Marshall Karp's Killer Secrets: Writing Thrillers that Pack a Punch

All right, so you're cooler than they said.

You promise not to make me look old and stupid?

I can help you on the old.

I can't help you on the stupid.

Hey there.

Your buddy Dave Temple here saying thank you for pushing play on this 217th episode of the Thriller Zone, voted by you as your number one favorite thriller fiction podcast.

So out of the gate, thank you for that.

Today I have something pretty special for you.

I'm sitting down remotely with with one of the grand masters of crime, police procedural and domestic thriller fiction.

He's only one of the biggest names in the biz.

In fact, he has worked alongside easily the biggest thriller author in the world today, James Patterson.

This guy, my new best friend, has written more than a dozen number one New York Times bestsellers.

Who is it?

Marshall Karp.

And he has a smash of a hit on his hands.

In fact, as you'll hear shortly, this is one hell of a book.

I won't go on about it now and instead let you stay for the juice.

So without teasing you any longer, let you and I get into the Thriller Zone with Marshall Karp.

All right, already.

You're.

You're.

I want to hang with you.

And you're in where, California?

I'm in San Diego.

Oh, wow.

I lived in LA for a couple years.

Yeah, Hollywood.

Marshall, I know something about you.

If.

And people hear me talk about this all the time.

I'm always talking about having face to face conversations, and they're very hard to pull off because nobody ever wants to travel much these days.

But I do a few shows out of Los Angeles and I'll do the show in a studio we have rigged up there.

And I spoke to your PR people and I said, is there any way in the world I can get marshalled with a face to face?

Can I sit down?

Oh, no, he's.

You do know who you're talking about.

He doesn't go anywhere for anyone.

And I'm like, well, frick it.

So I knew I.

I had this feeling.

I'm like, if I could sit down with this cat, we would have so much fun.

Because you can re.

When you're breathing the same air, it's just.

There's magic that nobody quite fully appreciates.

You're the best thing to happen to me today since Christian radio.

Praise the Lord.

Oh, Jesus.

Stop.

Yo.

All right, behave.

Well, you do know that I.

Well, you don't know this because you don't know me, but I grew up as a pk.

That's a preacher's kid.

So I.

I have seen it all, my friend.

Yeah, I've seen.

No, listen, I got stories.

And, and it was preacher Temple.

Yeah, Pastor Temple.

Sure.

Yeah.

Get that.

You like that.

Can't get any more religious than David Temple in, In.

In Texas.

In where?

Carolina?

North Carolina.

North Carolina.

My daughter's in Charlotte.

That's where I was, baby.

Well, it's the best.

No, really, it is the best.

My family's there.

How you doing?

Look at this.

Look at this bad boy we're talking about.

Don't tell me how to die.

Hey, Marshall.

Don't you tell me how to die.

Don't you tell me what to tell you.

Don't you tell me what not to tell you about how to die or not to die.

This is going well so far, David.

Yeah.

All right, ladies and gentlemen, Marshall Carp.

I'm not going to go down all the accolades.

Everybody does that, Marshall.

And I'm written this many, you know.

Everybody knows you, for crying out loud.

I mean, you're.

You're a legend in your own mind.

So here's the thing.

Now on your website, I love this description because this pulled me in.

In high school, I was voted most likely to kill someone to get what she wants.

25 years later, I'm dying, and there's something I have to do before I run out of time.

All right, I want to decide where I.

Where I insert my geek factor for the show.

Can I.

Can I geek out now or should I hold my geek for later?

Should I yell out nerd alert, or should you just go for it?

I'm just gonna go for it.

All right, well, first of all, there's four points I want to make, and then we're gonna get into the book.

But a couple of just a few things right off the top, Maggie's a force to be reckoned with.

She's a 43 year old woman who's gotten a terminal diagnosis, and she's embarking on a mission to find the perfect successor to her role as mother and wife.

Number two, I really, really, really.

And I like people who use lots of reallys.

Really like your writing style.

Number three, it's easily.

And if you knew me better, Marshall, you'd know this easily one of the best books I have read.

The show is in its eighth season.

We're approaching four years in June.

It's in the.

It is the.

In the top three books I've read in that entire time of this podcast.

No bullshit.

I don't smell any.

And number four, P.S.

i started reading this yesterday.

Morning because I had been stacked and packed, just trying to get ahead of things.

I started reading.

I went to the gym about 6 o'clock yesterday morning, came home for breakfast and started reading.

Over breakfast.

I finished it in time for dinner.

As I went to prepare dinner for my wife, because I'm that kind of husband, and I thought, wow.

I turned to my wife, Tammy, you'd love her.

I said, tammy, when's the last time you saw me devour a book this fast?

And she said, quote, never.

Thanks.

Yeah, it's the book.

It's my 15th book.

And David, I don't know how long it would take you to write a book, but it takes me about a year, year and a half.

I'm into the characters I know, and I wrote a bunch of books for James Patterson, created the NYPD Red series, and I got really good at it.

And I'm one of those old school guys who refuses to phone it in.

I want my next book to be better than my last book.

I'm proving something to my late father who's been gone all these years, and I just want to.

I want to do it right.

And so writing another book in the same genre, the same vein as I've been writing, I did one of those, you know, is this still all there is?

And I said, I want to go outside my comfort level.

I want to do something.

And this, well, not.

The book didn't come to me.

The character came to me.

She just popped into my head and it was seven years ago.

It doesn't take seven years.

My first book took five years.

This is my 15th.

It took.

And it's because.

Oh, first of all, spoiler alert.

It's Maggie's the protagonist.

She's the first person voice.

And I did not grow up as a teenage girl.

I didn't marry a successful, handsome doctor and birthed three kids.

I didn't come from a big Irish family that is like bonded like crazy glue.

And yet I had to figure out how to capture her.

And the more she told me her story, and by the way, it's what she read.

In the beginning, I was going, this is a great family drama, girl.

But we do speak to our characters.

You know, sometimes we just type for them and let them talk.

Sure.

I go, I write thrillers.

And that's when she said that line you read up front, that I happened to mention that in high school, I was voted most likely to kill someone to get what she.

And I go, ooh, yeah, now, now you have to figure it out.

And you have to be true to the story.

I mean, she's dying.

We can't say at the last chapter.

Oh, wait, it was a lab mistake.

No, she's on a journey.

I want.

But how do you figure out an ending as a thriller writer that is going to blow your audience away?

And let me tell you, pants down, you never saw it coming.

Just.

Just tell them Snookered.

And the biggest trick of all, I think, correct me if I'm wrong, you thought it's not really a thriller.

Halfway through, Right?

You go, it's.

But I like Maggie.

It's a family drama.

Do.

What the.

Yeah, that was you.

You.

Tammy called me.

She told me all about it.

Yeah.

Let me tell you a couple of things.

First of all, that opening scene is its own world.

You had me at the opening scene, which, you know, if you don't have me at the opening scene, I'm.

I'm promising you right now.

I'm.

I'm.

I'm admitting something.

Maybe I shouldn't.

But if you don't grab me in the opening scene or the opening chapter, I'll give you the opening chapter, because I'm that guy.

I will not go on the ride with you.

I got too much to do, Marshall.

Too many things to.

I'm coming back from prostate cancer.

I'm on top of the world now.

My health is back.

But I learned a little.

Yeah, knock on that wood, baby.

Because I.

I learned something, Tammy, and I live by this.

This philosophy.

Now, if I only had this year to live, would you spend your time doing blank.

And I'm.

I'm not doing that on books, man.

And I'm reading this first chapter.

I'm like, she doesn't hold me.

I got.

I don't know how much time I got.

I'm just gonna.

I'm not.

I might not read this.

So, to your point, too much melodrama there.

But it's not really melodrama.

It's reality.

But I'm reading this.

I'm a couple of chapters in.

I'm like, wait a minute.

I thought it was going to be this at the beginning.

And I'm just about to put my foot on the brake and I'm going, well, I mean, the family drama is nice.

Who doesn't like a little family drama?

But.

And then you throw a little hook in there, a little.

A little sideways sidewinder, and I go, wait.

Holy.

I didn't see that coming.

And then within minutes, I was so obsessed.

I haven't been this obsessed with a book in a long Time.

Now, a lot of people who listen to the show going, Dave, you know, you say a similar thing, and I'm like, no, no, this is all straight up.

This is going to be a book that everybody is going to want to read, because I have never read anything quite like it in the way.

And I'm going to stop there because I just absorb that for just a moment.

My buddy Marshall, my buddy David, who, bro, that is just smoking.

All right, let's get, let's get.

Let's dive into it.

How do we get people to want to read it?

I don't care if they get it from the library.

I just want them to read it.

By the time we're done with this show, Marshall, every one of my listeners is going to either pre order, order, post order, or go to the library, one way or the other, going to pick up this book, and they're going to read it and they're gonna.

And I'll tell you what, folks, if you.

If you pick it up and you read it and you don't like it, you send me a note, I'll give you your money back.

I'm kidding.

I will paint your house.

No, never mind.

Wait, that's.

Oh, shut up.

Couple things.

Maggie's proactive approach to her impending death is both, I think I can say, unconventional, compelling.

So I want to start off the show with a big old question.

What inspired you to explore this narrative of a woman orchestrating her family's future after her demise?

Which.

That in and of itself, she's a control freak.

We picked that up pretty quickly.

How did you come up with that?

That's a mindset.

Well, like I said, I was trying to think of what I could do out of the box, and I wasn't thinking about it that moment, and she came into my head, and you said, she's a control freak.

And I mean, she's a woman.

I'm a man.

But we identified because, I mean, my wife's nickname for me is Mike.

Last name row, manager.

Okay?

I am a firstborn.

And if you've done any research, any reading about birth order, you know that we are driven to run the show.

Hi, I'm Marshall, and I'm CEO of this family.

You know, that kind of thing.

So it took me a while to figure out what she does for a living, but I knew she was in charge.

And when I, I, I mean, she just told me flat out.

And then, I swear, I went out and talked to 50 women at least, and said, what would you do?

And they all Said the predictable.

My family, my, you know, go to Disney World, you know, I like that.

Someone said, well, I finally give my husband my passwords, but only one woman.

And she swears.

I didn't mean to say that.

Did I really say.

She said, well, I go out and get an std, give it to Michael and let's see if the bastard gets laid after I'm gone.

But nobody, I didn't want a character who would be like everybody else.

And I had the feeling that people would root for her, that people would want to.

And, and then it was just a process of figuring out how to get her.

Like I said, seven drafts.

The first draft was, I thought I'd write four or five chapters of Maggie, you know, growing up, you know, how did, how did she come to want this?

Well, she came to want this because when she was a teenager, her mother died of the same early, same disease.

And then mom said to the Maggie and her sister Lizzie girls, they're going to come after your father.

And she called him, you know, you know, like she said, like, Wait, wait.

Wait, don't say it, don't say it, don't say it.

I put a note here.

One of my favorite lines in the whole book.

It's got a note in yellow.

When my mother died, I watched in horror as a parade of perfume piranhas and pretty pink dresses flocked to my grieving father like stray cats to an overturned milk truck.

Now, a lot of kids don't know what a milk truck is, so in one other passage I said like, like hammerhead sharks on a feeding frenzy.

But you, I mean, it's, it's, it's called, it's called women with casseroles.

It's called the brisket brigade.

It's called how low can that Cleavage go at the wake.

But it's true.

Yeah, I mean, we all know it.

And there.

Now a lot of them are well intentioned.

Yeah.

But there are some people who will do it just for the ride, just, just for the cash and prices.

And that's what happened to her father.

So once I knew that it was like, okay, what happened?

She couldn't handle it as a 17 year old girl.

I mean, she tried.

She.

And when the casseroles came and they did come, she and her sister, okay, would put all the food in Tupperware and wash out the casserole dishes so these women could not come back three days later and say, I forgot my dish.

So little by little by little, I did get into the head of how women think so my first five chapters turned out to be 32 chapters of Maggie's life.

And I loved writing it, but the book was chronological.

And if you've ever seen a really good movie or a Netflix special or Apple Hulu, it.

It doesn't go chronological because, well, here, here, here, the timeline moves around.

And I figured out a way to keep you involved in the timeline so it didn't have to say 10 years earlier, five years earlier, and seven drafts into it.

And, God, a hundred women reading it for me, saying, honey, girls don't think about sex that way.

Not for nothing, but the first sex scene I had to write for Jim Patterson, he goes, I'm glad you made yourself happy with that scene, but women aren't going to enjoy the guy spilling a beer on his lap and his girlfriend helping him dry it off.

I go, no, no, write a sex scene for a woman.

Write for women.

Jesus, Jim, you sound like my wife.

But.

But I was doing an interview and I couldn't see it, but there was some.

There was chat going on, and one woman in the chat said, one woman out of 150, whatever.

And she goes, well, what right does a man have to write in a woman's voice?

I mean, how can he be the protagonist?

And somebody wrote back to her, honey, news flash, Bram Stoker was not really a vampire.

Yeah, we can do that.

I mean, we can write.

We can.

One of the assignments I'll give writing students is like, I want you to write a 500 word essay as told by first person.

But don't make it a warm old crusty grandfather or a sweet waif on the street.

Make it an inanimate object.

Write the story of a paper clip.

Write the story of an old hunting jacket.

And, you know, it's also.

You said something before.

I always ask the question, so what's the purpose of the first chapter?

And they go, you know, set the tone, you know, get their attention, you know, introduce the character.

Finally, someone says, the purpose of the first chapter is to get them to read the second chapter.

Exactly.

I was going to say to turn the page.

Yeah.

And I go, okay, it's easier question, guys, what's the purpose of the second chapter?

And if you keep them short.

And I've always written what I call popcorn chapters.

I want you to read a thousand words, get to the button at the end and you'll.

Damn it, I gotta just.

I get all kinds of emails saying, you son of a.

One guy told me he's listening on audio, and he started to drive the long way yeah.

How it's.

As a writer, nothing makes you feel better than dicking around with your readers.

Yeah.

Well, there's a couple things I want to interject here so I can actually say a few words.

One is one thing.

Wait.

I just want to say.

I was going to say before I was going to apologize for speaking while you were interrupting, but go ahead.

Well, I did.

A couple thoughts did come through my mind.

I'm like, well, how does this guy.

How does this guy.

Now, I'm not the guy who's going to say, you have no right writing as a woman.

Because one of my last thrillers was a female detective in Hollywood.

But I go, boy, the fact that he nailed a woman's voice and then two specific daughters voices and then ancillary characters that are females, plus the mother, who is a primary character.

And they were all, listen, I grew up in a household with a mom and two sisters, so I got a very good idea how that world works.

Number one.

Number two, we're authors.

We're creators.

If we don't have the imagination to be able to do something like that, then we really should just go do something else, like maybe paint houses or wash windows.

But anyway, I was surprised at just how emotional this is.

The point I really want to get across.

And.

And I'm gonna sound like a little bit of a wimp, but I don't really care because I got nothing to lose.

I was.

I was surprised how emotional and how draining and in a good way, by the way this book ended up being.

Matter of fact, I found myself getting so sentimental, especially at the beginning.

And then when you get to a particular scene that involves a motorcycle and a whole lot of people.

And that's all I'm going to say.

That scene is so emotionally fraught with complexity and a.

The nuance of the realization of finality of life.

I was just like, man, Marshall is like one of my.

One of my new heroes.

Because the way you pulled me in and really upset the emotional apple card in me was.

That's not an easy feat.

And I was.

I was transfixed.

Talk amongst yourselves.

I found myself sobbing when I was writing it.

I know.

You're talking about the motorcycle ride.

Yeah.

You're talking about chapter nine.

Yeah.

A lot of people at the publisher read it, and they were texting me as they were reading it.

And one guy, Sean, a video designer, he goes, chapter nine, you made a grown man cry.

I go, it's all right, it's all right.

It's like, it's the human Experience.

Why do people read books?

I mean, yes, I love as a kid, sci fi, paranormal, but I want to be real people doing things that you don't expect.

And by the way, tell them that there are a lot of laughs, there's dark, dark, dark, dark humor.

But that's what we do.

When you're a cop or, I mean, cancer patients can make you laugh, what is humor other than a violation of your expectations?

Am I right?

Yeah.

You think, oh, she's gonna.

And then she cracks you up great.

Big old heart on chapter nine.

Because, yeah, little, little notes to myself that I do throughout the book, and this book is full of them.

I won't belabor it and bore people.

With it, but belabor, belabor, belabor away.

David, can we talk?

All right, let's.

Let's move on to something else.

You're.

I love your.

There's a couple things, folks, and, And I'm saying this not only to.

I'm not blowing smoke up mar skirt.

I'm.

I'm.

Yeah, feels good, doesn't it?

I'm just trying to say things that hit me viscerally so that I can, you know, I don't get anything.

I'm not, I'm not selling.

I'm selling books for you, but I don't get anything out of it.

But I want people to know that there are certain things that trigger me and that is part of my journey.

And I know from people who write me, they write and say, dave, the way that you interacted with fill in the blank Marshall, in this case really made me.

I had to go buy the book.

So here's a couple things.

Your play on words, your double entendres, your storyline, switchbacks, I call them.

The way you play with time and it.

And it does not.

It had me mesmerized.

But, you know, the way you time jumped was confusing.

Only for a fraction of a second because once I understood your rhythm and the way you set up the each chapter, I was like, wow, how did he do that?

Because I was right there with you.

You went over here to this decade back.

I'm like, I'm right there with you.

You jump forward.

I'm right there with you.

There's no confusion.

Sometimes other writers can get a little confused, not make calling any names out, but it was intriguing and yet it never held the story back with any kind of confusion.

Instead, it kept me riveted, which is literally.

And I said this to you out of the gate.

I.

I could not put it down.

I found myself.

I'm on the treadmill with it.

I'm.

I'm reading.

I'm having lunch with it.

I'm having breakfast with it.

I'm.

I'm.

Matter of fact, my wife.

We were gonna watch a movie.

I should.

I'm gonna mention this.

I probably won't say what I said at the end of the movie.

It was a Oscar winner.

I said, and I'm over there reading it.

I'm cooking dinner, and I'm reading it.

And she's getting ready to sit down for the movie.

And I'm like, honey, I'll be right there with.

I.

I have to.

She goes, no, go ahead, Go ahead.

It's okay.

Dinner can wait.

And then I finally finish it.

I'm like, oh, wow.

And then we watched the movie, and it was the biggest disappointment I've had in a year of Sundays.

And it won a huge award.

I'm not going to say, but you.

Said at the beginning you just went through a big health scare.

Yes.

Yep.

At the end of the book, not that you haven't already, but a lot of people have written this to me.

Closed the page, last page, closed the COVID walked away.

And I couldn't stop thinking about my family, my mortality.

What would I do?

And that is such.

That's the best thing an author could get.

I sometimes will say, oh, you know, I write the kind of stuff you read on the airplane, and then you get off the airplane and you give the flight attendant the book.

But I wanted this book to stay with people, and I think it does.

Mission accomplished.

Yeah, it stays with me.

And I now have the biggest man crush ever.

You are my guy.

Tammy and I are going to have to talk.

I mean, I'm almost ready to come to Los Angeles.

I spent a couple years out there in Hollywood, and you know what they say in Hollywood.

Hello.

He lied.

Well, being from New York, an agent would call me and said, so what did you think of my writers?

No, he's not right for this job.

He goes, I know, there's no openings.

I said, oh, no, there's an opening.

I said, but here's the problem.

Now, if you tell him to do this with his yoke, and they go, you liked what he did, but you just want him to make it better.

I go, yeah, he's good.

He's got a lot of potential.

He's young.

Don't worry.

Good client.

He goes, like, this is very refreshing.

You're very honest.

Where are you from?

I said, it's a little place called Not Los Angeles.

Yeah, I did Three tours of duty in that city.

This is part of the reason I'm living in San Diego instead of the center of it all.

But yeah, you never.

And it's, it's a real frustration.

You never really know what people think.

They're never going to tell you what they really think because you could have a job for them later or not or so forth.

Yeah, I'm.

I'm honest.

I mean, you know, I'm.

I'm fair.

But if you ask me my opinion, I'll do my best to help you.

I want to talk technique with this literary geek which I want to talk about getting your secret sauce to getting and keeping those pages turning.

However, before you answer that, I want to take a short break for our sponsor.

But when we come back, I'm going to ask that question.

We're going to find out.

Folks, it's Marshall Karp.

The book is don't tell me how to die.

And it's Dave Temple on the Thriller Zone.

Stay with us.

My husband Alex is a successful doctor.

He's also drop dead handsome.

A lot of women wish they were me.

In three months they're going to get their chance.

I'm dying.

And when I'm gone, Alex will be single again.

And those women will pounce on him just like they went after my father when my mother died.

But I'm not going to let that happen.

Instead of one of them choosing him, I'm going to choose her.

The latest thriller from number one New.

York Times best selling author, Marshall Karp.

The story of a woman with nothing to lose.

Did I mention that in high school I was voted most likely to kill someone to get what she wants.

Don't tell me how to die.

As we said before the break, I want to talk technique.

And I know that you're gonna probably.

Well, David, of course it's just this or that.

But I want you to be.

I think we've bonded enough that you can be real with me, Marshall.

I'll try.

We got a mutual bromance over here.

I.

I love your hair.

I love your hair.

Oh, it's remaining of it.

But anyway, here's the thing.

Hey, wait a minute.

Gloves are off.

I want to talk about the secret because now.

And here's what I'm getting at.

It reminds me a little bit about James Patterson and I hope that.

I know that's a compliment.

You guys, you guys got some history together.

You co wrote with him on several books.

It reminds me of his style.

Yours is a little bit different, but I want to know, I kind of break down.

I'm always doing this.

I'm a student, like how did Marshall get me to do that?

And I'll go, I'll go back.

All right, hold on a second.

All right.

Oh, okay.

Well, that's how he did it there.

He's not going to do it again.

I'm going to get him next time.

Oh, he did it again.

So tell me that secret.

Well, it's.

I don't know if it's a secret, but one of the things I learned from Jim early on, he used to say if my next door neighbor got shot and was lying in blood on his front lawn, I wouldn't describe the house.

I don't give people the details that they don't need.

And that was interesting.

And his.

He sends all his co authors a, a list of 19 things to remember.

And it's always see the difference.

There's a big difference between me and Jim.

And he will tell you he is a storyteller and tell the story, don't indulge.

And you know, when you get here, kick it up a notch, kick it up a notch, kick it up a notch.

But the biggest difference is I invest heavily in characters.

You know, I don't know that Jim would have or could have written this book because it's not about character.

It's what they call a slow burn.

But I'm more of a craftsman in terms of the writing.

But what I learned from him is to make sure that you don't lose the reader.

He's a champion of small chapters.

My first book, the Rabbit factory had 115 chapters.

Because it was my first book, it took a long time to start.

But then once I got going, I couldn't stop.

And that book was 140,000 words, which as you know, is.

But when the publisher published it, I said, you know, David, his name was David.

I said, you know, God loved the, the art director, she put every chapter started on a right hand page, which means that there are 50 blank left hand pages.

You want to save a couple of trees?

She said, no.

He said, I'd rather it was this fat because when someone reads a good book, they'll talk about it.

But when someone reads a 632 page book, they won't shut up about it.

It's true.

And I always put myself in the place of the reader and of the character.

So there's a thing in front of my keyboard that says right now what's going on in the hearts and minds of the character?

You're writing now, if David got shot in chapter 20, and now I'm at chapter 27.

Chapter 20 was three weeks ago, right in my life.

But in David's life, it was just half an hour.

I got to get back into what's going.

I have to remember where he is.

So there's that.

And it's not a secret sauce.

It's just a style.

It's sort of like you saying, how come you can be so good looking and talented at the same time?

And I go, uh, well, you left out humble and modest.

But it's just, I, I said it before.

I just don't phone it in.

I just don't try to get the book out.

I want, I want to connect with you.

I, I, I read, I, I'll write it.

I will read it out loud to see how it's.

And by the way, if you have not listened, even sampled the audiobook, January Lavoie, who might be one of the best narrators out there and one of the biggest sweethearts ever.

And she's got, she's got a fan club, she's got followers.

If I say that, if I tell your audiobook listeners, it's not only is it done by January Lavoie, but she gave life and breath and soul and everything to these characters.

And, and what was terrific, we did a podcast together.

She told me.

I mean, she said, so I've done 700 books with the same engineer.

She lives down in Atlanta.

She's the same guy, and he is a man of few words.

We do the book and it's like, thank you very much.

I mean, they talk, but he's a total professional.

He's not a talker.

Like, I don't know you.

And she said, 700 books.

And when I finished those last five words and don't tell me how to die, he keyed his mic and he goes, whoa, that was awesome.

And I wound up talking to him.

He said, yeah, I did say that.

I mean, it's, I don't know how I do it.

I do it.

I do it because I try to do it.

I do it because I want to do it.

I do it because we all have a gift.

I'm trying to figure out what the hell yours is, but, oh, no, no, no.

You're Conan O'Brien.

You're David Letterman.

You're a guy who knows how to get the most out of people.

Well, you suck up.

You.

No, you know what it is?

Here's a little inside secret.

I did 25 years of major morning show so I've been around a lot of people my whole life.

I, I, I'm, I'm inquisitive, I'm not afraid to ask questions, I'm insatiably curious and I got nothing to lose.

So I'm like, I'm here to help you sell a book.

I'm, I have become a rabid fan.

I, I did catch myself going back at your website and looking at other books.

I'm like, all right, I'm, now he's got me hooked.

I've got to go find some more books to read.

And this is coming from a guy who, two books a week.

Because like this week I got two shows, so I'm reading two books and you gotta, you gotta really carve out the time.

Now I'm gonna see if I can pull this off.

Hang on a second.

1.

Three months before the funeral, at 6ft 8, 360 pounds, Irv Hollingsworth was not only the biggest TV weatherman in Hearthstone, New York, his larger than life personality and his flair for showmanship had made him the most popular in the county.

Which is why instead of reporting from a warm, dry studio that watershed June morning, big Irv, dressed in bright yellow waist high waders and a matching XXXXL slicker, was broadcasting live from Magic Pond during a torrential downpour.

Well, she is talented.

Just maybe you want to consider a different narrator on the next one.

If you need a guy, you do not suck.

I said, by the way, that was kind of like that's been my gold standard for everything.

Don't suck, suck less.

If I say this does not suck, that's a compliment.

Except when I bought a Dyson.

Right.

I want to go back to Jim for a second.

So your collaboration with him on the NYPD Red series, I'm trying to remember, I'm sure, because I don't know if you knew this or not.

I don't think you've watched the podcast, but Jim kicked off season eight in January.

He was my very first guest and I don't think he does many podcasts.

So I'm a little bit, I was a little bit wowed and it was a lot of fun because he's a, he's a hero of mine.

I mean, he really kind of got my, he lit the fire underneath me to say, you can do this, kid.

He didn't even know it.

But I want to go back to that because I want to.

That one focused on crime and investigation.

This one is clearly a domestic thriller, which is, you know, and I was Looking up, I was researching.

It was either on the Amazon page or it was inside the book.

I think it was actually inside the book because it will tell you.

Yeah, fiction, thrillers, Domestic.

Domestic thriller.

That they don't, you know, a lot of people don't think so.

You think, oh, it's a domestic.

Really.

However, it feels very specific.

Versus you got crime and investigation, and you got domestic thriller.

Even though there is crime inside this domestic thriller.

Tell me how you feel, how you would describe to a listener the difference between that, if that matters to you.

Well, I.

I mean, a thriller, you start with a big event.

By the way, you don't have to buy my books now.

I will send you the doorstop called the Rabbit Factory.

But the book actually.

Well, I don't know when this.

Today.

Snowstorm in August is on Kindle special, you know, 1.99.

That.

That the idea for Snowstorm in August was, okay, first chapter, a helicopter with, you know, crop duster arms comes out and strafes New York City's Central park with 4,000 pounds of cocaine.

That's a thriller.

You want to know who did it, you want to know why, you want to know what they're going to do next.

And you want to know.

And that's what a thriller is.

And you kill somebody in the first chapter, and you lull someone, and then, boom, somebody else gets killed.

And that's.

And Jim does.

A lot of Jim's stuff is over the top.

He can think of these things.

He can, yeah.

I mean, I heard him do a podcast with someone, and someone asked him, how do you do that?

And he said, well, all right, suppose I wrote something about you, and in the middle of this podcast, someone comes in and murders your producer, right?

He said, what are you gonna do?

You're going to turn to chapter two.

But this was different.

This was a different movie.

In my head, this was.

And I said this before, I think.

I don't know which podcast is this?

No, it's like, I couldn't spring all this.

I had to get you to love Maggie, be caught up in her journey before I made everything change.

So this was a totally different.

I don't know, what's the difference between, you know, a sonnet, a piece of poetry, and a ransom note?

It's all intention.

So I don't think I've helped you at all here.

So you're on your own, sucker.

You have.

You have.

And it's interesting because there's so many comments that I want to make, but I.

So I'm so careful not to give a dang thing away because of something you just said.

And how do I say it?

Let's just.

Well, whenever you can make me fall in love with a character and root for them, you got me?

But then when you can make me root for them and they may be up to a little bit of no good, then you challenge my thinking of, you know, the angel and the dove on the shoulders.

So it makes me go, well, should I root for them?

Because they're kind of bad.

But they have a.

They have.

You know, there's some.

Actually, some common sense to that.

But then when the third level comes in, which I won't say, then you're like, wow, that's called conundrum.

It's called Safe.

Safe literature.

When you always.

There's look, your characters, if they're not flawed, what are they?

I mean, yeah, women.

I say women because women were attracted to this book.

But trust me, men have been writing to me and saying, dude, this is not my kind of book.

But, yeah, well, hey, dude yourself.

But I mean, they say Maggie's flawed.

She did things that made me hate her.

But it's like, make a list of people you know that are not flawed.

And you know, they're still.

You like them for what?

You accept them.

Sure.

That was what we.

Hey, also, you gotta cut her some slack.

She's got three months to live.

You know, she has.

She's desperate.

Yeah.

And there is a little bit back to the psychology.

There is an.

You mentioned, Remember I mentioned to you early on how you pulled me in emotionally and you had me on this real emotional roller coaster.

And then of course, as I'm driving to pick up my dog, I'm listening to Love Stories sung by Tim McGraw and some country.

So I'm like, oh, my God, I am just making this worse.

But the funny thing about it is I kept.

I want to drill down on some of the psychology.

Now, Marshall, I'm going to tell you something.

I make a litany of notes to myself so I never look like an idiot in case my brain just gives out.

I'll write them in their entirety.

But I.

I bold certain things so that I make sure that I hit a point.

But every once in a while, I'll come up and it's a little bit too floral.

I'm.

I'm about to do that to you right now.

I'm going to read it just like I wrote it.

But I want you to listen, to hear it in the way that you and I are just talking, which Is casual.

So here, I write this down.

I want to drill.

Drilled on my psychology here.

Maggie's determination stems from her mother's death and its aftermath.

Can you talk about your approach as to the generational impact of loss on family dynamics?

Now, that's way too fancy writing.

But it makes me want to go, yeah, but you know what?

There's generational impact.

You got the mother, you got the daughter, you got the sister on those family dynamics.

So if you can unpack that thing, how does it hit you?

I think it hits me.

It's not quite a question I have heard because it's.

Maggie does not burden her two daughters when she says.

And by the way, I don't know if you, like, choked up a little when Maggie tells us that they were having.

Mom was sick, but she seemed like she was getting better.

And we had this wonderful picnic at Magic Pond just the way we did when we were kids.

Love that.

And then the four words.

The four words.

And I'm not gonna do that.

Since then, I have screamed in caves.

I have you written in the steam on my shower those four words that my mother said that I will never forget.

How strong are you?

Yeah, well, you know, this is about.

We learn from life.

My wife was pregnant, and we were ridiculously young.

We went to Rome when she was three months pregnant.

I, of course, said, no, you help with the bags.

We were in a hotel in Rome, and it was like around midnight, and she came out of the bathroom and she stood backlit, in nightgown, and I could see her.

And she was just standing there, and she looked at me and she said, how strong are you?

She was three months pregnant.

She just came from the bathroom.

And I.

Very strong.

I lied.

Now, there's a happy ending to that story.

You know, it was God, 19 something, technology.

And we called a doctor in New York who did this.

And then we got this great doctor in Rome, and he gave her some kind of progesterone shot or whatever.

And then we traveled and we did it again.

And in Greece and in Yugoslavia, wherever we went.

But when Maggie's mother says that to her, she's not imposing, she's not dumping stuff.

She's conveying values.

I remember things that my grandfather said to me, that my father said to me, that my teachers said to me.

That taught me about what's important in life.

And we all have that.

We can all go back to a moment in time where someone generationally.

I mean, my grandmother was a riot.

She.

She made the best.

I mean, she did make the best chicken soup.

And I said, you gotta give me the recipe.

And she goes, well, you know, I grew up one of seven sisters.

Farm girl in favor of Hungary.

And it's a family recipe from the farm.

She said, all right, you're writing down.

I said, I'm writing down.

She said, first you steal a chicken.

And she meant it.

And she gave me a picture of what she was like when she was a little girl.

And, you know, my mother used to say, we never did that when we were children.

And my father goes, oh, my God, let me tell you.

Your mother's just left the room.

What?

Me and your two, what we did, we were.

We were doing this, and we were, like, setting fire, cracking.

I mean, you want to hear from your parents what you need to hear so you could be a better person.

And so Maggie's.

Maggie's drive, I think, is generational also.

You know, some of us have this.

What I would call a defective rescue gene.

Yeah, I think the shrinks called it codependent, but I think it's way more that, you know.

I'm sorry.

David, what is your emergency?

Cause I'd like to make it more important than the rest of my life.

I want to.

And Maggie wants to fix things.

She's a fixer.

You know, people.

I want to make it better for you.

How can you go on without me?

So I'll hang around after I'm dead, and I'll fix things.

And it's not a generational demand like, you better go to church, you better wear clean underwear and all.

It's just a lesson you learn.

It's just a value you pick up.

And you can't shake that value because it means something to you.

We all have those values.

And that's what Maggie, she not only means, well, look, I still do things that.

My father's gone a long time ago.

How am I doing, Dad?

I want to do it because I know that's what makes my dead relatives feel proud of me.

Sure, this should be not part of the.

You know, but this should be like I always say, my.

I.

I say to my.

My shrink says, well, just tell me.

I.

I said, well, you know, I tell you everything.

And he goes, no, you don't.

I said, yeah, this shit's private, man, you know?

Yeah, but you've just hit a hot button.

Yeah, well, I got another hot button for you.

I got another one for you.

Well, it's not really a hot button, but I'm always thinking about psychological complexity because it's just.

I'm Just wired that way because it's, it's prepared.

It's about preparing for one's death.

So that to me was such an interesting thing.

You know, my father was taken very quickly at a much too young of an age, younger than I am now, and I was way too young.

And then my mother was taken a couple of.

Or passed a couple of years ago from a wicked ass cancer and.

And it had me doing this and.

And because you're.

The mother's character is writing out letters to her daughters.

And I love this here.

When I'm gone, I want you to read this.

And this is what I want to leave as a legacy and think about this.

So that just got my whole head spinning.

My dad was always too.

You know, he's working three jobs and too busy, but he would send me on a rare occasion and I still have them and I can.

It's maybe this few on a.

On a yellow legal pad.

He'd stop his day and write me a note.

And I cherished everyone and I've read them hundreds of times and they're very simple and.

But they mean the world to me.

My mother, fortunately, I had a couple of several days, really beautiful, languorous days with her right before she passed.

And she didn't need to write me letters.

But just yesterday as I was reflecting on this book, I thought, what would she have written to me knowing what was coming and after she was gone.

Son, I want you to think about these things.

So I kind of tried to channel her and to hear those and I didn't yesterday.

But this is the takeaway I'm babbling.

Is that this book was not only just good old flat out entertainment, Marshall, which it was, and we've done a lot of kidding around and, and that's fun and I love that.

But man, for some reason it just triggered something in my head.

I can't say this about every book.

Matter of fact, I can't say it about very many books.

But the way it caused me to think deeper is what's affected me so much.

So I hope that's the compliment and I hope it means to you what I think it might.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, you.

You hit a major hot button in that.

My father had three blue collar jobs.

I mean, worked two at a time, worked around the clock so that his kids would have a better life.

And, you know, he dropped out of high school, but he was still smart.

He.

He was a writer.

You wouldn't know it, but he wrote me letters more to me than my two younger Brothers.

And when I was in college, we didn't have a way to text our parents, Right.

He would write to me because it was a stamp and it wasn't a phone call.

I have those letters.

I have them cherished.

I have written four to 500 page journalists to myself that sometimes I talk.

I write to my kids.

But then I've also told my friend to just burn everything when I'm dead.

I have written a letter to myself every New Year's Eve since I was 16 so I can go back and hear.

I, of course, at 16, I ritualistically burned them.

But then when I was 20, I wrote a letter.

I was in college, and I still have that.

And I could talk to that guy, that contact that piece of me after I'm gone.

In my first book, in the Rabbit Factory, when we meet Mike Lomax, LAPD detective, he's only widowed for six months.

And in the very.

After I kill somebody, in the very early chapter, he opens a letter from his dead wife that he opens.

She left him nine letters while she was dying.

She was dying of ovarian cancer.

They had tried to get pregnant, and then it turns out she wasn't pregnant, she was dying.

The first couple of chapters, you read that first letter and the first letter that he's reading, which is maybe number five or number six.

And then throughout the book, she's in touch with him again.

And what is it about that to be able to be in touch with your past?

It's like if you could go back one day in time and spend the day with that one person or that little group, who would it be?

To me, it would invariably have nothing to do with the girlfriend that you never shook, but it would be about spending time with the people whose values I inherited.

Yeah.

And so, yeah, I like to do that.

And when I wrote the fifth book in the Lomax in Big series, I said, you know, there's only nine letters, and the reader's been exposed to them all.

And my friend Danny, who, he said, well, what if she actually wrote some more and gave it to Mike's father to give to him at a certain point in his life, not while he was raw, but a couple of months late, a couple of years later.

Yeah.

And.

And being the old, smart, clever marketing guy that I am.

Yeah.

I.

I, of course, put the first six or seven chapters of book two in the.

You know, and then.

Yeah, well.

And to that same point, I did find myself yesterday thinking this weekend, when I get some quiet time, and I'm not, you know, racing to the end to get all these podcasts done.

I said, I'm going to start this diary just for myself that I'm going to set aside, that I'll pass along, because, you know, we don't.

We don't know how long we're going to be here.

And I.

There's just a few things I want to be able to say to some people that I'm like.

And I try.

I generally live in that space of.

I'm going to tell you what I think right now, because all I have is right now.

And having lost both parents, grandparents, a lot of aunts and uncles, you know, you realize how brief it all is.

So you've challenged me to just do that, folks.

All of them, by the way, for me, the books, especially this books, that's a legacy.

Sure.

People will read this when I'm gone and I'll feel good.

David, what do writers do with.

We're screwed up in the best possible way?

Yeah, you make shit up.

I mean, that's what we do, right?

Well, as we kind of start to wrap, there's a couple things and I.

This is something I want to make sure I touched on because I'm.

I'm a big fan of television and film and long form that is visual.

And I know that you got a background in screenwriting and television, and I want to know how those experiences and those mediums have influenced your work as a novelist.

That's one part of it.

And.

And I don't want to get too fractionalized, but.

So how is.

How has that world influenced this world?

And what shifts have you seen in your very young years shift from when you were in the heart of it in Hollywood versus what it is today?

Because I know there's been a little span of time.

So let's start with the first one.

How those experiences influenced.

How has television and screenwriting influenced your novel writing?

Well, the first draft of my first book, I basically wrote what the characters did and, and what the dialogue was.

And my editor read the first 50 pages and said, well, what are they wearing?

I said, no, no, wardrobe lady will fix that.

And they say, well, what is the neighborhood like?

Oh, the location scout will do that.

And then.

And what does he look like?

I don't know yet.

He could be white, he could be black, he could be short.

He could.

She goes, you don't have those people to communicate.

So when you're writing a book, you have to paint the picture without belaboring the picture.

But also when you are creating a Scene and you have some budget to put the people outside, inside, in the set.

You're allowed to do more than just two talking heads.

Right?

So I always.

I'll have two people talking, but where can I put them?

That's kind of interesting.

I mean, look, it's what I'm able to do, I think cinematically.

I also think I want somebody who makes movies to read this book and say, this should be a movie.

You've probably already said that to yourself, this should be a movie.

And so I write cinematically and I feel.

And then I pace myself like cinema.

And I think for me the difference between what I did back then is that there's just so much more latitude.

My film just looking, which.

I got the most amazing email last night on my pub day.

I got the most amazing email from Jason Alexander, who directed it.

It's like the 25th anniversary and there is.

I shouldn't say this out loud because it's not chiseled and sewn, but a film festival wants to use that movie as the anchor for their whole weekend long festival.

They want me, they want Jason, they want the producer, they want the 12 year old kid who was the star to show up.

The biggest thing I learned is that everything's gotten that movie got an R rating for one word, starts with F, ends with uck.

Okay.

All right.

What he should have said, 12 year old kid is like, I'm going to dedicate my summer vacation to trying.

I'm tired of reading National Geographic.

I want to see two people doing it.

Right.

If he had said doing it.

Yeah, See, I could say F you.

Right.

And that's just profanity.

And that's PG 13.

Right.

If I said I would like to F you.

Oh, in 19, 2000, that's a big no.

No.

Well, as you can see, the world has changed and people are more open.

I don't think values change.

I think Shakespeare wrote about young love and people still write about young love.

It's never the insides.

I don't think our insides change, our outsides change.

If you stay inside the characters, you're always gonna be who you are.

And by the way, like everybody, I got better at what I do.

I learned.

I learned from Jim Patterson, I learned from reading books, I've learned from talking to you, your insights and no, I'm not.

No smoke.

You know how to make someone feel comfortable and forget that.

Am I really on a podcast.

There's.

I got.

I'm saving one last question that I end all my shows with.

But before That I want to say, what is.

What's next?

Because I want to make sure that you are on this podcast when that next book drops.

It's NYPD Red 8.

Okay?

8.

And when I took over the series, it was just called NYPD Red, then NYPD Red 2 and 3 and 4.

But when I took over with Jim.

Loves numbers, doesn't he?

Yeah.

I made NYPD Red 7 the murder sorority.

Okay?

And then I am currently writing NYPD Red 8, the 1159 bomber.

My log line in my head already is, you know, it's 11:59, and the city that never sleeps is afraid to get out of bed.

Nicely done.

Look, it is due to hit the stores at November 25th.

I have never been this close to deadline, but of course, I spend time with wonderful people like you promoting the hell out of Don't Tell Me how to Die.

I think, I guess everybody, me, the publisher, everybody's kind of overwhelmed by the reception for Don't Tell Me they Want to Talk to Me.

Dude, first of all, before we go and may I call you your holy dudeness?

Please.

I think when you run across a book and I want to talk, very seldom do we ever get to talk to people in a real way.

And I'm going to do this, and if you don't like this little piece, I'll cut it out.

But I want to ask you, what do you think about the publishing world today?

This is like if you and I were sitting around having a favorite beverage or snack, and it was just you and me hanging out in that sexy room of yours.

If I said, you know, Marshall, be real with me, it's just you and me.

What do you think of the business these.

These days?

A, B.

Do you think this social media really matters?

Does it help you move books?

Do podcast and Twitter and Instagram and TikTok.

Does it really move books for you?

And number three, do you give a shit?

I made the mistake before of telling you that I am this brutally New York honest.

So I think the publishing business is a business.

And, you know, in Jerry Maguire, it's not called Show Friends, Jerry, it's called show business.

And whatever heart there was when I got into it, I mean, I was partners with the publisher.

They respond, you know, publishers these days.

I told you, I wrote Don't Tell Me how to Die.

The first draft was not for publication, but we sent it out to a couple of my agents, sent it to publishers, and they.

We love Marshall, but no, this book is not for.

They.

They didn't see the Value that this could be great.

You just have to rewrite it a bunch of times.

So I don't think there's anybody in the publishing business these days that will look at an unpolished gem and say you've got potential.

And that's a shame.

And it's more and more of a business.

The world is run by algorithms.

I mean, thank God yesterday was pub day because now I don't have to like generate pre orders which like to feed the algorithm gods.

There's a part of my website where I encourage other writers, young writers to just write.

And I have said to them there are a million.

Let's go with a holes.

There are a million people in the publishing business who can stop you from becoming a published author.

There's only one person who can stop you from being writer.

Do not let the publishing business intimidate you because these days you can self publish.

Find your niche.

Do you want to make money?

You're in the wrong business.

Read things on medium where they say if you, your book will never make money.

And most people don't.

And you know, after four successful books in the Lomax and Big series, I didn't sell quite enough.

I had a cult following or maybe just a few wackos short of a cult.

But they, they kept writing to me for years.

We want another Lomax.

And I wrote Terminal, the currently last book in the series and self publish it.

You know, using.

Back then it was Amazon, they had something that Amazon had something called the, the White Glove group.

Oh yeah.

For authors.

And so the first question is publishing is a business.

This book, I have a collection of rejections.

All authors have rejections.

At one point I was, I was cursing them out like, don't they see it?

I'm crushed.

But recently, I swear I was thinking, God bless these publishers, God bless these people with no vision for killing.

My first draft, my fourth draft, my fifth draft, because they made it a better book.

I rewrote certain parts.

Don't think that they're gonna love you.

They're in the business to make money.

If you can't make money, get out of my office.

That's one the second.

What do I think of social media?

Well, as a consumer, I mean, yeah, I can get lost on TikTok or Reddit or.

But it's the world's most fun time waster.

But these days, and I work with people who are like 30 something smart these days, it's amazing because you have your niche people, you have your book talkers.

There's a Great value in spreading the word on social media.

I really believe that.

And do I give a shit?

No.

But yes.

You know what I mean?

It's.

You work within the system.

We walk a fine line of art and commerce.

That's a tough question, but I think you got to give a shit when you're out there marketing.

Do not give anything when you're writing.

Yes.

Do not write for the business.

Write for the readers like they are in North Dakota.

So, Marshall, as we start to wrap it up, I always ask all my guests, and you are one of those, what is your best piece of writing advice?

Now, you've given a ton of solid information this entire show.

It's probably been a masterclass for me.

I've learned a lot from your writing.

I've learned a lot from just hanging out with you.

But I know that everybody has a little bit of a last minute credo by which they live, and I'd love to know what yours is.

For my aspiring authors, basically, it's never.

Never, never give up.

Richard Bach, who not everybody's heard of, but he wrote a bunch of books.

And then he wrote Jonathan, Jonathan Livingston.

Livingston.

Seagull.

Seagull.

And it was a book about a seagull who was looking to find himself, his values, and had pictures of birds and, you know, it was practically spiritual.

And that turned out to be a bestseller over the course of two different years.

And he said, a professional writer is an amateur who didn't quit.

That is it.

But it's about your relationship with, it's how you deal with it if you're a real writer.

And also, well, before I even thought about writing a book, I said to my friend who wanted to write a book, look, if you write one page a day for a full year, you'll have a book.

And he called me a year.

He goes, you're never going to believe this.

I said, what?

He said, I wrote one page a day and I have this really cool 365 page book.

And I go, holy shit, that works.

Read a lot, write a lot.

And don't think about marketing, don't think about publishing, don't think about bestsellers and being on podcasts with adorable hosts like David Temple, stuff like that.

I mean, it's like, oh, we should teach a class together because we'd have so much fun.

We would, wouldn't we?

Well, folks, I want you to do me a favor.

And by the way, Marshall, you have won the award.

You win the award for the best unique website address, and that is carp kills.com not marshallcarp.com but carp kills.com.

so folks, you want to learn more, go there.

There's a gaggle of books.

You can snag them all at your leisure.

And boy, has this been fun or what?

It's a lot better than I expected, you know.

What does that mean?

Mr.

Well, it means that you and I would just set up on a blind date.

Yeah.

And many years ago I was set up on a blind date.

Yeah.

And I married her.

And you married her.

Sweet.

It's the essence of chemistry, by the way.

You've done something.

Somehow through you, I feel connected to your audience.

You make me feel your audience because you know what?

They want you.

I mean, you're really good at this stuff, aren't you?

I don't know.

I thank you.

You're very, very kind.

You're very kind and I appreciate that.

I'm humbled by that and I'm honored to have you on the show.

But I just, you know, I just reflect what I like.

That's all I do.

If I, if I like a book, you are flat out gonna know it.

If I don't like a book, you may not know it.

I just ask questions that I want to know about.

I don't, I, here's the thing.

I started in radio when I was 16 years old and I had somebody somewhere say to me, and I've lived by this.

Now, David, don't get your head full of all this, that and the other.

When you go to get on the microphone, you crack that mic for the first time, imagine one person, think of one person, not this audience.

And so I always thought of my mom because my mom was the only person going to listen to my show.

And so I thought that way from then on.

And for 25 plus years that's kind of how I did it.

So I just talked to the audience like it's just you and me.

I don't sit there and go, well, I'm going to pontificate to my vast audience.

So that's all.

I'm just, I'm, I'm a geek and I have fun.

I like what I do.

There you go.

That's the sound of it.

You're my favorite pk.

Praise the Lord.

Do they know what that means?

Yeah, probably by now.

Yeah, they do by now after four years.

And by the way, I got a non fiction book coming out about my prostate cancer journey that's going to hopefully come out maybe this year.

And then my second non fiction is going to be something about the world of living inside pk.

Living inside the world of being a preacher's kid.

Because it's a lot of people go, dude, I don't give a.

I'm like, well, there's going to be a lot of people who probably do, because they're gonna.

They're gonna live in that space of like, what's that like?

Or better yet, hey, I lived in that world too.

And I had all this guilt and all this pent up emotion, and I'm like, hey, let it go.

I have a nonfiction book in my head.

But my.

You know, I don't have.

Which is.

I threw everything away at the age of 39.

I.

You know, I was top of the food chain in advertising with money and stock and, you know, but the punishment for being good writer was to promote me to.

And they wouldn't let me write.

I gave it all up to follow my dream.

And I'm a huge believer in, like, when you look in the mirror and say, is this all there is?

Go for what's more.

And I really have.

You know, I really do want to write it.

They want me to write more fiction, but.

So, yes, write those books, especially the prostate cancer thing, because there's a niche audience who can use your help, use your experience.

Anyway, just to put that button on it again.

Thank you so much.

I know this.

Your time is valuable.

Everyone's.

If.

If people are still listening by now, your time is valuable.

So thank you for listening.

But, dude, this has been such a joy, David.

It has been a joy.

It has been.

It's a dream come true.

No, it's fun.

I cannot believe that there is anyone on the planet that will watch this podcast for longer than my movie.

Yeah, we're clocking 92 minutes.

Yeah.

How about that, peoples?

Oh, well, mine was 97 with the credits, so.

Roll credits.

Okay.

Mr.

Carp, I presume.

Oh, my God, the accent.

All right, actual recording is higher quality.

Actual.

Actual guest is lower quality.

But that's another thing.

Do we really need an audience?

Because this is really good for me, what we're doing right now.

Really?

What do you mean, do we need an audience?

Of course we need an audience.

A grown man telling me I'm cool.

Are you gonna use this video?

Because I actually.

Oh.

Oh, hell yeah.

Wherever you're comfortable.

Oh, no, I'm comfortable in Barbados.

So that ceiling fan, is that in your way?

No, hang on a second.

I've got a.

My.

My producer's in my ear.

Yeah, yeah.

John, can you go over and remove that ceiling fan?

It's, it's annoying as.

Okay, he'll be right over.

This just clarified.

I usually ask people if a profanity is encouraged or discouraged.

You don't have a second, seven second delay?

No.

How about, how about whatever the.

You want to say.

I just thought I'd come out of the gate with something big.

Now I don't generally every once in a while, you know, a little bit of razzmatazz doesn't bother me.

I don't go around, you know, this is.

We're not sailors here, but, you know.

Yeah, right.

All right.

What happened to your.

Well, wait, what the.

Tell me about.

About yourself, David, because I don't know enough.

I just came off of a Christian radio program.

I.

It was great, but.

Yeah, you need to get in the headset.

Bless your heart.

Oh, my God.

Best line of the day.

Now, I'm from the south, so when, when you want to insult somebody to their face and make them feel okay, you go, well, bless your heart, Art.

But when you say bless your heart, you know you're onto something.

How much fun was that?

Okay, folks, I'm going to make this very short and sweet.

Join me next Thursday as another thriller.

Thursday presents another one of the biggest names in the business, the real book spy author Ryan Stack.

Guess what?

We've got a special guest appearance.

It's going to make a little trifecta with miss Birdie Bell.

As you'll remember, Ted Bell, only one of my favorite authors, was on the show twice before.

Sadly, he has passed gladly.

Ryan Steck has taken his place in the form of carrying on the Alex Hawke series.

So make plans to attend Next Thursday, the 20th right here on the Thriller Zone.

I'll see you next time.

Your number one podcast for stories that.

Thrill the Thriller Zone.