When Is It Time To Start Over?

Imagine being a bodyguard for Queen Elizabeth and President Obama, then walking away to write novels. Or being the guy who reviews every major thriller author for 10 years before you decide to publish your own book and start facing up against those same authors. I'm really excited about today's conversation because it talks about the leap of faith that changes everything.

The moment when playing it safe stops being an option and you decide to bet on yourself instead. I sat down with Simon Gervais and Ryan Steck, two thriller authors who've built successful careers by taking massive risks. Simon was a Canadian Infiltry military officer turned federal agent who worked on anti-terrorism in the Middle East and Europe, then protected heads of state like Queen Elizabeth and President Obama.

before leaving it all in 2014 to become a full-time thriller author. Ryan spent a decade as the real book spy, the guy reviewing everybody from Brad Thor to Jack Carr, before finally jumping to the other side and becoming a thriller novelist himself, facing all the authors he used to critique. Together, they just co-wrote The Second Son, which comes out December 1st. We get into what it really takes to walk away from stability, how to deal with the pressure when you finally make the jump,

the reality of climbing one mountain only to find yourself back at the bottom of the next one, and why surrounding yourself with people at the same level as, wait, but, and why surrounding yourself with people at the same level as you matters more than you'd think. If you've been holding yourself back from taking the leap, this conversation is for you. Without further ado, please welcome Simon Gervais and Ryan Steck to Geisse.

Josh Felgoise (02:13.838)

Let's get into it. Nice to meet you both. Can you guys introduce yourselves to the audience and just say like a little bit about who you both are? Simon, we'll start with you. Sure. My name is Simon Gervais. I'm a full-time novelist. I used to be an infantry officer with the Canadian forces. And when my military contract ended, I joined the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, which is for my American friends, the Canada equivalents to the FBI, the ATF, Secret Service, all rolled into one big organization.

Since 2015, I'm a full-time writer. So cool. Ryan, how about you? Yeah, it sucks to go second on these. I have no military background. I tell people I'm a spy, but my agent always says, like, Ryan, calm down. You're a book spy. You didn't, like, really do anything. So I've been the real book spy for 10 years. And I think it was 2021, 22, made the jump to thriller novelist. So now I cover the genre and I write books in the genre. And pretty much my whole life is thrillers.

Had an idea for this one and got to work with a good friend of mine and Simon to bring readers the second son. Well, I'm so excited to talk to you both about this. What is the biggest risk you've taken in your career and did it pay off? Simon will go with you first and then over to you, Ryan.

Yeah, absolutely. Listen, until 2014, was RCMP officer. I was making a six digit salary. was living the dream, enjoying every day when I woke up to work. I really believed in what I was doing. And it took me seven years to write my first novel. And when I signed a contract, I had another book that was due a year later.

And for me say, listen, it took me seven years to write a book. How am I going to be able to do it like in 12 months? So I spoke with my wife who is an endodontist surgeon here in Canada. And I said, you know, I really love writing. You know, would you support me if I took a leap of faith and tried to do that full time? And she said, absolutely. Like I will support you 100%. So that was my biggest leap of faith and biggest risk I ever took.

Josh Felgoise (04:27.308)

well, just because I didn't have, I had my wife, but I didn't have any other safety net. So it had to work. How hard was it for you to take that leap to decide you wanted to go full time writing? Did you struggle to believe in yourself? How did you get past all of that? It's a very good question. Listen, I never doubted myself. I didn't know the business very well when I did that. So maybe if I knew everything,

I would have did something different, but I didn't know what the odds were. So I just went at it like I did in my previous career and it kind of paid off. Very cool. Ryan, how about you? Wow. Look, I mean, the leap of faith was going from covering thrillers to writing them. When I've been the guy that was reviewing Simon and everybody else for a decade, I don't even know if Simon knows this, but a lot of authors played like pranks on me.

So my first book came out, you have to go out and get endorsements. You have to get blurbs and no one took that seriously. Really. I would get like a lot of like, Hey, this one's okay. Maybe get it from the library. Don't buy it. And then I would freak out. And then I would get like a second email from someone that was like, Hey, just kidding, buddy. This is a great book. And it'd have like the real blurb on it. But prior to that, like I didn't appreciate how hard it is to write a book. Simon mentioned, you know, you take six, seven years. There's a saying in publishing.

that you have your whole life to write your first book and you have one year to write your second. And you don't really think about that when you're in that honeymoon phase of like I signed a book deal, I get to be an author and it's fun. And then you realize like, I've got to go write a whole second book very, very quickly while everyone's watching you, you know, the publisher, your agent and all that. So it was a leap of faith to go from, and not only that, I think, look, when you cover thrillers for a decade, people like

The expectation is going to be that you're going to have a really good first book. And I think first books can be challenging because people don't know the characters, you're setting everything, you're introducing them to the characters, to the universe, to everything else. So yeah, I think it was a hard, a very high bar because I covered thrillers for a long time. And I think because of that, Josh, I waited a while to even try to publish my first book. So what, what kind of led you to want to do it? Like what, what brought you over the edge from?

Josh Felgoise (06:49.825)

holding yourself back for so long. I'm sure a lot of people listening right now can relate to the fact of something you're you holding yourself back for so long from doing the thing you want to do. And then finally taking that leap. And I think everybody's leap is different. I think you both have a different story of that. So Ryan, what's yours? man, I think. Yeah, very politely. When you when you cover books for a living, you get a sense of like, you know, this one would have been better.

Someone would have done this or that and and eventually you want the control you know and I was very blessed to have an agent right out of the gate because I'd done so much in the industry and I just remember one day my agent whose name is John he said like you know if you just wrote a book like you wouldn't have to complain about you know what everyone else is doing and you probably make a lot more money and That's that's probably all I needed to hear man. Then I went for it What? What do you do when you're starting with no road map? How do you create?

structure or momentum? Well, I don't. mean, I don't do that. I there's a good friend of my name, Joe Rosenberg, New York Times bestselling author. And he said that when you sit and look at a blank Microsoft Word document, it's called the cursor for a reason. It blinks at you because you feel cursed. I can't sit and create from nothing. I admire the authors who can do that. That's not me. That's not my style. I have to spend a lot of time like trying to see that scene in my head and then I can go write it.

Simon, what about you? Yeah, for me, actually, I'm an outlier now. So I write an outline. I'm going to spend a few months doing an outline. It's going to be between six and 15,000 words. And I think it's easy for me to write a story when I've already worked out the quirks before starting. Because a few years ago, about five years ago, I used to be a pensor. So I kind of write the books just like Ryan said. You look at the screen and you just start it.

I wrote myself into corners so many times and I've lost so many thousands of words, months of work that I said never again. So now I know how I'm gonna start, I'm gonna work all the twists and turns. I know how the story will hand. I even write a little bit of dialogue. So when I actually start writing the actual book, I already have the entire skeleton written. Wow, okay. So there's a full process. So when you're starting,

Josh Felgoise (09:15.263)

a new book, which I know you're starting the second one of this series before the first one's even come out, which is amazing. How do you start? Like, do you have a routine you follow? Do you have like something you do every day to get that creativity flowing that you can share with our listeners that that would be helpful for anybody? Well, Ryan and I, and you know, we can jump in after, but we kind of set ourselves our deadline. The editor gave us like, need to give us that book for.

Let's say November 1st. And then we're going to work together building an outline. And then we're going to give each other updates and kind of dates to follow to make sure that we're not behind. so far, it's funny because you just mentioned that we're starting the second book before the other one even started. We're actually about to finish it. Like I have about 48 hours left of work, right? And I do. And then it's going to be up to our editor.

Of course, there's gonna be developmental edit, copy edit that's gonna come. But I would say right now, 99 % of the book is done already. Anything you wanna add there, Ryan? Yeah, I mean, it's a fascinating process working with someone. There has to be a lot of trust. I think the fact that we're friends and we don't bring ego. I was a big fan of his. And Simon, I've covered him from his very first book, by the way, as a book spy.

So I knew what I was getting. I knew what I was getting with him as a writer. and then it, but, but, but deeper than that on a personal level, I knew what kind of guy he was. And I think the reason that we work so well is we just don't bring ego. If I have a good idea and I think it's a good idea, I can pitch it to him freely. but oftentimes he'll come back with something better. And, and I, I have no shame in going, yeah, no, you're right. Your, your thing is better. Let's do that. And then it's a collaborative effort. And how do we, how do we do that? The only thing I really do differently,

writing a book with Simon than writing a book solo is on my books, the first thing I write is the last chapter. I always write the final chapter first. And the reason for that is because like my philosophy is if I know where the book ends, I just have to go back to the beginning and tell the story up until I get to that point and I'm done. So I like to know where I'm ending and then I feel like I never shortchanged my readers. I never...

Josh Felgoise (11:34.336)

get to a point where you're like, he hit his word count and he wrapped this book up. No, I try to write the ending first. But with Simon, think what's been so fun is I don't think we always have an idea, but I don't think we really know for sure how these books are going to end until we're there. And then we're having these ideas and we're pitching each other and trying to make it work. And that's what's made it so fun. Tell me more about that collaborative process and how you guys

worked together? Did you guys ever argue and like get into I liked this more you like this more? How do we meet in the middle situation? And like you mentioned not bringing ego into this. I'm assuming that's hard when you're writing a book and you care so much about these characters and what you're you're building. So how do you navigate all of that? I don't we so I don't think we've ever have we ever argued I don't think we've ever argued. I don't think so. I think we will.

They won't even have a real debate about stuff. We're just gonna talk, we're gonna brainstorm and right away I can see when Ryan's idea is better than mine and this versa. So no, I don't think we argue, we challenge each other though. That we do. We try to one up each other with better idea, but this is for the greater good of the book, not because it's gonna be Simon's idea or Ryan's idea.

We do admit when somebody else has a better idea and we think it's going to work better for the book. So I think the secret of a good collaboration is to be open to changes. I'm curious more about the open to changes situation. Like if you really love the thing that you just brought, can you move past it? Can you, how do you decide that that person's idea is better than yours? Like how do you navigate that? I think you're both professional about it. right. Like, so you sit down.

And again, there's been many times I really loved my idea and a pitch I had, but Simon, he's never said no. I've never told him no. It doesn't work like that. It's like, you know, what if, like that's a good idea, but what if, and it's always taking it farther or in a different direction to, know, maybe you didn't see. That's what makes this fun. There's genuinely some things in this book, In the Second Son, that I could not have pulled off on my own.

Josh Felgoise (13:45.531)

There's things I would never have come up with and also to that point. I genuinely can't remember anymore What I wrote what he wrote what was my idea? What was his idea like it so becomes its own thing by the time we're done And I can tell you like the the level of trust that that has to be there I mean that is probably the most important thing there were things with the first book that I could not articulate But I thought would look good on the page

And I know Simon trusted me enough to say like, Hey, go write it and let's see what it looks like. And, uh, he mentioned we're wrapping up the second book now and there's definitely things where he came to me and was like, Hey, what if, and I'm like, man, just write it and we'll see what it looks like. And so there has to be trust back and forth for this relationship to work. And for, for us, I mean, I won't speak for Simon, but it's far surpassed, like all my expectations just in terms of like how well we'd work together. And then the end product.

And something else about being open to changes. You need to understand Josh that Ryan and I both have our names on the book. We are both fighting for the same objective. We're not fighting against each other. We have the greater good in mind. It's to make the best book possible for our readers and to sell a lot of books. So it's easy to collaborate when you shared the same objective. Like if we were competing against each other, it would be different. But now we're working together.

So that's why I think it's important to be open to changes. And it's actually easy to do because I know that Ryan wants what I want and this versa. That's a really interesting insight into this because you are, it's the point is to collaborate, make the best product. And that makes it much easier to take the ego out of it. Simon, I want to ask you specifically, you literally lived in the world you now write about counter-terrorism, high pressure operations.

What mindset from that world do you still carry with you when you sit down to write? I think it's discipline and I'm not lazy. So, know, whatever I need to do to get to my objective, I will do. It doesn't matter if I'm at the end of the deadline, I need to work 20 hour day. It's fine. I'm totally fine. And honestly, what I bring is another perspective because in my

Josh Felgoise (16:07.529)

in my other line of work. When I made a mistake, I could get killed or I can get somebody else's kill. Here, if I do a mistake, I'm gonna get a bad review. So the pressure is lower. I still push myself to the maximum that I can because I wanna succeed in every field that I worked in, law enforcement, investment, publishing. I wanna be at the top. But I would admit that writing,

isn't the same pressure if you go through a door and you try to stop like a criminal doing something. So it's kind of, it gave me perspective and I think it allowed me to breathe easier understanding that this world there's pressure but it's not the danger. And you've seen that danger up close and you've lived that high stakes reality where there is real stakes. If you make the wrong move, as you said, you could get killed, someone else could get killed.

How has that shaped the way you understand human nature? Well, my wife would tell you probably that it changed me a little bit at the beginning for the worst because I didn't trust people. There are still situations in my day-to-day life where I think like a cop. I won't trust somebody who's asking for help right away. I'm always looking around to make sure that this is not an ambush. This is not somebody that's trying to get something.

that you shouldn't get. So I think it makes me a lot more cautious. I'm always very aware of my surrounding, even today, 10 years after I left the force. Wow. And it's kind of a crazy mindset to live in. And you mentioned discipline in your answer, and I'm curious to both of your takes here. How do you create or kind of like keep creating discipline? Like I think...

that lot of people don't have discipline when it comes to creating something or in the workforce. I think it's hard to have discipline, especially when you don't love what you're doing at the moment. If you're in a job you don't love, what do you recommend for somebody on how to create discipline and keep discipline in their life? Well, I mean, it's a job, you know, so I feel very fortunate. Like this is work today. We get to talk to you, right? Like we're in air-conditioned offices, like

Josh Felgoise (18:30.953)

This is, this is considered work and there's people that have to go actually work every day. Like they have hard, like labor intensive like jobs and they spend that hard earned money to be entertained by whatever we're doing. So I don't think you can afford, it's not fair to the reader to have a bad day, you know, writing or creating. Yeah, there's days you don't have your fastball if you're creating this. Now this is why collaboration is fun though, Josh. If I'm not at my best, I just call Simon, right? Like I can't figure it out. I just call him.

That's the benefit to having two people work on a project. But beyond that, it's really just like, hey, lock in and do the best that you can. The nice thing is you can always edit bad pages. You can't edit blank pages. So write something and then come back and make it better. I don't believe in like bad days. Oh, I don't feel like writing today. I'm not going to do it. You don't get a book done that way. And I like to think of the reader. By the way, not only do they spend hard earned money to buy your product,

You can always make more money theoretically. You can't get back time. So people that are, you know, they have families, they have lives, they have jobs and friends. They're going to spend time to sit and read, you know, what we're creating. Like they're never going to get that back. I want them to walk away from that six hours, nine hours, 10 hours, whatever it is that they were reading and feel like they got their money's worth. You know, that, that, really drives me. I love that entire answer. Simon, how about you? For me, how do I, how do you keep discipline? For me, I have objective I want to achieve.

There's stuff that I want. There's experience, adventure that I want to live. And I know what it costs to do them. So whatever I need to do to achieve these objectives, I will do. So this is all I kept disciplined. This is why I sit in my chair every day. This is why sometimes I do work 20 hours a day. Because I know what I want and I'm not going to get that with doing nothing. I need to work.

What is the thing that you want? Like what is the thing that you're striving for when you say that? Yeah, for me, think Ryan will know I'm traveling a lot. I'm away three, four months a year. have like my wife and I travel a lot. I have two kids, 18 and 20 years old. You know, we just came back from Mexico. We in the Bahamas two weeks ago. We're going, we spent the summer in Hawaii.

Josh Felgoise (20:47.611)

And then in Greece, Egypt, Turkey, and my wife and I are here for a month because I have work to do and then we're heading to Spain for two weeks. So this is what I like to do. This is the adventure, the life that I want. But you know, to do that, I need to achieve the work that I need to do to be able to pay for these projects. That makes sense. Ryan, you said something I really liked in your answer. You said you can't edit a blank page, you can edit a bad page.

I really like that and I think that is translatable to anything people do, whether it's a creative pursuit, whether it's work, whether it's anything. Can you talk more about working through those, I know you said you don't have bad days, but can you talk through the days where you don't feel so confident in yourself or you feel insecure about the writing as you both said that you have this kind of pressure that you want the reader

to leave feeling like they've spent their, or they've really spent their time well. And how do you kind of manage that pressure and the doubt and insecurity and all of that? Yeah, I mean, well, first of all, it's not my quote. I wish I could take credit. I can't remember which author said that, but what someone did and probably way smarter than me. Also back to Simon's answer about he like, he can't turn off being a cop. I would love to be important enough.

to get ambushed like one time. Like I really would. I don't think anyone cares. I don't ever have to look over my shoulder because like no one, no one cares. and when we get into like, you know, self motivation and stuff like that, I don't try to be rude to people, but like if you find yourself in a work situation and you need help getting self motivated, then you probably have never struggled, you know? And I mean, I've struggled in life. I know what that's like. I'm so fortunate to like, all of us are honestly like to sit here and have this conversation today.

Like we're so blessed for that man. There's a there's an author that both Simon and I are good friends with named Jack Carr. And this guy was a Navy SEAL. And now he's a number one New York Times bestselling author. He's got like two TV shows that are like number one and number two on Prime Video. And his whole motto is just like never tell me the odds. Right. Like someone's someone's done it. Someone else has done it. I can do that. And I think that has to be has to be the mindset every day. You know, you just said something about

Josh Felgoise (23:11.173)

living in like a kind of a high pressure environment or anything like that. How do you guys feel calm? Like how do you, how do you take breaks? Like you spoke, you talked about take writing for 20 hours or like all of that. How do you maintain that like balance or take breaks? Yeah. I'm never calm. That's, my wife probably wishes I was. No, I'm never calm.

Simon does travel a lot. That probably helps. I sort of live vicariously through him. When I travel, it's like to my office or to my office downstairs. Like it's, that's about as far as I go. yeah, I think it's just, it like, is relative to what you're doing at the end of the day. Like we're writing, we're writing books. We're not going to war, you know, we're not out arresting bad guys. Like we're just writing books. And so I take that very seriously. And I know Simon does. And again, this is, this is why the collaboration and the partnership works so well.

is because we're pretty aligned with that. know, we just, again, it really comes down to like, hey, let's put our heads together and create the best possible product that we can. Yeah, exactly. For me, it's about work and life balance. I worked all week last week, but I was in Mexico and I was sending pictures to one of my editor and to Ryan, say, you know, I'm working, I swear to I'm working, but I'm beachfront, you know, I'm sitting on the beach. But that's the beauty about the work that we do. I can bring my laptop everywhere.

I work when I'm on a plane, I work when I'm home, and I work when I'm traveling as well. it's a beautiful thing about it. What do you find harder? You went from counterterrorism to creative storytelling. Do you find it harder to be in all of that danger or to be in the stillness of writing and just that? know what I mean? Listen, honestly, I enjoyed

both. don't regret a day of my previous career and I'm enjoying what I'm doing now. I it's hard for me to say which one I enjoy the most or in which one I felt the most. Well, the other one was more dangerous. I actually had a lot more adrenaline rush in my previous job than I do here. But I will tell you something when I used to be in the military in law enforcement as great as this work was you still work in a box. You work for the federal government.

Josh Felgoise (25:31.312)

Right now I work for myself and I don't have that box anymore. So I can create everything that I want. So this is, I would say, even more rewarding. You know, when you have books that have thousands and thousands of reviews and people write you emails and say, you for the six hour you gave me. You know, I always say that my books won't change your life. You know, I'm not never gonna go on Reese's Rooter's spoon or, you know, other.

big name like that, like Oprah Winfrey. But what I promise you is that if you grab a Simon Gervais book and now a Simon Gervais and Ryan Steck book, we will deliver to you five to eight hours of great entertainment. And for me, when our readers connect with that, that's super rewarding. That's a great answer. What is some- if they don't, by the way, it's not because we didn't try. just want to, you know I mean? Like I can promise you if you don't like this book, it's not because like-

We didn't give it everything we had. And I think, you know, that's, that's the thing. Not every book is for every reader. you asked, you know, like, what's hard about like taking the jump by the way, from like critic to author. I think back, man, all the books are like, I thought would have sucked. Like if you would have gave me Twilight, if I'd have been the first critic to read Stephen Myers, Twilight, I for sure would have just passed. But my wife knew that one was, you know, I mean, went on to sell so many books, like during the pandemic, she put a new one out and it like saved bookstores like

Right? Like it's relative. Like I can tell you, we, give everything, everything that we have. And then I just want to add this, like, I love that question of like, Hey, what's harder, you know, being in law enforcement or doing that. And it's like, I, I once did an interview with Jack Stewart, another friend of ours, who's a thriller novelist, and he is a former top gun instructor. And he got asked, which is harder, flying, flying airplanes or writing books.

And he said flying airplanes and I roasted him pretty hard because I was like, dude, there's been pilots that have died and like air traffic control can tell people how to land that plane. There is no one 800 number for like an author to call. Like, I can't finish this book. I need help. And someone will like step in and do it like that doesn't exist. So yeah, no, that's that's a good point. What is something that you have had to unlearn to get better at what you do now? I can start with this one, as you can see from my accent on French Canadian.

Josh Felgoise (27:55.026)

So for me, I think in French, I speak in French with my family all the time. But when I started in this business, I knew that I wanted to write for the American, UK and Australian market because the Quebec market is so small, you cannot make a living writing books. So for me, really had to, you know, not unlearn French, but I had to learn how to write better English.

because even though my law enforcement career was in English, I was writing reports, know, investigative report. I never actually wrote fiction. So this is something I really had to learn, kind of forget how to think in French and write in English. And I think my writing skills are actually a lot better than my speaking skill. Even though I know you guys understand perfectly what I'm saying, it's very.

easier for me to write than to speak in English. What did you do to kind of understand the English culture more or be able to write in these terms more? Because I used to work in English, it kind of came easily. And I read a lot of book. I've always read a lot, but only in English. So I think to be a good writer, you need to read a lot of books. And this is what I did. Kind of give me the format I needed in my head to actually be able to write a book.

I mean, I spent 10 years on your side of the conversation, you know, so it's hard. It's hard going from that to the to the other side. I feel like probably the first year I was an author and I got trotted out to do interviews like halfway in. I realized, man, I'm asking them questions now. Like I slid back in to my side of it because I'm so used to doing that. So I've had to learn to be interviewed and not the one asking questions. How have you gotten good at that? I feel like that's a that's a hard skill to get good at.

I've no, I have no, I have no idea if I am good at it. I, yeah, you just go into it now and I think try to be yourself, you know, it's harder to, it is harder to be on your side. So you should know that like I've done both. I think it's harder to be the one asking questions. it's your show. You have to, you know, keep your audience entertained and all that. We just get to show up and talk to you about like our book and a little bit about us and then we're out. It's like so much easier. So yeah, I think I just go into it like not trying to be something I'm not.

Josh Felgoise (30:12.006)

you know, not, so I'm not going to hijack this and become the, you know, the person interviewing, but also like understand that like your personality and like who you are, your books, what you're writing, like it's not maybe going to be for everybody. And I think, people that come into interviews and I knew this when I was on your side of it, Josh, like you can tell right away, like who's real and who's not. And so, yeah, you know, just

get better at letting the questions come to me and then just being real about it. That's a good answer. Simon, do you have anything about that, about being interviewed as an author and what you've learned over the years? Well, yeah, it's kind of a piggybacking on your last question as well. Like the last two years of what I used to do for a living were part of a unit I didn't even know existed before I joined it. So I had to be very, very secretive about during that time of my life. And then within a month,

I became an author and I needed to talk about myself. I needed to walk a very fine line about using what I used to do living to promote myself, but without talking too much about what I did as well. So it was a balancing act. And it took a while for me to be, I'm not saying I'm gonna good, I'm good, but I think I'm moderately good at marketing myself nowadays.

So I think this was like the biggest change from my previous career to what I'm doing now. And I think that's a good skill for anybody to learn too, right? Like how to market yourself, how to talk about yourself and tell your story. I definitely struggle with questions for you Simon, because I know you can't really talk about what you've done or the operations or the things you've done in your past life. So I think that that is, yeah, do you have something, sorry? Yeah, I mean, I can speak a lot about a lot of things. Like, I mean, it's been, it's been 10 years. Of course, there's certain tactics that

I can not talk about, but honestly in 10 years, the tactics have changed as well. You know, I don't think I would be as good as in my previous job than I used to be when I was actually doing it. It's been so long. So there's a lot of things that you could probably ask me and I can answer nowadays. What Ryan, did you have something? Sorry, man. I just want to be able to say something like I worked for a unit that I didn't know existed. You know, like I can't even say stuff like that. the best I could be, like I wrote ending. didn't know.

Josh Felgoise (32:29.958)

would exist, you know, when I started the book, like just that is like, it's so cool. And I don't have that, you know, so that's what I mean. Just go in and be authentic. I think that's why, by the way, we have so much fun working together because again, Simon really does bring that side of it. And I, and I don't, I bring sort of the opposite. I look at things as like an everyday man. And this is why our hero, chase Burke in the second son is really a reflection of both of us. He's the everyday man who has the background that you would need to maybe be an action star.

But that's not really who he is when we first meet him. Yeah. mean, and that's like the coolest part is that people can see themselves in these characters, right? And like that's kind of exactly what you're saying, Ryan. Can you describe the book in a few sentences to the audience and share what it's about? Tell everybody what they're going to be reading soon. I think I'll let Ryan tell this one. He's always so better than me and articulating something that's going to take me five minutes that he's going to be able to do it in 15 seconds.

Well, we'll see if I can do that in 15 seconds. Now, I mean, look, I'm really pumped up. I actually have it right here. So I'll show that. Yeah. So the second son is about a guy named Chase Burke, who is just that he is like the second son. He's lived in the shadow of his big brother, Michael, who is the golden boy. Right. And I think that's, that's been tough for him. So anyone that that's grown up with like a sibling and you've struggled to sort of like break out of their shadow, this one's for you.

But Chase here finally after struggles in life and not really knowing who he is and what his purpose is, is happy. He's finally happy. He's a sommelier, he's working in a restaurant, a very nice one. He has a woman that he's in love with. And then one day, everything goes out the window. He finds out that his big brother who died may have been a traitor. So that's a blow.

You come from like the perfect family and now your big brother that you've always idolized may have been a traitor. The woman he's in love with, it happens to be a congresswoman who's in a restaurant that's ambushed, it's shot up and Chase reacts to that saving the day. But because he's this everyday man that we've talked about, suspicion falls on him. You're not good enough to be the hero in this situation. So he becomes suspect number one.

Josh Felgoise (34:51.492)

And the only way to clear his name and maybe his brother's is to really find out what's going on. And the second he does that, he launches himself down a rabbit hole of conspiracies and twists and turns unlike anything I've written, unlike anything Simon's ever written. And who were your guys' biggest inspirations in writing the book? Like who are you guys most inspired by that you read, that you watch, that you listen to?

That had some inspiration on the book or just in for you in general Well, I answer I answered just briefly then I'll let Simon but like sure we want to be true to who we are right as as creatives and I know we Simon, know really loved Robert Ludlum and was fortunate enough to get a write a write a book for his estate Which is great, by the way blackbriar Genesis. I covered that one too when it came out And look, that's what's so fun, man. I covered all his stuff so

Yeah, you want to be true to who you are as a writer, but I will tell you what makes the second son different. It's nothing like what I've written. It's nothing like what he's written. And I wanted there to be legitimate like Harlan Coban like twists in this one. And I think that's what really sets it apart. You're to get the action you'd expect from one of Simon's books and a lot of like the character and pacing from mine. And then you're going to get some legitimate like you're going to pick your jaw up off the floor moments. Well said. Honestly, I don't have anything to add to this. It's

It's great. Perfect. OK. Do you have any other inspiration, Simon, or anybody like any favorite books, any things you'd recommend of yours to the audience? Either of you can answer that, too. About inspiration, I read a lot like you said, like Ryan said, like I've been a huge fan of Robert Ludlum, Tom Clancy, you know, all these big name authors of the 90s, early 2000s, still give me joy like Webb Griffin when I read him.

So I don't have anything specific that I'm using to, to, you know, not to challenge myself, but to give me ideas. think it's a, it's a combination of what I used to do for a living. The TV shows I'm watching, the books I'm reading, the news that I'm consuming every day. Like I'm a news junkie. I consume at least 90 minutes of news on TV and paper every day. So I think that all plays in my head and it helps me write books that I hope are.

Josh Felgoise (37:12.324)

you know, follow the current event pretty significantly. do you strike the balance between keeping up with all of that stuff? You said you watch 90 minutes of TV news media. Ryan, I'm sure you're keeping up with all of that stuff, too. How do you guys strike the balance of putting that into your everyday life while creating? For me, it comes easy. You know, I read the news before going to bed, when I wake up, when I eat lunch usually. And I go I go to all the spectrum. I read the Canadian news.

National Post, Globe and Mail, La Presse in French. I'm gonna watch also the news in the United States. I'm gonna go to Fox News, CNN, MSNBC. I do everything. So I get a lot of different perspective. Enough so I hopefully can make my own mind about stuff. Yeah, I don't watch much of anything because I have to read so much for my job as a book spy and I'm covering so much. The only time I can say honestly, I watched the news regularly was writing The Second Son with Simon.

And then, you know, book two. I don't want to anything away, but there's a powerful sort of like cabal behind the scenes in this. And the intention was that this powerful entity has its hand in everything. So to understand that, yeah, I needed to have the news on a lot, mostly so I could keep up with Simon. But beyond that, man, I don't watch a lot. I do read a lot.

But rather than like emulating or taking inspiration from another writer, for me it's like, I know all the other stuff that's out there. I'm more interested in writing what doesn't exist. When everyone else is kind of like out there to zig, I'd prefer to zag. And so I think the second son is very true of that. Yeah, there's gonna be a lot of familiar notes and flavors that you would recognize from our genre, from Simon, from me. And then I think you're gonna get

Really surprised really really quickly with the direction and that this one takes Ryan How was it going from fan to collaborator? Like tell me about that and how how it felt how it was Becoming being a fan and then becoming a co-worker of somebody you've you've obviously really liked for a long time Yeah, I mean I've dealt with this one for years like I part of what made the real books by work early was people when they would go online they knew who they were talking to so if you go read a review from you know

Josh Felgoise (39:34.757)

Kirkus or Publishers Weekly. And you see that posted. You don't generally know who wrote that. You can't really discuss the book with anyone. So yeah, it's still funny to me. I was actually at church last Sunday. There's a big group of guys and I was walking by and they're like, hey, ask Ryan. He might know of them. And they stopped me like, hey, Ryan, do you know of an author named Jack Carr? And I was like, yeah, I do. I called him today to tell him the story. Actually, I was like, yeah.

I do guys. And they're like, Oh man, his stuff's so cool. Like, have you ever read it? And I was like, yeah, also he's read my books, you know, and he endorsed them. He should probably buy my books too. Um, but no, like, uh, like, like, yeah, like I was a Jack Carr, uh, fan and, but we were friends before he was famous, you know, and I think that's what's so cool from my perspective to see is, is some of the guys like, actually can tell you that I was the first person, uh, outside of his publishing house to read his debut novel, Terminal List. And I went on Twitter when it was still called Twitter.

And I said, this guy's is going to be the next Clancy. And I got made fun of. True story. And Jack and I still talk about that to this day. I got made fun of and he's definitely today's Clancy. So, yeah, man, I think it's stuff like that. I still very much, you know, love the authors that my favorite authors, my favorite living author is CJ Box. Vince Flynn and he are kind of tied for like my all time favorite authors.

But I mean, yeah, being a fan, I actually years ago, I had pneumonia and they sent me CJ Box's new book. And because we're friends now, which is so crazy because I'm a super fan, like we're supposed to call him Chuck. Simon knows that I struggle with it still because he's like CJ Box to me, but I had pneumonia and I'm like definitely ill and I turned the page and I saw my name.

And he wrote me in as a character into his series. By the way, Simon did too, and he killed me off in a book. So yeah, man. I mean, I'm kind of used to it making the jump. This would probably be a lot different if I made the jump. Like this is my first book, but I was covering everyone and a fan and a friend and then made the jump to writer and so many people, Simon included, supported my first book and my other books. And so that made it a lot easier. Really more than anything, it was going from like

Josh Felgoise (41:49.903)

you know, friends to collaborators. I didn't know this until Simon said it in an interview. We've never met in person. What? Yeah, I see. I never even occurred to me that that was that was true. I blame him for traveling a lot. Notice only one of us is sunburnt by the way for this interview, right? Like you just said he's back from Mexico. Yeah, we never met in person and I think that that's an interesting layer to this. People would probably look and think that we meet up a lot to do this and you don't and I think maybe that would have been weird.

like before 2020 and like COVID. But now I think it's like so normal that like he said that and I realized like, man, I've been with my agent for a decade. I've never met him in person. Like, you know, like I didn't even occur to me and how strange that might be. But but there you go. So there's been things to adapt to. But now, man, I wanted to work with him because I'm a fan of his stuff. It's really cool. It's a it's very cool thing to get to do. Simon and then we'll go over to Ryan.

What is something about success that nobody warns you about that you only can understand once you've been there or once you've gotten to that place of success? Well, I think when you have the top of the pyramid, it doesn't matter what type of industry. It's a fight to stay there. For where I am right now in my career and that publishing career, there's 10,000 people that want my spot. you you need to keep

doing what you do to the best of your ability. And if at some point, because it will happen, I'm gonna get passed by better writers, by newer, younger writers, I don't want it to happen because I've been lazy, that I didn't give my 100%. So I keep fighting every day, I keep showing up, doing my very best to give my reader the best experience possible. And I think this is something like...

When I call it success, mean, success can be defined in so many ways, right? You sell a lot of book, you make a lot of money, you invest it well. You know, what is success? I think success maybe is for somebody to have a lot of time to spend with their family and they don't need a lot of money to do that. And for them, it's success. So I think success is very dependent of who you are. But whatever success is for you, it's hard to stay there.

Josh Felgoise (44:07.97)

it's hard to stay at the top because life's gonna throw curve ball at you nonstop and you need to be able to adapt to changing situations. Do you have any advice for, I guess, adapting to those situations or realizing that maybe once you've fallen off of a level of success that you once reached, how to navigate getting back there and how to deal with when you're down here, if that makes sense? Right, yeah, no, it's true. I do that a lot because I mean, I'm an investor as well. This is how...

mostly we make our living. Books are great, but you know, I do a lot of other stuff as well. And I think it's about diversity. You need to diversify your portfolio when you invest. I'm not 100 % into venture capital. I'm gonna do other stuff as well. As for books, as for publishing career, you know, as Ryan mentioned, I wrote for another publisher as well with the Jason Bourne universe, which Robert Ludlum, I have my contract with Thomas and Mercer.

I have a book to movie and TV series deals that, you know, I'm gonna probably write a few episodes and things like that. So you need to diversify because if you only do one thing and something happened to this, then you're gonna look, you don't have any safety net. So you wanna make sure that you do everything, that you're divisify in your portfolio and the type of work that you do as well, especially when you work as a creative like we do.

You know, when you work for the government, whatever happens to you every two weeks, you get a paycheck. It's not true in my world. You know, I need to be able to write well, and I need to make sure that my choice and investments are the right one as well. Yeah, that's a fantastic answer. think somebody can take any piece of that and apply it to their own situation too, of what you just said. Ryan, how about you? Well, I think the challenge that no one talks about or they don't tell you about,

is when I started my series, my Matthew Red series, I didn't want to write the first or second book. I just knew I had to because the story I wanted to tell was the third one. It was a book called Out for Blood and it was the book I always wanted to write. And then I got to write it, right? Like I did the first one, the second one, and then it comes out. And at the time, know, my readers and my publisher, my agent, everyone's like, we can't wait to see what you do next. How do you top this one? And I was like, my gosh, I don't know how I'm going to top this one.

Josh Felgoise (46:29.175)

That was the one I really wanted to get to. And I wanted to tell that story. And even I hadn't thought much about what was going to happen after that. So the high of finishing a book and giving it everything you got and feeling like I left, you know, nothing out there. I left it all in the field and I feel great about it. You turn it in. The reality is you got to start the next one. And you're like, you, it's literally like you just climbed Everest and then you blinked and now you're back at the bottom.

And you don't even get to come down it. It's just like you blink and you're back at the bottom. It's like climb up it again. And you're like, all right, let me figure that out. So I think that's probably the thing that surprised me most about being an author. And I know that might not have a lot to do with success, but like in our, in our field, success means you got another book deal, which means that's, that's the problem you face, right? The book came out, you got a contract. Like that's to me, that's what success looks like. You get to go write another book. I mean, I actually really do think what you just said about

climbing the mountain and then being back at the bottom does have to do a lot with success because when you get one successful deal or you do one successful thing at work, like that's, you can only ride that success for so long, right? Like you can only, you're only gonna get credit for that for another week or so, another month or so, then you have to do it again and you have to beat that thing and you constantly have to level up. So I really do think that that relates to success. I like that analogy a lot.

No, I mean, the other side of this, I agree with Simon, like diversify. And that's part of what we're doing together. You know, I never put all my eggs into one basket. So I have my own series and I'm very passionate about it. But I also write for the Ted Bell estate, the Alex Hawk novels. And now I get to do this with Simon. If I had anything I could give like, like new writers, like give advice on it would be don't put everything into one hero, you know, one character, one series, challenge yourself, go beyond that, write other stuff.

Yeah, I think that's great advice. On that same note, Simon, we'll start with you, then we'll go over to Ryan. If you could talk to your younger self, your 20-something-year-old self, what would you tell him about success, about failure, about patience, or just what advice, what would you go back and tell that person? I guess to cliché my answer is I just believe in yourself and do what you love and what you believe in and, you know, be proud of yourself, celebrate.

Josh Felgoise (48:48.499)

every milestone where there's a little bit of success because and like all the businesses being investment where you're going to have a few bad months in a row or publishing where your book sales aren't as good there's going to be a lot of down so every time there's a little up celebrated you know talk about it don't be shy about it and I would say and this is something that I did it I'm proud but it kind of happened by mistake make yourself a group of friends and grow with them

so in publishing, for example, like I have a very good friends that we grew together in the business. We started together. We were at the same level and we grew together. So when you exchange with them about the challenges that you're facing, they understand. Like, let's say was talking to Stephen King is so high above where I am right now. You wouldn't understand the challenges that I have, you know, we wouldn't be able to communicate, but my friends that I have right now.

we have the same kind of success. And so it's easy to talk about our wins and our losses and we understand each other. That's really good advice. Man. I totally agree with that. Yeah. Like I already told you, I called Jack Carr earlier to tell him that story. and something that came up by like editorial meetings and he's like, I've never had to do one of those. And I was like, that checks out. Like probably you don't need to when you're selling a million books, you know, you're, and you're coming in number one every year on the New York times list. Like, yeah.

It is different. Simon's right. I call him class of writers because I was covering them. So you can kind of see like, you know, you go to the nineties, like, like early nineties, Vince Flynn and, and, and Lee child and Brad Thor and Daniel Silva and so many others, man, like they all started then, you know, and then you go a little bit farther in and you get like the Brad Taylors and the Mark Graney's and Josie Rosenberg and some others like that.

And then it dwindles after that a little bit. You know, our industry has changed a lot. And so I do think there's value to that. You know, when you come into the industry at the same time as someone else, yeah, they get it. You know, you're, you're, talking to someone about, man, I don't know what do with my series. You know, I'm four books in and so are they.

Josh Felgoise (50:58.964)

And if you go to talk to someone that's been doing this 30 years and they're 28 books into their series, it's not the same, Yeah, no, I think that is the same for everybody. You have to start somewhere and it's good to have a group of people that you're starting with that you can talk to and collaborate with and share in that struggle or in that success. Well, thank you both so much. I'm really excited for people to read this book and keep up with you guys.

Josh Felgoise (51:50.388)

Ryan, how about you? Man everywhere. You can go to the real books by dot com for more on on my book, Simon books and everyone else that writes mystery and thrillers. I have a real books by sub stack now, Twitter X Instagram, Facebook at Ryan stack author and at the real books by and yeah, you can go pretty much any bookstore Amazon. Find find all the books there. But we're kind of we're kind of everywhere and we are man. We're so pumped. We're so pumped for readers to get their hands on this one and finally get to see

what we've been working on. So thank you for for having I'm going to link the pre-order below in the show notes and everything and I'll put your websites there too. Thank you guys so much for coming on. I really loved this conversation. I learned a lot from both of you and I think listeners really will too. Thank you so much. This was awesome. Thanks Josh. That is the episode. Thank you so much. Listen to guys that a guy's guide to what should be talked about. I'm Josh. I'm 25 years old and I'm here every single week, every single Tuesday to talk about what should be talked about for guys in their 20s.

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