speaker-0: Welcome to Plot Recon, where thrillers get tactical. I'm your host, Evan Graver. Today, I'm joined by Tom Tate, a spy thriller author whose work centers on covert operations, intelligence tradecraft, and high stakes global conflict. He writes fast, action-driven fiction that drops readers in the middle of the shadow wars and political intrigue. Welcome to the show, Tom. All right. So the first question I always ask is, how did you get into writing?
speaker-1: unfortunate circumstances. I was working for a company and we were selling out the particular division that I was in and I was let go. And so I had a lot of free time on my hands. And as I was looking for a job, I saw a YouTube video with Mac Macowitz on future weapons. And I saw this weapon called Middle Storm. And I thought, wow, that would make a really awesome, used to be the center around some type of a spy thriller. And that'd be cool if somebody wrote that. And I realized that nobody was going to, so I did it.
speaker-0: That's awesome. It's nice to see thrillers with forward-looking tech in it. I kind of enjoy seeing what other authors and what other technology is out there and trying to put it in my books too.
speaker-1: interesting and I think it's it's always kind of fun to try to invent some technology too if you need it for a particular scene that it's not so far-fetched that it's unbelievable but real enough that it could actually happen.
speaker-0: Yeah. So I got to ask on your website, tatescovertworld.com, you have a book counter and then you have a prediction counter that says one prediction has come true. So you hit my intrigue automatically and I told you this in the email when we were going back and forth. So tell me about this prediction and what came true about it.
speaker-1: got three that came true. It's sort of so to speak. But the first one I'm talking about is in my novella called Intercept. And that's a story about Moshe Tlavi, who is the Iranian nuclear guru. He comes back to Iran after being off the grid for about seven years to start up their nuclear program again. And I figured, okay, someone's gonna want to take him out. Who would that be? Obviously, probably me. And I wrote this in 2012, 2013, 2014, so it's been a while. Anyway, in 2020, the real Iranian, Fakhrizadeh, was assassinated by Mossad. And so six years after ISIS got...
speaker-0: ⁓ it's interesting how, I think writers have a crystal ball. So we look into it to see what the next trouble area is going to be around the world. And then we try to write to that particular problem. So you said you had two other predictions that came true. What were those?
speaker-1: So in my latest book, Beyond All Measure, there is a scene on the back of a yacht where there is a very wealthy Saudi prince, and he is handing a glass of champagne to this young lady. It's a very unique looking bottle. It's very old, and she inquired about it. And he mentioned to her that some divers in the Baltic Sea found a wreck from an 18th century shipwreck. and found these cases of champagne and brought them up. And I wrote that scene probably in 2019, 2020, because it took me about seven years to write that book. And I think last summer, some divers in the Baltic Sea came across an 18th century ship and they found cases of champagne. So that's got to be a one.
speaker-0: Alright? Yeah? ⁓
speaker-1: It's fun with things like that.
speaker-0: It is. You can't call it coincidence or you know, you, I don't know. It's always interesting to see that kind of stuff happen. So you took seven years to write. Is that the first book that you wrote? No, the first
speaker-1: book was Spear Garden which was the one with the metal storm weapon and it literally took me six weeks. But I wanted to hone my craft a bit so then I wrote some novellas just to get my character out there. Rewrote Spear Garden and it took me over four years after I finished it before I published it the first time.
speaker-0: Okay. Okay. So you, you, I was looking at your Amazon page, you're self-published, correct? What led you down that path versus going, trying to get a traditional deal?
speaker-1: I'm kind of an impatient person and I know that's kind of hard to believe when I took seven years to write one book and waited four years to publish another one. But you know, I did try, know, there's everybody gets rejections. was speaking to a best-selling author actually a couple of weeks ago and he'd gotten over 169 rejections from you. from a different agents. And I think I've gotten probably around 70 or 75. And I thought, you know, and they always take some time. We'll get back to you in three months. We'll get back to you in five months. Expect an answer in three to six months. It's like, I'm not going to wait. So I was like, I'm just going go ahead and get it out there now. And I know that Vince Flynn was self-published to begin with and he became very successful. So I thought, yeah, he was an inspiration. I'll just.
speaker-0: Okay. That's a, lot of people have gone down that path and then got picked up. So good luck. Good luck to you on that. So, so what are you doing to get your books out there? Are you doing a lot of advertising or just trying to write more novel?
speaker-1: Can ⁓ really for a while there, just threw them out there and didn't really do much. But recently in the last couple of months, I've been trying to aggressively get them out there and I've figured out how to do click testing on Facebook to see which ad works the best and then put that out out there for 10 days to two weeks. I figured out how to ⁓ pre-program tweets to go out on X. Same thing with Facebook and Instagram. I'll create like on a Sunday, I'll create a whole week's worth of ads to go out and just kind of then let it go and do its thing. And that's been good. I've seen a lot of steady movement every day. And then I finally, you you get bombarded with emails from marketers all the time, know, daily. And I put them through the ringer, but I finally allowed this young lady to work with me. And she did some keyword optimization, did my profile on Amazon. We wrote the book descriptions on Amazon and did some other things to position them to be in right place. And she just actually just did that this week. So I'm going to be a guest on another podcast on Wednesday, think it's Wednesday, it's the 10th, whatever day that is. And he says that his authors usually see a nice bump then. with the Facebook, Instagram ads, tweets, I post them on LinkedIn every once in a while, the optimization of my profiles and then trying to do podcasts to get my name out there. I'm starting to see some movement in.
speaker-0: Good. We want everybody to be successful because I think that the self-publishing world and all of us thriller authors kind of try to help each other out and give lessons and tell people what works and what doesn't. So it's a nice group or whatever you want call it to be and to help each other out in that way. So you have your main character, his name is Blake McKay. So this is always an interesting question for me is that I'm always fascinated by how people came up with their main character names. So what was your inspiration?
speaker-1: I wanted my character to be able to blend in in the Middle East because that's where a lot of his characters are, his stories take place. So if he needs to be able to blend in, needs to sort of have that. But I also wanted him to have some chiseled features, some unique looks to him. So I made him half Scottish and half Lakota suit. So he's got the olive complexion to be able to blend in, but he's got the Scottish in him so we can grow a nice thick beard if he needs to, long hair, black hair. So he the black hair. and the tan skin from his Native American and he gets the thick hair and a lot of other chiseled features from Scottish ancestry. So the McKay is obviously the Scottish last name and then Blake just came to me and it sounded like a good solid name so that's what I went with that's how he was born.
speaker-0: I always wonder, we look at character names, I always wonder if there's somebody out there that goes, I love that character so much I'm gonna name my baby after it.
speaker-1: Probably so. Probably so.
speaker-0: So, I mean, you have to go out to, mean, there's so many names that are in a book. Like Emily is in like, I don't know how many books that there's an Emily character in. I can name like three or four off the top of my head and I fallen into that trap. have an Emily in my book. So. Characters are fascinating to me. Do you prefer to write Blake's side of the story or do you like to write the bad guy's side of the story?
speaker-1: I really incorporate all of their parts. It's really Blake's part of the story, but I want to bring enough in of the bad guy character so you understand what he or she is like. And I want you to hate them as much as I hate them. And so you have to really give the reader a good background of that person to give them a
speaker-0: Yeah, you have to give them a motivation and you have to make the character somewhat likeable and that people will be interested in it when I continue to read those scenes. So what's your schedule like now? mean, what are you pumping out now? you shortening your timeline on the books? Yeah.
speaker-1: I did. I think... I've got I'm in the process of writing a prequel right now. It's called who is Blake McKay and I'm probably about 75 to 80 % done with it I published beyond all measure April 1st of last year and I'm looking to probably get This one out sometime. Maybe mid-may So if time allows me to so I'm a senior sales engineer for a software company And I also coach a collegiate women's lacrosse club team that that's why my voice is a little raspy right now. It was cold last night and I was yelling at the girls at practice. So my full-time job and those other side things kind of take away some of the...
speaker-0: Yeah, yeah. It's difficult sometimes to squeeze the writing in and then you're like, you either like, I have to get this onto the page or you're, you know, you're taking notes somewhere or, know, you're just like, I just don't feel like writing today. Is that how you find things to be?
speaker-1: Yeah, and I get myself into rhythms too. If I get myself into a rhythm, I can pump out two, three chapters in just a couple of days. Now the last chapter I cranked out, it was a long one. I might have to shorten it, but it's close to 4,500 words. But there's a lot of things that are happening. It's a close quarter battle inside an old whiskey class submarine in the North. So there's a lot of detail. I've taken tours of that submarine. I've talked to some mariners. it's, I try to make it as absolutely accurate as I possibly can, but still by filling in the detail, tell a story and keep people's interest. And so that one took quite a bit of time. And who is Blake McKay's story is really kind of interesting. It's really how did he become a CIA agent, how was he recruited? And it really is almost like four, five stories into one. Cause I'd originally written some short novellas when I first started writing. you know, as your writing develops and as your style changes, you look back on things that you read, that you wrote before and you just kind of like, God, that's, that's horrible. I need to rewrite that. And so I took three of those novellas, rewrote them all and incorporated them into to who is like making a story. ⁓ But so they're completely different. One change is completely different. And so then the last part is something that's gonna be fresh and brand new. And that's what I'm just getting ready to start that very last part.
speaker-0: So are you a potter? You've got everything plotted out or you're more of a pantser and just kind of freestyling as you go along and have to do all the research in the middle of writing? Yep.
speaker-1: to me. The stories kind of write themselves. I have an idea. Beyond All Measures started off, it was going to be a book called Retaliate. And it was going to be basically a retaliation slash revenge based on the things that happened with Spirit Garden. And it started off and I just didn't like where it was going. And I just stopped writing. And I stopped writing for quite a long time. And that's why there was, that's why it took me seven years. I probably didn't write anything for five or six years. I had lots of other things going on. I just didn't have time to write. And then I met this older gentleman. in Belgium. He became a writing partner of mine and we've been partners for the last going on four years now. And he really kind of kicked me in the butt and is like, you got to do this. You got to get this done. And he really helped me. He helped me to write Beyond the Measure. He kicked me in the butt to write, ⁓ the Royal Continuency. And now he's kicking me in the butt to start finishing these chapters for Who is Blake McKay? But they, they do, they write themselves. I'll start off with the scene and I visualize if I'm sitting in a movie theater watching something, what would get my attention? What would shock what would I say? Oh, I didn't see that coming. And I'll just put it to paper. I think somebody had a quote or a comment on my books that don't think that any character is safe because I'm not afraid to kill anybody at any time. And so if I see that happening in the book.
speaker-0: Yeah, it's a I've killed off characters and then got down the line been like, man, I wish that guy was still around. Yeah, I also have characters show up in the books and that I thought that they were just a throwaway character for that scene. And then they've been in, you know, numerous books afterwards.
speaker-1: That's what the dreams are. Yeah, in the same way I had a young, or in fact, the Massad sniper, her name is Solomon Zinn and she was in Intercept and I thought, okay, I'll never use that character again. And lo and behold, as I was writing the role of contingency, was like, would be a shocker. Here she comes. And then also the way I ended the book, I left it open to bring her back.
speaker-0: Okay. Always fun to be able to bring those characters back. are you seeing like putting out, well you're putting out one book a year, I assume? Yeah, that's about right. All right. Are you seeing like readers want more from you? Because there's a lot of self-published authors that are, you know, cranking out four or five, three, four five books a year. Are you looking to do that later down the road?
speaker-1: planning on it. If if by some miracle, my books took off, and I could write full time and I had the luxury of doing that, then yeah, I would probably would crank out probably at least three. If it happens, great. If it doesn't, I'll crank out about one a year. But to answer your first question. Yeah, I do get I do. It's nice. I get comments from other readers I get reached out to sometimes on Facebook Messenger, sometimes through my website. But that's the reason why I wrote Who is Blake McKay is probably the biggest question or biggest comment I got. How did he become a CIA agent? What happened to him? ⁓ What's driving him? And that's what this novel I've got coming out soon tells you. Not only how did he get recruited, why did he get recruited, and what's the underlying thing that's driving him to to be the best that he can possibly be at his job because he's got might have an ulterior.
speaker-0: always. You have to have that, right? So what interests you about the Middle East and Mossad and to set your books in that arena?
speaker-1: They're not all set in that arena. You know, that's a place of contention right now in the world. It always has been. think, you know, you see a lot of movies made with Middle Eastern terrorists. so that's kind of where the first book takes place. Well, first book, Spear Garden, really kind of takes place all over the place. It goes from Cuba to Afghanistan to Belarus. But there's a good part of the book that takes place in Afghanistan and dealing with Al Qaeda and things like that. Beyond all measure, it's It's up in the Arctic. It's up in Indicott Island in Alaska. It's in the middle of the Arctic Ocean in the North. It's in Norway. It's in Vienna. So when it intercepts in Vienna, it's in Switzerland. And then with the rural contingency, it's kind of more like an eco disaster type thriller. takes place. There's scenes in India. There's scenes. Most of it takes place a lot of it in Siberia and Moscow. So a lot of things taking place.
speaker-0: So the bio lab, did you have a Chinese bio lab in a house in Las Vegas on your bingo card?
speaker-1: That was kind of a shocker when I, I just heard that on the news, it either this morning or yesterday?
speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah. cleaning ladies went into the house and they said that they were feeling nauseous when they came out and they called the authorities. ⁓
speaker-1: There's a lot of times that truth really is stranger than fiction sometimes. I told you there were kind of like three things that I predicted. One, it wasn't really a prediction. A very good reason for having my disclosure in the front of my book that says, person is living or dead that resemble anybody in this book is complete coincidence. And again, I wrote Spear Garden initially in 2012. And the name of the director of clandestine agents at the CIA is named Mike Brennan. And the way I described him, I kind of thought of remember that cartoon show came. Yep. know, his dad, that little short guy. I kind of built my character off of him. But then lo and behold, John Brennan becomes director of the CIA. He looks exactly like the freaking character I came up with. I'm like, crap. I don't think I wanted to think that. I'm not saying that's him, but I wrote it before I even heard it.
speaker-0: I think that we base all of our characters off somebody we know or somebody we've seen in real life. So if you have a president that resembles somebody that's in office now, I think it's just going to happen. so, you know, I've written ⁓ friends of mine into the books and just to see what the, you know, cause I know they read them. I just to see what kind of kick they get out of it. And they always appreciate it they always find it funny. And I always put them in interesting situations.
speaker-1: Yeah, I sort of do that too, but I kind of have a rule if somebody I'll put somebody I'll put my friends in my book like but not the full name Blake's alias his name is David say and he's a philanthropist in Vancouver, Canada. That's his cover. He feeds starving children or whatever. anyway, one of my closest friends growing up his name was David say kicks out. So I use his first name and his middle name. But anybody that asked me to say will you put me in your book? I say yeah sure and then I know really really bad
speaker-0: That's a fun way to do it. Don't ask me unless you want to die.
speaker-1: My neighbor's wife asked me and she's in the odd-known ⁓
speaker-0: And how do they take that? Do they see that, now he's going to kill me?
speaker-1: I warned them, said, I'll put you in there but you're gonna die. They're like, ⁓ really?
speaker-0: Killing characters off is fun because then you could just, you know, it's like therapy, you know, almost in a way.
speaker-1: Now I did kill off I started writing the book I had absolutely no intention of doing that and as as things went on I kind of turned her into a villain because she was offered something that she really really really wanted and if this didn't succeed she would be so she wasn't gonna get it so she kind of kind of became crazy and she she dies and think of the Titan the submarine going down to the Titanic kind of like that
speaker-0: I didn't let go of the video game controller soon enough, I guess.
speaker-1: Yeah.
speaker-0: So my final question to everybody is, what's the one thing you want people to take away from your books after they finish reading them?
speaker-1: Please. like like it when people can finish reading the book and feel like they just got done watching. I really changed up my writing style three or four years ago and that's why I rewrote Spear Garden. I wanted it to have that style. I use almost no dialogue tags at all. So instead of, you know, I read something today, this guy's in the room, he paused. That's boring. You know, him pick up a cup and take a sip of water or you know, I want everybody to visualize everything as much you possibly can. And I think from a lot of the comments that I've gotten, people say I feel like I was watching a movie. I can see them on my And that's what I want. If you could be entertained enough to where I can visualize something in your mind the way that I have it, then I think I'm...
speaker-0: That's the goal, man. You want people to visualize what's in the books and enjoy it really well. And that's a wrap on this episode of Plot Recon, where thrillers get tactical. Thanks to Tom Tate for joining me and talking about building a high stakes spy fiction rooted in covert ops and global conflict. If you want to check out his work, you can find his books on Amazon or at TatesCoveredWorld.com. As always, if you want to see the full episodes of this, check it out on PlotRecon.com. pick up some merch to support the show. I'm Evan Graver. Thanks for listening. Stay sharp, write hard, and keep your fiction tactical.
speaker-1: unfortunate circumstances. I was working for a company and we were selling out the particular division that I was in and I was let go. And so I had a lot of free time on my hands. And as I was looking for a job, I saw a YouTube video with Mac Macowitz on future weapons. And I saw this weapon called Middle Storm. And I thought, wow, that would make a really awesome, used to be the center around some type of a spy thriller. And that'd be cool if somebody wrote that. And I realized that nobody was going to, so I did it.
speaker-0: That's awesome. It's nice to see thrillers with forward-looking tech in it. I kind of enjoy seeing what other authors and what other technology is out there and trying to put it in my books too.
speaker-1: interesting and I think it's it's always kind of fun to try to invent some technology too if you need it for a particular scene that it's not so far-fetched that it's unbelievable but real enough that it could actually happen.
speaker-0: Yeah. So I got to ask on your website, tatescovertworld.com, you have a book counter and then you have a prediction counter that says one prediction has come true. So you hit my intrigue automatically and I told you this in the email when we were going back and forth. So tell me about this prediction and what came true about it.
speaker-1: got three that came true. It's sort of so to speak. But the first one I'm talking about is in my novella called Intercept. And that's a story about Moshe Tlavi, who is the Iranian nuclear guru. He comes back to Iran after being off the grid for about seven years to start up their nuclear program again. And I figured, okay, someone's gonna want to take him out. Who would that be? Obviously, probably me. And I wrote this in 2012, 2013, 2014, so it's been a while. Anyway, in 2020, the real Iranian, Fakhrizadeh, was assassinated by Mossad. And so six years after ISIS got...
speaker-0: ⁓ it's interesting how, I think writers have a crystal ball. So we look into it to see what the next trouble area is going to be around the world. And then we try to write to that particular problem. So you said you had two other predictions that came true. What were those?
speaker-1: So in my latest book, Beyond All Measure, there is a scene on the back of a yacht where there is a very wealthy Saudi prince, and he is handing a glass of champagne to this young lady. It's a very unique looking bottle. It's very old, and she inquired about it. And he mentioned to her that some divers in the Baltic Sea found a wreck from an 18th century shipwreck. and found these cases of champagne and brought them up. And I wrote that scene probably in 2019, 2020, because it took me about seven years to write that book. And I think last summer, some divers in the Baltic Sea came across an 18th century ship and they found cases of champagne. So that's got to be a one.
speaker-0: Alright? Yeah? ⁓
speaker-1: It's fun with things like that.
speaker-0: It is. You can't call it coincidence or you know, you, I don't know. It's always interesting to see that kind of stuff happen. So you took seven years to write. Is that the first book that you wrote? No, the first
speaker-1: book was Spear Garden which was the one with the metal storm weapon and it literally took me six weeks. But I wanted to hone my craft a bit so then I wrote some novellas just to get my character out there. Rewrote Spear Garden and it took me over four years after I finished it before I published it the first time.
speaker-0: Okay. Okay. So you, you, I was looking at your Amazon page, you're self-published, correct? What led you down that path versus going, trying to get a traditional deal?
speaker-1: I'm kind of an impatient person and I know that's kind of hard to believe when I took seven years to write one book and waited four years to publish another one. But you know, I did try, know, there's everybody gets rejections. was speaking to a best-selling author actually a couple of weeks ago and he'd gotten over 169 rejections from you. from a different agents. And I think I've gotten probably around 70 or 75. And I thought, you know, and they always take some time. We'll get back to you in three months. We'll get back to you in five months. Expect an answer in three to six months. It's like, I'm not going to wait. So I was like, I'm just going go ahead and get it out there now. And I know that Vince Flynn was self-published to begin with and he became very successful. So I thought, yeah, he was an inspiration. I'll just.
speaker-0: Okay. That's a, lot of people have gone down that path and then got picked up. So good luck. Good luck to you on that. So, so what are you doing to get your books out there? Are you doing a lot of advertising or just trying to write more novel?
speaker-1: Can ⁓ really for a while there, just threw them out there and didn't really do much. But recently in the last couple of months, I've been trying to aggressively get them out there and I've figured out how to do click testing on Facebook to see which ad works the best and then put that out out there for 10 days to two weeks. I figured out how to ⁓ pre-program tweets to go out on X. Same thing with Facebook and Instagram. I'll create like on a Sunday, I'll create a whole week's worth of ads to go out and just kind of then let it go and do its thing. And that's been good. I've seen a lot of steady movement every day. And then I finally, you you get bombarded with emails from marketers all the time, know, daily. And I put them through the ringer, but I finally allowed this young lady to work with me. And she did some keyword optimization, did my profile on Amazon. We wrote the book descriptions on Amazon and did some other things to position them to be in right place. And she just actually just did that this week. So I'm going to be a guest on another podcast on Wednesday, think it's Wednesday, it's the 10th, whatever day that is. And he says that his authors usually see a nice bump then. with the Facebook, Instagram ads, tweets, I post them on LinkedIn every once in a while, the optimization of my profiles and then trying to do podcasts to get my name out there. I'm starting to see some movement in.
speaker-0: Good. We want everybody to be successful because I think that the self-publishing world and all of us thriller authors kind of try to help each other out and give lessons and tell people what works and what doesn't. So it's a nice group or whatever you want call it to be and to help each other out in that way. So you have your main character, his name is Blake McKay. So this is always an interesting question for me is that I'm always fascinated by how people came up with their main character names. So what was your inspiration?
speaker-1: I wanted my character to be able to blend in in the Middle East because that's where a lot of his characters are, his stories take place. So if he needs to be able to blend in, needs to sort of have that. But I also wanted him to have some chiseled features, some unique looks to him. So I made him half Scottish and half Lakota suit. So he's got the olive complexion to be able to blend in, but he's got the Scottish in him so we can grow a nice thick beard if he needs to, long hair, black hair. So he the black hair. and the tan skin from his Native American and he gets the thick hair and a lot of other chiseled features from Scottish ancestry. So the McKay is obviously the Scottish last name and then Blake just came to me and it sounded like a good solid name so that's what I went with that's how he was born.
speaker-0: I always wonder, we look at character names, I always wonder if there's somebody out there that goes, I love that character so much I'm gonna name my baby after it.
speaker-1: Probably so. Probably so.
speaker-0: So, I mean, you have to go out to, mean, there's so many names that are in a book. Like Emily is in like, I don't know how many books that there's an Emily character in. I can name like three or four off the top of my head and I fallen into that trap. have an Emily in my book. So. Characters are fascinating to me. Do you prefer to write Blake's side of the story or do you like to write the bad guy's side of the story?
speaker-1: I really incorporate all of their parts. It's really Blake's part of the story, but I want to bring enough in of the bad guy character so you understand what he or she is like. And I want you to hate them as much as I hate them. And so you have to really give the reader a good background of that person to give them a
speaker-0: Yeah, you have to give them a motivation and you have to make the character somewhat likeable and that people will be interested in it when I continue to read those scenes. So what's your schedule like now? mean, what are you pumping out now? you shortening your timeline on the books? Yeah.
speaker-1: I did. I think... I've got I'm in the process of writing a prequel right now. It's called who is Blake McKay and I'm probably about 75 to 80 % done with it I published beyond all measure April 1st of last year and I'm looking to probably get This one out sometime. Maybe mid-may So if time allows me to so I'm a senior sales engineer for a software company And I also coach a collegiate women's lacrosse club team that that's why my voice is a little raspy right now. It was cold last night and I was yelling at the girls at practice. So my full-time job and those other side things kind of take away some of the...
speaker-0: Yeah, yeah. It's difficult sometimes to squeeze the writing in and then you're like, you either like, I have to get this onto the page or you're, you know, you're taking notes somewhere or, know, you're just like, I just don't feel like writing today. Is that how you find things to be?
speaker-1: Yeah, and I get myself into rhythms too. If I get myself into a rhythm, I can pump out two, three chapters in just a couple of days. Now the last chapter I cranked out, it was a long one. I might have to shorten it, but it's close to 4,500 words. But there's a lot of things that are happening. It's a close quarter battle inside an old whiskey class submarine in the North. So there's a lot of detail. I've taken tours of that submarine. I've talked to some mariners. it's, I try to make it as absolutely accurate as I possibly can, but still by filling in the detail, tell a story and keep people's interest. And so that one took quite a bit of time. And who is Blake McKay's story is really kind of interesting. It's really how did he become a CIA agent, how was he recruited? And it really is almost like four, five stories into one. Cause I'd originally written some short novellas when I first started writing. you know, as your writing develops and as your style changes, you look back on things that you read, that you wrote before and you just kind of like, God, that's, that's horrible. I need to rewrite that. And so I took three of those novellas, rewrote them all and incorporated them into to who is like making a story. ⁓ But so they're completely different. One change is completely different. And so then the last part is something that's gonna be fresh and brand new. And that's what I'm just getting ready to start that very last part.
speaker-0: So are you a potter? You've got everything plotted out or you're more of a pantser and just kind of freestyling as you go along and have to do all the research in the middle of writing? Yep.
speaker-1: to me. The stories kind of write themselves. I have an idea. Beyond All Measures started off, it was going to be a book called Retaliate. And it was going to be basically a retaliation slash revenge based on the things that happened with Spirit Garden. And it started off and I just didn't like where it was going. And I just stopped writing. And I stopped writing for quite a long time. And that's why there was, that's why it took me seven years. I probably didn't write anything for five or six years. I had lots of other things going on. I just didn't have time to write. And then I met this older gentleman. in Belgium. He became a writing partner of mine and we've been partners for the last going on four years now. And he really kind of kicked me in the butt and is like, you got to do this. You got to get this done. And he really helped me. He helped me to write Beyond the Measure. He kicked me in the butt to write, ⁓ the Royal Continuency. And now he's kicking me in the butt to start finishing these chapters for Who is Blake McKay? But they, they do, they write themselves. I'll start off with the scene and I visualize if I'm sitting in a movie theater watching something, what would get my attention? What would shock what would I say? Oh, I didn't see that coming. And I'll just put it to paper. I think somebody had a quote or a comment on my books that don't think that any character is safe because I'm not afraid to kill anybody at any time. And so if I see that happening in the book.
speaker-0: Yeah, it's a I've killed off characters and then got down the line been like, man, I wish that guy was still around. Yeah, I also have characters show up in the books and that I thought that they were just a throwaway character for that scene. And then they've been in, you know, numerous books afterwards.
speaker-1: That's what the dreams are. Yeah, in the same way I had a young, or in fact, the Massad sniper, her name is Solomon Zinn and she was in Intercept and I thought, okay, I'll never use that character again. And lo and behold, as I was writing the role of contingency, was like, would be a shocker. Here she comes. And then also the way I ended the book, I left it open to bring her back.
speaker-0: Okay. Always fun to be able to bring those characters back. are you seeing like putting out, well you're putting out one book a year, I assume? Yeah, that's about right. All right. Are you seeing like readers want more from you? Because there's a lot of self-published authors that are, you know, cranking out four or five, three, four five books a year. Are you looking to do that later down the road?
speaker-1: planning on it. If if by some miracle, my books took off, and I could write full time and I had the luxury of doing that, then yeah, I would probably would crank out probably at least three. If it happens, great. If it doesn't, I'll crank out about one a year. But to answer your first question. Yeah, I do get I do. It's nice. I get comments from other readers I get reached out to sometimes on Facebook Messenger, sometimes through my website. But that's the reason why I wrote Who is Blake McKay is probably the biggest question or biggest comment I got. How did he become a CIA agent? What happened to him? ⁓ What's driving him? And that's what this novel I've got coming out soon tells you. Not only how did he get recruited, why did he get recruited, and what's the underlying thing that's driving him to to be the best that he can possibly be at his job because he's got might have an ulterior.
speaker-0: always. You have to have that, right? So what interests you about the Middle East and Mossad and to set your books in that arena?
speaker-1: They're not all set in that arena. You know, that's a place of contention right now in the world. It always has been. think, you know, you see a lot of movies made with Middle Eastern terrorists. so that's kind of where the first book takes place. Well, first book, Spear Garden, really kind of takes place all over the place. It goes from Cuba to Afghanistan to Belarus. But there's a good part of the book that takes place in Afghanistan and dealing with Al Qaeda and things like that. Beyond all measure, it's It's up in the Arctic. It's up in Indicott Island in Alaska. It's in the middle of the Arctic Ocean in the North. It's in Norway. It's in Vienna. So when it intercepts in Vienna, it's in Switzerland. And then with the rural contingency, it's kind of more like an eco disaster type thriller. takes place. There's scenes in India. There's scenes. Most of it takes place a lot of it in Siberia and Moscow. So a lot of things taking place.
speaker-0: So the bio lab, did you have a Chinese bio lab in a house in Las Vegas on your bingo card?
speaker-1: That was kind of a shocker when I, I just heard that on the news, it either this morning or yesterday?
speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah. cleaning ladies went into the house and they said that they were feeling nauseous when they came out and they called the authorities. ⁓
speaker-1: There's a lot of times that truth really is stranger than fiction sometimes. I told you there were kind of like three things that I predicted. One, it wasn't really a prediction. A very good reason for having my disclosure in the front of my book that says, person is living or dead that resemble anybody in this book is complete coincidence. And again, I wrote Spear Garden initially in 2012. And the name of the director of clandestine agents at the CIA is named Mike Brennan. And the way I described him, I kind of thought of remember that cartoon show came. Yep. know, his dad, that little short guy. I kind of built my character off of him. But then lo and behold, John Brennan becomes director of the CIA. He looks exactly like the freaking character I came up with. I'm like, crap. I don't think I wanted to think that. I'm not saying that's him, but I wrote it before I even heard it.
speaker-0: I think that we base all of our characters off somebody we know or somebody we've seen in real life. So if you have a president that resembles somebody that's in office now, I think it's just going to happen. so, you know, I've written ⁓ friends of mine into the books and just to see what the, you know, cause I know they read them. I just to see what kind of kick they get out of it. And they always appreciate it they always find it funny. And I always put them in interesting situations.
speaker-1: Yeah, I sort of do that too, but I kind of have a rule if somebody I'll put somebody I'll put my friends in my book like but not the full name Blake's alias his name is David say and he's a philanthropist in Vancouver, Canada. That's his cover. He feeds starving children or whatever. anyway, one of my closest friends growing up his name was David say kicks out. So I use his first name and his middle name. But anybody that asked me to say will you put me in your book? I say yeah sure and then I know really really bad
speaker-0: That's a fun way to do it. Don't ask me unless you want to die.
speaker-1: My neighbor's wife asked me and she's in the odd-known ⁓
speaker-0: And how do they take that? Do they see that, now he's going to kill me?
speaker-1: I warned them, said, I'll put you in there but you're gonna die. They're like, ⁓ really?
speaker-0: Killing characters off is fun because then you could just, you know, it's like therapy, you know, almost in a way.
speaker-1: Now I did kill off I started writing the book I had absolutely no intention of doing that and as as things went on I kind of turned her into a villain because she was offered something that she really really really wanted and if this didn't succeed she would be so she wasn't gonna get it so she kind of kind of became crazy and she she dies and think of the Titan the submarine going down to the Titanic kind of like that
speaker-0: I didn't let go of the video game controller soon enough, I guess.
speaker-1: Yeah.
speaker-0: So my final question to everybody is, what's the one thing you want people to take away from your books after they finish reading them?
speaker-1: Please. like like it when people can finish reading the book and feel like they just got done watching. I really changed up my writing style three or four years ago and that's why I rewrote Spear Garden. I wanted it to have that style. I use almost no dialogue tags at all. So instead of, you know, I read something today, this guy's in the room, he paused. That's boring. You know, him pick up a cup and take a sip of water or you know, I want everybody to visualize everything as much you possibly can. And I think from a lot of the comments that I've gotten, people say I feel like I was watching a movie. I can see them on my And that's what I want. If you could be entertained enough to where I can visualize something in your mind the way that I have it, then I think I'm...
speaker-0: That's the goal, man. You want people to visualize what's in the books and enjoy it really well. And that's a wrap on this episode of Plot Recon, where thrillers get tactical. Thanks to Tom Tate for joining me and talking about building a high stakes spy fiction rooted in covert ops and global conflict. If you want to check out his work, you can find his books on Amazon or at TatesCoveredWorld.com. As always, if you want to see the full episodes of this, check it out on PlotRecon.com. pick up some merch to support the show. I'm Evan Graver. Thanks for listening. Stay sharp, write hard, and keep your fiction tactical.
