, Sean. It's an absolute pleasure to be here. Thank you for having me as a guest. It's a pleasure to have you. I've been looking forward to this for quite some time, right? So when I get the opportunity to talk to people like you that have done amazing things and written amazing books that kind of twist the mind a little bit.

1:43And what I've found is really kind of crazy because I get a chance to preview a lot of books. And some of them I just can't get into. But there's been a specific set of books that I'm always able to latch onto right away. And it's in the genre of your writing. And I looked at my wife last night and she goes, are you still reading? I'm like, yeah, I am. And she goes, well, you know what? That's really odd for you because you'll lose interest really quickly and you don't really stick to books much. I said, yeah, but these types of books really simulate my mind. And it makes sense because when I watch TV, I like to watch the true crime stories.

2:19I like to watch all the stuff that most people get really, really scared about.

2:26Yeah, I can understand that. And I think, you know, in terms of why somebody gets either gets drawn into a book or doesn't, I think it really comes from two angles, because part of it is down to the reader. It's just whatever interests you, whatever you are drawn to. And if you come across somebody that says, oh, I don't like to read, what that really means is they haven't found the right books yet, you know, because especially at school, you know, when I was growing up in England, there were certain books that you were supposed to read, certain books that you were supposed to like. And if you happen to not like those, you know, the teachers would be mad at you.

3:02It would be as if you were, you know, letting yourself down in some way. And you were kind of forced to keep going down that path. And it was the wrong path for you. It was just all about just keeping looking around. There are so many different kinds of books, you know, out there, so many different authors, so many different genres. There's something out there for everyone. And so, you know, people will find books they like if they keep looking. but it's also in terms of the kind of books that we write you know that's that's it's a delight to hear you say that because you know I think it doesn't happen by accident it's something that we work very very hard to to make happen it's part of the kind of craft of of what we do is making it so that you know the words that you know they're the little squiggles on the page but they also they're like little hooks you know the idea is that they get they hook into you and take hold and they drag you through the story from page one through to the end if you're doing the job right.

4:00So it's wonderful to hear that once you, you know, once you pick the book open and you look at that first page that there's something there that grabs you. Well, I appreciate that because, you know, like you said with school, you know, you go to school, especially, you know, here in America, like here's the books you're reading this year, right? You're going to read To Kill a Mockingbird, which honestly bored me. I know it's a great book, but I didn't really like it. The only book that I really enjoyed was Catcher in the Rye. Right. So like, because it was edgy, you know, like I could see myself stem white in that story.

4:32And when I'm previewing exit strategy, it's visual to me, Andrew, it truly is. And that, that is a gift that you have in, in these, in these series, because I'm reading through the first eight chapters and I'm seeing everything that goes on and where I can see it, right? Because it makes sense. It's very, it was broken down. It was very obvious what the scenes were. But when you're able to give the reader the art of visualization, it takes the novel, it takes the book to another level. And that's what you've done for me so far in this book. Well, thank you. Yeah. And I mean, that's what I try and do.

5:11I didn't invent this. So I can't remember who did somebody described um one way of writing as being as if you are it's as if you're a journalist reporting on um scenes but the scenes only happen in your head you know so you you start off by imagining it seeing what you see and then you try to get that that down on the page for for other people and then the the the trick is getting the correct amount because it's too much detail absolute nightmare everybody's bored um not enough detail then people can't picture it fully so it's trying to get just that that exact right i think it might have been stephen king who said that um it the detail that you put in is like the spice that you put in a recipe you know you don't you want just the right amount too little you don't taste it overwhelms you so um and that sort of thing there's no golden rule to it there's nothing that you can that you can formally learn And it's almost an instinctive thing that just comes from years of reading because every author is firstly a reader.

6:14That's how you decide that you want to be an author. You don't decide that you want to write books if you don't enjoy reading. And so, you know, you just learn over the years. You kind of absorb almost like some kind of osmosis, you know, the amount of detail that is going to be just right to portray the scenes that way. Well, it's surely an art form, right? It's surely an art form. And the one thing, the other thing that I want to edify you on is you brought a lot of current things into this novel. Or you talk about social media, right? And you talked about, you know, the DOD and potential types of way to monetize live feeds.

6:53That's what's going on in our world. So that right there just grabs me even further and pulls me into the pages because social media and media is my world. That's what I do. And I can see where you are going with it. I'm like, oh my gosh, this is so applicable. This is how people think right now. How can we monetize this, right? Whether it's patches on a uniform, right? Or product placement, you really start touching on that in this book. Yeah, well, you know, one of the things, you know, Lee, my brother started the series, and then he wrote 24 books. Yeah, this is amazing, because actually, Exit Strategy is the 30th in the series, which is mind-blowing, really.

7:35But after 24 books, he asked me to come on board with him, and we did a few together, and then one of the ones that I did on my own. The only thing he really said to me when we started working together was that he wanted me to help to kind of nudge Reacher into more into the current world with technology. Because, you know, all of those years ago when Reacher stuck, I wasn't social media. You know, people barely had eaten back then. People really didn't know what the internet was. And so that part of the world has really, really moved on and um Lee was feeling after he was 24 that maybe Reacher had fallen a little he liked Reacher being a little bit behind the curve because it kind of makes it makes Readers feel good if they know a little bit more about certain things than the than the hero but he felt it had gone too far and had fallen too far behind and so um he asked me to kind of nudge him in that direction so yeah one of the things I was thinking about with exit strategy was really um not just behavior of not just the everyday behavior of the characters, but, you know, more the sort of the bigger picture for them.

8:47If you are existing in the world today, doing the kind of things they're doing, what else would be involved? You know, and it's strongly that all of the things that you mentioned, the social media, the monetarization, all of that would be part of it. So it was almost essential to put it in, I thought, because otherwise you would feel like you weren't writing, you weren't setting the story in the real world you were setting it in you know some vacuum that didn't really exist and i think what's important andrew because when you read something you want to escape a little bit you want to have some imagination but you also want it to apply to what you can wrap your mind around and that was one of the special things about the first eight chapters that i've gone through is it's like man he's really tying this all together but the other thing outside of the visualization and the connectedness to our actual society that we have here in America is, you know, it was emotion.

9:44Like I could feel, I don't want to ruin it, but one of the characters emotion with that note, right? That the, you know, all this stuff and then the please, like that one word, that one word and actually shifted Reacher's mindset during the actual meeting to take action and put himself at risk. It did, yeah. And I mean, that is really one of the crucial kind of mechanisms of any book like this, because you've got your hero. Every book, he has to get involved in some crazy scheme that some bad guy is running. and so the most difficult thing and particularly after 29 other books is how do you do that in a new different way um there's the old joke about um agatha christie's character miss marple you know everybody says that if you were checking into a hotel and miss marple was in line ahead of you you would just turn around and leave because you knew somebody who was getting murdered that weekend And so, you know, how do you come up with a scenario that Reacher plausibly gets drawn into some bigger scheme?

10:56And we feel that, you know, there's always going to be a coincidence of some kind. You know, Reacher's sitting on a bus next to someone who's in trouble. He sees somebody getting kidnapped. He, you know, walks into a room. It's a kind of wrong place, wrong time dynamic. And we feel like, you know, readers will kind of give you one pass. You can have one of those coincidences in the book to get the ball rolling. That's all you get. And generally, that's how you get the character drawn into the story. And so this time, yeah, we came up with the idea of having this person essentially reach out to Reacher for help, even though he actually, it was mistaken identity.

11:35He thought Reacher was something else, but he needed help. And that's something that I think people can relate to, you know, because despite everything that's going on in the world, it really does seem that people fundamentally still want to help one another, want to be decent to one another. And the idea that somebody, some stranger asks you for help, you know, what would you do? I think most people, if they were capable, they would try to help. And I think that's something that people can relate to. Using the words out of my mouth, that was going to be my next point, right? Is, you know, at the very core of a human being, if we see someone in trouble, we want to help.

12:12like truly want to help to a point of maybe even putting ourself at risk. So I love, I love what you did there. The other thing that I saw early on was an evolution of a character, right? With the gentleman that made that, that text message, that first phone call requesting for help and then slid the note at the very beginning, I looked at that character and like, okay, he's very fragile. He's very scared. He's very timid, but wait a second. There's more to this guy, and he's actually a little bit of a badass.

12:45Yeah, I mean, when you first meet him, you know, he's at a really low ebb. He's in trouble. He's frightened. He doesn't know what to do. He basically just wants to run away and disappear. But, you know, Reacher just steps up, and, you know, maybe having Reacher at his side, you know, gives him that opportunity to, you know, get back to his real self. You know, not be timid and frightened and actually, you know, not only stick around and stay in the fight, but actually participate and really contribute because there are certain things, certain skills Reacher doesn't have. He's not great with technology.

13:25He's not great with computers. So somebody there that does know how to do that kind of thing really added something to Reacher, I think. Well, yeah, and it plays on that word called collaboration, which is so important in an everyday life, right? You know, and again, the thing that I want to ask you, because I've been really thinking about this over the last month and a half, you know, as you said, Lee started, your brother started the series, and then you're now working with him. And this is one that you, you know, you did, I think you said you did this one on your own, right? I did, yeah. There was a show created from this series.

13:59I mean, that has to be something that you guys, I hope you look back and be like, wow, this is something that we did together and it's a pretty amazing feat. it is it's it's it's you know and particularly for my brother i'm delighted because he started out in television um you know behind the scenes uh stuff um in tv in england and um he wound up writing because he you know he got fired from his job and couldn't work in tv anymore so it's actually lovely for him to be on almost full circle you know he's he's now uh you know i can focused on the books and his focus is more on the TV universe because there's the show about Reacher himself, which is just by doing a magnificent job with.

14:48And very shortly, there'll be a spinoff show involving one of the subsidiary characters. So, you know, the TV universe is starting to expand as well. That's really cool. And I want to edify Lou real quick because, you know, what he did in that moment where he was, you know, let go from his job, he found a way to still put out art. And then years later, you know, he's back in that TV. So I want the audience to understand that no matter what you're going through, no matter what is happening in your life, it could only be temporary. And you never know if you're going to be led back to that point.

15:19So don't burn the bridge, just move forward and do what you can do at that moment. What are your thoughts on that? Yeah, I think you're absolutely right on that. And I think, you know, Lee's a great example because what seemed like potentially the end of the world at the time, you know, I remember back, all of those years ago. He's married, he's got a kid, he's got a mortgage, he's got to put food on the table, and he gets fired. It was a complicated situation. The TV corporation had taken a different direction, really. They were not doing things that he approved of or that he liked. New technology had come in, which squeezed the number of people that they needed to produce the shows.

16:03So it was just a bad, bad situation that wound up with him being discarded. And so, you know, suddenly faced, you know, I think he was maybe 40 years old, he's got all of these commitments and responsibilities, and on the face of it, no way to fulfill them. I mean, that could seem like the end of the world, it could seem like an absolute disaster. And it, you know, it certainly was a difficult situation to be in. But you're right, if you look at it positively, then you can say, well, rather than looking at which doors have closed, you know, which doors have opened as a result, you know. And so he took a huge leap of faith.

16:40He, you know, bought a pad of paper and a pencil and decided is reinventing himself as an author. And, you know, it worked spectacularly well for him. And as you say, back to kind of where he was, and great that you don't burn the bridges, because, you know, it might feel satisfying in the moment, but longer term, you know, is that really paving the path to success? Probably not. So it does show that, you know, it's the attitude that you adopt when you face these kind of bad situations that goes a long way to determining the outcome. I love that because that's the basis of this show, right? I really want, no matter who I interview, I want to bring some level of real life adversity and how to overcome it.

17:20And we don't always have to know how it's going to turn out, right? A lot of times when people say they're going to do something, I'm going to do this, but I expect this and it's a quid pro quo. And that's not how it usually works, right? You got to make sure that, okay, I'm going to do this because I have a passion for it and I'm going to fight through this and not judge what the outcome is, but those moments that Lee had and that you've had, you know, throughout your career, you know, the books and the bestsellers, that's great. But the gift is right here is the journey of it, right? I often look back at certain milestones that I want the show to hit and we hit it.

17:57And it's all of a sudden for that brief moment, Andrew, I'm lost. I'm like, what now? Because the fun was the pursuit. Yeah. And I remember it was a different scenario entirely, but the first house that I bought in England years and years ago, it was a real fixer-upper. You know, it was, it was, the bones were great, but it was in, it was in terrible, terrible shape. So I worked on that house every available moment, you know, every weekend, every evening when I got home from my job, everything went into into fixing up that house, room by room, floor by floor. And I remember so clearly the first weekend after it was finally finished, I was just sitting on the couch thinking, well, what do I do, you know, because for three years, you know, every moment I had gone into this project.

18:46And then when you don't have, you know, that project is finally done, you know, years and years, you think it's never going to finish, all kinds of things go wrong along the way. Obviously, you learn a lot along the way, hopefully. But you get to the certain point, I can completely appreciate what you say because you've then got to kind of decide, okay, you've got to shift your focus, haven't you? And say, what's next? Where's the new horizon? Absolutely. I was loving this conversation. It's just so deep and it's something the listeners can really relate to because not everybody can relate to writing all these different books and doing something so publicly.

19:19they maybe do something privately and they're afraid to get it out. So, you know, don't be afraid, you know, move forward and, and put your artwork out because the world needs more great artists. I don't care what it is. I don't care if it's a musician, an author, you know, a show host, whatever it is, get that out there, right? Because it helps you along the way, find out who you truly are. Because a lot of times people look at, you know, someone say, Andrew, what are you? I'm an author. No, that's something that you do. Right. And there, there has to be a massive opportunity to detach from who you really are to what you do.

19:51Right. And I just feel that people do struggle with that. That is a huge point. You're absolutely right. You know, in our society, we're slow conditioned to kind of define ourselves in different ways. And one of the main ways is by your job, you know, you're in a bar, you're at a party, even a bus stop or something, people will always say, Oh, what do you do? And then, then you, you know, you, you, you, you say, you know, whatever your job is. But you're right, it's not who you are, it's what you do. But it's actually something that I found a useful stepping stone along the way, because other jobs that I had towards the end, I mean, I had some really fun years in previous careers, but towards the end, I was fed up with it.

20:33I was disillusioned, and I wanted to change. I wanted to become an author. And so, if people asked what I did, I'd say, oh, well, I work in telecoms, but I'm going to be an author. And then not only was I thinking, well, you don't really want to be defining yourself by what you do, but I also started thinking, well, excuse me, people, this is what I'm going to do. So really, I ought to actually do it or else, you know, shut up about it. So it was like a spinoff of that process. But you're right. I mean, what you do should be, you could use it as a way of expressing yourself rather than defining yourself.

21:08It's very well said. You know what I ponder a lot? the question of what is it that you do? What do you do for a living? Sometimes I feel it's a measuring stick to see if you're above somebody on par or they're below you. What are your thoughts on that? Yeah, I think you're right because people, in a way, they like to sort of have that kind of social hierarchy in their head and they, you know, if they're like, oh, you only do such and such, you know. And there are not many, not many, but I've met a few people over the years who have, you know, they're super intelligent, super well-educated, very, very talented people.

21:45And they have realized that if they get a mainstream job, you know, that pays a good wage and gives you a company car or whatever, that is just going to take up all of their time and mean that they cannot devote the time to whatever artistic or creative thing they want. So they have deliberately taken jobs that a lot of people, the truth is it's wrong, But the truth is, a lot of people would look down on, like driving a bus, for example. You know, I know a guy who's extremely talented in two or three different fields, and he chooses. He could do anything else that he wanted to do, but he chooses to drive a bus because then he has time to do other things that are more fulfilling creatively.

22:25And not many people have really got the courage to do that because you feel yourself drawn into that trap of, you know, someone's going to ask you what you do and it has to be the right answer. It has to be respect. My parents were very much like that. I think if their attitude had been different, I really love, I like making things. I like making things out of wood and metal. I like repairing things. I like machines. I like how machines work. I like fixing stuff up around the house. And I think without, you know, my parents had this enormous urge for me and my brothers to be respectable and do professional type jobs, you know, and they think without it was just so, it was so, you know, deep seated when I was growing up.

23:17It was one of those things I couldn't really see beyond it. I didn't really recognize that that could have been an alternative. So, kind of pushed down the road that they wanted. But I think I would have done better and been happier if I could have done something more practical and more, you know, but it was delayed by the time I figured that out. So this is the road going on. But yeah, there is certainly a pressure in society to have the right kind of job. And you're absolutely right when you say that a lot of the time when people ask that is because they're looking to sort of, you know, say, oh yeah, well I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm higher up the pyramid than he is.

23:57It's really funny because, you know, I frequent the same coffee shops and everything like that at different times of the day. And it's always comes up. What do you do? Like what, like you're here a lot. What do you, what do you do, man? And I tell him, I tell him this is what I do. Here's my show. Go check it out. And it's so funny because I went and got a coffee before I came here. Right. And, and, and the gentleman working the drive-thru, I said, have you listened yet? And he's like, no, but I searched you and I found you. When you left that day, I had to figure out, is this dude really legit?

24:24And it's almost like, yeah, once you tell somebody you have a podcast, they're like, okay, dude, who doesn't, right? Who doesn't have a podcast? Anybody with a phone or anybody with a laptop can create one, but it is a special thing to create a successful one. So I always feel that even when I say, hey, I'm a show host, I have this podcast called The Determined Society. this is the kind of guests we have this is what we cover they're still like all right dude as soon as i turn my back the google search who was this guy because there's that that thing like is this person really who he says he is and it's kind of a weird thing in society it is but you know i can relate because we we get exactly the same thing um as authors you know my wife is also an author and if we're if we're out somewhere you know on a make you're on vacation or you you're at a at a party or something and people ask you yeah you can see and but oftentimes you barely kind of walked away before they're pulling their phones out and you know exactly is this guy real yeah yeah but that's another funny thing about your study now isn't it unless it unless somebody can verify it on the uh on the internet then they don't but they don't believe it but we were where were we were um we actually visited the galapagos islands a couple years ago beautiful and we were on a boat, you know, traveling around the islands and there was no, there was no internet on the boat.

25:48So there were only 16 people on the boat. So you got to know the other people pretty well. And, you know, you'd be at dinner at lunch or walking around the islands and chatting. And it was, it, everybody took a couple of days. They felt very weird and disjointed because you'd be having a conversation. There'd be some question would come up, you know, who was it that was in that's such and such a movie or, you know, who scored the goal in whatever match. And every first couple of days, everybody's just whipping out their phones instinctively, you know, by habit. It didn't do any good because there was no signal.

26:22And so just going back to that way that we used to live where everything that you interacted around was based on something that you'd already known or something that you'd read or something that you'd thought about, as opposed to something coming from outside of you, you know, on the internet or, you know, on social media or wherever else. It's like your social media or your internet presence is your currency. It's interesting. Real quick though, because my wife is from Quito, Ecuador. How beautiful is that country? Absolutely stunning. I absolutely love Ecuador. Yeah. We've been back since because we we loved it so much and i felt a little guilty because um i didn't before the first time i visited i didn't really know much about ecuador um and in fact it was the first time i've been anywhere in south america so we arrived and i couldn't believe it it was absolutely gorgeous and um we we we spend as much time as we could there and then have been back since and yeah if anybody has the opportunity is ecuador you should absolutely do it it's beautiful i remember uh so again, we went for the first time in July.

27:33We have like, we have three kids, dude. I mean, I hadn't been to Ecuador and there are times where it's a little bit more dangerous in South America and you don't want to go there at those given times. So my wife, I was always telling me these stories of, you know, bad things that happened there when she was a kid. And then, you know, the roads, they're mountainous. And I'm like, dude, I'm scared to go here. I didn't, I didn't want to go, Andrew. I was like, can we go somewhere else? Can you please go somewhere i said i want to do this but when i got there as soon as i hopped in the uber and i saw all the andes mountains and it was just this big weight lifted off my shoulders and i think next next year this coming summer we're going to do the galapagos so thank you for the warning that there's no internet yeah well actually i think this is this is a couple years ago but i think i think with everything i think they probably do but yeah it was it was just a fun experience but the Galapagos, you're going to love it.