Cops and Writers Podcast
Cops and Writers is a podcast hosted by retired police sergeant and author, Patrick O'Donnell. The podcast provides valuable insights and humor for crime writers who want to create accurate and believable police stories. O'Donnell conducts in-depth interviews with members of law enforcement and civilian experts, discussing police procedures and culture. He also interviews crime fiction writers and writers from different genres, discussing what works in the ever-changing landscape of book sales and publishing. The podcast offers candid stories told with cop humor and technical details about the world of law enforcement.
Cops and Writers Podcast
Move Over Jack Reacher, Bestselling Author Nick Petrie's Peter Ash is Here!
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Today’s show will be especially helpful for you writers out there, or if you are curious to see what makes a full-time thriller author tick. On the show today, we have award-winning and bestselling author Nick Petrie, who just released his 9th book in the Peter Ash series, The Dark Time.
His first novel, The Drifter, won the ITW Thriller and Barry Awards and was nominated for Edgar, Anthony, and Hammett Awards. He won the 2016 Literary Award from the Wisconsin Library Association and was named one of Apple’s 10 Writers to Read in 2017. Apple Books named Light It Up the Best Thriller of 2018. Both Light It Up and The Wild One were shortlisted for the Barry Award.
Lee Child, author of the Jack Reacher novels, said. “Lots of characters get compared to my own Jack Reacher, but Petrie's Peter Ash is the real deal.”
Nick is the quindecennial blue-collar author. He has an impeccable work ethic forged with years of working as a carpenter and other trades, which has paved his way to becoming a full-time, bestselling author.
Please enjoy my conversation with one of the nicest guys I know in the business, Nick Petrie.
In today’s episode, we discuss:
· What has changed in the publishing business in the last two years since he released his last book?
- Luck finds people who show up for work every day.
· Artificial Intelligence and the publishing business.
· Best marketing practices for authors.
· How his former professions and life experiences have helped him in his writing career.
· Pros and cons of writing in a series.
· His advice for new or newer authors looking to break through.
All of this and more on today’s episode of the Cops and Writers podcast.
Visit Nick's website to learn more about him and his books.
Check out my newest book! Police Stories: The Rookie Years - True Crime, Chaos & Life as a Big City Cop!
What's the craziest thing you saw when you were a cop?
My first week on the job, a guy running at me with a butcher knife. He'd just killed his brother over the last hot dog.
That's chapter 1. There are 33 more.
Police Stories: The Rookie Years just launched - available on Amazon.
Search 'Police Stories Patrick O'Donnell' or click th
Amateurs wait for inspiration. Professionals show up and get to work.
SPEAKER_00Welcome to the Cops and Riders Podcast. Your host, Sergeant Patrick O'Donnell, worked the streets in one of the nation's largest police departments for over 25 years. Ride along with O'Donnell and his expert guests as they help you navigate the oftentimes confusing and misunderstood world of law enforcement. O'Donnell and his guests on this show do not represent any law enforcement agency. The content of this show is not meant to be legal advice. Do you think you need a lawyer? You probably do.
SPEAKER_01Hey Cops and Writers, thanks for being here with us today for another episode of the Cops and Writers Podcast. I'm Patrick O'Donnell and I'll be your host for today's show. This show is listener supported, so thanks to all of you who keep the show going. I would especially like to thank those of you who are patrons of the show. Your generosity helps pay for the software, equipment, and my time producing this show. Yes, you too can become a patron for less than a cup of coffee or a pint of Guinness. Just go over on to patreon.com forward slash cops and writers. Today's show will be especially helpful for you writers out there. Or if you are curious to see what makes a full-time thriller author tick. On the show today, we have award-winning and best-selling author Nick Petrie, who just released his ninth book in the Peter Ash series The Dark Time. His first novel, The Drifter, won the ITW Thriller and Barry Awards and was nominated for Edgar, Anthony, and Hammett Awards. He won the 2016 Literary Award from the Wisconsin Library Association and was named one of Apple's ten writers to read in 2017. Light It Up was named the Best Thriller of 2018 by Apple Books. Both Light It Up and the Wild Ones were shortlisted for Barry Awards. Lee Child, author of the Jack Reacher novel, said lots of characters get compared to my own Jack Reacher. But Petrie's Peter Ash is the real deal. Nick is the quintessential blue-collar author. He has an impeccable work ethic, forged with years of working as a carpenter and other trades that has paved his way to becoming a full-time best-selling author. Please enjoy my conversation with one of the nicest guys I know in the business, Nick Petrie. Nick Petrie, welcome back to the show.
SPEAKER_03Oh, thanks, Patrick. So nice to be here. I appreciate it.
SPEAKER_01The last time the last time we've seen each other virtually was almost two years ago you're on the show.
SPEAKER_03That's true. That's true. Although we had coffee just last summer, which was nice.
SPEAKER_01We did at Brewers too, where I am a fixture where I do write there. I love riding there, especially in the summer. Yeah, you got the beach, it's nice. You could sit outside. It's a great spot. Yes. And they treat me so nice. And I even have a little bookstore there now. Really? Yes, I got the idea of you know what? What's your next beach read? And uh, I'm trying to remember the author, and I'll remember as soon as we stopped talking, and I hit hit the off button on record. But uh oh, Ava Natiello? She wrote, I think it was the memory box. Yeah, it was the memory box. And you know, super popular book, and the way she the way she marketed this book was what's your next beach read? She got t-shirts um made up with the cover of her book, and she was on the Jersey Shore. And first she made sure all the bookstores on the Jersey Shore on the beach had her book. She made sure that they were well stocked with her book. She hired a film crew out of her own pocket to follow her going along the beach, and you know, the front was the cover of her book, and the back was what's your next beach read? So she went up to people that were reading books and gave them her book. And she had balloons that were like the shape of boxes, and you know, and as a force multiplier, she pitched it to the news, you know, that night, and they ran with it. So it wasn't the news cam, you know, those news cameras, it was her own cameras. But they took her footage.
SPEAKER_03They did that's that's super interesting. I I'm I'm always really interested in people who uh sort of have sort of taken their own line in the in the marketing world. I mean, Jack Carr is such a great example of that. He is he's a marketing genius, yep. Um, but I you know it's so hard to because the you know books are not a central place in the culture the way they once were. Um so it's a it's much harder to get to get anybody to pay attention. And so, like, you know, the stuff like that, it just seems like such a great idea.
SPEAKER_01So, you know, I took a a piece of her um marketing. So I'm at the coffee shop, they know who I am, and now some of the regulars know, hey, what are you doing? Well, I'm writing a book. Like, ooh, that's cool. So I did a book signing there. I've done a couple actually, and you start some good conversations, and it's like, you know what? I always do well here. How about I just put up a couple of books on, you know, you've got you know, like sunscreen, you've got you know, coffee mugs. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, and they're like, Yeah, that's a good idea. Well, before we know it, we're selling the heck out of that stuff. That's great. It's like local author. Pardon? Local author. Then that's the key. I have a picture of myself in uniform with a canine, you know, with a little blurb, you know, local, you know, blah blah blah, Milwaukee police officer, you know, turn off.
SPEAKER_03I've seen that picture actually, it's really great. And you look like you're about 12 years old.
SPEAKER_01I know, yeah. You know, it was just good lighting at that point. That's what that's what that was. But yeah, but yeah, I always thinking outside the box, and you know, I'm always looking for you know something different, something that sets you apart. So, you know, again, you know, it's we were just having coffee there not that long ago. So, what's changed with you since we last talked and your author career?
SPEAKER_03Uh well I've let's see. The new book uh is called The Dark Time is coming out March 9th. It drops at Boswell, it lands officially on March 10th, which is Tuesday. So Boswell books in Milwaukee. Very nice. I love I love that cover, by the way.
SPEAKER_01Oh, heck yeah. Super cool.
SPEAKER_03Um and um I'm I'm make doing my last pass through um uh the edits on the book that'll come out next year. Uh so that's kind of what I've been what I've been uh getting set up. And I'm not sure when when you're gonna drop this episode, but I'm I'm uh doing all of this pre-publication stuff. So I'm you know, I'm writing a piece for Crime Reads, which is this great online magazine, uh, writing a piece for Writer's Digest, uh, you know, you know, bunch of stuff like that to just sort of, you know, I don't think of it as like my real job, but there are there's a chunk of time in the year where it sort of takes over.
SPEAKER_01Sure.
SPEAKER_03Uh and it becomes my real job. It's harder for me to I can I can do something like line edits because that's just you know essentially reading with a pen in your hand.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Um, I can do that while tr while doing all this other stuff. It's hard to kind of generate the next project, um which is uh, you know, kind of the thing after these edits go out the door.
SPEAKER_01All right. Now is the next book gonna be book 10 then in this.
SPEAKER_03The next, yeah, this is book nine. The dark time is book nine. The next book, which just still does not have a title, is book ten. And it's the last book in my contract. So um I'm uh you know, next comes another conversation with my editor about what else they, you know, how many more books would they like? Hopefully it's it, there's there's not zero. Oodles, hopefully it's not zero.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. So we're pushing forward with that. What do you think has changed in the publishing business in the last couple of years? What trends?
SPEAKER_03Oh my god, I I think a lot has changed. Um the the publishing industry really leaned into um sort of trying to have more different voices, um, which is uh, you know, both in literary fiction and in genre fiction. And I think it's great. I think there are, you know, we've gone way too long hearing from very few voices. Um, and so that's changed a lot. But it also means there's a little less room for a middle-aged white guy like myself. Um, and and that's just that's just part of that that process. Um, but like to see, you know, guys like S.A. Cosby, you know, show up, he's a spectacular writer. Um, you know, we we there are so many new new folks in the world. But, you know, so that's sort of like how the the land, the the internal landscape has changed. Um, you know, externally, I think, you know, there are still blockbuster books, but publishing is becoming more and more like uh the film and television industry, which is that they are much more risk-averse and they are looking for the next big thing as opposed to sort of supporting something that is doing okay and trying to grow something that's doing okay. Um, this is no longer the industry, you know, uh where Max Perkins helped uh a young writer named Ernest Hemingway figure out how to write a novel.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_03Um, or or you know, back to, you know, I can't remember who Cormac McCarthy's first editor was, but like he he wrote four or five books that basically sold, you know, 10 copies each. But they believed in him and they believed that he was a talent, and they kept publishing him anyway. And then he wrote this little book called All the Pretty Horses, which became a National Book Award winner, was made into a film starring Matt Damon. Um, one of my all-time favorite books. Um and that book is actually kind of one of the reasons why I write crime fiction, because it's a cowboy novel, right? It's Louis Lemour or Zane Gray just done incredibly well, right? It's all the same themes, it's all the same, you know, sort of tropes and ideas, it's just elevated. And and that's you know, kind of that's sort of my my goal. But um the other the the larger piece to that is that you know fewer young men, especially are reading, right? We we are all you know kind of addicted to our phones. We read, right, but we read on our phones. We read short stuff, we consume 15-second videos, we you know, most Americans are having trouble with their attention span. Um, so it's it's just become selling full-length fiction has become uh kind of a harder, a harder thing to sell. So we again we still have blockbusters, um, we still have big, big, you know, you know, uh there's there are a few big, big books every year that kind of everybody reads, but um you know, it's harder to sustain a career kind of lower, lower on the totem pole. I have I can't tell you how many friends, many friends who are super talented, who their series gets canceled, a good series gets canceled after two books or four books. Um just because they, you know, and they were they were profitable, they were they just weren't profitable enough. So it's a yeah, watching publishing really turn into multinational corporate publishing um has has been is a is a real change. And and I think it's forced me to think a little bit more commercially, like what you know, and that's really not the muscle I have, is like what sells. Um, you know, I'm not the writer who looks at holes in the market to say, oh, there's nothing like this, I should write that. Or this is really hot, I'll write something like this. Um, which is a legitimate strategy. It's just not it's just not a muscle I have, but but I do think a little bit more about um speed, about I, you know, I want my books to really move quickly, I want the pages to turn. Um, and that's I don't know, I got a I got something uh today from uh somebody who had a uh a net galley uh of the of the book who you know, just an early reader who is like, I started reading your book at noon, I finished reading at midnight, you know, you ate my entire day. Yeah, that's awesome. Um but like but like to yeah, but you know, to to have a book that you want to do nothing more than to sit down and to chew through in 12 hours, like you know, that's to me that's a high compliment.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, there's nothing better as an author to get an email or have somebody tell you it's like I didn't sleep last night because of you, or my husband didn't sleep last night, or my wife didn't sleep last night because of you, because they couldn't put the book down. If you can accomplish that, man, that you're cooking with steam. Well, and that's why we do this, right?
SPEAKER_03I think we we are writers in general, and I think there's a kind of a misconception. We are looking to connect with people, like though having that. I mean, it really is a conversation. Writing the book is only part of that kind of magical alchemy. The the other piece is reading the book. Um, and readers bring their own, you know, ideas and experience to that. It really is a conversation, and and I'm I love that about what I do.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's super cool. If, like I said, if you can accomplish that, that's great. And what from my side of the coin, you know, I've been hybrid published and I'm you know self-published, and what I see is traditional publishing is starting to take some of those uh best practices in those worlds, and they're trying to incorporate that a little bit. You know, you know, you were talking about like what? No, as far as speed goes, you know, I see you know, I've seen where before it's like it it's like at a snail's pace, you know, when it comes to traditional publishing, and they're looking and it's like, well, oh, that self-published guy over there, he's published three books this year, and you know, he just and he's making a lot of money, and people are buying them. Why are we waiting two years, you know, for smoke to come out of the chimney like the Pope just got elected, you know, to oh, you know, and it's like I don't get that.
SPEAKER_03That's another real change, though, is traditional publishers are looking at self-publishing as a as a as a as a training ground slash proof of concept, uh, or just kind of a way to co-opt somebody who is self-publishing and and cranking out copies, and they're like, hey, we went in on this. Yes. Um so and I, you know, I think that's a that's a positive. There, they're you know, 30 years ago, there was a uh real stigma against self-publishing. They called it the vanity press. Yes, yes, you know, that that is in the last 10 years that has changed completely, and there are so many ways to get your work out there. And there are great writers that that is the choice they've made because they want control over their work. Um, and you know, hey, more power to you.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you know, with my cops and writers group, you know, I've been blessed to meet all these authors that are doing you know a lot better than me, they're making a lot of money, they're working their asses off. And you really have to work your ass off as a self-pub. Nobody's gonna do it for you. You have to have all the pieces in place, you know, find yourself a dynamite editor, cover designers, you know, you are the marketing team. I mean, you can farm out some of this stuff, and I do, you know, it's like I have a VA, you know, she does my newsletter every weekend, she takes care of my website, you know. But it has to be the right people, and just because you can write a book, you know, you can write say like five books a year or ten books a year, it doesn't mean they're gonna be good. You know, that's where it all starts with. You know, sometimes when there isn't a gatekeeper to tell you it's like, you know what, you need to tighten that up, or ooh, that's that's just not gonna work, you know.
SPEAKER_03Well, it it it's totally the wild west, but that doesn't mean that there it's not there aren't really spectacular writers in that ecosystem.
SPEAKER_01Oh, there are, and they they there are and they do rise, yeah. They do, they do, but you know, it just what I have seen is a couple different kinds of authors. One was they started with traditional, you know, they got a zillion rejection letters, and they got that one, yeah. You know, we'll take you, and then they're getting paid 20 or 30, and they're like, wait a second, why am I getting paid so little amount of money? And I'm doing it. Are you kidding?
SPEAKER_03And traditional traditional publishing is far less than that. Yes, I I make I make eight percent on a paperback. Oh my god, and and 10 to 10 to 15 on a hardback, depending on how many have sold.
SPEAKER_01See, that's I find that ridiculous. I have author friends that are well into six figures and more that started traditional and bought their rights back. They're like, no, I can do this, you know. It's and they have flourished because they have done that.
SPEAKER_03It it really is running a business in a way that that working with the with one of the traditional publishers is not. I mean, working with a traditional publisher, you basically provide the manuscript and they do everything else. And there's, I think for a lot of writers, that's all they want to do. Like they they got into it because they like to write and they just want to sort of pass it off. And and you know, again, more power to you. But uh, I mean, I am leaning in and getting more and more involved just because it's my career and I, you know, I want to, you know, kind of see what decisions are being made, and I want to I want to know why, and I want to lean in. Um, but if you're self-pub, you know, if you this you are it's an enterprise, and that enterprise is you. Yes. So I'm I'm really impressed by people who can make that work.
SPEAKER_01So am I, you know, and now in I didn't even plan on this, but it just popped in my head. There's a lot of AI garbly goop that's going up on Amazon. Oh, yeah. It's just stuffing it, you know, with just garbage. You know, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense, and that makes things hard for all of us. And I'm not anti-AI in any way, shape, or form if it's used correctly.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, the problem is this is the amount of slop that is gonna enter the system. I mean, we already see a bunch of it, but you know, in a year from now, in five years from now, it's gonna be that's gonna be what makes self-pub a much more difficult environment. Because instead of, I don't know how many books, self-pub books are are published every year, it's gonna be 10 times that or 20 times that or a hundred times that.
SPEAKER_01Yep.
SPEAKER_03Um, and it's some you know, some dude in his underwear and you know, I don't know, Belarus who's cranking out these these these books.
SPEAKER_01And yeah, like a hundred bucks a hundred books a day or some, you know, like three years, yeah.
SPEAKER_03It's gonna be it's gonna be interesting to see kind of how that all plays out.
SPEAKER_01You know, when you when you publish a book on Amazon, there's a question. It says, are any parts of this AI generated? It's a yes or no question. And I'm thinking to myself, well, I use pro writing aid. That's kind of AI generated. And sometimes I do bounce ideas off of Claude or Chat GBT. I mean, I don't have them write the book. Where's the line? And okay, you have this information, what are you gonna do with it? Why are you asking me this?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, well, I think they're still at the information gathering stage. Yeah, um, trying to trying to kind of figure out what the tools are and and who's using them and how. Um I I I agree. I mean, I use it for research. I mean, you have to double check everything because you know it it's not uh it's it's more reliable than it used to be. But every once in a while there's a real it makes stuff up sometimes. Yeah, oh it's yeah, there's some really stupid stuff in there.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_03But you know, I I have I I know somebody who, you know, it's like so, you know, here are the bones of my stories. What are some kinds of scenes that I should see? Um, and like, you know, do I do that? Would I do that? No. Do I have an issue with other people doing that? I don't, I don't think so. I mean, as long as you're you know, the problem is that AI then, who whether you're using Claude or Chat GPT or whatever, is then gonna say, would you like me to write that scene for you?
SPEAKER_01Right. And you're like, no, I would not like you to write this scene for me. But yeah, it's it is the wild west. You know, it kind of reminds me of before AI was a thing with writing and all that, you know, with uh Kindle Direct Publishing, there was you know K U Kindle Unlimited, and people were just putting in Garbly Goop in in these books because they could get the page reads, you know, people would go to the end of the book instead of it counting like every you know page. It was just, oh look, he he just looked at the back page. You know, people were there's always somebody gaming the system. Then Amazon has this giant machete and starts cutting heads off, and yeah, and there's innocents that do get caught in the crossfire.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and it's like Facebook's the same way, and I mean it's the problem when there are no humans in the loop.
SPEAKER_01Correct. Yeah, that's without a doubt. So Yeah, we'll see. I mean, I I foresee a day with books and music and art where there'll be a little tagline saying human created.
SPEAKER_03I think there will be categories. Um and and the you know again the problem then becomes like which category do you fit in and how? Um but I don't know. The the other thing I think is that um I think there will be a backlash against AI because it's gonna if it if it does anything near what it's not even what the boosters are saying, it's it's it's what even the naysayers are saying is gonna happen. We're gonna see a lot of jobs being eaten up by AI in the next five, 10 years. And at that point, you know, human-made stuff is gonna take on a new cachet. Yes. Um I mean, I think there's you know, I think the writing is pretty clear on the wall. It may happen faster, it may happen slower, but you know, nobody is really sort of saying AI is gonna stop getting better.
SPEAKER_01Right. No, it's only gonna it's only gonna get better.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. And it's well, and there's this backlash against data centers too, because they're you know, they're consuming water, they're bringing, you know, bumping up electricity prices. Like I think there is this, there is this sense from people that like, and and of course, all of the money is gonna go to some tech company. Sure. Uh, and you know, I'm a capitalist, we all should you know make some money and earn a living and blah, blah, blah. But but I think there are people who are sort of saying, wait a minute, why are these companies happy? You know, it's what is it, seven companies are hold of half the value of the stock market? Um, is that necessarily a good thing? Uh so I think there's you know, those conversations are going on. It's it's really interesting.
SPEAKER_01It is. These are very interesting times, and it's very emotional for some people. You know, I've gone to book conferences and I mean they're getting heated. You know, when they start talking about AI, holy catfish Batman, it it starts getting a little crazy in there. And I'm like, whoa, whoa, I still like you. Either you're AI or anti-AI, you're a nice person. You know, I'm not gonna like poo-poo you because you think this way, but wow, people they dig their heels in no matter. You know, I could say, you know, AI is doing amazing things with medicine right now, you know, diagnostic-wise, you know, treatment, and people are like, oh my god, no, I would never use it. Okay, your child is sick, and AI is gonna diagnose this, you know, whatever disease. Are you really gonna be that guy? I'd hope not.
SPEAKER_03Well, I I just like even now, like some of the really basic stuff, right? So um I went to the dermatologist, she lopped off a chunk of me. I had there's a history of melanoma in my family. Um, I get on a on a Friday afternoon, I get something from the lab. You know, this this just you know, tells me what this thing is. I can't read it. I have no idea what it means. I don't have the, I don't have the, I didn't go to medical school. Yeah, I don't, I don't have the Latin, you know, all of that. Right. So I just I'm just like, okay, uh, cut and paste, drop it into Chat GPT, and it's like, oh, this is this, this is this, this is so instead of waiting until until Tuesday to to realistically get a call back from my dermatologist, I I I got a I found out on Friday night I didn't have to worry, you know. And like, like to me, that's enormous. There's there's there's huge value. But like you have to part of it is just being an informed, you know, person and listening to all sides and sort of weighing for yourself, um, as opposed to just sort of you know blindly following, you know, you know, getting stuck in your news silo and believing everything you read. And whether you're on the left or the right or or pro AI or anti-AI, we're all guilty of that. And for me, the goal is to sort of manage to try to step out of that and to you know read across the political spectrum and to you know talk to people who you know may or may not agree with me, just like you were talking about.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, absolutely. I'm a huge fan of that. You know, when I was a sergeant with the department, when rookies would come in, one of my first speeches I would give them fresh out of the academy. You have friends that are not cops, hold on to them for with dear with dear life. Please hold on to them because they're gonna think differently than you, they're gonna act differently than you. It's super easy to get inside our little bubble here, and we all think the same, we all act the same, you know, blah, blah, blah. It's good to be around people that have a different perspective and a different perspective. That's really smart.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, just well hold on. How great for the how great for those rookies to have that at the front end, as opposed to figure out, you know, 10 years in, holy cow. Like I need an I need to find some other ways to some other opinions in my life. That's so great.
SPEAKER_01Well, some people don't think that way, unfortunately. You know, and you don't have to be a cop. I mean, I see it every day in little echo chambers and whatever else, you know. Like what what you just said, you know what, AI or anything else, you know, it's like try to ascertain the facts and make up your own damn mind. You know, that's yeah, that's why God gave you a brain. It's like use it, yeah. Yep, pretty simple stuff, I think.
SPEAKER_03But yeah, I'm with you. We're preaching to the choir here.
SPEAKER_01We are all right. Well, see, we said we weren't gonna talk about politics.
SPEAKER_03We didn't we didn't really talk about politics.
SPEAKER_01No, we didn't. It could it could get much worse, and it's not going to. I promise, my dear. Thank God.
SPEAKER_03Yes, thank God.
SPEAKER_01Yes, there's more than enough channels for that. That is not my channel, so yes. All right, so you strike me, Nick, as a blue collar author. And for those who are watching, he actually is wearing a blue collar right now. You know, luck finds people who show up for work every day. How true is that? And could you explain it?
SPEAKER_03Oh, I think that's enormously true. There's a there's a uh painter named Chuck Close, um, sort of an acclaimed uh painter, whose line was um amateurs wait for inspiration, professionals show up and get to work.
SPEAKER_01Yes, I've heard that.
SPEAKER_03And I really do think I can't remember who else there. This is um, I don't think it's Hemingway. It's somebody who who talked about um uh you know, the the muse always finds me because I'm always at my desk at 9 a.m. every day. Right. And I I I'm I'm a big believer in routine and in showing up. And you know, I have many, many days where I am not inspired. I have many, many days where I would rather be doing something else, or I have many other things to do. And what I have found is that if I just open the document and I just start to look at what I did, you know, yesterday or the day before, and oh yeah, you know, here's a sentence that that isn't quite right. Uh oh, here's a paragraph that I can tweak. And then before long, I've sort of fallen into it. And I just, you know, I'm just back at work. And I think, you know, to, you know, I people who are not writers think of this as something it's a great, it's a great passion. It's a it's a something that we you know do because we we've always wanted to do it, and that's all true, but it's also it's also hard work, and it's you know, writers are all fairly tormented and filled with self-doubt, and you're putting yourself out on the page for everybody to read, right? And like they're it it you you feel vulnerable in a way that I never felt when I was, you know, a carpenter or a contractor or a cabinet maker or a home inspector or any of those things where it was just my professional knowledge. This is my whole self on the page. Um, but I I am a fan of just showing up to work. I I work six days a week, sometimes seven.
SPEAKER_01Yep.
SPEAKER_03Um, I I work long days. I I like to do it. And I think, you know, I am a Midwesterner. So part of it is that's just I think part of being a Midwesterner is sort of that work ethic. But you know, the the the blue collar job part, like unless you're James Patterson and you are basically, you know, he he basically provides an idea and then functions as an editor for somebody else. Like it that's that's a management position, right? But for for every other writer, like if I don't, if I don't show up at my computer and start typing, I'm nothing's gonna happen. Right. It really is a like if you don't go to work, you know, you you you are not gonna move this job forward. It is so much like being a carpenter or a cabinet maker to me. Um, so I yeah, I'm a big fan of that whole aesthetic.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think people have a very rom people who don't write have a very romantic you know view of what a writer's life is, you know. It's like, well, I'm gonna look at my vision board this morning, then I'm gonna you know, say some affirmations for about an hour, then I'm gonna do some yoga, and I'm gonna burn some candles, and I'm gonna meditate, and then it it's noon. Oh shit, there goes my morning. Okay, I'm gonna have you know some lunch, and then in the afternoon, you know, I might do some more yoga, and then I'm gonna start getting inspired, and then I'm gonna sit at my desk. I see.
SPEAKER_03I thought that was your whole day. Yeah, that's just I just figured that's how you function, Patrick. That is my my secret is out.
SPEAKER_01You got me, man. You got me. Nobody wants to see me in yoga pants, just so you know, nobody wants that very well. But you know, it if you're like I said before, I'm in the world more of the self-published guy where it never stops. The brain, the only time my brain goes into neutral is when I'm sleeping. Either you're thinking of marketing stuff, either you're thinking and I've got the podcast, you know, this podcast as well. I'm constantly thinking it's like, oh, she'd be a great guest. Oh, he'd be he'd be super. I wonder if I should change this. And then it's like, you know, I'm about 95% done with the um with the first draft of my newest book, and I'm like, okay, you know, what's we're getting towards the end here. I really want to end it on a high note, you know. I really, you know, and before I know it's 11 o'clock at night, and I I can't I'm having trouble keeping my eyes open, and I'm like, oh shit, I should probably go to bed. But it never ends. It never ends.
SPEAKER_03Well, you're running a business, right? Anybody who I I I've been self-employed since I was 22 years old, right? So anybody who has ever run a small business understands that it never it never goes away. There's always more to do. And at some point, you just sort of have to say arbitrarily, okay, my day is done now, because if I don't stop and get some sleep and rest a little, I'm not going to be very useful tomorrow.
SPEAKER_01Correct.
SPEAKER_03And that is to me, that is just the reality of working for yourself, running a small business the way you do. And also, I think writers in general, like our brains just go. Uh, every writer I know will be, you know, just they they just can't turn it off. Um, so I think that's just part of the package.
SPEAKER_01Well, it's funny. I mean, I'll just say one more thing about this. I was fortunate enough to know Mark Cameron, our mutual friend, and I was at a conference with him. I'm having lunch with him and his wife, and he always has his bag with him with his uh laptop in case he gets a new idea, he can, you know, or or at least a notepad that he can write down. And we're just talking. I was telling him, you know, when I was working third shift, my ex-wife was not very supportive. She wasn't very nice when it came to me trying to sleep during the day. She didn't get that. I was working all night, and his eyes lit up, and he's like, Do you mind if I use that in a book? I'm like, No, yeah, I have to that's a that's a that's a true writer, right?
SPEAKER_03You harvest the details of the real world, yes, and and try to bring them into your work.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, I just thought that was a funny moment. Yeah, he's just like Eureka, you know, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03He's a we we talk, he's he's a lovely guy. Mark is really one of my favorites.
SPEAKER_01Oh, absolutely. He is one of the nicest guys I've ever met, you know. And for his moniker of success, he's like the most humble guy you'll ever meet. The crazy stuff he's done in his life. He uh obviously you could write books about it, and uh he's just yeah, he's just a normal dude, and him and his wife are just such a cute little couple, and they're just they're so nice. It's just it's amazing to me. It is so you know, we're talking about previous life experiences, you know. That did mold you as a writer, I would imagine. You know, is your previous employments, you know, you your previous jobs and experiences. How could they not?
SPEAKER_03Well, in a way, it's I mean, that's the world that my main character, Peter Ash, lives in, is is he is a he is a working class guy. Um, and I think working class is it it doesn't necessarily mean I think what it used to. I mean, I have I know lots of folks who you know liked school and went to college and they are now you know doing something with their hands because that's a life that's satisf that's that's satisfying to them. And there's a market for it. There is a marketing for sure. But and you know, my being a cop is a blue-collar job, right? You work with your body. Um, but so that's I mean, I I bring that kind of physicality to the character. And there's, you know, I'm I'm not a veteran, but I write about a Marine Corps veteran. And I think my life in the building trades has helped me uh sort of understand some of the uh camaraderie of what comes out of life in the military, and that, you know, sort of the physicality of all of that. And it's a you know, being a working the building trades is is not a particularly safe uh business. There are accidents all the time. And so again, I'm not comparing my life to a combat veteran, but but there are enough elements in common that it helps me imagine my way into that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you know, we could let's talk a little bit about Peter Ash. Why do you think people respond to him so well?
SPEAKER_03You know, it's that's an interesting question. I think part of it is that you know, Peter is you know, there are there are plenty of characters who are like hard asses, who are, you know, tough guys and they want to be tough guys. Um, and and that's not really the core of the character. He's somebody who is trying to figure out how to live his life after uh you know eight years at war, and he's now years on from that, but that effect affects you for the rest of your life, and he's still sorting that out. And he also is somebody who is, you know, he he's polite, he tries to be kind when he can, and you know, but he also feels a duty to be useful in the world. And, you know, these books have you know some violence in them, but they're they're they're earned, and it's Peter rising to help or protect somebody as opposed to being the aggressor. Um and I think that's a big piece of the appeal. The the other is just you know, the other characters in the in the book, right? There's June Cassidy, his girlfriend, there's Lewis, his friend, um, who is a you know semi-retired career criminal. And the relationships between those characters, I actually have a lot of female readers. And unlike a lot of this kind of stuff, um, you know, where it's mostly male readers, but I have a lot of female readers because the characters are well developed, because the relationships between the characters are something that I lean into. Because if you don't care about the characters, you you are not going to care about what happens to them. So for me, that's an important piece of of what I do. And I think that's kind of the core of the appeal of the books.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you know, nobody likes a big bully, but yeah, people do respond well to a big guy that protects somebody from a big bully.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01You know, that's that and how does it make you feel when people compare Peter Ashe to Jack Reacher?
SPEAKER_03That's actually a great question. Um, well, first of all, it always seems like a giant compliment. And and Lee Child is the most generous guy. He's a he's a lovely, lovely guy. Um and he he uh he said something nice about my first book, The Drifter, and his, you know, his his his that quote has been on pretty much every book since. Um not because anybody asked him to do so, but because it's what he was reading. He was on a being interviewed for a radio show, and the the uh the the interviewer said, Oh, what are you reading now? And he said, Oh, I'm you know, he's a he's an English guy. Oh, I'm reading this book by this guy, Nick Petrie.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Um, that's awesome. And and uh, and I really like it. And then so of course it got back to my publishing team and they reached out to him. And um, but and I I've read all those books. I'm a big fan of those books. Um, I'm uh I know Andrew, who's his brother, who's now writing those books.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_03Um but I I'm not sure the comparison is altogether accurate. Um, you know, Reacher is not in every book, but in most of those books, he's really a Superman. Yes. Um, he's you know, he feels no pain, he strides without fear into every situation, and and there's a lot of kind of revenge and punishment in those books. That's in a way, that's what Reacher's role is, is to be the punisher of the evildoers. Yes. Um, and you know, again, those books have a giant audience, they're incredibly well written. I've I've again I've I think I've read most of his stuff at least twice, if not three times, because I've learned a lot from it.
SPEAKER_01Sure.
SPEAKER_03Um, I'm I'm a big rereader in general. But, you know, my character is, you know, he's flawed and he is, you know, his he wonders if he's doing the right thing. And he, you know, he's leading from a place of how can I be helpful, as opposed to let me smack down this guy. And the my villains also, the goal for me is to have the to is to is to I want you to have some sympathy for these people who are doing, you know, in some cases pretty terrible things. To I want you to see them as as people. And it doesn't mean that they're they you know they may or may not be evil, they may or may not have just made some bad decisions, they may or not, you know. I I believe in that whole spectrum of of you know being a bad guy, but I want you to to try to see them as you know, as human beings. You know, the there's a great line um that that I think of all the time, which is that even the villain is a hero in his own mind. He the villain thinks that he or she are just doing the right thing. And to me, that's a very compelling way to look at characters. And so I think those are those are some of the things that that set me apart from what Lee's done. And again, I'm not trying to take anything away from what Lee's done. Everybody knows he's a he's a rock star and he's kind of a legend at this point. Um, but I you know, I I I uh I'm I'm grateful for you know this the nice things he said about me, and I'm grateful for those readers who found me.
SPEAKER_01And I think that's what makes a good writer a great writer when they really have some depth in, you know, it's kind of easy-ish to write a great main character, you know, and I love the fact that you know they've got flaws and they're aware of these flaws, they have weaknesses, even though on the exterior they seem like they're pretty indestructible. You know, they have stuff going on in their heads that nobody else knows about that they're struggling with. And the same thing with the villain, you know, it's so easy just to say, hey, he's a bad guy, she's a bad girl, you know, whatever, blah blah blah. But what I'd love to like say Dexter, I'm a huge Dexter fan. You're rooting for the serial killer, you understand why this guy he's doing horrible things, but he's doing horrible things to horrible people. That there's there's a part of you, there's just this little part of you that's like, yeah, I feel bad for this guy. You know, look, look what happened to him when he was a kid, you know, blah blah blah.
SPEAKER_03You know, I love that well, and it's it's you know, it really is the complexity of character, and and that character is actually a great, a great uh example. And and the the piece about how um you know Dexter's dad uh was a cop, and so and Dexter's dad knew what he was and knew what he was going to be, and sort of pointed him in this direction, yeah, right. So he's like he's doing the best he can with who he is, and like that is such an utterly human experience. Who cannot identify with that as an experience? Like, I really you know, and that's the goal is for for the reader to sort of say, oh, that's he's like me in this way, or she's like me in that way, and to make it easier to fall into those stories and to and to identify with those characters.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's yeah, that that's great writing. That's great writing, I think. So, marketing, the word that strikes fear into many an author's heart. What do you think is the best bang for the book?
SPEAKER_03Uh I am probably the wrong person to ask about this. Um, I'm a I'm a traditionally published uh big five author, and a lot of it is kind of out of my hands. They have a playbook that they follow. Um, and I am really lucky in that my publisher, Putnam, which is part of Penguin Random House, has a long history of supporting their authors in a way that not every publishing house does. No, I I have other I have friends who are published by other big five publishers who, you know, it my publisher is sending me on like, you know, a nice long book tour. You know, I I have and they're paying for flights. They're paying for food. They're paying for hotels. That's awesome. I have lots of talented friends whose, you know, publishers are basically saying, You want a book tour? You know, knock yourself out. Set it up yourself. Yep. You know, they they book it themselves, they arrange it themselves, they pay for it themselves. Um, so I'm I'm quite lucky in that regard. But there's, you know, they have sort of stuff that they do. I think uh like a Goodreads promotion is something that I I hear more about people doing that I think has some benefits. Uh, I think a newsletter is essential if you're a writer, and to sort of cultivate that newsletter and to try to grow um, you know, the number of people who are reading it and to uh above all put it out on a regular basis. Um you know, I there they're you know, you can you know boost Facebook. I mean, there are stuff that you can do on social media, and not so social media is a great bang for the buck anymore because it's been so, you know, the algorithm keeps changing and it's the the you know, a lot of that stuff has evolved so that it there's it's really not about um you know, sort of you know, you generating your own content. It's really become the professionalized where it's influencers creating content is really what's getting the attention. So I'm not I'm not sure those are necessarily important. But I think, you know, the stuff that you do is you you get out there, you talk to people. You know, I think book events, um, you know, again, I'm I'm not sure how many you know extra books I'm gonna sell by going on this longer tour, but I know I'm gonna talk to a lot more people.
SPEAKER_01Yes.
SPEAKER_03And I know that people who are passionate readers who discover books will say to their friend, hey, you should, I just read this guy, this this first, I've read the this guy for the first time, and I really like his stuff, and you should try him. And that's really that that sort of you know ground level of uh of support that builds over time. Um, so those are kind of the things that that I do. And I, you know, again, I like podcasts because I like talking to people. And I again it some have bigger audiences than others, and I don't know, you know, how many of those lead to an actual book sale. Um, but you know, library events, bookstore events, if I do a library event, you know, I always want to have a bookseller there so that if somebody wants to buy a book, there's no obstacle to that. Right. Um and uh I you know that's kind of my take. You know, you you and I have talked, and I I know other writers talk about sort of this kind of guerrilla marketing stuff. Um, and I I you know, if that works, it's great. I think there are many people who try something like that, that it just never, you know, catches on. And um, you know, I I think you have a knack for that. I think some people do as well. Jack Carr, for example.
SPEAKER_01Oh my goodness.
SPEAKER_03You know, really has a knack for that. Um I'm not sure, I'm not sure I have that muscle. Um, and I, you know, I prefer to focus my attention on writing the next book. Um, that that doesn't mean that's what I necessarily should be doing, but I'm not a super fast writer. So a you know, a book a year is a is a challenging timeline for me. So I don't have a lot of other bandwidth for for other things. Gotcha.
SPEAKER_01Now, writing in a series, you have a long-running series that is successful, you know, Peter Ash. What are the positives and negatives of writing in a series for you?
SPEAKER_03Well, you know, I am not Peter Ash. I'm not a Marine Corps combat veteran, but we share a sensibility. So part of the fun is to sort of put that sensibility out into the world. A lot of Peter's observations about things are the observations I myself might make. Um the, you know, so that's just fun to sort of be like have to sort of have an avatar out into the world.
SPEAKER_01Sure.
SPEAKER_03Um, and I know now, right? So book nine is coming out March 10th. Uh, it's called The Dark Time. I have, you know, really only three recurring characters, uh, Peter and June and Lewis, but I know them very well. And I know how they're going to react. I know their voice and how they talk. And and um so those are, you know, it's like starting a new book is like, you know, taking a trip to see some old friends. Um, so I really like that part. The the challenging part is that um, you know, gee, I've I've uh the ninth book is coming out, the tenth book is, you know, all but done for for next year. And to start the next book, it's sort of like, well, you know, I go through, you know, my list of ideas, and it's like, oh, you know, I did that in book three, oh, I did that in book six. Oh, I kind of did that in book four. You know, you you you know, you have to expand the the realm of what's possible um in order to keep the series you know alive and to not sort of get stuck in the same kind of doing the same thing. Um, and I'm you know, I love series fiction. I never really thought I would end up writing series fiction, certainly not this long. Um, and a lot of the people that started out, you know, kind of when I did, you know, their careers are, you know, they their series had ended. They they their publisher shut them down. There are not many people of my you know generation, my my class, so to speak, um, the year that I came out who are still who are still doing this. So I feel really lucky to do it. Um, but it it's you'd think it would get easier, but it hasn't. It's gotten harder.
SPEAKER_01Okay. You know, what would your advice be to somebody that has, hey, I want to write a series? Well, what would some of the best practices be? Or some of the mistakes that you've seen yourself make.
SPEAKER_03Well, so I really designed this series because I didn't want to get stuck in one place doing one kind of thing, right? So if you go back to like a classic PI series, like the Spencer novels by Robert Parker, um, you know, they are there are some variations from the theme, but they they're they're set, they're all set in Boston except for a few. There are certain kinds of stories, and that's a strength to series work, is that they they contain kind of a worldview and an approach to things. Um, you know, Brad Taylor's world is different from Mark Cameron's world, which is different from my world. So that's part of what readers want, is they want to fall into this world. But I very deliberately um made my character somebody who does is not always in the same place because I like I like place as a character. And when you're 10 books in and you're writing about the same places, you just sort of keep referencing the same things. And I really like the challenge of sort of, you know, where am I going to set this next book? You know, what is it that's unique about that place and what are the stories that that place, you know, kind of implies, right? Um, you know, I I was writing a book about the newly legal cannabis, and so I chose Colorado because that was where it had first become legal and where it was really kind of the Wild West. This was my third book uh lighted up. Um, but then setting a book in in largely in Denver, there are implications to that. Um, you know, what is that world like? What does it feel like? And that book ended up being kind of a Western. And I didn't really know at the time that that's what I was doing, but it it really, you know, it that's kind of what it is. Um, so part of it is to think ahead a little bit about, you know, it's gotta be a world that you're comfortable in having. It's gotta be a world where you want to be, because if you're successful, you're gonna be doing a lot of it. Um and I'm lucky in that, and that I like that, and that I have shaped it to the kinds of things I'm interested in. Um you should also, I mean, I yeah, it should be a main character whose head you're willing to be in, right? Like if you're if your main character is you know deeply depressed and an alcoholic, that might not be a real fun place for you to be. Right. For you know, unless your your goal is to have them evolve out of that, like Lawrence Bloch's wonderful, or have them go on a drinking binge and do you know silly stuff or whatever.
SPEAKER_01Like, okay, cool. But then they wake up the next day and it's like, well, that was dumb.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. But so I, you know, I I think I think series fiction has gotten harder um because series television has sort of moved into that niche uh in in a lot of ways. Um, and again, I I don't my my my friend Don Bentley, you know, is like you are the he he's he says I'm like the last standing series writer of my kind of R generation, just because you know, but before us, it's really like Brad Taylor and uh Mark Grainy, who are still going and still successful. And they again, those guys are both incredibly talented and also great guys. Um, but it's a you know, it's a it's a challenge. But you know, I am not a writer who you know looks for a hole in the market to fill or looks for a trend to jump onto. I wrote the book I wanted to read that I thought was a standalone. And my agent said, oh no, this is a series. And my publisher agreed, and they wanted they wanted the next one, and then they wanted two more, and then they wanted three more, and then they wanted three more. And so I just sort of found myself on this trajectory. And so every book is just sort of like, well, how do I, you know, how do I adjust this now? Um, and CJ Box is a friend of mine, and he and I have these conversations about, you know, his, I don't know, what is he on book 25 or something on those Joe Pickett books? Um, and he is, you know, he does not plan ahead. He's just like, gee, what do I want this next book to be about? And I think that's a really smart way to think about it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_03I think people get into trouble when they are like, I want to write a 10 book series. And again, whether this is, you know, a PI series or you know, fantasy or romance or whatever, yes, but they oh, I they spent all of this energy plotting out this 10 book arc. And it's like you really just should probably write the one book. Yeah. And sell the one book. Write the one really good book. Yes, yes. Because that's the that's the secret to getting to getting published, or and or if you're a self-pub, the the secret to getting an audience is you know, it's not about having the right agent or you know, getting the right cover. I mean, those are all helpful, but it really is about write the best possible thing that you can. Yep. And put all of your effort into that.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. And you know, backing up just a little bit, I'm a huge fan of geography. You know, I think that's why Reacher does so well, because they they place him in a different spot, you know, mostly he's not cornholed into like say, you know, Chicago, Illinois, or something like that. You know, I I I think that's that's a really cool, and there are there are benefits to writing like that.
SPEAKER_03Well, and he's really, I don't know if this was conscious or not, or maybe this is something that evolved over time, but most of his books really are you know set in the heartland. Yes. Um, you know, they're cornfields and wheat fields and long empty highways, and I mean they are they are again, it's a a certain version of America where you know Reacher appears, you know, he's sort of like a cowboy in the old west. He sort of shows up and he he writes the wrong and he punishes the evildoers and then he moves on. Yep. Um, and I I think that piece was very intentional on his part. Um but you know, there are a lot of readers in the heartland. We we want to see our own, you know, our own places reflected in the books that we read. That's I think that's part of why William Kent Kruger is a success as well, not just because he he puts his heart into those books, but also because he writes about the Heartland.
SPEAKER_01Now, when you're writing, do you have a specific like actor or actors in mind for your characters? You know, it's like, hey, that gal is Sophia Vegera, uh, that guy is you know Tom Cruise. You know, is that going on in your brain?
SPEAKER_03It's not. I I think that's really helpful for some people to because it lets you picture somebody, but I have been with these characters for so long that I just I don't even have to close my eyes to sort of see their faces in that that are in my head. Um if there is a if there's a character that I am sort of struggling with, I will think about somebody I I know and kind of a like the demeanor, the way they carry themselves. Mark Cameron's actually a really good example. He has a very specific vibe. Yes. Um and um, you know, to sort of, you know, I have a neighbor who describes himself as a farm kid and he's a successful business guy, but like he's just he has very straightforward, he's very down-to-earth. Um, so like I do sort of I steal things from people I know, but I don't, you know, I'm not super plugged into, you know, kind of what's you know, who's hot in the world of actors and actresses. And I I have I have some favorites. Um but um you know the the choice of who the who will play that person will never be up to me anyway, um even if it gets to that point. So for me, it's all you know comes out of my head and out of the real world that I interact with.
SPEAKER_01All right, cool. So tell us about your newest book, The Dark Time, the ninth book in the Peter Ash series that is due out March 10th.
SPEAKER_03Uh that's a great uh very nicely done.
SPEAKER_01Thank you.
SPEAKER_03Uh so yeah, this is the ninth Peter Ash book um called The Dark Time. Peter Ash is a Marine Corps veteran. He's still reckoning with the consequences of his war years later. Um, it's not this is not a military series. This he's really kind of an amateur detective with some physical skills. Um in the dark time, we meet an influential tech journalist named Caitlin Thorson, known as KT to her friends and enemies. Uh, returning home after dropping her teenage daughter at school one morning, she finds a threatening letter pushed through her mail slot, telling her that if she doesn't back away from a story, she'll be killed. Now, KT's a pretty tough cookie. She's no stranger to hate mail, but she's never had an actual death threat arrive at her home. Uh, the letter also specifically threatens her daughter, Ellie. So she's got, and she also has no idea which story she's supposed to stop investigating. She quickly calls her old friend and fellow journalist June Cassidy, who sends uh the formidable Marine Corps vet Peter Ashe to protect KT and her daughter. But despite Peter's uh many skills, the situation quickly goes sideways and he's thrown into a maelstrom of mystery and violence greater than any he could have anticipated. So even after June shows up to help and Peter's friend Lewis comes to town, the challenge uh is I think this may be kind of my biggest story yet, um with bigger consequences that than anything I've done. It was which was a lot of fun to do.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you know, when anybody asks me advice, and it doesn't happen often, but when they do when it comes to writing stuff, you know, it's like, well, what about this or that? Raise the stakes. The stakes aren't high enough. Yeah. Well, I didn't. No, you didn't raise them even higher.
SPEAKER_03You know, it's like, yeah, yeah. Well, and then and there are lots of kinds of stakes, right? Like, not every book can end with a nuclear weapon about to go off. Right. I mean, you can only do that so many times. Right. But there are there are moral stakes. Yes. There are there are can be yeah, very small, intimate, but powerful stakes. Um, you know, it you know, it becomes the life of a child or the life of somebody you love. You can crank up the tension in lots and lots of ways. Yeah, yes, you can.
SPEAKER_01And that's and that makes a good book. Yeah, get the tension going. Get it going. So, how do you want people to feel when they're done reading one of your books? And is that a consideration when you're writing the book?
SPEAKER_03That's an interesting question. I don't know that I've ever been asked that question before. Um, I mean, what I want them to feel is both sort of a wow and a sense of satisfaction. Like I want them to feel as though the things have turned out not as expected, but in an entirely satisfying way. And if I've done that and it's the first one of my books that they've read, then ideally I would like them to say, gosh, where's more by this guy? And I that's that's how I function as a reader. I read something from somebody who I haven't read before, and I I track down everything else they've written.
SPEAKER_01Sure.
SPEAKER_03Um, so that's that's sort of the goal. Um, you know, my I I get I get readers all the time who are like, yeah, I was up late reading with a flashlight under the covers because my wife is trying to sleep. And that's awesome. I love I love that stuff. I love that stuff. That is so cool.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so what actor? This is a fun question that I ask uh my favorite um authors. So, what actor, living or dead? And we kind of rushed on this. Would you want playing Peter Ash if it if these series make it to the big or little screen or whatever screen, you know, screaming services or you know, whatever? Who would you want playing Peter Ash?
SPEAKER_03We we actually got very close to a Netflix series. Um, there was a pilot script, and they commissioned a second script, and they commissioned a series Bible, which is the yeah, sort of how does how does the rest of the season uh sort of unfold and what's the plan for the segue to season two? Um, but in the end, it it just netflix was buying less stuff. This was we we got sort of side sideswiped by the actors and the writer strike.
SPEAKER_01Oh, okay, yeah.
SPEAKER_03So we were we were we were partway along that process, and then the that strike just sort of took all the momentum out of it. And and you know, at that point then Netflix was also and all the streamers were sort of like reporting that they were losing viewers, and so they're like, oh, we're gonna we're not gonna throw quite so much money at this, we're gonna be more thoughtful about what we make. Um and the the you know the Peter Ash uh Netflix series was uh was uh an unfortunate uh you know catastroph uh uh a failure of that. Uh you know, we that we we lost out on that. Yeah but at the at the time the one the one guy um now I can't think of his name. Um John Barenthal. Okay. Um who has a really great range uh as an actor. He's about the right age, he's very physical. He's sort of the one guy um that I've consistently thought of. Um he you might know him from um oh my god, what's that Taylor Sheridan film set in Wyoming?
SPEAKER_01Oh, Yellowstone.
SPEAKER_03No, no, well no, that's the series. There's a film before that about uh uh a Park Service uh employee. His job is to basically kill uh you know predators that are preying on Oh, okay, okay.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I'm looking at his uh filmography here. He was in The Punisher Wind River.
SPEAKER_03Oh Wind River, yeah. And he he doesn't have uh Jerry actually Jeremy Renner, also I'm a I'm a big fan of Jeremy Jeremy Renner, but um the um he just he he shows a he's got a lot of different sides to him, which I really like. Yes, but you know, again, I'm he's not taking my calls.
SPEAKER_01Well, well, I don't know why. And if I if I have anything to do with it, damn it, we'll we'll get this uh rolling. So uh so let's start winding this down here. What like one piece of advice would you give to a new author that is either you know like one or two books under their belt or is just starting out that's you know they're trying to push that boulder up the mountain, they're trying to push to the next level. What would your word of advice be to them?
SPEAKER_03I mean, you have to keep evolving, you have to keep you know improving your craft. Um and there are lots of ways to do that. You can read crafts books, you can you can give your books to uh you know friends who you know, writers you admire to sort of say, Hey, how could I made this better? Um, you know, I I am I'm on the receiving end of that for you know writers that I know who sort of say, you know, this has given me trouble when you take a look at it. Um and I to me that's a great privilege to have somebody whose work I admire to say, you know, I'd like your take on it. Um so I'm on the receiving end of that. And I I have a a book that's given me some trouble that I've uh shared with other authors as well. So I I do this, you know, you know, this goes both ways for me. But that's how you get better is you find a reader whose taste you trust that works for you, whose advice works for you, and you you keep trying to get better at what you do. And also you you have to read. You know, the the writers, people who who want to be a best selling novelist who don't actually read, like you are you that is how you learn to write is by reading people who are better at what they do than you. Um, you know, if what you want to write is, you know, erotica, you you better be reading romance. You know, if what you want to do is read, is write romance. You better be reading, you know, really good women's fiction. You know, if you want to write crime, you really better be reading, you know, the top tier of uh of authors because there's so much to learn. And if you can cultivate that mindset of always getting better and of trying to stretch yourself, and again, especially we we were talking about series before, but I think that's the crucial thing to a series is to keep pushing the boundaries, to keep trying new stuff. Um both because you don't want to bore yourself and if you're you don't really don't want to bore your audience. Right. So and and that, you know, that said, just keep showing up. You know, if you've got something in the mail to agents or or your agent is shopping to publishers, um, you should have another project that you are working on. You should be, you know, you should be, you know, still working because the the reality of being a working writer is that it's work. And you better be, you know, there nobody is gonna be is ever gonna care about your work as much as you do. So you need to lean in and you need to sort of, you know, put in the time, you know, get off your phone, you know, maybe don't watch so much TV, you know, get out of the bar, stop smoking weed, and pay attention, right? And like you, you this is this is not something that um people are successful at. Very rarely are people successful at this, just half ass in it. You gotta you gotta put your whole ass in there.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I wholeheartedly agree with you. So what's next for you?
SPEAKER_03Um, well, I've got the Peter Ash number 10 is I'm just uh tuning that up. My I've gotten the notes back from my editor. So I've I've hit his stuff. I'm just gonna do one more pass through with a pen in my hand, doing the line edits just to make sure there are no clunkers in there that I haven't missed something. Um and I'm prepping for book tour, which starts March 9th for the dark time. Um, so that's gonna be, I think so far I've got 18 events scheduled, which is gonna be a pile of fun. Um and once I get these edits out the door, I have to kind of think about the next Peter Ash, which is always both uh a blast and uh say a little terrifying, a little intimidating. Yep. Um I I don't does this happen to you where like the the book that you've finished is still sort of lodged in your head, and so when you start something new, you're always comparing it to the thing that's finished, the thing that that that you've polished and polished and polished, and then the new thing is just always crap. Yep, it's like man, this isn't as good.
SPEAKER_01What the hell? Yeah, this sucks. What happened?
SPEAKER_03Like, why I got bad at this? Yeah, yeah. So I actually I this happens to me really uh all the time. It's really I'm it's not until I'm like halfway through a book where I've set aside the previous book and I've really fully into the next one. So I have something up on my, I've got a bulletin board where I I put up note cards for kind of you know uh how the story is progressing. Okay. Um and I one of my note cards just says, just write a bad book. Because really all you have to do is begin. And once you begin, you can make it better. But if you can't get yourself to begin, you're never gonna make it better. So just write a bad book, just get going, just get started. Uh so that's kind of my that's kind of my mode.
SPEAKER_01When I interviewed you two years ago, that was the title for the podcast. Just write a bad book.
SPEAKER_03It's something I talk about all the time because I I talk to a lot of aspiring writers. And it's true. It's super cool. Yeah. Well, and and like perfectionism and procrastination and that sort of self-doubt, you know, that is what gets in the way. We have to sort of overcome the worst version of ourselves in order to get to get closer to that better version of ourselves. I think that sort of the emotional and psychological part of writing is the hardest part. There's a point in which you've written a few books, you've read a million books, like you know how to put a story together. But allowing yourself, trusting yourself, you know, getting past sort of that self-doubt and uncertainty, which is just the coin of the realm. That is just what it means to be a writer, no matter if you're, you know, you're on, you know, book 10 or book 25. Like all the writers I know, you know, Lee Child famously, there was an interview where he's like, Yeah, every book, I just am like, I think I've forgotten how to do this. You know, if Lee Child feels like that, it's okay that I feel like that. It's okay that everybody else feels like that.
SPEAKER_01Right. Absolutely. You can't edit a blank piece of paper. Exactly. That's very wise. Yes. All right. So where can people go to learn more about you and your books?
SPEAKER_03Uh, my website is nickpetrie.com. Okay. Um, my I'm on uh I'm semi-active on Facebook and Instagram. Um, I am uh I do a little lurking on Twitter, but I'm not really posting there anymore. Um just because I don't have the bandwidth. I'm trying to kind of keep my life simple. Um, and uh on my website, you can subscribe to my newsletter. So I send something out uh once a month. I don't want to clog up people's inboxes too much, but there will be um, you know, tour information, which is also going to be all on my socials as well. And you know, there's always a there's an excerpt from a book, or there's there's always kind of something uh kind of new and interesting, something great I've read, something good I've seen. It's usually what I've read. Um so that's another way if you want to dive a little deeper and to uh you're kicking off the book tour March 9th, where?
SPEAKER_01Boswell Books in Milwaukee. On North Downer Avenue, I believe.
SPEAKER_03North Downer Avenue, yeah, yeah. No, and it's and Boswell, if you if if you're local and you haven't been to Boswell Books, you really should go. It's it's it is A, it's a great kind of legendary independent bookstore. The the guy who runs it, um Daniel Golden, who used to work at Warner Books in New York, and is somebody who is kind of a legend in the book world. Um and you wouldn't know it. He's a very unassuming guy. He's very, he's uh, you know, he's a he's a he's a lovely guy. But the the what I love about a good independent bookstore is you go in and they will they will I they have recommended, and Daniel does this all the time, books that I that I didn't know existed, that if I knew they existed, I wouldn't necessarily have picked up.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_03That but but because he knows enough about what I've read, which he somehow he carries all this stuff in his brain, um, you know, I will find something new and spectacular that I would not otherwise have have have read. So that's the that's the great benefit of a of a great independent bookstore is as a recommendation engine from one actual human being to another.
SPEAKER_01Very good. Well, the name of the book is The Dark Time. Due out March 10th, it's gonna get released. Nick Petrie, thank you so much for being on the show. It was a great conversation.
SPEAKER_03Oh, it's always my pleasure, Patrick. It's nice to see your face.
SPEAKER_01Thank you, everyone, for listening to my conversation with best-selling and award-winning author, Nick Petrie. It's always a treat sitting down and chatting with one of the most successful, nice guys in the book biz. I really enjoyed my conversation with Nick, and I hope you all did as well. Well, that wraps up another episode of the Cops and Riders Podcast. If you haven't done so yet, can you take a minute and rate and review the show on Spotify or Apple Podcasts? If you have already, thank you. As always, thank you for all of your support, and of course, let's be careful out there.
