I was joined by Brad Meltzer, American novelist, non-fiction writer, TV show creator, and comic book author, to talk about his process of writing his new book, The Lightning Rod!
Do you know, some ongoing comic has no Act 3? Writing a twist in a novel and any kind of media is an art!
In this episode, I was joined by Brad Meltzer, American novelist, non-fiction writer, TV show creator, and comic book author, to talk about his process of writing his new book, The Lightning Rod!
A few of the lessons that I learned from Brad are, there was a secret group that the government hired 15 years ago to come up with scenarios terrorists could attack the US. Characters are the most important part of writing a novel, Negative Feedback is the ONLY feedback, and don't give up when people say "NO"!
Read the full list here: https://notepd.com/idea/10-things-i-learned-from-thriller-writer-brad-meltzer-363
The Idea Machine Website is in Beta! Come join us at notepd.com, where you could read and share your ideas!
My new book Skip The Line is out! Make sure you get a copy wherever you get your new book!
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I write about all my podcasts! Check out the full post and learn what I learned at jamesaltucher.com/podcast.
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James Altucher 0:01
This isn't your average business podcast, and he's not your average host. This is the James Altucher Show. Today on the James Altucher show, what does it mean to write a good thriller novel? What does it mean to write a twist where no one's going to guess where the twist leads to? So Brad Meltzer who sold 10s of millions of copies of his thriller novels, he has a new book coming out the lightning rod and he comes on to talk about all sorts of things about writing if you have any interest at all in thrillers, writing movies, comics, listen to this interview with Brad Meltzer. You know, in comics,
Brad Meltzer 0:52
what, you know, stories have a three act structure Act One, act two, act three, basically, right, there's beginning there's a middle and there's the end. And when I went to work for DC Comics, they said to me, so much of comics are about act two, there is no Act Three, there's no there is no end. Which as a novelist, I'm like, I can't do that. That's why my comic stories are always self contained, beginning middle end, but for the most part they want Superman is going to go forever, right? So you're never going to end
James Altucher 1:18
but but when one episode be like, let's just take the Superman TV show from the 50s that always had a beginning of a three act structure or beginning, right?
Brad Meltzer 1:26
Because they never but they never had an arc over a whole season. They were just a 15 minute episode. That's absolutely right. But now, you don't want to watch an episode of the flesh where he finds a villain next week fights a different villain, you want to have a full 22 episode arc. And that 22 episode arc, we all know now as Netflix figured out, when you do 22 episodes of anything, you're just you're you're milking half the episodes in there, because they're never going to fit what you want. It's what killed the X Files is what kills, you know, something like last, you know, like, you're just eventually trying to put up with network demands of give me 22 of them. Whereas Netflix is like give me give me your solid best 12
James Altucher 2:04
It's true. Like I used to like, like with laws for this. I used to try to figure out fairly quickly, which were filler episodes like they there was no real me, there might be just one plot point. That would extend the story, but everything else was just filler. And then I would just not watch those because I was binge watching. See, you can't you can't waste too much time on fillers.
Brad Meltzer 2:22
That's the thing. That's the truth.
James Altucher 2:24
So we're talking about the lightning rod, of course, what's the official publication date?
Brad Meltzer 2:29
March 8,
James Altucher 2:30
march 8, and but I do want to ask the What what are you working on so many comics? What's your favorite superhero show?
Brad Meltzer 2:37
My favorite superhero show? That's a fair question. I definitely love Peacemaker for now. I don't know in terms of mon Oh Peacemaker was great on HBO Max. James Gunn, basically doing television they took a you know, a film director and writer who crushed in the movie theaters and said, You know what, we're gonna do a TV show. I thought Peacemaker was great. I thought, I mean, we were talking offline before we started about you know, those early seasons of The Flash were just really fun because they just you really felt like special effects caught up with with the TV shows, but it's, you know, I actually think TV shows are really hard for this genre. I do I think they're What about
James Altucher 3:14
like, like, kind of these shows like heroes which are not quite comic book style, but our superhero style.
Brad Meltzer 3:21
The funny thing about heroes so heroes what no one realizes they were written. They were comic books, you know, the to, to the writers were friends of mine on on heroes, Michael Green, and Jeff Loeb. They basically go through for a Smallville and then wrote in comics Jefra more in comics than anything else. You know, and two of them are two of the best writers in the genre. And, you know, I remember watching heroes me like, Oh, I know what they're doing. It's an homage to you know, this is an excellent issue. This is a so and so we should remember that storyline and talking and being like, Yeah, you get it. But it was that that to me was actually America's first taste of a comic book. Genre without realizing it. We're getting comic books, right. That was those were comic books.
James Altucher 4:03
Yeah. And then it seemed like there was a lot of knockoffs of heroes that there was like alphas and then there was like, there's a worked you know, ironic takes on heroes like I forgot the one that's on Netflix now. The poor
Brad Meltzer 4:16
boys, I love the boys. The boys is Eric crypkey crushing it. He's an amazing writer did supernatural for many years and now is I think, and the boys comic was spectacular was you know, Derek Robertson and Garth Ennis killing it.
James Altucher 4:30
Do you think new writers now rather than getting into let's say, the thriller genre, like like you did when you started writing? Do you think they're going straight to TV? Because I mean, like, take take a show like travelers on Netflix, you know, time travelers are coming back from the future to change things so they could save the future. It's like a good idea for series but it would have been great as a novel as well, but you don't see I don't see stories like that in novels anymore. I just see them on TV.
Brad Meltzer 4:55
You know, I think I think two things have happened to you know, one is You know, in a comic book world, someone wants to describe comic books for DC and Marvel that the comic books themselves forget about television and film and everything else that that comic books were the r&d. Right. It was the research and development. That's what comic books were they figure out what works. And then TV and film says, Oh, you did 100 issues. These are the five best. And these are the other five best. We'll take these. And they took them. And that and if you look at the film's I'm speaking to you the week before days before the Batman comes out. And people are already buzzing with is it going to be year one? Is it going to be this story? What is it going to be Darwin cooks ego like what's, what are they taking from to help them stitch together this movie, because every movie, whether it's endgame, or even spider verse, And Spider Man was was taking from some storyline that was r&d in comics, and then either improved upon or built upon or expanded upon. But but that so that's always the setup of the way comics of comics have worked. I think what you're seeing now to your point with with novels, there are spectacular things that are coming in novels, it just takes the it takes Hollywood a couple years to find them. I mean, you're saying, Oh, I didn't see it. But that's because you just saw Hunger Games, even though that was many years ago now. But like, you know, it's an it's not like it comes Hunger Games had three books out before they had the first movie out. And so it takes Hollywood a while to kind of catch up on it.
James Altucher 6:28
So the lightning rod, which is sort of a sequel or kind of as a sequel to the the story, you started in escape artists, you know, same characters. And, you know, I know it's hard always talking about novels, because we don't want to give away too much of the plot. I will say it's a riveting book. I'm so glad I got an advanced copy. And it right on the front is quote from James Patterson and lead child. This is, according to James Patterson, this is your favorite. This is favorite Brad Meltzer novel. So, I hope he likes all the other novels as well.
Brad Meltzer 7:01
My wife was we were very happy with that quote, like James Patterson gives you a good quote. That's the one time you get to impress your relatives. Yeah, cuz
James Altucher 7:07
everybody. Well, do you know him? Have you? Did you call? I
Brad Meltzer 7:11
know him. I've met him. It's not like we hang out. But I know, you know, I know. Just like I know, Lee. I mean, again, I the one thing that's good about thriller novelists especially is it is a tight community. And whenever you get a bunch of writers together, it's just free therapy because all of us are basically sit by ourselves all day long. And then when you get us together at thriller fest, or some other event or Book Expo, it's the one time where we get to say like, Hey, what's working for you? Or hey, the publisher this or hey, it's how this publisher doing? And so, that's always fun to me, I love I mean, I'm a nerd. So I love that I love getting to meet Lee Child or James Patterson, whoever I've been able to meet over the years. In fact, my first the first book that I ever wrote, the lightning rod celebrates my 25th anniversary is writing thrillers of my first published book, and the very first book before it came out. I wrote letters to John Grisham to Scott Turow and to David Baldacci were like the three big writers at the time that were crushing it in that genre, specifically the legal thriller genre. They were right i My first book was legal thriller these obviously lightning rod isn't but the first book I wrote was a legal thriller. So I wrote to the three legal thriller big honchos, and I was like, Listen, I'm 27 years old, my books coming out, I don't know anything. Can you help me? And my phone rings one day, and I pick it up. And it's John Grisham. Hey, it's John Grisham. How can I help you? And it was this is pre internet, this was pre go on Twitter and DM someone this was pre hey, look, I mean, I literally wrote a letter and put a stamp on it and sent it to wherever we sent it at the time. With no connections, we didn't know anybody, we it was really a cold call. And all three of them got back to me and reached out to me, and that is, you know, one a sign of what nice people they are, but also just a willingness to help those of us who are young and starting out. So to this day, if you have a book and it's your first book on my Twitter account, you will see all the time, I will be tweeting for all these people who it's their first book, and I will always help them and tweet out their book.
James Altucher 9:08
Well, what John Grisham tell you on that call,
Brad Meltzer 9:11
he told me, you know, he was one of the things he told me he told me advice and other authors gave him and I'm like, who's giving you advice, but I remember he told me at the time, he said, listen, and this is when they were making a John Grisham movie all the time. They were making movies one after the other after the the firm and the Rainmaker, Matt Damon, mm makhani, Matthew McConaughey and all these people. And he said, listen, whatever happens with your book, whatever Hollywood does with your book, it'll all be gone. And that book will always be on your shelf and no one can take that away from you. And I still give that advice. People who get all worried and sweating you know, worry about what if it gets a bad review? What if this bad thing happens? What if no one buys and I'm like that book will still forever sit on your shelf and that is, it is to this day, great advice.
James Altucher 9:55
Well with this book, I mean, he once mentioned that in an interview that Usually there's some, some little story here that kind of kicks off the whole plot. But that kind of inspires the whole story. So what you know, I don't know how much to give away is sort of a military intelligence type of thriller. But like, what what story idea kind of inspired you to kick this off,
Brad Meltzer 10:22
was one of my greatest fears of all time, which is when you hand your keys over to a valet. And that's how the book open. Yeah, he hands his keys over to a valet, and the valet takes the keys and instead of driving to the parking lot with his car, he hits the GPS button. He says the words go home, and the car plots a route to the man's home. And now this valet has the man's car keys and the man's house key that's on there. And this is going to be a robbery, he's going to rob them. But when it gets to the man's house, he walks inside and as a man with a gun waiting, and you realize this isn't a robbery at all. This is a trap. And when the valets body goes to our heroes, Zig Ziglar hausky, who's really well known for working on government secrets, he uncovers not just one of the government's greatest hidden secrets that the government has. But he also asked the question that really is a whole book is about was What's your greatest secret that no one knows about you because it's coming out. And that I just ruined Chapter One of the lightning rod for you. But that's basically the opening was my own fear of handing my keys over to valet and always knowing they could just go break into your house.
James Altucher 11:28
So that's funny. So at some point, I assume like you're at a restaurant, you hand your keys to the valet, and you start thinking that what if he says go home? But what if there's a when when does it start to turn into a pile like that? Like, when do you think, Oh, what if there was a murder? Or they're waiting for him? Like, does it start to just feed itself?
Brad Meltzer 11:46
First of all, I love that you say, you know, one time you go to the restaurant and worry about the valet. Every friggin time I go to a restaurant and hand my keys to the valet I'm worried about what they're gonna see what they're gonna find what they're gonna put like, I just all thriller writers, the reason we can write these thrillers is because we're super paranoid. Right? My job is to sit around and take a normal situation. And imagine the worst case that becomes life threatening. So that may be fun for you to turn the pages of the lightning rod and be like, Oh, this is fun. I'm reading that. But that's my life. That's my brain. Like, every time I was at a restaurant last night, and my daughter now teases me she's like, You handed the key of LM and my family knows, you know, you don't have the house key. Don't have that house key no way she knows. But that's so yeah, you and then you just, you know, I'm looking for a way in I'm looking for something that I've learned over time. A very simple rule I write with, which is I'm not that special. If, if I'm worried about this, or if it's entertaining to me, and hopefully, it'll be entertaining to other people out there who have that same fear. And that same, you know, oh, my gosh, what would happen if that happened? So I that that kind of kicked it off. And then the other thing that was really big for me in this one is it's always there is some level of research that will always come from something. And I you know, I do a lot of work finding government secrets. So in one book, I did the hidden tunnels below the White House, I did the labyrinth below the Capitol, I've done the secret tunnels from below Disney World and one of the books. But in this one, I found out that there were 12 there are about a dozen secret government warehouses that the government has all across the country in strategic locations to deal with bioterrorism threats, whether it's Zika, whether it's anthrax, whether it's, you know, botulism, or smallpox or even COVID Now, so that if something happens, someone attacks New York, then they're going to have a push package ready within four hours in New York with the the antidote to whatever that is. They have cobra venom stored in one of these warehouses. God knows what that does, like every imaginable disease. They have everything from no drugs to get rid of pain to incubators, incubators, you know, medical advice, medical devices, in the Giant, Super Costco sized end of the world warehouses, and they are hidden in places that are right sometimes in front of your face. And I was like, I need to go into that. I need to know where their warehouses are, I need to know what's inside them. And so when you're reading the lightning rod, you get to those last chapters. And you're like, you know, you'll see you go into one of the warehouses, what's inside there, I won't ruin the ending. But what you see in there is exactly what's really there. I didn't make it up. I just described what's really there. And that's the fun of the book. How did you get into one of them? Well, the funny thing is, is so I'm so slow. As a writer, I started researching this book five years ago, it was pre pandemic. So they didn't have any problem saying come on in. I had unprecedented access. It was back when they were on to the CDC. I went to the CDC, I flew to Atlanta, they I was in the headquarters in the mobilizing unit that watches all the warehouses. It was fine if I tried to research this book today. I'd never get in anywhere. Never let anyone in there now after COVID, so it just winds up being the dumb luck that that I was able to get inside to go to, you know, experience them.
James Altucher 15:08
Obviously you think about your characters a lot like, you know, speaking of that valet and I'm not giving away anything here, that's not even on the first page, we must really think of what this valet his entire life has been like to get him to this point. I don't want to say he's a minor character because he kicks off the entire book, but we only really see him alive for a couple of pages, as you mentioned,
Brad Meltzer 15:29
but he's got a whole story. Yeah, you have to, you know, if I give you that plot, I can make up an easy plot that says, Oh, look, a guy's in danger. He died. Chapter Two. But if you don't care about that character, who cares? Yeah. So I have to make you love that valet in two pages before we kill him. And you know exactly what he fights for. You know exactly who he fights for, you know exactly what he loves in exactly what he wants. And that's the key of every character, at least for me is you have to know what they want. If you know what they want, you know what they're doing.
James Altucher 16:02
So again, it's always hard to talk about a novel because I don't want to give away the details novel, but I am very interested in process. Like for you, you sit down, you have kind of this kickoff incident, you maybe have a vague idea of what the book is going to be about and what you're going to need to research and so on. But what are the beats of a thriller novel? Like, what points do you have to hit when in order for you to say, Okay, this is a thriller novel, and I did a good job in terms of black characters world building the whole thing.
Brad Meltzer 16:32
Yeah, you know, it's funny when we first spoke that first time we met, you asked me that question, I never forgot it. Because you were you're such a process oriented person. i You, I remember, you kept trying to say like, what are the pieces to do it as if, and and it's funny, I know that there are pieces, right? I know that you can read books like story, you know, there's like books that will tell you how to break down a story in the three act structure and how to do it need to be a twist at the end of Act Two. I don't follow any of that. I just don't. My body. My my internal clock, I'm sure follows them. But I don't I don't write by like, well, I've set up the character. I've given him backstory now. I have to kill him. Now what has to happen? Hmm. Now I have to have twist one. Now I got to twist one what happens now investigation time, like I just don't, I would if I you know, my friend, Simon Sinek. Always, you know, says in his great TED talk, he says, you know, every life is like a bull's eye. And the outside ring of that bull's eye with three rings is what you do. And you know what you do, and I know what we do. And everyone knows what they do. The middle one is how you do what you do. Right? And for someone who let's say you're a plumber, or my uncle who's a garbage man, like he knew exactly how to do what he does. You drive around you pick up the garbage, you put it in the truck, you take it back. But for people in the creative arts, even even sport, how do you do what you do? How do you get so good at basketball? Or how do you write a novel? Like so much of it? It's just trusting your gut. How do you know when they give, give a good Pat, you know, make a good pass on a basketball court like you just like you just trust your gut that this is going to be a good one. And it's not. It's not Well, someone can't be watching and I have to make sure I have six inches or more or it just you got to trust it. And I trust my characters. The key to me for structural stuff is making sure like I've been at this 25 years. If you give me chapter one, if I give you the chapter one I gave you guys in a valet dies. And I can figure out chapter two, how I know how to build the boat while I'm selling the boat. I'll figure it out as we go. But that's not a good book. For me, some people it is, for me, I need to know the characters. If I have good characters and you care about those characters, I can do anything I want. You'll follow me anywhere because they're interesting. So I will I remember I plot it in the lightning rod. The first time you see Nola after that one of those opening scenes who's like our kind of like crazy wild child character. She's like this incredible, based on you know, real research and these war artists that the government has on staff who paint disasters as they happen. The US Army actually since World War One has had an A war artist on staff painting, you know whether it's storming the beaches of Normandy, whether it's Vietnam, or at 911. And I remember going to them and saying you're telling me everyone's racing with guns blazing. And you got someone who's racing with nothing but pain pressures in their pockets. I got to meet that guy. That guy sounds crazy. And they said, You mean her? You want to meet her? It was a woman in real life. And I built my car. I remember when I had my first plot. I was like, I'll figure out all that after even in the light, right? I'm like, I know what no is gonna come up later. And no, I finally was stuck. I didn't know what she didn't know what to do in the plot. I really didn't. I had that opening scene and I was like, listen to Nola. She will tell you what she's doing. And you can see I won't ruin anything. You can see that when Nola when they first Case Nola, Nola gets away. Because no one's like, I'm not that stupid. I'm not falling for that. And I just watched her and I know it sounds totally crazy. But when your characters can take over and you're not plotting anymore, that's when it's most realistic.
James Altucher 20:15
Is that because you're surprised? So it's a little easier to surprise the reader?
Brad Meltzer 20:20
I think that's part of it. I think it's also, you know, when you're, you know, the guy who did Breaking Bad had this great quote on there forgetting I'm going to paraphrase him, I just said, I'll never forget it. But he basically said, No one believes coincidences and fiction. You know, if I say always walking on the street, and the murderer bumps into him, you're like, Yeah, because you just said the murderer bumped into the hero, that's never gonna happen. But if something goes wrong, for your hero, whatever the coincidence is, a car knocks him out of the road, you believe all of that, that seems much more realistic. So the key is, is to try and find that, that balance that just leaves it feeling completely not, you don't want to ever feel the author's touch in the scene. You never you know, you're watching it, when you watch a movie, you're like, not only happen, because the author basically made it happen.
James Altucher 21:11
But like, if, if, if some if the characters cars, you know, driven off the road, or some, you know, a car bumps into and it goes off the road, I would think that that's not a coincidence that it's part of the plot.
Brad Meltzer 21:24
Right? Well, that that's part of the plot. But but think of the thing of that, that's not really a coincidence, right? But think of if the if, if a character is following the bad guy, and he's trying to sneak around so and so. And all of a sudden, a guy, I'm connected to either of them, opens up his window and says, What are you doing on my property, and pulls a gun, and has nothing to do with either of them. And that says bad luck, man, you just pick the wrong backyard to be hiding. And you're like, Oh, crap, everything just went really bad and really South really fast. And just that seems more fun. And realistic, at least to me is my personal reference.
James Altucher 21:59
That's actually very interesting. Because I'm going to make an analogy with with business, let's say you were developed a product, some new toy, and you showed it to a bunch of your friends. And they all said, Hey, this is a great toy, we love playing with it, you're gonna make a gazillion dollars. That actually gives you no real information, like, so the the analogy is that only if someone says, I really didn't like this, then you can ask why didn't they like it? And they're gonna tell you something real? Because there's a reason why they didn't like it. But if they there's a lot of reasons why people say yes, they might say yes, because they don't want to hurt your feelings. They might say yes, because they want to get off the phone with you and go back to what they were doing. They might say yes, because they liked it. But who knows? But if they say no, and and they're willing to tell you why that's real information, that that's not fake information. So I wonder in general, if things going wrong, in any area of life is the way to convey real information.
Brad Meltzer 22:57
Listen, I will tell you when I have the same like five friends that have been reading my books for 25 years, right, we were in from when we're young, in our 20s. And the first thing I always ask them, as I don't say, did you like it? That's nonsense. The first thing I always ask them is, what parts Didn't you like? That always gives me more impact is a great saying I think as Neil Gaiman I'm gonna, it's basically like, when you ask people what they don't like about your stuff, they are 99%, right? When you ask people how to fix what's wrong with your stuff, they're 99%. Wrong. And he says it a little bit differently. But I think the same is the exact same, which is the one thing we all know is when it's crappy. And and I always say any upcoming writer, and I think this for nonfiction for fiction for anything you work on, and I think it for business, too, is you give your idea to 10 people, you'll get back 10 different answers of what they think about it. But you have to find the five to 10% that they all have in common. And that's what's really wrong. Because some people just be like, it's too fast. Some people like it's too slow. It's all Goldilocks problems, right? Like, it's too big, it's too small. It's too rough. It's but when you hear, you can kind of read you have to learn to read between the lines with what's wrong. And you'll hear like, oh, they don't understand why Zig is doing this. They don't understand why he's risking his life. Like they can't all verbalize it. But that when you see what they all have in common, you know, no book is ever perfect. You just got to find what's really wrong with it, and then fix that and then fix it again and fix it again. And I go through, you know, seven, eight drafts of a book easy and I've been doing this 25 years, and I'm still doing that many drafts of a book because I'm just constantly trying to make it so that when you get to the end of the lightning rod, you go, Oh crap, I'm so surprised by the MDM. And I'm so mad at myself. I didn't guess it it was right in front of me of the bad guy was the whole time
James Altucher 25:10
How much of the overall arc of the story do you know in the beginning and how much is kind of like you say, given to you by the characters as you're writing?
Brad Meltzer 25:18
Yeah, I always know who the bad guy is. That's the one thing I know, I know who the bad guy is. Because if you do an a who done it, you need to know who to leave out of the room while the done is happening. Right? I need that. Otherwise, I'm just making it up as I go. What I do make up as I go is kind of the way to get to the end, I did one book, where I plotted the entire book out. And I was like, I got the whole thing. I'm just going to literally, instead of plotting 5100 pages, I'm going to plot all 400 pages. It was so horrible creatively to work on that book, it was like playing paint by numbers. I was just like, okay, chapter two, chapter three, it was just, it was no fun. And I realized, at least the fun for me is, is not knowing the end of the story. Why would you ever want to know the end of the story.
James Altucher 26:04
And I would think that I always kind of think that an audience will their their readers or viewers or listeners or whatever. They're like an x ray machine. So if you know how the story is going to end it where every detail along the way, you can't really hide it from them, they're going to be able to figure it out.
Brad Meltzer 26:21
Readers are far smarter than the authors they read. I really believe that. And I think that it's so interesting, like I will take I'll have my plot, and I've never nailed it on the first try. I will tell you, I always take the plot. And I'm usually like, there's one part where they'll say, that doesn't seem like there was a fair game, you know, and I firmly believe if you read my book, and you guess the ending, like you as a reader trying to guess the ending time as a writer trying to fool you, if you guess the ending, you win. If I guess the ending, I win, as long as we're both playing fair. So you didn't flip ahead. And I didn't just make it the butler who appears on one page and just, you know, shocked it out of nowhere. So I'll always have friends who like read it and be like, Nah, I don't know, it kind of came out of nowhere. So I'll put three more clues in. And then the next person who will read it, who I trust will say, I saw coming a mile away, I'll take one of those clues out. And then next person will go like, Oh, that was awesome. How did I not say it? And it's I know, it's literally like that you can put in three more clues or put in six more clues or take out two more. And it's like a recipe you find the exact right spot. And we've all seen it. You know, when you've seen that thriller, where you go like, ah, that's the killer. It was right there on every page had I not guessed that. But you're totally at the same time shocked. And it has to be in a good thriller, the perfect balance between I played fair as a writer and put all the clues there, and you still didn't see it.
James Altucher 27:47
And on the one hand, you shied away from the question on process for the whole book. But what is a clue? What is a legit twist? Because I would think twists are hard. Because you have to put something in that where you know you're twisting. But you also have to have the skill to realize the reader is not going to realize this is a twist.
Brad Meltzer 28:06
Yeah, no, no. And that's what I mean. Like, I know that I know that I'm doing something that is structural and that way that your brain needs. But I don't I don't do it and say I need a twist here. I literally just go like, man, I've been in this part for a while I want to change, but I don't sometimes it's on page 30. And sometimes it's on page 70. And sometimes it's on page 170. Like, it just, you know, it's like the Supreme Court definition of pornography, which is you know it when you see, like, I know that moment when I see it where my characters are like, they're stuck. And I don't know what to do. And, and and yes, I know, I need to know the twist is coming. But sometimes I surprise myself with it. Like I remember. I remember I always say you know, the phone always rings when you're in the shower. I remember physically being in the shower, and just going, Oh crap, am I like what? When I got out and I'm like, I got it, I got it. This person, this character is working with the bad guy. This is an inside job. So I knew the ending of the bad guy was but now I had I didn't even realize, Oh my gosh, this would be a great twist. What if this character that I invented three months into writing the book is actually on his side. And now I got to come up with a backstory for that and why that works. And that's the fun of writing to me is figuring my way there where I'm entertaining myself. And
James Altucher 29:26
then once you know that, like let's take this example once you know Oh, this guy's really on the side of the bad guy. How do you in turn now conceal it from from the reader because you're so aware that this guy's a bad guy. And now you're going to start filling in his backstory. That seems to me difficult.
Brad Meltzer 29:43
It that's the art man. That is where that is where you have to like, again, if you what you just described is like the same as me saying James don't think of pink elephants. And you're like I can't now I can't do anything but think of pink elephants like you have to in your head. Just know Don't treat him like a bad guy, right? I'm like a good guy. But give him enough. You know, and you'll see sometimes you'll see like, just that little sprinkling. And I see when I when I watch TV shows, I will watch TV shows and movies. And we'll hit some point. And there's something about I'm like I said to my wife, I know who did it. She's like, don't say it. Don't say it, like, and I'm like, I know who did it. And then we'll get to them the movie and she's like, Did you guess and I'm like, my way so much better. You know, like, I will constantly be rewriting everything. I'm in trying to make it that twisty way. But
James Altucher 30:31
what's an example of a good twist in let's say, popular movies or fiction or TV? You know, that you could describe like you could you looked at it, you could say, Okay, well done.
Brad Meltzer 30:42
I mean, I think my one of my favorites of all time, is the murderer in Scott Toros presumed innocent.
James Altucher 30:50
I was gonna ask you about Scotch rose for presumed innocent. So yeah, and I think that's
Brad Meltzer 30:54
great. Yeah, that's, that's one of the great twists that stuck with me. I love that. I love that.
James Altucher 31:02
Because I would not have guessed that one. I recommend anyone watch that movie. It's like 30 or 40 years old or whatever. But yeah,
Brad Meltzer 31:08
I'll challenge you and say, read the book. Okay. The book is 70 times better. Like that is a perfect book. And so how
James Altucher 31:17
do they keep people from guessing that but still at the same time? I guess the trick is, people can't guess it. But once you realize it, it's obvious.
Brad Meltzer 31:27
That's it. That's it. And you know why? Because the person who did is the bad guy in that book has all the motive in the world. But you also love that character. That's the magic. Yeah, it's right in front of your face. I think that um, I think I think the movie Juno has a really amazing twist that you think that you know, we all love Jason Bateman. He's the best you all hate one. You know, Jennifer Garner looks like the bad guy. She's the fussy one. And then they twist it and you're like, oh, how do I not see that coming? That's so obvious. It just feels natural. And your biases get the best of you because you're told to like this cool guy and hate the stuff you won. And so I love those I love when when your archetypes of how you view the world are turned on their head. And I think you just have to, I think you have to play fair, I think if you just you know, again, if you just make it oh, you know what, what was the other one I just saw,
James Altucher 32:22
let's look at that quote that you just said. So the art archetypes somehow are twisted, like, somebody seems like the good guy or the good woman and you know, is playing a role that we've seen in society many times. So we it's baked into us that we really must think this person is is good. And then that's the twist. She or he turns out to be not good. But I would think now people reading thrillers are watching floors on on movies, they know that they know to think that the one you're supposed to hate is not the bad guy.
Brad Meltzer 32:56
Oh, yeah. I mean, that's yes. The answer is the answer. Your question is yes, that's exactly against here to your first question. I never mean to shy away from it. It's just really trying to find a fair answer. I again, I can't. You're absolutely right, that people guessing are 50 billion times better than they were 20 years ago. They just are we're savvy, we've seen more stuff we've seen done and redone and ridden. But here's a perfect example. So that my favorite book of all time is watchmen by Alan Moore. And yeah, so really, my son who's 13 years old now 14 years old, just read it. That book has been ripped off and redone and been through the zeitgeist for 30 years. And no one's been able to outdo it. And when you get to the ending, my son literally said, Oh my gosh, how could I not see it coming? And it's so good. That is one of the best endings and bad guys you'll ever find ever, ever, ever. And why? Because it just was perfect. Not because it was like, it's not just taking Oh, I'm told on this person's good. And now it's gonna be bad. It has to be formed. That's just a black and white, you know, two way view of it it just now now what I do as a writer is I know you're going to know that. So my guy who's extra nice is never going to be the one who everyone thinks is the bad guy. It's got to be the guy who's a little extra nice, but not so nice. Like, and you just have to build a better mousetrap. And we are as thriller writers always trying to build a better mousetrap because we got a folio.
James Altucher 34:27
So like in reason it even novels or movies or comics or whatever. Where's a good example of, of a twist that that you thought Well done.
Brad Meltzer 34:38
Let's say I'm trying to think of something that's much more common recently.
James Altucher 34:48
Like, or you can even pick like lost or something like that. Yeah, no,
Brad Meltzer 34:53
I'm just thinking I'm trying to think of something that we can actually talk about openly because everyone knows it. So I'm just trying to think of like, even like in the Marvel world, I think that I mean, again, this is hardly a big one but it was it's a blatant obvious one is is the the guy in Black Panther who works for the CIA, the guy who's in Sherlock and oh yeah, go like that guy comes in. You're like, here's this little Niboshi guy coming into what? conda he's obviously the worst, right? We hate him by his existence, and he winds up being awesome. And they totally turned it right or, or looking at something. I think a really good one is, is what's your name? Thanos his daughter is a middle aged hippie. I'm a Gomorrah. No Naka, Mora, the sister the other sister. Gosh, I'm playing and now every every one of my friends is literally texted me right now being like dumb. So how can you forget her name? Hold on, it's good. I have this nebula. Nebula. Thank you. Nebula. Oh my gosh, what's wrong with me. So Nebula is you know, the right hand person for Thanos is the you know, the biggest of the big enemy. But who saves the day. In the end, they literally earn that entire turn for her. They earned it they make us love it, they make us love her. And even Gabor to some level is like kind of a bad guy in in league with the bad guys when you're for. But so you have to earn it. And when you earn it, it's spectacular. And it's pay off.
James Altucher 36:24
And that's what I love. When you when you realize later on in the writing that okay, this person is going to be aligned with the bad person or the good person or whatever, in an unsuspecting way. Do you then backfill so that there's little clues along the way and and you make sure that they're not too obvious? Like how, yeah,
Brad Meltzer 36:44
no, that's what you do you literally then then you play Goldilocks? Yeah, a little too much little to let little last just right.
James Altucher 36:51
Like in the case of Nebula, like how quick or let's even take the case and presumed innocent like, which again, is so many years old that I don't mind spoiling it. Feel free to spoil it if you want. But how would you sprinkle in that are how
Brad Meltzer 37:07
I think you again, I think you stay true. I think in those examples, they stay true the character I think that um, or even you know, as a perfect example, Black Widow, Black Widow, here's here's even better, let's go even more common. Black Widow and Hawkeye were both bad guys, when they were introduced in the comics they earned over time, like that loyalty that made us be like they can't be bad guys. They're the best Scarlet Witch's introduces a bad guy in Avengers two. Right? And she comes in now as everyone's favorite. Well, we love Wanda Wanda, and it's all the best of me, but they earned it and you earn it by like letting that character be that character. And you can see that when Wanda misses her love of her life, the great grief that she has undoes the universe. You're like, oh, that's totally reasonable to you're not a bad guy. You're just a misunderstood person. I think that killmonger In, in Black Panther. I'm just using these movies. One because I'm a comic book person, but two, because I really think that they're just known by the average, you know, just about everyone is one of the things you have to do is you earn that and you and you follow it.
James Altucher 38:17
So what's an example where it's been done poorly?
Brad Meltzer 38:21
What's an example where it's been done poorly? Or what I you know, what I can think of, I don't like bad mouthing anyone's work, but the ones we the same ones you hated the same ones I hate like the ones where you're like, That's ridiculous. She would never do that, or that's ridiculous. He would never do that. I mean, that's it's always the same.
James Altucher 38:39
So So with stories that are like, sequels like this was a sequel? Do you start thinking in terms of like, like, right now? Do you start thinking about the next way you can use these characters? And
Brad Meltzer 38:54
yeah, I mean, listen, I never think of them as a sequel I got there's, you know, someone said,
James Altucher 38:59
You I, by the way, I didn't read these gay bars, right? There were these gay bars. Right? Like, it was no, no issue.
Brad Meltzer 39:04
Right. James Patterson said, This is my favorite Meltzer book, like, I need to know that someone's gonna pick this book up because he said that, and then never gonna read anything before this. And that's okay, too. And so I purposely layer in everything you need, you can start scratch with it, like you did. But I do think of what the next one is. The final scene of this book, obviously, very clearly has in mind, something else coming the same way. The final scene of the last book has something in mind that if you showed up for all of them, great, you get rewarded, and if not, it's okay to I'm gonna fill you in as soon as you start.
James Altucher 39:34
Well, how do you think you've improved over the past 25 years of writing these?
Brad Meltzer 39:39
I mean, I don't you know, I think the thing that I've proved that if I improved on anything, it's just, you know, realizing that you have to always be improving. I mean, I really think for a while, I spent a little you can very easily start to believe you're really good at something just because you're selling lots of copies and that is not a marker of being good at anything. That's just a marker of your sales. And I, I had my a ton of 20 year anniversary of doing this was like, great, I can keep doing this. And they'll hopefully pay me to do this. But how do I actually get better after 20 years of doing something? When you're doing some of this? Like, how do you actually improve? And the only way to do that is to kind of check your ego at the door and say, you know, which of these books were the best and which of these books were not as good, and I'm going to do my best to figure it out. And that's what I tried to do. I literally looked and figured out okay, these were these were the three best books, I think, maybe four best books I've ever written. Now, what do they have in common 20 years ago? And what are they have in common? And I realized I was like, Oh, they have the best characters. That's why these books the four best, like, without a question, I was like, don't start your next book, until you have Zig. And until you have no luck, and when you have those characters, then you can start the book. And I think that these books are so much stronger. Because I, I understand these characters so well. And I think improving I don't think I'm I got any better or any smarter, any wiser any, but I was able to just not think that I was great. And therefore I found some room for improvement. I'm just I'm trying as hard as I can. So
James Altucher 41:13
you know, during this pandemic, a lot of people they were basically, you know, as we know, everybody didn't go to work, they stayed home, many people started pursuing their their childhood interests or, or what they always really wanted to do. So what would you say to someone in their? You started in your 20s? What would you say to someone now in their 30s 40s, or 50s, who wants to be a thriller novelist? Because they love thriller novels. They always wanted to have time to write one. And now they do. What would you say? How does how to start? What should they do?
Brad Meltzer 41:45
I would say great. Well, you're welcome. You're in the club. Like that's I honestly, like, I love the guy. Remember the show Frasier, the father on Frasier. I saw some, this could be ticked off, you know, Bs information. But it said, like, he was like, you know, 60, something years old when he started acting Great, awesome. Like, I love that I don't think you have to be, you know, if anything, the thing that hurt me when I was 20, is I didn't have the breadth of experience to write about, I just had what I lived up until I was 27 years old. I think it's great. I think it's fantastic. I think the only thing you have to do is it writing is about persistence. You know, I mean, I can tell you how to ride a bicycle, I can say hold the handlebars, and balance your center of gravity, and go two miles an hour. And you know, and then you'll ride the bicycle. And you can use James to write all down all the things of how to do things. But until you get on that bike and pedal, you will never learn how to ride a bike. And that's how writing is to me, like I can tell you, Oh, you know, make a good character. And then make sure you have a couple of twists and make sure you know where you're going and whatever other rules are. But until you sit down and type and get on that bike and pedal so to speak, you're never going to write a book. So you just have to write a book and write one page a day. And if you write one page a day, you'll have a book in a year, you absolutely will by the numbers. The problem is what most people do is they go oh, I'm gonna I'm not writing my paycheck. I'm gonna write to tomorrow, I'm gonna get really good tomorrow. Oh, no, screwed on. Right three on Wednesday, and then it's all gone?
James Altucher 43:11
And is that is a good point. So you know, last question. I remember one time we were talking, I think, I think it was you. You have a better memory than me. By the way. I've noticed in this in this conversation. But
Brad Meltzer 43:22
that's what writers do you understand? We have to use everything. So we remember everything.
James Altucher 43:26
So you were telling me about there was a you did a little bit of either work or consulting, whether paid or free. I don't know, for the government where they kind of got thriller novelists and other novelist or other storytellers to basically imagine worst case scenarios for the government and brainstorm. And I was just curious, is this still like an ongoing thing?
Brad Meltzer 43:54
They did ask me, I did it for free. They asked me for free, asked a bunch of thriller writers. They asked me to come in and brainstorm different ways a terrorist could attack the United States. And my thought was, if they're calling me we have bigger problems than anybody. You think the country is screwed up right now. I mean, but it was right after 911. All kidding aside, it was after 911. They paired me with a Secret Service agent and a chemist, and it would give us a target like New York, we would destroy it in no time. And it was incredible. I don't know if they I know they stopped doing it. I don't know if they started doing it again. But after 911 When you have terrorists who will take planes and use them as missiles into buildings, you need what they called out of the box thinkers. They just were like, no one can think of that. That's like something that like monkeys banging on typewriters would come up with. So we're going to get monkeys and typewriters. And we were the monkeys and typewriters. And we just were like coming up with the craziest things. The thing that was I don't know if I told you last time was that they've called me back to do it a number of times. And when they call me back, they would give me the place that they were looking at And that's terrifying because it may be a place where my family or friends or someone, you know, it was like these big kind of group events. And I'm like, do they know something? I don't know. Or they just throw plain here. And, but it was amazing. It was, it was incredible to work on. And I loved it. I loved doing it. And I felt honored to do it.
James Altucher 45:19
Did they ever react to anything you said? Like, you know, change some policy or?
Brad Meltzer 45:24
thing? Yeah, it's so fine. The only thing I can tell you is they never told us if anything were on was right or not. So you had no idea. They never told us I would say the only thing I knew is they invited me back and everyone did not get invited back. And the funny thing was, is if you look up the story in the Washington Post, the only I'm the only person that's quoted in it because they told me that I was the only person everyone was sworn to secrecy. And they said I was one of the only people who actually kept his mouth shut so they let me be the one to go public with it. And they let me like I was the one who the Washington Post interviewed for it cuz they were like, you're the only one who followed our friggin instructions. So that's why it's so hard to have a conspiracy in the government cuz everyone just wants to talk about it.
James Altucher 46:00
That's funny. Well, well, look, Brad Meltzer your new book, the lightning rod. Excellent was riveting to me. Like I said, I'm really glad I had an advanced copy. I feel privileged. You got lead child quoting it. James Patterson. Lee Child says Noah Brown is one of recent fictions all time great characters. Trust me, this is a terrific, compelling unputdownable thriller. So it's true. And I encourage people to check this out. And Brad once again, thanks for coming on the podcast and, you know, teaching us all a little bit more about what you do.
Brad Meltzer 46:34
I appreciate it. Always good to be back. Thank you so much. Thanks, Brad.