“I want you to keep flipping those pages. Probably one of the nicest introductions I get when I do media stuff is, "Ladies and gentlemen, it's because of our next guest that I didn't get any sleep last night. I wanted to read a little bit of this Thor book and before I knew it, it was 4am.”
Brad Thor is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of twenty thrillers, including: Near Dark, Backlash (One of Suspense Magazine‘s Best Books of the Year), Spymaster (“One of the all-time best thriller novels” – The Washington Times), The Last Patriot (nominated Best Thriller of the Year by the International Thriller Writers Association), Blowback (One of the “Top 100 Killer Thrillers of All Time” – NPR), and The Lions of Lucerne (“One of the best political thrillers ever” – Barnes & Noble).
As a prolific writer, it is essential to write the kind of stories you, yourself want to read. That passion requires a PHD-level of knowledge and understanding in order to truly succeed in a genre, especially in a climate saturated by entertainment options. “I know I compete with Netflix, I compete with the internet, all that kind of stuff, so my chapters have to be short, crisp, cinematic, each one has to end with a cliffhanger, so that people want to go to the next one. That's the definition of a page-turner.”
A style of writing termed “faction” creates fictional storylines that draw closely from real world people, places and events so as to make the storytelling and its stakes all the more compelling. Scot Horvath serves as the long-running protagonist in many of Thor’s books, where he serves as an American special operator who faces big moral questions around rules of engagement in pursuit of enemies around the world.
LISTEN AND SUBSCRIBE
SPEAKER
Brad Thor
#1 New York Times Best-Selling Author
Near Dark
MODERATOR
Anthony Scaramucci
Founder & Managing Partner
SkyBridge
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
John Darsie: (00:08)
Hello everyone. Welcome back to SALT Talks. My name is John Darsie. I'm the managing director of SALT, which is a global thought leadership forum at the intersection of finance, technology and politics.
John Darsie: (00:19)
SALT Talks are a series of visual interviews we've been doing during this work from home period in lieu of our global conference series, the SALT Conference, to provide our audience a window into the minds of subject matter experts who are leading investors, creators and thinkers. What we also try to do with SALT Talks is provide a platform for big, important, world-changing ideas that we think are relevant to our audience.
John Darsie: (00:42)
We're very excited today to welcome Brad Thor to SALT Talks. Brad is a novelist, and he's a number one New York Times bestselling author of 20 thrillers, including his most recent book, Near Dark. Some of his other books include Backlash, which was named one of Suspense Magazine's best books of the year, Spymaster, which was quote, "One of the all time best thriller novels," as written by The Washington Times... There's The Last Patriot, which was nominated as Best Thriller of the Year by the International Thriller Writers association, Blowback, which was named one of the Top 100 Killer Thrillers of All Time by NPR, and the first book in the Scot Harvath series, The Lions of Lucerne, which was quote, "One of the best political thrillers ever," according to Barnes & Noble.
John Darsie: (01:29)
Brad is not only a novelist, but he's also appeared on several major media outlets, including ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, Fox and CNN, among many others. He discusses terrorism as well as how closely his novels of international intrigue actually follow real threats that are facing the world today. Brad has also served as a member of the department of homeland security's analytic Red Cell unit. He's also lectured law enforcement organizations on on the horizon and future threats that are facing the country and the world. He's been a keynote speaker at the National Tactical Officers Association annual conference.
John Darsie: (02:10)
In 2008, Brad shadowed a black ops team in Afghanistan in preparation for researching one of his thrillers, The Apostle. Brad graduated cum laude from the University of Southern California, where he studied creative writing, film and television production. Prior to becoming a novelist, he was the award-winning creator, producer and writer and host of the critically acclaimed national public television series, Traveling Lite.
John Darsie: (02:35)
As a reminder to everyone watching today, if you have any questions for Brad during today's SALT Talk, you can enter them at the Q and A box at the bottom of your video screen. Hosting today's interview is Anthony Scaramucci, who I know is very excited about this interview. Brad is one of his favorite authors and I know that he has either almost finished or he's picked up Brad's new book, Near Dark. Anthony is the founder and managing partner of Skybridge Capital, a global alternative investment firm, as well as the chairman of SALT.
John Darsie: (03:02)
And with that, I'll turn it over Anthony for the interview.
Anthony Scaramucci: (03:05)
Hey John, and thank you Brad. Thanks for being here. I'm going to hold up the book. Phenomenal book, and I actually did finish this. I got in trouble last week, I had Daniel Silva on and I hadn't finished the last four chapters, so I had to make sure I finished it this weekend. Phenomenal book, and once again you are right on it in terms of what's going on in our society. It's a fascinating book. I recommend it to everybody.
Anthony Scaramucci: (03:29)
But I want to go to the back story behind that amazing biography of yours, so give us a little more color on your personal. Where did you grow up? What did your parents do? How did you make the transition into being the brilliant novelist that you are?
Brad Thor: (03:45)
Thanks, and thanks for having me Anthony. I appreciate being here and you sharing me with the SALT audience today. I grew up in Chicago. My dad was a Marine, and my mom was a flight attendant for TWA in the glamor days, the 60s, when travel really was elegant.
Brad Thor: (04:00)
My dad was in the Marine Corps for a while, and used the G.I. Bill to go to college. The Marines were his ticket out of the south side of Chicago. He graduated, went to work in real estate for a big developer named Arthur Rubloff in Chicago. Arthur developed a ton of stuff in Chicago. My dad basically carried Arthur's briefcase, and learned everything from Rubloff. And then my dad started a firm, he's still got it, he's still going, called Code and Construction Consultants, and he goes in and works for owners, works for [inaudible 00:04:33], all kinds of stuff. You may be developing an office building, a hotel, or renovating an office building or hotel, and he truly represents the owner in making sure that they are getting the best materials, the best labor, at the best prices. He puts out RFPs and 20 subs will come in. 20 electrical contractors will come in. Goes through everything.
Brad Thor: (04:53)
When I was 16 my dad wanted me to see what the family business was and took me on a job meeting out in San Francisco, and I remember they were negotiating down to how much door hinges cost, and could they [inaudible 00:05:04] stock, certain things on the site, so that they could guarantee the price would not go up for the developer and all this stuff. So I learned a lot about negotiating from my dad.
Brad Thor: (05:12)
My mom was an entrepreneur as well. She became an executive recruiter. So I learned a lot growing up, to never rest on your laurels, always treat every day in your office as if it's the first day on the job and it could be your last if you don't give it everything, and never take your customers for granted. And probably the biggest thing that I take from all that is, I say this in all my book events Anthony, which is I don't work for the publisher. I work for the readers. Those are my bosses. And when they leave reviews or give a colleague a book at work or a family member one of my books, that's my annual performance review, so I always want those five stars or somebody saying, "Try this Thor book." And that I get from my upbringing in the Midwest.
Anthony Scaramucci: (05:53)
That's great. You have a writing style that's been dubbed faction. When I read your books I feel like I'm reading a presidential daily briefing, and so let's talk a little bit about that. How did you develop that knack? Is it from your travels? Is it from your relationships in Washington, intelligence services... How did you develop that knack?
Brad Thor: (06:14)
It's a little bit of everything. I'm in the entertainment business. My job is to give you escape. I want you to keep flipping those pages. Probably one of the nicest introductions I get when I do media stuff is, "Ladies and gentlemen, it's because of our next guest that I didn't get any sleep last night. I wanted to read a little bit of this Thor book and before I knew it it was 4:00 AM, my eyes were bleeding, I couldn't believe that I shut it. Great book."
Brad Thor: (06:38)
So my style has developed and improved over the years. Being a Midwesterner, I always want to do better than the last time. There was a great book called The Content Trap a couple of years ago and it said, "One of the biggest mistakes entrepreneurs make when they're trying to grow their client base is to improve the product. And you may do little tweaks with the screwdriver that the client never sees, the customer never sees, but that's not where increasing the customer base lies." I thought that was very interesting, because I'm a perfectionist at heart. I want to get better. I'm 20 novels in, and as you and I have talked about before, my thrillers are like the James Bond movies. You don't have to have ever read a Brad Thor book before to jump into the latest one. But I'm always trying to go a little bit further outside my comfort zone, get better as an author, so that means I'm reading books, I'm writing all year long.
Brad Thor: (07:34)
I think Stephen King had one of the best pieces of advice, which is to write the kinds of books you love to read, because that's where your passion is. And for me, I add on to that that you probably have a mini PHD in that genre if you've been reading them for a long time. You know what books you like, what books you don't like and all that kind of stuff. I know I compete with Netflix, I compete with the internet, all that kind of stuff, so my chapters have to be short, crisp, cinematic, each one has to end with a cliffhanger, so that people want to go to the next one. That's the definition of a page-turner.
Brad Thor: (08:10)
So over the years I've realized that attention spans have probably gotten a little bit shorter. We've taught people not to wait a week for the next episode of the series. You can binge everything right now. So it's just kind of my business acumen that I got from my parents, is how do I compete? It's not only how do I compete, how do I win? And I win by being more entertaining than anything else I'm competing with. Because it takes a lot of discipline to sit down, start a book and finish it, so I want to make that process as easy as possible.
Anthony Scaramucci: (08:39)
Well it's no question. I was going to say every time I get to the end of something I'm like, "Oh man," and I've got to go again, so you're very, very good at that. But you've also captured something which I think is very unique. This Scot Harvath, I'd like you in your words to describe him to people that have never met him before. I've met him 16 out of the 19 times. I've got 3 more I've got to read, but I want you to describe him for us. And then secondarily, how many Scot Harvath are there in the United States, working for the United States right now?
Brad Thor: (09:16)
So Scot Harvath is my protagonist. Harvath grew up in Southern California. His dad was a SEAL. And he was very rebellious. He got into skiing like a lot of my Southern California friends do. Crazy, you wouldn't think of kids growing up in LA and San Diego skiing, but they do ski, whether they go to Big Bear or whatever.
Brad Thor: (09:34)
And Harvath ends up deciding he doesn't want to go to college, and he's got a shot with the US Ski team. His old man hates that. His dad ends up dying in a training accident as a SEAL instructor, and Harvath decides, "I no longer have the will to compete in professional sports. There's a greater calling for me." He decides to go finish his college degree, gets into the navy, becomes a SEAL himself.
Brad Thor: (09:57)
Ends up distinguishing himself, he works his way up to SEAL Team Six, distinguishes himself on a presidential detail where the president was appearing by water. Comes into the White House, and the then president in my book says, "This guy is too good to have on defense just trying to bolster our counter terrorism expertise. We need to let this guy off the chain and go after the bad guys."
Brad Thor: (10:17)
And one of the questions or kind of the debates, Anthony as you've seen in my books over the years, is we have these things called the Geneva and Hague Conventions, and basically they set out the Marquess of Queensbury Rules for warfare, that if you are going to be a lawful combatant, you at least have to show up on the battlefield with an armband. You can't hide behind women and children, put bombs in cars so that when soldiers go by you can clack off and kill them.
Brad Thor: (10:43)
So there's been this debate about what does it mean for the United States to abide by rules when certain enemies won't. And I think one of the reasons that Jack Bauer and Kiefer Sutherland in 24 were so successful is we all want to have some heavies on the side of the United States. We believe we're the heroes in our own story. I believe that too. I think this is the greatest nation in the history of the world. We're very fortunate to live here. What are we willing to do to protect American lives?
Brad Thor: (11:11)
So if you are willing to suspend the rules or to kind of turn a blind eye to rules being broken if it means the bad guys can be caught and dealt with, well then you have to ask, "What kind of person do you send out? Who do you trust to break the rules?" Because it can't be someone that breaks the rules only because they're a sadist. It's got to be somebody that if they bend or break the rules, it's for a greater good. And I don't take a side on that, actually.
Brad Thor: (11:35)
It's very interesting, because you'll have different politicians or different spies or special operations people talking about it. This is a big thing for Marcus Luttrell in Lone Survivor. I had the great honor of becoming friends with Marcus. And this was the big debate if you read the book or saw the movie, When the goat herder stumbled across that four man SEAL team. What do we do with these guys? If we kill them, we're going to go to Leavenworth. If we tie them up to a tree overnight, well the wolves are going to eat them, and that's just as bad as killing them. If we let them go, we may die. And in fact three of them died, and Marcus barely made it out.
Brad Thor: (12:06)
So this question about what we should be allowed to do [vis-a-vis 00:12:10] what our enemies... If they don't have a rule book, should we have one? How many pages can we peel out of our rule book if we really want to be effective against these people? So that's a continuing theme, but that's who Harvath is, is really this guy that is trusted to go out there and make the right calls and maybe we don't want to know what he does, as long as he gets the job done, sort of a thing.
Anthony Scaramucci: (12:32)
So how many people are like that in our intelligence community?
Brad Thor: (12:36)
Not enough. We have some incredibly brave men and women. The majority of people at the CIA, DIA, we have amazing people. We have some kind of messed up structures within there. We're not policing, particularly on the intel side. People like Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden, Reality Winner... We're getting these young 20 somethings in there that are willing to expose some of the most sensitive secrets in the United States because they've got this woke kind of social justice attitude which is completely incompatible with the job they're being asked to do. We don't want to know what their personal feelings are about what the government is doing. If you really think something is bad, I've always said you could go to Rand Paul in a heartbeat and say, "Senator Paul, I discovered this and this bad thing is happening," and let Rand Paul help you work it out.
Anthony Scaramucci: (13:28)
So more of a process of following the whistleblower rules as opposed to becoming a rogue operator, is what you're saying.
Brad Thor: (13:36)
Yeah. And you know what, I probably shouldn't even put Snowden into that category, because everybody right now that's listening and watching this knows what Snowden looks like. There's no way he was dating a stripper in Hawaii. I'm telling you. I have all these feelings about Snowden and then he runs over to the Chinese and the Chinese are like, "Oh okay, well we'll give him to the Russians." A lot of that just doesn't feel right to me, but this idea of vomiting up intelligence because you don't like what the United States is doing, I agree it's not a good thing. It's not safe.
Brad Thor: (14:10)
I didn't like the Chelsea Manning sentence. The rest of the sentence got commuted and all this stuff. We have not made a strong enough example of one of these people so that it doesn't happen again. And when it comes to secrets, that's one of... It takes so long to develop the intelligence that we have. That it can be given away like that, we need to make sure that doesn't happen.
Anthony Scaramucci: (14:30)
Well I mean, just giving my feedback not that it's worth anything, but when I was in the White House, albeit for that very short period of time, you learn very quickly how complex these issues. You learn very quickly that if it's in the White House, it's a very hard decision, because 5,000 other people, Brad, would have made the decision, so now it's filtering up to the president. And then you find out that there's so much complexity, and frankly, you've got your ideals and then you've got American lives at stake and you've got this whole soup that you have to live in.
Brad Thor: (14:59)
And no certainty. It's 80% certainty, 90, if you even get that high. It's rarely 100.
Anthony Scaramucci: (15:07)
Yeah, well that was the bin Laden raid. It was very uncertain, the bin Laden raid.
Brad Thor: (15:09)
And the Russian bounties on American troupes, most recently. They made it into the PDB and the certainty level was high enough that we shared it with the Brits, so it's very rare you get a 100%. But the bin Laden raid, if you watch Zero Dark Thirty, that whole debate back and forth, what level of certainty do we have, that's right on the money.
Anthony Scaramucci: (15:27)
Yeah. So this makes things very complicated. You do a very good job of sifting through that. Again, I feel like I'm reading an intelligence briefing when I'm going through your stuff. Lets talk about that. You do extensive research on global terrorism, what are the greatest threats right now facing the United States? I don't want to give away your plot here, but just talk existentially and talk generally.
Brad Thor: (15:50)
Right. The worst actors are the ones you always hear. It's Russia, China, and Iran with North Korea in fourth place. I pivoted a while ago off of Islamic terrorism, because I kind of got the feeling that there were other things that were bubbling up that were of concern. One of the biggest obviously being the annexation of Crimea by Russia, which got the Russians tossed out of the G8, brought it down to the G7.
Brad Thor: (16:15)
But one of the biggest thing people don't think about, why we tossed the Russians and why that was such a big deal, is because when the Soviet Union broke apart, about a third of their nuke arsenal was in Ukraine, and we guaranteed as the United States to the Ukrainians, that if you get decommissioned, if you let us help you get rid of those nukes, we will guarantee the integrity of your sovereign territory. We'll make sure that you don't get invaded, it doesn't get gobbled off. And the Ukrainians said to us, "Sounds good. Can you get the Russians to sign that piece of paper too?" And we're like, "Okay, for what it's worth, yeah. We'll get the Russians to sign it."
Brad Thor: (16:48)
And then what happened, Putin invaded under the Obama administration and they rightfully got thrown out of the G8, but that was kind of it. So we didn't live up to it. It was almost like that little slice of Czechoslovakia, little slice, it's a substantial slice of Czechoslovakia, being given away to Hitler when Hitler said, "Oh, I just want to protect ethnic Germans." The Sudetenland.
Brad Thor: (17:06)
There's that famous quote, I think it was [inaudible 00:17:11] that said that, "History doesn't repeat, but it does rhyme." And so I started looking at, "What does a revanchist Russia look like?" Now we've been in Afghanistan, we've been in Iraq for a long time, and Putin wants to gobble back up all of old Soviet Russia, so if Putin chose to...
Brad Thor: (17:29)
The RAND Corporation for instance did a study, if Putin moved on Latvia, Lithuania or Estonia, the three Baltic members of NATO, how quick could he do it? Could we get it back? Would it succeed? They ran the simulation something like a thousand times, and switched generals, top US generals from red team to blue team, Putin won every single time. And it's amazing, because if they take Gotland, the island off of Sweden, and they put their air defense batteries on Gotland, we will not be able to get ships into the Baltic. We won't be able to fly planes there because of Russian air superiority on that side of the Baltic, and the biggest quirky thing that I learned from my novel Spymaster, Anthony, was that if we want to move men or material from Germany or Poland up into that area, the railroad gauge changes. You actually have to remove the equipment from one train, put it on another, and the Russians have all of those transit points marked for sabotage.
Brad Thor: (18:25)
So it's basically impossible to win, and as you know the NATO charter, Article 5 says, "An attack on one is an attack on all," so we would have to go and defend those members. But there's a lot of Americans that are tired of war, couldn't find one of those Baltic places on a map if their life depended on it, and probably wouldn't want to send their sons or daughters there.
Brad Thor: (18:44)
So as I look at this as a thriller writer, I say, "Okay, this is fertile ground, because what in my fictional world would a president do to ever even get called into war in that part of the world? What might he allow my fictional character and my teammates to do?" That's been some of the fun that I've been having in the novels lately.
Anthony Scaramucci: (19:02)
Yeah. No look, it's a nonstop thriller read and it's very insightful. Again, I don't want to give away the plot, but I want to ask you this about NATO, because I think it's very important for the Americans, and certainly you've thought about this. The global alliance, the post World War Two order was setup to be offensive and defensive, and its primary responsibility in Europe was to contain Communism. You could say it was a global responsibility if you factor in the Korean and Vietnam war.
Anthony Scaramucci: (19:31)
We're here now in a post communist era, if you will, because these countries are not really operating in pure communism anymore. Is NATO obsolete? Does NATO need to be refreshed? And if it needs to be refreshed, do we need to protect those nations? Is that important? Is that in our global and national interest? I'm not an isolationist I might add. There's reasons why, but no one wants to hear my opinion. They want to hear yours, so what do you think?
Brad Thor: (20:00)
I think NATO is critical, and I absolutely think NATO should continue to go on. By any measure, NATO has been a huge success. We have not had another global war since World War Two, and that's thanks in large part to NATO. Communism or no communism, I think it's really important. Because regardless of what the ideological subscription is of Russia, they took the Crimean Peninsula. They would take more if they could, so I think it's very important.
Anthony Scaramucci: (20:26)
So why aren't they taking those Baltic States? If a thousand times out of a thousand they could take them, why wouldn't they just take them?
Brad Thor: (20:37)
I think while the military option is very difficult for us, I think there's a lot of financial... There's a lot of different things we could do to the Russians if they did make that move. I think there's a lot of damage we could cause and it doesn't necessarily have to be with dropping bombs on them, so I think that's number one.
Brad Thor: (20:54)
This issue of the NATO members not living up to their 2% of GDP to be invested in their own military, I think is a big issue. I think if you have nations that are not contributing what they said they're going to contribute, that's a problem. I don't like the public fights over that stuff. I'm not a fan of that. I think behind the scenes there's more we should be doing to get them to meet that standard, but I still think NATO is absolutely one of the top, if not the top military alliance ever created in history. I think it's very important and should stay.
Brad Thor: (21:26)
And by the way, that Article 5, "An attack on one is an attack on all," that lever has only been pulled once, and it was by us, the United States, after 9/11 when we went into Afghanistan.
Anthony Scaramucci: (21:42)
One thing I want to bring up and I want to get your reaction to, because I think it's interesting. George Marshall, there was a biography written about him. Obviously with [inaudible 00:21:51] and the father of the Marshall Plan. He was a Truman Secretary of State after being the chief of staff for Roosevelt of the army.
Anthony Scaramucci: (21:56)
When NATO was slipping in terms of their percentages, he said to his fellow team mates if you will, "Let it happen. We want to be the military superior nation on this planet for as long as possible." It was his belief that we're a benevolent democracy, and the less military out there the less potentiality of use of military, even if it was among our allies who during the Second World War frankly were our enemies.
Anthony Scaramucci: (22:26)
It's an interesting concept about where we sit in the global spectrum. But I do agree with you, there's a lot of things the United States could do to Russia. Although with Russia having the GDP of Italy, to be this much of a force, tells you that we're doing something wrong in terms of containing them in a more appropriate way.
Anthony Scaramucci: (22:46)
But lets go to my next question, then I got to turn it over to John Darsie, who once again has been bested in the room rating, because he has all this fake interior designing going on. You've never seen a more room rating overbite than John Darsie. I don't know what there is. You've got all that natural stuff going on behind you, so once again John, in a SALT Talk you've been trumped by one of our guests.
Anthony Scaramucci: (23:11)
But I want to ask this last question, then I'll turn it over to John. Do you have a favorite among the books that you've written? Something that you really say, "Wow." You closed the manuscript, you shipped it off to the publisher and said, "That's my opus."
Brad Thor: (23:25)
You know what, every one is different. Every one was a challenge. Every one has been harder. You think doing 20 books it would get easier. It doesn't. That's just part of my nature. I consider myself a small business person. I'm only as good as the last thing I've written, because that's the highest the bar has ever been for me personally. I always say my favorite book is next year's book because that's the one I'm writing right now. That's the one I'm super passionate about.
Anthony Scaramucci: (23:48)
Have you started next year's book Brad?
Brad Thor: (23:50)
Yeah. I have. And by the way Anthony, for the benefit of those who are watching, the one thing I can tell you is the current book Near Dark, if it was a movie poster, the logline would be, "A hundred million dollar bounty has just been put on the head of America's top spy." That's really what Near Dark is about. My guy, hundred million dollar bounty on his head, can't trust anyone, reluctantly he has to trust one person, and it bounces all around the world.
Anthony Scaramucci: (24:17)
It's fascinating. The ending is even more fascinating than the beginning. So I'm holding it up again. I'm going to turn it over to John, Brad. He's got questions. You've got a lot of fans out there that are coming in, asking questions, so go ahead Mr Darsie.
John Darsie: (24:34)
Yeah, we have a lot of questions. A lot of engagement on today's talk. Brad, thanks again for joining us. So as I mentioned in the open, you embedded yourself in Afghanistan in 2008 with a black ops team, and authenticity is obviously very important to your work. Some of our viewers want to know, "Why is that authenticity so important, and what was that experience like in Afghanistan?"
Brad Thor: (24:56)
So first of all, I think that the details are the bedrock of a good thriller, and you've got to get those right. My wife, if she picks up a book, she'll finish the book no matter what. You get maybe two strikes with me. If you put a safety on a Glock, that's a big strike against you. You've only got one more after that, and I will put a book down and not pick it back up. There's no reason not to do your homework. You have the internet for God's sake.
Brad Thor: (25:20)
Poor Clancy, I don't know how he got the details he got for Hunt for Red October, the libraries and places he must have haunted forever to write that novel without the benefit of the internet the way we have it today. So details are really important.
Brad Thor: (25:34)
The Afghanistan trip was amazing. I got told three things. Make sure all your life insurance is paid up, get in good shape, and grow the biggest beard you can. Got to Kabul and one of guys said, "Do you have any sunglasses?" I'm like, "Yeah, I've got my sunnies with me." He's like, "Let me see those." He takes them, puts them in his pocket. He goes, "You get those back at the end of the trip." I'm like, "What do you mean?" He goes, "Nothing marks a westerner from a distance like a pair of sunglasses."
Brad Thor: (25:57)
It was really these little things, and John, that's what I was interested in. They were going out and building human networks, gathering intelligence... So the best fried chicken I ever had was in Jalalabad. Best ever. And the other thing that was really interesting, was learning... I spoke about with Anthony, Marcus Luttrell and Lone Survivor, and how those Afghans protected Marcus. Well that's based on something called Pashtunwali, which is their code of honor. And every village I went with this team to, we already had permission of the village elders to be there as their guest, because what happens is if you're their guest, they will fight to the last man and boy in that village to keep you alive.
Brad Thor: (26:40)
I always joke, "Try to find somebody to help you change a tire on the way to the airport in the rain when you're off to the side of the road. It doesn't happen." So here's this incredible code of honor there. The people were fantastic. It was great. But just even little things, like it would be on and off [inaudible 00:26:54] and they'd have pallets of water. You grab a case of water and throw it in the back of the truck. Just the little color details that you had to be there to pick up. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity, and that all went into my thriller The Apostle.
John Darsie: (27:09)
Next question is about, "What type of books and authors do you read, and have any in particular inspired your style as a writer?"
Brad Thor: (27:18)
I grew up grabbing whatever book my parents had just finished and set down. I would mark, I would watch my dad or my mom, and they read Le Carre, Ludlum, Freddy Forsyth, Clancy, and no sooner had that book hit the coffee table or nightstand, then I'd come and swipe it and I'd read those books myself. So those were really good, those great cold war books, because they dealt not only with the turmoil and private lives of the spies themselves, but the overarching global politics and why these things matter. Why the successful accomplishment of a mission was critical to the future of the west and things like this.
Brad Thor: (27:56)
I've always loved the tension between spies and government, or war fighters and government, because as long as we have gathered together in tribes and picked up rocks and sharpened sticks to go get our women back or take back the crops that the other tribes stole from us, there's been politics involved. So that intersection for me is fascinating, and it creates a real dynamic tension that can lend itself to the excitement in a thriller.
John Darsie: (28:22)
We have a couple questions that all sort of aggregate into one about your own writing process. You talked about how you don't really create a universal arc for your character Scot Harvath, and you don't have a destination in mind for him. You're really talking current events, weaving them into different stories that you're writing about that character. What is your individual writing process like? How do you write? Where do you write? What's that challenge like in terms of crafting a new narrative, like a Bond movie as you mentioned, with each book that you write?
Brad Thor: (28:57)
Great question. So like I said, I've done 20 novels. It does not get any easier. I'm not an outliner. Dan Brown who wrote Da Vinci Code is a buddy of mine, and Dan at one point shared with me the outline for Da Vinci Code, which was really cool, because Dan is like a mega outliner and I got to see all the things that didn't make it into the final novel. Which is kind of neat, to see like a highlight reel or something, everything that ended up on the cutting room floor. It was very cool. He had some cool stuff he was planning for that.
Brad Thor: (29:22)
So I'm not an outliner. I really believe in the quote from Robert Frost that says, "No joy in the writer, no joy in the reader. No surprise in the writer, no surprise in the reader." I want to have the same experience writing the novel that you do reading it. I want my palms to sweat. I want my heart to pound. I specialize in absolutely sticking it to myself. I paint myself in the corners all the time. I'll go home at night and my wife can tell by the expression on my face if it's a red wine night or a Bourbon night, how badly I've put myself in a corner, and she always says, "Don't worry. You'll figure it out tomorrow."
Brad Thor: (29:58)
That's what makes my job hard, John. That's what makes it challenging, but that's also what makes it so rewarding, because if my job was easy, it would be boring. And I don't have the kind of brain and personality that deals well with boredom. I constantly have to have stuff going on, so I've got kids that get up in the morning, in the before time we get them off to school, breakfast and everything. I'm a big health nut, so I'm working out six days a week and then I'm in the office early, and I treat it 8:00 to 6:00 because I have a family. I want to be home for dinner with my kids and that kind of a thing.
Brad Thor: (30:29)
But listen, this business is seat of pants to seat of chair. And Jack London was famous for saying, "You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club," particularly if you're putting out a novel a year like I am. So it really is about mental toughness and discipline and paying attention to the details.
Brad Thor: (30:48)
The old thing, watch the pennies and the pounds watch themselves. Any business where you're going to be successful, you have to be a detailed person, because if you're not watching the details, you're not going to build a successful product. You're not going to build a successful company. So the same things you see in the world of finance, wherever it might be, whether you're a hedge fund manager, whether you're just doing [MNAs 00:31:07] constantly, it really is attention to detail and self-discipline. It's the key to success no matter what your business is.
John Darsie: (31:14)
So 19 of your 20 novels cover the character we've been speaking about, Scot Harvath. You have one that covers a band of female intelligence officers and special operation forces. We have a question about other minor characters that show up in your books that people seem to be infatuated with. Scott Coleman, Nicholas being another. Do you see yourself branching out of that Scot Harvath series?
John Darsie: (31:38)
We had Daniel Silva on last week, and he sort of fell into the Gabriel Allon series because it was so popular, sort of what you talked about with Scot Harvath. You didn't intend to make it a serialized stories about that character specifically. But what do you see as your future as a novelist in terms of the characters that you write about?
Brad Thor: (31:58)
Well it's such a great question. I've got about 60% male readership, 40% female readership, and that female readership is going up. So we came at this book with, and I probably have the mirror image up, the way Anthony did it looked a lot better, but we have this really cool foil cover that catches the light, and it's got [inaudible 00:32:17] on the cover which is one of my favorite destinations. I've always wanted to put it in a novel. I finally got to do it with this one because it was just the right story for that location in France.
Brad Thor: (32:27)
So what I challenged myself to do with this book was I wanted to create a female character to go with Scot Harvath that was just as good, maybe better than Harvath. So she works for the Norwegian Intelligence Service. She's a spy for lack of a better term, for Norway. In real life, the Norwegians have an all female special forces team that's called Jaeger. When they were being created it was called Tundra. That was the code name for them.
Brad Thor: (32:54)
I created her, she gets in there, she joins up, they turn her down, turn her down, turn her down, she works harder and harder and harder, gets in, gets onto the special forces team and there's not enough action for her. They were putting her in Afghanistan to go talk to the wives of Taliban guys and all this kind of stuff and she's like, "No, I signed up for what the men get. I want to kick in doors and shoot bad guys in the face." And she ends up leaving and joins the Norwegian Intelligence Service, there happens to be a kind of [inaudible 00:33:20] who's there to get her right at the right moment.
Brad Thor: (33:23)
So I've done almost this reboot of the franchise, where maybe Harvath is not going to go back to what he's doing. He may run off with this woman and they may do operations together, which is kind of fun. But yeah, Nicholas is a great person. God bless whoever asked about Scott Coleman. That's a Mitch Rapp, Vince Flynn character, okay. I'm a big fan of the Mitch Rapp books, by the way. And it's funny because Vince Flynn, God rest his soul, gave me one of my first blurbs. And Kyle Mills is writing the Mitch Rapp books for Vince Flynn's estate, and I knew Kyle before I was even an author. His dad was in the FBI and my dad's best friend who is like a godfather to us was in the FBI.
Brad Thor: (34:11)
So spinning off characters, absolutely. Nicholas is one. A lot of people want to see me bring The Athena Project back, which is the all female Delta force team. So be careful what you wish for John, because I always said I needed more time, and now we're on lockdown. Guess what? I've got nothing but time.
John Darsie: (34:29)
All right, so we need two books a year now, Brad.
Brad Thor: (34:32)
Well if I don't come out of this with two books, shame on me, because I get to look back on this time in the pandemic and I can become a better husband, better father, and I can crank out a second book. If I don't, if I fail on any of those, I've let myself down. So I think it's probably a safe bet that you're going to get a second book out of me from this.
John Darsie: (34:48)
All right. Fantastic. We talked about this a little bit before we went on the air, but what are the chances of a Harvath movie or TV show?
Brad Thor: (34:56)
Some great questions. Right before late fall, early winter, we had one of the top producers in Hollywood come to us and say, "Love these books. I've got an awesome idea, because Brad, you've got 19 Scot Harvath books, and yeah we could do them in any order. You've got the one Athena Project. This is like buying the Marvel Universe. I mean we could do films, we could do television, we could spin off characters. It is an amazing package."
Brad Thor: (35:24)
And the producer was fantastic. Done some amazing deals. Been recognized with Oscar nominations and all this kind of stuff, and I said, "Okay, well you and I both know that the big thing is the director." And he said, "Well who do you want as the director, Brad?" I said, "I get to pick?" He goes, "Yeah." And I said, "Well, who are you looking at?" He goes, "Well, here is my top three." And his number one guy was the guy I want. And I said, "You can really get this guy?" He says, "What are you doing tomorrow at two o'clock? I'll get him on the phone."
Brad Thor: (35:50)
I had a talk with this director. I love this guy's stuff. I guarantee you John, you, Anthony, everybody at SALT, everybody who is watching has seen this director's work. And I get on the phone with him and he's like, "Brad, long time fan. I love the Scot Harvath..." And it has just worked out great.
Brad Thor: (36:05)
So what we're trying to do now, is to get all the pieces lined up. I can't say who the director or the producer is and that kind of stuff, because they want to make the big splashy press announcement and be the first ones out of the gate and into production as soon as COVID disappears or who go overseas to shoot some place where there's no COVID.
Brad Thor: (36:20)
That's the one big thing we're working on now is putting the writers together and all this kind of stuff so that everything is in place, so when the financing drops in, either we go to someplace like in New Zealand and start shooting, or the minute California fully opens up or... My books are so international, we could go anywhere. We could go to Iceland and shoot one of the books if we wanted to. And that's what they said is really the blessing of my books, is that we don't have to let COVID dictate to us. We can let the book dictate where we go and when we start. So fingers crossed we'll find a place and we can go to work soon.
John Darsie: (36:53)
All right, well good news for Scot Harvath fans. You talked about how from a topical perspective you've pivoted a little bit from focusing on Islamic terrorism to focusing on things like Russia, Crimea, things of that nature. Do you see anything on the horizon that might become an increasing focus of yours? Or as a specific question about sort of the domestic threats as well, the rise of domestic militia groups and social unrest taking place in the country. But generally, where do you see maybe where the puck is moving in terms of your storyline?
Brad Thor: (37:26)
That's always my favorite Gretzky quote, which is, "Don't go to where the puck is. Skate to where the puck is going to be," which is precisely what I like to do. Listen, I think we've got a lot of problems that have gone way too long unaddressed with China, but I think that as tensions rise with China there's a chance for a mistake to happen, whether that's in the South China Sea, who knows?
Brad Thor: (37:48)
We have a lot of influence operations that are happening right now with China and Russia trying to exploit all the cultural and political divisions in the United States right now. And one of the things I complain the most about is how many Americans get their news from Facebook, because you're not really getting the news, you are siloing yourself in areas where you feel comfortable. So you're going to places within Facebook where you are getting your beliefs reinforced, not challenged. And the Russians and Chinese know that, and they are exploiting that. So they're going in where people feel comfortable and unchallenged, and they're giving them bogus information and trying to manipulate them.
Brad Thor: (38:22)
It's a big problem there. I don't know how you spin that into a thriller, but I am concerned with what happens... I'm really good John, I pride myself in being able to peer over the horizon and tell you what's going to happen next, but COVID has kind of wobbled my radar a little bit, because a lot is going to depend on, "Is there a vaccine? Does it burnout? How bad do things get?" And we've also got a pretty major election coming up in November, which is going to impact what certain adversarial powers are going to feel good doing.
Brad Thor: (38:52)
China and Russia are going to feel comfortable doing certain things under a Biden administration or under a Trump administration, and that's the one item that is just kind of hanging out there, and I don't know how that ball is going to come over to the plate. It could be a little outside, right down the middle, I'm still trying to focus in. Ask me again in 45 days. I'll see if I can have a better answer for you.
John Darsie: (39:12)
All right. Amazing. Well Anthony, do you have a last word for Brad? As I mentioned earlier, Anthony is a huge fan of your books.
Anthony Scaramucci: (39:19)
Well yeah. Well, I love your books. I look forward to your book, Daniel Silva's book during the summer. I think that it's phenomenal writing Brad. I hope that we can get you back on when your next book comes out. I'm going to recommend it again, and I love the cover. Probably not great to see it here on a Zoom call, but it captures everything that's inside the book and more. We wish you great success with the book, and I hope I get a chance to see you in a non-COVID environment. Hopefully, somewhere in Nashville where we can listen to some great music and get a beer together.
Brad Thor: (39:52)
I love it. Sounds like a plan.
Anthony Scaramucci: (39:54)
All right. God bless you, sir. Have a great success with the book, and we'll see you soon.
Brad Thor: (39:58)
Thanks Anthony.