December 16, 2024 • 50 mins
Joint Episode with Eric Bishop discussing our recent book launches!
For those navigating the world of indie publishing, Eric Bishop joins us to share insights from his book "Babylon Will Rise" and the hustle behind self-publishing success. Our conversation highlights the creative storytelling and marketing strategies crucial for indie authors, along with the importance of feedback, community support, and transitioning from military to civilian life. From mentoring veterans to supporting fellow writers, we emphasize the power of collaboration and the impact of giving back, leaving listeners with valuable advice and inspiration.
Make sure to check out Jason on IG @drjasonpiccolo
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Welcome to another episode of Guess what, not just
A Tale of Two Scribes.
We have the protectors here.
We have a dual episode going on.
I told everybody I was done forthe year, but jason decided to
come out with this book righthere which we need to talk about
.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
So we're gonna start by saying hey, welcome to the
protectors podcast.
This is a joint episode withtale of two scribes with eric
bishop.
What's going on, brother?
Speaker 2 (00:43):
I like it, I'm good.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
I'm good.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
I just I got my Edinburgh sweatshirt.
I was walking down this whoknows what the name of the road
was, this cobblestone road withmy mom and my cousin and I was
in a sweatshirt and I got really, really cold and I don't get
cold.
So I ducked into a generictourist shop and I looked around
and said, hey, $35 sweatshirt,I don't want to be cold.
(01:07):
So I threw that thing on and itkept me warm.
I tell you that trip lookedamazing, man.
Well, you got to go to Europe.
There a couple months before meyou got to go to Germany and
then, yes, I got to go thecoolest thing, I think, really
about it.
Besides, just what I was ableto see was my mom had never left
(01:27):
the country I take that back.
She had been to Canada and shehad been to the Bahamas, but she
had never gone overseas toEurope.
So, 71 years old and it was athank you trip I paid for it for
mom to go.
I was like mom, you've done alot for me, I want to take you
(01:49):
and do something cool with you.
And, um, yeah, just had ablessing with her and we had a
blast.
I, I had her out at the templebar one night in dublin.
I couldn't get her to throw oneback, so I made sure I did, but
uh, you know, took her on a fewexperiences.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
so that is the greatest thing you could do, I
think, is a son is like travelexperiences, you know yeah,
absolutely, um, yeah, just youknow we've had obviously a lot
of offline conversations.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
We both had some interesting things occur in our
life in the last couple yearsand the things in life, the
things that we accumulate, allthe stuff doesn't really matter
in the end.
You don't take it with you.
No what matters.
Relationships matter, you know,people matter.
So to have the time with peoplethat you love, um, it's good to
have a reminder every now andthen, especially because I've
(02:32):
had a few friends in the lasttwo, three years that have lost
their parents, one or both, um,and so I'm blessed I haven't had
to experience that at thispoint, but I I want to try to
enjoy those moments I can havewith something like this, with
my mom for sure.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
so and you know you talk about losing people, like
now that I'm in my 50s, like I'mmore and more people I've been
to high school with and theirfamilies, nobody else.
And I'm like man, I want toexperience everything I possibly
can.
Yeah, I've been to uh, what?
I've been to the united states,los estados unidos, like the
bahamas, like when I was a kid,right, but iraq, kuwait and
(03:10):
germany.
So it's like I don't have thisbig like, but now I'm like all I
want to do is I want to see theworld, I want to experience the
world well, we'll get a fewtrips under our belts together
in the next couple you got tosee shine down.
You got to go to england,england or Europe or somewhere
to see those guys.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
Yeah, there'll be there they're.
They're kicking off a tour thisyear, I'm sorry, this year,
2025.
We're not there yet.
Nothing's announced of when,where I know they're going to
tour.
I know, I do know that.
I think.
So, yeah, I think, if they makeit over to uh europe, I think
we'll have to be uh, we'll haveto do some fanboying and go over
(03:48):
there and catch a few showstogether.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
It's crazy.
I'm always on like ticketmaster now looking for shows in
europe and I'm looking like I'mtrying to like scour the
internet for like cheap flightsfor anything.
I'm like I just want live musicnow.
Man, that's like my thingcoming out of dc, you should be
able to.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
The other place that's really good for Europe is
JFK.
Getting flights out of JFK islike four or 500 bucks.
You can find a lot of differentplaces in Europe.
Unfortunately, I'm not close toJFK so I have to get up there.
I did make a purchase the otherday.
Fortunately my son does notwant Well, my son knows I was
going to say fortunately hedoesn't know.
I did get him a concert ticketshe doesn't know yet about those
(04:24):
are Christmas tickets.
But the big one I got the otherday was we got tickets to go
see ACDC.
Oh, they're awesome.
Man, never seen them.
So we were going to see them inNashville.
I was looking at like Vegas andChicago and Nashville ended up
being the spot Of course.
He was like are we going to beup next to the stage?
(04:45):
I was like dude, you didn'tknow the prices ahead of time so
you had to log in.
I was in the queue for like 30minutes, waiting, waiting, and
finally my turn came up andfirst thing I did was click down
like floor near the stage$7.50,.
Speaker 1 (04:58):
I think was the cheapest one.
Holy crap yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
Per ticket.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
And I said per ticket .
And I said I love my son but Idon't sell that many books.
It's a lot of books.
That's what we're going to talkabout today is indie author.
But you know, when you talkabout shows man, I um, I saw
acdc in 98 or 99 in san diego.
What a great show man.
For those about to rock, oh manand and the cannons, oh God,
you're going to have a greattime.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
Looking forward to it .
I've done some and I like tokind of do these bigger ones
with him, like we've we've seenBon Jovi, we saw you two at the
sphere, uh Eagles, oh man, uhGarth Brooks, just yeah, those
fun.
A bunch of Shinedown shows andthose ones are special because
we're not stuck in one seat,which that's kind of the fun
(05:47):
part of having that access.
You can just go side stage.
Speaker 1 (05:50):
This is the tickets I have so far for the next year.
I have Disturb the Sickness25th Anniversary Tour and
Capital One Arena in DC.
I have Killswitch Engage andthen I have Metallica M7272
world tour.
Where are you seeing them?
(06:10):
I'm seeing them at the bank ofamerica stadium.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
You know where that's at.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
I didn't know those tickets were available.
Yes, my friend, I got those along time ago, though, as soon
as they came out, boom I wonderif they're still when we get off
tonight.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
I gotta look, because they're on my bucket list.
I haven't seen them yeah, I sawthem.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
Gosh, that was like one of my first main.
I mean I used to see speedmetal concerts in the 80s, yeah,
but that was my first big one.
I saw Injustice for All.
Wow, I saw Injustice for Alltwice.
I saw Black Elm twice and thenI saw this M72 tour before I
think I I saw them with mybrother.
I've seen them probably about70 times, oh, okay.
You've seen them a whole bunch.
Yeah, they're incredible,brother.
(06:45):
Yeah, I haven't been anywherebut Iraq, kuwait and Germany.
But I have seen some good shows.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
You have seen some good shows, yeah, Well, again,
the great thing about your takein life and the way you're
looking at things happening inlife right now is that you know
what.
It's never too late to startgoing out and exploring.
You've got Global Entry.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
Global Entry is where it's at, brother.
Speaker 2 (07:08):
That's the thing for international traffic.
So it was funny.
I used mine for the first timea week ago, sunday, and I got up
to the in Charlotte.
I got up to the kiosk and Ithought you'd have to show your
ID.
So I'm like fumbling around mywall to grab my ID and the
worker was not the nicest person.
I'm like fumbling around mywallet, grab my ID and the
worker was not the nicest person.
Hey, what are you doing?
I'm like I'm getting my globalentry ID.
He goes go up to the littlemonitor and put your face.
(07:29):
That's all you need.
I'm like, oh okay, I had noidea.
So I did that.
I walked over.
I almost walked by the guy withthe passports.
He was like, hey, I was likedone.
40 seconds from when I walkedinto the room, my mom didn't
have global entry and she toldme use your global entry.
She went with the commoners andI think it took her 25 minutes
(07:53):
to get through customs andeverything.
Much different experience.
I waited for her.
She said leave, because she wasactually flying out to
Connecticut.
I was just going.
I said, no, I'm going to getyour bag and wait here, I'm not
going to leave you.
So which?
Then.
It was a cool thing thathappened as I was waiting there
in the international terminal orbaggage return and someone
calls my name, comes up to me,shakes my hand, says I love your
(08:15):
books no clue who this personwas, no idea.
Introduced himself, he said Isaw you in London get ready to
board the plane and I wasn'table to go over and say hi and
I'm like that was the first timeoutside of like local family
friends where I live, thatsomeone actually called me out
where I don't live I live anhour from Charlotte.
So that was kind of like, okay,I feel a little more legit now.
(08:38):
You know, watch out Jack car,you know.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
Well, you know, talk about indie authoring man.
It's like if anybody I knowknows how to market a book, it's
you.
And now we have Babylon WillRise and I've noticed that the
reviews are coming up.
You're starting to get.
I love how you do the pictures,with everybody taking pictures
of it.
Yeah, so you are probably oneof the best indie marketers I
know.
Oh, and you're a great authoras well, so I'm excited I got
(09:04):
the babylon will rise as soon asit came out.
The omega group series, man youdid.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
I appreciate that.
Yeah, thanks I.
You know I didn't.
I didn't want to have to be amarketer, I didn't want to have
to go down this path, but Iwanted books to come out.
And I mean, even if you get an,a, you know, you know, you get
an agent, you get a publisherGuess what they're not doing all
the work for you?
You have to promote your booksand there are exceptions.
(09:30):
There's people that don't domuch promotion, sell a lot of
books, but that's really theexception of the rule, like the
people that are out there makingthe bestseller list and stuff.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
They're hustling.
They're hustling.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
They're hustling really hard, um, and they might
get some times when they don'thave to cause.
You know you, you get about sixweeks, two months after a book
is out.
You know the sales typicallypretty much not plunge or bottom
out, but they go downsignificantly.
So you can kind of lay low andwork on your next book or get
everything else ready.
You know you don't have to doit 24 seven.
I'm in the position where,since I don't have that big
(10:05):
publishing help um, for aslittle as it might be sometimes,
it has to be fairly constant.
You know, I just have to andI've also had enough stuff
coming out last couple of yearsthat there's always something to
kind of bring to people'sattention.
So the hustle is real.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
What are you doing, like about a thousand words a
night, or four or 500 words anight, or how do you?
How do you set yourself up?
Speaker 2 (10:27):
The truth would be I have no set rules.
I wrote a bunch on the trip.
I've written since I've beenback from the trip.
I've not.
I've done some editing onsomething.
I wrote the last couple ofnights but I've not really
written anything since Babylonof Rise came out.
I haven't written on the nextbook, supreme Justice, in a few
(10:48):
nights.
I'm in writing mode now.
So when we get done tonight,I'll do writing tonight and I'll
do writing for the next couplemonths pretty consistently.
But almost years ago, when thekids were little and I was
married, everyone went to bedand I would just.
That would be my time, my wifeat the time went to bed early,
got up early I was a night hawk,slept in a little more.
(11:10):
So my writing window where Ihad no distractions was like 10
o'clock till 12.
And that's when I did it.
I still gravitate towards thattime now, but it's sporadic,
like there's times I'm writingand then there's a month where I
might write hardly anything,just because I'm trying to
format the next book.
I'm trying to work on this withthat.
(11:31):
So, yeah, there's no and there'sno secret formula.
I mean, there are people outthere that swear you've got to
write every day.
It's BS.
It might work for them andmaybe for them they have to.
I can start a chapter, put itdown a week later, go right back
to where I left off and startwriting again.
It's just and I'm not sayingit's the best thing in the world
but my brain is able to just gookay, you're back.
(11:53):
Keep that thought going,although I try to stop at a spot
that I don't have to rememberwhere I got to jump off to the
next time.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
So where are we at, with Babylon Will Rise.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Well, it's out in the world.
It is available on Amazon ebookpaperback, hardcover.
It's actually, out of all thebooks I've been putting out and
put out the last couple of years, this one people the advanced
readers are saying that theylike this the most.
And part of the reason I wantedto talk with you tonight we're
talking about Pivot and talkingabout what you're doing for
(12:29):
veterans is Babylon Will Rise ismy first full-length novel that
really focuses on militarypersonnel.
I never served.
I don't pretend to—no impostersyndrome going on here that I'm
pretending I've done something Ihaven't.
It's all creative stuff goingon in my head.
(12:49):
But I've had friends that haveserved, so I've kind of gleaned
from them what it's like.
I've been around them in carsfor hours at a time and just the
endless ball busting thathappens.
So I've kind of integrated allthat and when I want to tell
stories of, I think I at leasthave a good idea of what happens
when soldiers are getting readyfor a mission or they're out on
(13:12):
a mission.
So I've really enjoyed.
I love telling these charactersstories.
And for this story, you knowthe Omega group's a six person
group there.
There's a person in charge ofit as well, a seventh member
who's not involved in theday-to-day action, but in this
one I brought in a femalecharacter.
So the boys meet up withCharlie and when they first hear
(13:35):
who Charlie is, they think it'sa dude Little.
Do they realize it's Charlene?
She goes by, charlie, and thefeedback I've got from her has
been incredible.
Incredible enough that Iprobably want to do something
with her in a couple years.
Give her and her group offemale office soldiers their,
give them their due.
So I'm excited about it.
Speaker 1 (13:58):
Now, when you put this all together, like one
thing I do want to talk abouttonight is indie authoring.
And yeah, because I indieauthored mine, I was going to go
the traditional route and tryto pitch it blah blah, but my
goal with the pivot book was I'mlike look, this is my
information from 30 years ofbeing in the government on how
to get hired, how a veteran anda service member can get hired.
(14:19):
I could go the traditionalroute and wait a year, but I
don't want to do that.
I want to get this informationout now because to me, that's
like 200,000 people leave theservice every year.
That's potentially 200,000people that are missing out on
the information.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Right, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (14:35):
I'm not talking about the marketing-wise.
I didn't write the book to makea ton of money.
I made a book to break even andto get the information out
there, because to me indieauthoring is this I wrote, I put
the information down, I put ittogether and then as soon as my
manuscript's ready, or as soonas all that everything's ready,
I send it away to some guy, metsome group, I met on fiverr to
(14:58):
do the inside editing and then Ifound someone to do the cover
and then I had to go and uploadit to KDP, amazon, kdp, then
Barnes Noble.
I had to hire someone to do thecover for that specific thing.
But what I like to tell peopleis like, if you have a book,
write it.
You don't always have to gotraditional and you're fairly
(15:21):
successful for going this route.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
Yeah, again, and I've said this on even recent
podcasts.
The thing is, is what do youwant out of it?
So if you want to be a New YorkTimes bestseller, it's never
going to happen.
Going indie Just not going tohappen.
New York Times doesn'tacknowledge that you exist,
basically, unless it becomeslike a Fifty Shades of Grey.
(15:44):
You know, something happens tothat, and then a bigger
publisher picks up something,because that started basically
as kind of like a self-publishedkind of thing, and that's an
anomaly, like a complete anomaly.
But generally speaking, if youwant New York Times bestseller
list, you're going to have to gotraditional publishing.
I've said this one in otherpodcasts before.
Guess what?
New York Times bestseller isnot necessarily the most bought
(16:06):
book for that week.
It might be, but it also mightbe some politics thrown in there
.
There might be a lot ofpolitics.
Yeah, there's a lot of crapthat goes on.
Enough that I've learned aboutit in the last five, six years,
as I've taken this reallyserious.
That sure would I like to beEric Bishop New York Times
bestseller.
Yeah, I'm not stupid.
Of course that sounds great.
I'll mark because I can marketit.
If I never get that, though,will I feel like I'm less of an
(16:29):
author.
No, not at all.
Again, when I get thoseresponses from readers, that's
who I care about.
When people read my book and Iget a legit review back, or
someone sends me a message andsays man that touched me or man
that made me excited, orwhatever, that's my juice.
That's my juice.
(16:52):
It's not does.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
Kirkus.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
Reviews, or does this other company that I pay money
to say nice things about my book?
I don't care about that, that'snot my thing, and if that means
I'm not going to be embraced bythe publishing world, then so
be it.
I think I will at some point,and it will be because of what I
write and maybe it's becauseI'll build myself
self-publishing wise and it'ssomething that they take notice.
But ultimately, if they takenotice, it's because they think
(17:14):
they can make money off of meand that's not a negative.
It's a business.
Publishing industry is abusiness and it's not a
charitable business.
It's a for-profit business.
Oh, absolutely.
So they're bringing on peoplethey think they can make money
on.
You might make money too not asmuch as you think or more than
you think, you never know.
But you've got to look at itand that's the lens that changed
(17:37):
with me in the last three orfour years, especially of
realizing, okay, this isactually a business.
So I want to tell stories.
But once I start going down theindie route, I have to look at
it from a business, like what Idid marketing for the body man,
even though it was a smallpublisher.
I did a lot of marketing myselfas well.
I don't do the same things nowbecause I look at it like okay,
(17:58):
what's my bang for my buck?
Am I pissing money away on thislittle thing?
That's not going to get mesales, and that's just
experience.
You just learn how to do itbasically, and sometimes you
fail.
Sometimes you know you do an adand the ad falls flat, and
again you kind of just have toroll with it and ultimately you
have to tell a good story, butthen you got to figure out how
(18:19):
to market it.
You know you're in that mixright now and I know yours is
nonfiction, so it does sometimes, you know, not always crossover
identical, but it's the sameconcept.
You don't put a book outbecause you want to sell two
(18:40):
copies.
You want to put a book outbecause you want it to get the
masses and for you, what Iadmire about what you're doing,
and what you even just said, isyou're trying to help people
that have served our country.
That you know what's the number22 soldiers a day on average
commit suicide.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
I think that's a low figure too.
Speaker 2 (18:51):
It probably is a low figure.
And how many of those soldiersthat get to that end and get to
that point, it's because theyhaven't found a purpose, a
mission.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
Yeah, they need a mission.
One thing I wrote in this bookwas this I'm like look and this
covers really the whole gambitso if you're a service member,
the first chapter is going to beabout hey, you're 24 months out
, how do you want to setyourself up, whether or not
you've been in for two years,four years, eight years, a
career, whether or not you'reenlisted or an officer?
But the big thing was, you know, I have a whole chapter on like
(19:24):
the bridge job, your first jobout of the service, or your
first job.
Let's say, you get out and yougo to college and your first
real job doesn't have to be yourcareer, it doesn't have to be
your dream job.
I call it the bridge job.
So what you do is you'resetting yourself up to build
your experience and then move onto the next thing, because a
lot of people don't realize youdon't have to.
(19:46):
You know, I grew up, I was inlaw enforcement for 23 years.
You know federal lawenforcement and it was always a
career to me.
I knew I had to stay in thegovernment in order to finish
out so I could retire, and I didRight.
But you, nowadays, you don'thave to, and that's one thing
about this book too.
It's not set towards you goinginto the corporate world of
(20:06):
entrepreneurship or anything.
It's really set towards peoplewho want to continue serving in
one way or the other, whetherthat's in a federal government
or the civilian, private world.
But it's more along those linesof how do I get that job?
I have whole chapters on thefederal hiring process, how do
you use USA jobs?
How do you use your veteranspreference?
And even if you were in amilitary, you get like a ton out
(20:27):
of about.
Let's say there's 18 chapters.
If you were not in the military, you can get a lot out of about
12 of those chapters.
It's all about interview prep.
It's about resume building,it's about what to even wear to
an interview, because you knowthey tell you in the government
when you're getting out of theservice.
Sometimes you're like, oh, youhave to buy a really nice suit.
(20:48):
I'm like, no, you don't, youneed to go to TJ Maxx, you need
to go somewhere If you need toget a secondhand.
You don't need the dress toimpress as far as a lot of money
Because, remember, you're goinginto a job but you don't want
to go into debt to get that job.
No, and you know, when you getout of the service, a lot of
people don't have a ton of moneyand, as a matter of fact, a lot
(21:11):
of people leaving this and Ihave a whole chapter on debt.
Yeah, a lot of people areleaving the service with some
amount of debt, whether it's carpayments or whatever.
So it's a very realistic look,and I think that's what sets
this book apart from anythingelse is because when I did the
market research, when I waswriting this thing, I was like,
okay, what kind of job books areout there, what kind of how-to
(21:32):
books are out there?
And they're more geared towardsthe hiring manager, not the
individual looking for a job,not the individual looking for a
job.
So I said, hey, you know what,if I was a service person,
service member getting out, oreven a veteran, what do I need
to succeed?
Yeah, and so that's why I wroteit.
(21:53):
Man, I think it's 437 pages ofjust guts Facts.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
Have you thought about maybe especially down the
line a little bit further, maybedoing some kind of an online or
videos that kind of breaks downsome of the stuff for everybody
, or as companions to the book,or something.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Yeah, one of my friends was like you know, do
you have TikTok?
And I'm like yeah, and they'relike you know what?
So now I'll start doing like,probably next week I'll start
doing like little TikTok blurbsabout getting hired.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Oh, I thought you were gonna say tiktok dances.
I was gonna say jason, come on,bro, 51 years old now.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
The other thing is I'm going to be giving um
speeches to military programs,because that's that's really
where this came from.
I was a.
I've mentored veterans foryears, for over a decade so
that's kind of where I'm like Ineed to put something down, so
when I'm talking about thesethings, I can just be like here,
it's all right here, it's righthere, yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:39):
Yeah, the giving back , I think, is.
So again, I think that circlesback to some of the stuff we
talked about is, people are.
A lot of times it's so easy inlife, especially we live in an
extremely materialistic world.
I mean, a couple hundred yearsago you live to survive.
Now, I think a lot of times ofcourse we were just talking
about traveling and going tosurvive.
(23:00):
Now, I think a lot of times ofcourse we were just talking
about it traveling, going toconcerts.
Now we live for comfort.
Hey, man, when can I, can Ihave a filet for dinner?
Hey, can I go, you know, towhatever a nice fancy, you know,
people Experiences.
Yeah, experiences andexperiences are super important,
but if that's all your life isabout and if you're not helping,
if you're not giving back withyou wanting to help with
(23:20):
veterans, with other people likemyself, I try to um, I try to
help as much as I can.
When it comes to authors,especially indie authors.
It's like I don't have anysecrets that I won't give out.
There's nothing that I'm goingto hold back and say I want to
sell books.
I don't want to tell this to, Idon't want to, you know, share
this, because that might causesomeone else to sell books that
(23:40):
I could have sold or know mysecrets.
Everything I learned I meanlike David Darling was one of
those authors that I will praiseto the high heavens, because
David would just be like hey,you got a question, just message
me or whatever we get on.
You know Facebook Messenger orthe video version of Facebook
and he would just be like okay,and he'd actually show me the
screen sometimes.
Okay, go in there and clickthat and all that Stuff.
(24:03):
That's like it meant so much tome that someone's willing to
spend hours to learn somethingand then, in two minutes, show
me what they learned, and it'slike I have the responsibility
to do the same exact thing whatsomeone did.
For me it's like show peoplehow it works and, like you were
talking about with you, knowjust what you can teach veterans
(24:27):
and what you can teach in theprocess.
I think there's an exactparallel to people that are
trying to get into thepublishing world.
Don't get in debt If you canput a book out and go as basic
as possible.
That should be your goal,because we both know and we've
been doing books in the industrylong enough to know that
there's a lot of people outthere that will promise you the
(24:49):
moon.
Hey, for $2,000 or for $3,000or for $4,000, I can get you
this, this, this and this, andmaybe they can.
Maybe they can get you this,this, this and this, and maybe
they can.
Maybe they can get that.
But if you're having to putthat on a credit card because
you want to achieve your dream,maybe you should work a side job
for a couple months and save upand put that in.
(25:11):
You know it's a gamble.
There's definitely a gamble inthere, and also the other thing,
too, that I always tell peopleis try to get someone.
You know, if it's a bookmarketer out there that's trying
to offer their services.
Try to figure out whether it'sposting stuff on social media or
whatever.
Try to find out if someone hasused them and get a firsthand
account of are they reliable?
Do they take your money and notdo what they promised?
(25:32):
Because I've heard so manystories of that over the years,
where I'm gun shy.
Now when I get messages frompeople and says, hey, man, for
150 bucks I can do such and suchfor you, I seriously are like
okay, do I got 150?
Sure, I got 150.
Do I want to get to this person?
Can I do it myself?
Or can I find a way to do it?
Or is there an actual value inthat?
Speaker 1 (25:54):
So you got to be really careful, so you got to be
really careful.
The book promotion deals Likeas soon as I put that on
LinkedIn the other day, I'minundated with people saying,
hey, have you ever thought aboutdoing this?
And then they want to chargeyou.
Yeah.
So that's one thing I wouldcaution If you're going to indie
author this, any book is itjust watch your money?
Yeah, absolutely Watch yourmoney Like whatever you put into
(26:16):
it, like when I Watch yourmoney Like whatever you put into
it.
So with my other book, withUnwavering, I initially had a
publisher for that one, a smallpublishing house and then there
they are.
I eventually got their rights.
That's me, brother.
My mom calls it my beefcakephoto.
But as soon as I got the rightsback to my book, I went through
(26:38):
it because it was horriblyedited before and I really
wanted to get it out there.
But at the time I was throwingmoney at this thing and I'm like
I'm never going to get themoney back, right, I mean.
And nowadays I wish I could goback and rewrite the whole thing
because it's really it's mystory, but it's not my story,
it's just a disjointed book andI'm not my story, it's just a
(27:02):
disjointed book and I I'm notproud of it as much as I am.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
I'm very proud of this book pivot because to me
it's like my unwavering is moreself-glamorization of like this
is me and this is what I've done, but this is more like this is
you and this is what you can doright so I think, you're seeing
as a way of giving back andhelping others and that, yeah,
that changes your philosophy onstuff, when you're putting
(27:24):
something out there to helpsomeone versus necessarily to
help yourself or to inflate yourego or whatever people do stuff
and that comes down to themarketing aspect of it too, is
like marketing that book iscompletely different than this
one.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
yeah, this one.
What I'm doing is I've beenreaching out to a lot of
colleges.
What I'll do is actually gobeen reaching out to a lot of
colleges.
What I'll do is actually gogive a speech and talk about it
and give them free copiesbecause I want to help out the
veteran community.
Now, what I would love to see,in order to make the profit off
of it at all, is just acorporation that volunteers with
veterans to buy a handful ofcopies.
Buy some copies in order for meto break even with it.
(27:59):
But overall, I'm very proudbecause I'm like I have
something that could beworthwhile and I was a hiring
manager for years with the Fed.
I was a veteran, so I kind ofknow where things are going.
Speaker 2 (28:12):
But yeah, man, so speak to this because I'm
ignorant to the process.
So you have someone thatenlists at 18 and I'm just
thinking off the top of my headon this.
Someone enlists at 18 years old, very wet behind the ears.
They kind of learn life'slessons, you know, with a four
year.
You know time in the with uncleSam and in one one branch or
(28:34):
another, four years is up, theydon't reenlist for anymore,
they're.
Four years is up, they don'treenlist for anymore.
They're you know they're intheir wind down period.
However that works.
I know retirement's, probablymuch.
I know how it works forretirement from some friends
that have gotten out recently.
But you're done after fouryears.
Okay, tell me what happens,what, what is the?
What does the military do toJoe?
Joe blow here that just got outafter four years?
Speaker 1 (28:55):
Well, you're supposed to have the transition
assistance programs.
You get like a little littletraining, a little resume prep
and stuff, but reallyessentially you're given a
little bit like really just a, alittle snapshot of what you
need to get out, and then you'reout, you're in a world.
You're boom.
There's no more paycheck everymonth.
There's, there's really nothing.
(29:16):
I mean, yeah, you can collectunemployment for six months or
so, but you're really out in theworld.
I mean it's like, hey, you knowwhat uncle sam said, thank you
for your service.
Boom, I mean, yeah, youprobably have some college fun
if you want to go to college,but not everybody's, you know,
gonna go to college, right, andif you do go to college, you're
still gonna need a job.
Yeah, so I mean and like I wassaying before, a lot of are
(29:37):
saddled with debt.
So you got to think about thosekind of circumstances too.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
Yeah, one of my buddies was based up in Campbell
and I went up several times tohis house and you know I was
asking questions, I was tryingto figure out how things work.
And so we came out of the baseone time and he just said and I
can't remember now the name ofthe main boulevard there outside
Campbell, but let me just takeyou down and you can see what's
here and you're going by stripclubs, car dealerships, all the
(30:03):
stuff.
It's like Payday loans, yes,payday loans, and this is what
the privates, the privates arethere and they have people that
are willing to take that meagerpaycheck they have and start
using it for something.
Bigger paycheck they have andstart, you know, start using it
for something.
And of course you get adeployment.
(30:24):
Or you know a lot of people herein the last 20 years were in
active duty for war and maybethey re-enlisted so they
might've got a 10, 20, $40,000.
You know how many people go outand buy cars with those bonuses
.
They're not buying land,they're not buying 40 acres in
Montana.
You know for somewhere to go.
When they get done, they'retypically.
You know for somewhere to go.
When they get done, they'retypically, you know, maybe
they're married and they have,you know, trying to buy a house
for their family or whatever.
(30:44):
Yeah, it's wild what happens.
Speaker 1 (30:50):
It's nuts man.
So let's get back to your book,brother.
I mean, now you're into themilitary, the thriller genre,
and you know you mentionedbefore.
But some authors are like, hey,you know what, I'm not going to
help you out, but I've noticedour crew of people around us
around us even the New YorkTimes bestselling authors that
we know will always help out.
Because, I look at it this way,your book's 300-something pages
(31:13):
Normal people.
When they get into these books,they knock them out pretty
quick and then they're on to thenext.
When they get into these books,they knock them out pretty
quick and then they're on to thenext.
It's almost like you're in aYouTube generation, a social
media generation, where you need, need, need, right.
So when it comes to competitionunless you're rolling into the
(31:36):
New York Times bestsellingauthorship like you're a Mark
Rainey or something like thatthey are very helpful because
their books are selling, butthen they have six months until
their next book comes out.
So someone will knock theirbook out in a week and then they
need more.
Yeah, so I think it'simperative that authors help
each other out, because it'sjust cross-promotion.
That's the way I look at it.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
Absolutely.
Well, you're not really people,and I thought it originally
there'd be a real bigcompetition.
Most of the people that readdon't just read one book a year.
Readers are typically prettyferocious when it comes to like
(32:16):
a fan of my books.
He texted me Was it last nightor Saturday night, I can't
remember now Last two nights hetexted me, Started the book that
day and finished it Notsomething he normally does, but
again, because it's 330 pages orwhatever that one is, it's a
short amount, it's a fast.
My chapters are pretty short andit was intentionally done that
(32:37):
way.
I don't want people to stopreading.
I want to go to the nextchapter and be like Charlie did
what, oh man?
What did the jackal say thistime?
Something, probably stupid.
So, yeah, so that, though, ofhaving the fact of having a
quick read.
So they're done with my book.
Well, I don't want someone tojust buy.
Babylon will rise and go.
I'm done.
(33:00):
I'm good for a while.
They're going to go readwhatever.
So, whether it's Mark Graney orJack Carr or Anderson Wilson or
Don Bentley, any of these, anyof these guys and most of those
are all veteran, really veteranauthors Um, they know there's no
competition there and they knowthere's no competition coming
from me because I don't have thebig you know big five behind me
that's helping to publish orpush.
It's me doing it and hiringpeople and stuff.
(33:22):
So, yeah, but always been super, super supportive.
Kyle Mills put something reallynice out the other day.
Brad Meltzer, who's not onTwitter really anymore, he went
on Blue Sky and Instagram andyou know he has kind words to
say.
So, yeah, the community'salways been super supportive and
it's humbling.
(33:42):
It's humbling to know that someof your favorite authors are
out there saying kind thingsabout the fact that you're
putting a book out as well.
And yeah, it's not a competitionto them.
They have their books come outand their readers are much
bigger readership than I havethat are going to pick up their
books and hey, yeah, maybe someof their readers will be like I
got time.
(34:02):
What's Babylon Arise?
Look like, who is the Omegagroup and who's this Charlie
girl who's going to kind of jackaround these guys a little bit
and put them in their place,basically.
So I think the best complimentI got was actually Aima Adair.
Aima basically said you knowagain someone who spent a career
serving in the Navy and she'slike I like Charlie, I liked
(34:24):
what you did with the femalecharacter, I like the
counterbalance to the boys andgetting that compliment from her
was kind of like okay, I guessI did do it.
I thought I did it because Ienjoyed the story and I'm my
first critic and my first fan.
But what is someone that'slived that world?
Think of what I've, what I'vedone with it.
So it's always great to getthat feedback yeah, she's great
(34:45):
man.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
I'm glad she's getting into screenwriting now
too yeah we need solid screenlike scripts out there, brother.
I'm telling you, man, I lovethe lioness show is not bad.
I really dig jackal.
I don't know if you saw thatone.
I have not seen it.
Speaker 2 (35:05):
I'll have to add it to my list.
My TV's been fairly minimalbecause I just have too much
crap to do the Diplomat's, mykind of like.
Oh, okay, that's my juice everynow and then I'm only like
three episodes into it.
I'm also savoring it because Ithink I found it by chance one
night months and months andmonths ago, maybe earlier this
(35:26):
year or whatever.
And I think I binged in likeseven nights or whatever, and so
I had to wait like six, eightmonths for it.
So now I said, okay, you canwatch one episode a week.
That's kind of like yourdessert after you did your job.
Speaker 1 (35:38):
So yeah, we need good screenwriters for sure.
I am on a Miami Vice binge now,like the original.
The old school one.
I'm on season one, episode 10right now.
Don Johnson baby, because Icould write while I watch,
because I don't have to thinkabout it.
Speaker 2 (35:52):
See, I can't.
So that's one way we'redifferent.
If I have the television on,I'm watching the television and
I'm not looking at my laptop.
Now, music motivates me.
I can get some, depending onwhat I'm writing.
It depends on what I want tolisten to, and sometimes it's
just silence.
Sometimes I just like silence,but that's one thing, and I was
going to ask you about that.
When it comes to writingbecause I can write, I finished
(36:15):
a chapter, I started a chapteron the paddy wagon on my way
down to Blarney castle and Ifinished that chapter over the
Atlantic last Sunday.
So I don't care where I am, aslong as I end up, I'll put in
noise canceling earbuds orwhatever.
If I block out annoying peoplemaking noise, I can write
anywhere.
So how about you?
Where, where, where's your.
Speaker 1 (36:35):
To me, mostly everything I write is nonfiction
, so I really just need facts,just facts.
I write a ton of op-eds now.
I write two or three a week, soI really just need facts.
As long as I have the facts, Icould write.
And a lot of times when I'mwriting that I need something in
the background, like noise.
Okay, so you do need that'swhat I need, like the tv or
(36:55):
something, because I need mymind is not.
I can't just have silence.
There's no way, even with music, and music to me is like I love
music so much that I want toenjoy the music so I wouldn't's
a distraction if you're tryingto write.
Yeah, I can't just write becauseI want to like.
I'm always listening to thelyrics and everything else and
(37:17):
relating it to my life.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
Let's jump back to Pivot for a second.
I had a thought pop throughwhen you were mentioning earlier
about USA Jobs and stuff.
Are there some misconceptionsthat, that, that that maybe
soldiers especially have asthey're getting out of uh, about
the process, or is there thingsthat um are aren't as obvious
as they should be for them whenthey're, when they're trying to
look into, you know, a careerafter the military?
Speaker 1 (37:42):
I think a lot of people think, because they're a
veteran, if they apply to a jobin USA Jobs, they should get it
automatically.
They should get an interviewautomatically.
But I've learned that you needto do the cover letters, you
need to have the resume tailoredfor that job, because, let's
say, there's one job opening andyou have three positions, they
(38:03):
get a thousand resumes.
What is going to set yoursapart?
And that is a lot of the adviceI give to people.
I'm like, when you look atthese jobs, your resume needs to
marry up to that job, becausethe resume goes to an HR person
first.
An HR person may know nothingabout these jobs.
All they know is keywords.
Well, they're going to look atthe job description, they're
going to look at the key pointsthat the government wants to
(38:26):
hire for, and then they're goingto look at the resume and if
you don't marry up to that orwhatever their algorithm they
use, if they're going to datamine it, if it doesn't marry up,
you're not going to get to thenext step, which is the
certification list.
The certification list goes tothe hiring manager and the
hiring officials and then theypick who they want to interview.
(38:47):
So then they look at the actualresumes and go oh, this person
looks like they align with thejob we want more.
If you just make a genericresume and send it to everywhere
, shotgun it to everyone ninetimes out of 10, you're not
going to make it to that nextstep.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
Okay, so there's a parallel to that too.
I know we're jumping back andforth, but I think it's
important to talk because we'retalking about the world of
fiction and nonfiction reallyNonfiction in the sense of jobs
and then fiction in the sense ofwriting novels.
Same thing happens when peopleare trying to get agents is it's
very easy for people to writeone cover letter, one letter for
(39:23):
an agent, a submission letter,and then where do you think that
letter is going to go?
If it's generic, it's going togo to what they call the slush
pile.
It's just going to sit thereand an intern might look at it.
And if it doesn't seem like it'stailored to that particular
agent, if you don't havespecific things in that letter
that kind of indicate maybe, whothat agent's clients are or
what other books they've soldyou're man, you're behind the
(39:47):
curve and I mean, I don't knowthe number of how many query
letters I sent from 2015,.
16 up until 2020, but it wasn'ta small number, and that's the
thing is, it's a numbers game.
And probably same thing,obviously, too, for veterans
that are looking for jobs.
It's like, you see, that youcan see that one job you want,
(40:08):
that's good, pursue that job,but you probably want to broaden
your scope and apply to morethan one job, just like you want
to go to more than one agent,because the chance of that one
being interested in you andgoing to the next step is not
super high for the most part.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
But with agents a lot of it comes out of networking.
You still have to do networkingin the federal government,
right?
You need to get your name outthere yeah and a lot of times,
once you get past the interviewand stuff, they're going to call
around and see anybody theyknow that knows you.
Yep, you know they're going totry to vouch.
Speaker 2 (40:42):
You need to have people that are going to vouch
for you yeah, my buddy thatretired a couple years ago and
this was this was man many yearsback now, probably 15 years ago
I think, when he was firstjoining up with SF.
He called me one day and he'slike, hey, I need some
information.
So I'm giving this information.
I was like, what's this for?
He goes.
You might hear from the FBI.
And I'm like, what the hell doyou do?
(41:03):
He goes, no, nothing, he goes.
I got to get security clearancefor my job and I'm like, oh,
okay, I said so, don't throw youunder the bus.
He's like, dude, dude, don'ttell the Tijuana story to that
guy.
Okay, good, Check, got that one.
So no kidding.
Speaker 1 (41:25):
No, I'm jumping all over the place.
I'll probably wrap this uppretty soon Now.
Did you go to IngramSparks ordo the Barnes Noble route too,
or are you strictly on Amazonright now?
Speaker 2 (41:35):
No, I did IngramSparks.
I don't like IngramSparkparticularly, but this book it
went smooth.
I've had Ransom Daughter.
Last fall IngramSpark was anightmare.
Cover kept getting kicked offand it was totally with their
specs.
And I went back and forth withthe guy that Todd Wilkins was
helping me do the cover, wentback and forth with Todd like
(41:57):
man.
They keep kicking it out andthis is the reason they're
giving.
Well, the reason is it's not inthe specs, it's in the specs
and so I always crossed myfinger with IngramSpark.
The reason I didn't go withBarnes Noble is because if I set
up an account with Barnes Noble, it only got me Barnes Noble.
So I always do Amazon, andAmazon makes up probably 98, 99%
(42:17):
of my sales honestly for everybook.
But I like to have it availablefor people that hate Amazon or
don't like Amazon and there's alot and they have reason to not
like it.
It just happens to be a goodplace to sell books if you're
self-published and if you'retraditionally published.
So IngramSpark this time wasreally smooth for me and
IngramSpark gets you everythingelse besides Amazon.
In fact, actually this time Ihad it set up a little bit ahead
(42:41):
of time and that's how you canget it.
So for authors that are curious, they'll see an author author
out there with a pre-order foran e-book.
Well, that's the only thing youcan do on Amazon.
You can't have an Amazonpre-order for your paperback or
hardcover.
They keep saying they're goingto have that ready, but it's not
ready yet.
It's not available.
So how you get a pre-order isyou actually do your IngramSpark
(43:02):
setup, and there's othercompanies that do this as well.
That will then get you apre-order that pushes over to
Amazon.
That pre-order will also go toBarnes Noble, it'll go to Books
A Million.
So, yeah, so I actually hadpeople, I had screenshots, you
know, a month and a half beforethe book came out and people
said, hey, I pre-ordered yourbook and I'm like, pre-ordered
the paperback.
(43:22):
How did you do that?
Oh, that's right, ingramsparkand I can see my numbers there.
So, yeah, it's exciting, but Iknow the majority of my people
are going to be going throughAmazon.
But I don't want to limit it andyou know, eventually we talked
(43:45):
about, you know, aspirations orpublishing and all that.
I'm comfortable with the indieworld right now.
Would I go traditional?
I have a book in my back burnerthat I started a couple of
years ago that I'll go back toin probably a few more years.
It's a high level concept thatprobably would be interested by
the publishing world.
(44:05):
If I can ever get that onewhere I want it to and get
comfortable, I might play thatgame of going down the
traditional publishing.
The problem with that and forpeople listening is I got a book
that I believe in.
That's really good.
I go to get an agent thatprobably is going to take months
it could take longer but say ittakes months.
The agent has a publisher thatlikes it.
(44:25):
They send it out, they go outon sub, they call it, they go to
10 different publishers ormaybe eight publishers, whatever
, and one of those publishersreally likes it.
From the time I submitted thatbook to the agent before, that
book is in Jason Piccolo's handsbecause I want to sell Jason
this book.
You're probably looking at twoto three years realistically and
to me that's what's kept me inthe indie world.
(44:47):
Now it's like man, I'm not donewriting Supreme Justice.
I can probably still have itout by summer without any
problems as long as I stay to mytask.
If Supreme Justice I was tryingto get traditionally published,
that thing wouldn't come outuntil 2027 probably or 2026.
And so that's part of the reasonpeople are afraid to commit.
(45:07):
You know, commit to sometimestraditional publishing, and
there's also reasons they'reafraid to commit.
Speaker 1 (45:12):
It's like not everybody wants to be a
millionaire, and to be amillionaire in the, the, the
literary world, is good luck.
But a lot of people have a book.
So many people, I know like,yeah, I'm writing a book.
Well, how long have you beenwriting it?
Oh, 10 People.
I know like, yeah, I'm writinga book.
Well, how long have you beenwriting it?
Oh, 10 years.
Write it finish it and publishit.
Yes, have it edited, have itlooked at, have people write it.
(45:36):
But indie publishing man it'snot.
You know, in order to upload itinto Amazon and everything,
you're paying minimal amount ofmoney for anything.
Yeah, so just if you want thebook out there, it's not like
you don't have to think the oldschool parameters that you have
to have a publisher, correct.
Speaker 2 (45:53):
Well, a couple of quick things.
If you think you're going towrite a book and be a
millionaire, don't.
You might, you might.
But the stats, and the statsare out there if people want to
go look them up.
The amount of authors that makenot a million, the amount of
authors that make $100,000 ormore a year, I believe, is 1.8%
(46:14):
in the United States.
So less than 2% of people and$100,000, while maybe 20 years
ago you'd be like, oh, I'm doingpretty good.
$100,000 in a lot ofmetropolitan areas right now is
you're probably close to thepoverty line.
I mean, you're lower in class.
You know your mortgage is$3,500 a month.
Well, $100,000, you can'treally afford a $35,000 mortgage
(46:37):
payment, you know.
So get that out of your head.
If you want to be a millionaire, can you be a millionaire?
Yes, the good news is you can.
A lot of factors are going tohappen and none of them are luck
.
Don't believe people when theysay luck Nope, but you're going
to have to work really hard.
However, just what you said ifyour goal is to put a book out
there, there's a lot of ways todo it.
(46:59):
Do it the best you can, if youcan afford it.
Get a good cover designer, geta good editor Cover design.
I love your cover man.
Yeah, thank you A cover.
My guy's in Serbia, my guy's inSerbia.
So I love it, man, and I likeyours.
I love I love the simplistic ofit.
I love the patriotism up top, soI wish the light would agree
(47:21):
with me better.
Let's get it better.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
You know what?
I probably should have made thecover not so glossy, but I was
like I do matt, so I learned mylesson.
Speaker 2 (47:28):
I do matt covers all the time, partially for all my
goofing up social media filmingstuff, um, but where I want to
go with that real quick, is ifyou want to do a book, do a book
because I have a corporate job.
I plan on still doing acorporate job for a while,
unless they can me for somereason, whatever.
But I try to work hard and Igot a great boss.
But but if something were tohappen to me, I have books that
(47:50):
I can leave my kids.
Even if I sell 10 copies of mybook, five copies or one copy, I
have something I can leavebehind.
So if you have like just whatJason said, you have the desire
to write a story, man, write astory.
Reach out to one of us in theauthor world.
We'll give you tips on where togo, maybe who the cover design
should be, or who to use forediting, because there's so many
.
And go to someone that someoneelse uses, like we talked about
(48:14):
earlier.
Be very wary of someone thatthat slides into your dms and
says, hey, I can do your coverfor 99 dollars, or marketing
well, how are you going tomarket and is your marketing
going to equate to sales?
Speaker 1 (48:28):
yes, you're going to everybody in the world look at
your book.
But sales is where the realmarketing is.
Speaker 2 (48:34):
Well, to add to that is everyone judges a book by its
cover.
Yes, so if your cover isabsolute crap, you could have
something that would makeHemingway cry inside that spine
and there's a good chance noone's ever going to read it
because your cover turned peopleoff.
The inverse is you could writeabsolute crap and have a good
cover designer and you mightsell a bunch of books, but it'll
(48:56):
be the last books you sell,yeah, but you got to find a way
to do them both.
But find good people.
Reach out to the writingcommunity, and we both know
people and we know so manyamazing people in this community
.
Reach out to the writingcommunity and people will
embrace you and they will helpyou.
Don't ask too much, but bereasonable and people will be
reasonable back with you andthen you know you might be able
(49:19):
to hold your book in your hand.
You might be able to, you know,go out and hold Jason's book in
your hand too.
Speaker 1 (49:26):
Well, brother, I appreciate their time tonight.
Man and everyone, check out.
Babylon Will Rise from theauthor of the Body man, Eric P
Bishop.
Speaker 2 (49:36):
And don't forget Pivot from the man that brought
you the Protectors, dr JasonPickle.
Don't forget the doctor part.
I did want to say this on mysister and on a funnier note so
and I've joked with you aboutdoctor in the past.
So my sister's got a master'sdegree and my mom made a comment
recently of I think she's goingto go for her doctors at some
(49:57):
point because she wants peopleto call her doctor.
Like I don't know if I can doit.
Even if she gets it, I don'tknow.
I can call Dr Jason Piccolo DrPiccolo, but my sister I changed
her diapers when she was youknow, she's much younger than me
, so I was a baby when I waslike 12.
It's like I don't know if I cancall her doctor, but kidding,
(50:18):
jason, thank you, thank you forthe book, thank you for what you
do for veterans.
You putting that positivity outand wanting to help people that
, like yourself, served ourcountry, is a higher calling and
it's a calling that should beapplauded.
So thank you.
Thank you, brother, you'rewelcome.
(50:38):
Take care everyone.
The Protectors and A Tale of TwoScribes.
We're out.
Welcome to another episode of Guess what, not just
A Tale of Two Scribes.
We have the protectors here.
We have a dual episode going on.
I told everybody I was done forthe year, but jason decided to
come out with this book righthere which we need to talk about
.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
So we're gonna start by saying hey, welcome to the
protectors podcast.
This is a joint episode withtale of two scribes with eric
bishop.
What's going on, brother?
Speaker 2 (00:43):
I like it, I'm good.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
I'm good.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
I just I got my Edinburgh sweatshirt.
I was walking down this whoknows what the name of the road
was, this cobblestone road withmy mom and my cousin and I was
in a sweatshirt and I got really, really cold and I don't get
cold.
So I ducked into a generictourist shop and I looked around
and said, hey, $35 sweatshirt,I don't want to be cold.
(01:07):
So I threw that thing on and itkept me warm.
I tell you that trip lookedamazing, man.
Well, you got to go to Europe.
There a couple months before meyou got to go to Germany and
then, yes, I got to go thecoolest thing, I think, really
about it.
Besides, just what I was ableto see was my mom had never left
(01:27):
the country I take that back.
She had been to Canada and shehad been to the Bahamas, but she
had never gone overseas toEurope.
So, 71 years old and it was athank you trip I paid for it for
mom to go.
I was like mom, you've done alot for me, I want to take you
(01:49):
and do something cool with you.
And, um, yeah, just had ablessing with her and we had a
blast.
I, I had her out at the templebar one night in dublin.
I couldn't get her to throw oneback, so I made sure I did, but
uh, you know, took her on a fewexperiences.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
so that is the greatest thing you could do, I
think, is a son is like travelexperiences, you know yeah,
absolutely, um, yeah, just youknow we've had obviously a lot
of offline conversations.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
We both had some interesting things occur in our
life in the last couple yearsand the things in life, the
things that we accumulate, allthe stuff doesn't really matter
in the end.
You don't take it with you.
No what matters.
Relationships matter, you know,people matter.
So to have the time with peoplethat you love, um, it's good to
have a reminder every now andthen, especially because I've
(02:32):
had a few friends in the lasttwo, three years that have lost
their parents, one or both, um,and so I'm blessed I haven't had
to experience that at thispoint, but I I want to try to
enjoy those moments I can havewith something like this, with
my mom for sure.
Speaker 1 (02:47):
so and you know you talk about losing people, like
now that I'm in my 50s, like I'mmore and more people I've been
to high school with and theirfamilies, nobody else.
And I'm like man, I want toexperience everything I possibly
can.
Yeah, I've been to uh, what?
I've been to the united states,los estados unidos, like the
bahamas, like when I was a kid,right, but iraq, kuwait and
(03:10):
germany.
So it's like I don't have thisbig like, but now I'm like all I
want to do is I want to see theworld, I want to experience the
world well, we'll get a fewtrips under our belts together
in the next couple you got tosee shine down.
You got to go to england,england or Europe or somewhere
to see those guys.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
Yeah, there'll be there they're.
They're kicking off a tour thisyear, I'm sorry, this year,
2025.
We're not there yet.
Nothing's announced of when,where I know they're going to
tour.
I know, I do know that.
I think.
So, yeah, I think, if they makeit over to uh europe, I think
we'll have to be uh, we'll haveto do some fanboying and go over
(03:48):
there and catch a few showstogether.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
It's crazy.
I'm always on like ticketmaster now looking for shows in
europe and I'm looking like I'mtrying to like scour the
internet for like cheap flightsfor anything.
I'm like I just want live musicnow.
Man, that's like my thingcoming out of dc, you should be
able to.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
The other place that's really good for Europe is
JFK.
Getting flights out of JFK islike four or 500 bucks.
You can find a lot of differentplaces in Europe.
Unfortunately, I'm not close toJFK so I have to get up there.
I did make a purchase the otherday.
Fortunately my son does notwant Well, my son knows I was
going to say fortunately hedoesn't know.
I did get him a concert ticketshe doesn't know yet about those
(04:24):
are Christmas tickets.
But the big one I got the otherday was we got tickets to go
see ACDC.
Oh, they're awesome.
Man, never seen them.
So we were going to see them inNashville.
I was looking at like Vegas andChicago and Nashville ended up
being the spot Of course.
He was like are we going to beup next to the stage?
(04:45):
I was like dude, you didn'tknow the prices ahead of time so
you had to log in.
I was in the queue for like 30minutes, waiting, waiting, and
finally my turn came up andfirst thing I did was click down
like floor near the stage$7.50,.
Speaker 1 (04:58):
I think was the cheapest one.
Holy crap yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:00):
Per ticket.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
And I said per ticket .
And I said I love my son but Idon't sell that many books.
It's a lot of books.
That's what we're going to talkabout today is indie author.
But you know, when you talkabout shows man, I um, I saw
acdc in 98 or 99 in san diego.
What a great show man.
For those about to rock, oh manand and the cannons, oh God,
you're going to have a greattime.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
Looking forward to it .
I've done some and I like tokind of do these bigger ones
with him, like we've we've seenBon Jovi, we saw you two at the
sphere, uh Eagles, oh man, uhGarth Brooks, just yeah, those
fun.
A bunch of Shinedown shows andthose ones are special because
we're not stuck in one seat,which that's kind of the fun
(05:47):
part of having that access.
You can just go side stage.
Speaker 1 (05:50):
This is the tickets I have so far for the next year.
I have Disturb the Sickness25th Anniversary Tour and
Capital One Arena in DC.
I have Killswitch Engage andthen I have Metallica M7272
world tour.
Where are you seeing them?
(06:10):
I'm seeing them at the bank ofamerica stadium.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
You know where that's at.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
I didn't know those tickets were available.
Yes, my friend, I got those along time ago, though, as soon
as they came out, boom I wonderif they're still when we get off
tonight.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
I gotta look, because they're on my bucket list.
I haven't seen them yeah, I sawthem.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
Gosh, that was like one of my first main.
I mean I used to see speedmetal concerts in the 80s, yeah,
but that was my first big one.
I saw Injustice for All.
Wow, I saw Injustice for Alltwice.
I saw Black Elm twice and thenI saw this M72 tour before I
think I I saw them with mybrother.
I've seen them probably about70 times, oh, okay.
You've seen them a whole bunch.
Yeah, they're incredible,brother.
(06:45):
Yeah, I haven't been anywherebut Iraq, kuwait and Germany.
But I have seen some good shows.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
You have seen some good shows, yeah, Well, again,
the great thing about your takein life and the way you're
looking at things happening inlife right now is that you know
what.
It's never too late to startgoing out and exploring.
You've got Global Entry.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
Global Entry is where it's at, brother.
Speaker 2 (07:08):
That's the thing for international traffic.
So it was funny.
I used mine for the first timea week ago, sunday, and I got up
to the in Charlotte.
I got up to the kiosk and Ithought you'd have to show your
ID.
So I'm like fumbling around mywall to grab my ID and the
worker was not the nicest person.
I'm like fumbling around mywallet, grab my ID and the
worker was not the nicest person.
Hey, what are you doing?
I'm like I'm getting my globalentry ID.
He goes go up to the littlemonitor and put your face.
(07:29):
That's all you need.
I'm like, oh okay, I had noidea.
So I did that.
I walked over.
I almost walked by the guy withthe passports.
He was like, hey, I was likedone.
40 seconds from when I walkedinto the room, my mom didn't
have global entry and she toldme use your global entry.
She went with the commoners andI think it took her 25 minutes
(07:53):
to get through customs andeverything.
Much different experience.
I waited for her.
She said leave, because she wasactually flying out to
Connecticut.
I was just going.
I said, no, I'm going to getyour bag and wait here, I'm not
going to leave you.
So which?
Then.
It was a cool thing thathappened as I was waiting there
in the international terminal orbaggage return and someone
calls my name, comes up to me,shakes my hand, says I love your
(08:15):
books no clue who this personwas, no idea.
Introduced himself, he said Isaw you in London get ready to
board the plane and I wasn'table to go over and say hi and
I'm like that was the first timeoutside of like local family
friends where I live, thatsomeone actually called me out
where I don't live I live anhour from Charlotte.
So that was kind of like, okay,I feel a little more legit now.
(08:38):
You know, watch out Jack car,you know.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
Well, you know, talk about indie authoring man.
It's like if anybody I knowknows how to market a book, it's
you.
And now we have Babylon WillRise and I've noticed that the
reviews are coming up.
You're starting to get.
I love how you do the pictures,with everybody taking pictures
of it.
Yeah, so you are probably oneof the best indie marketers I
know.
Oh, and you're a great authoras well, so I'm excited I got
(09:04):
the babylon will rise as soon asit came out.
The omega group series, man youdid.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
I appreciate that.
Yeah, thanks I.
You know I didn't.
I didn't want to have to be amarketer, I didn't want to have
to go down this path, but Iwanted books to come out.
And I mean, even if you get an,a, you know, you know, you get
an agent, you get a publisherGuess what they're not doing all
the work for you?
You have to promote your booksand there are exceptions.
(09:30):
There's people that don't domuch promotion, sell a lot of
books, but that's really theexception of the rule, like the
people that are out there makingthe bestseller list and stuff.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
They're hustling.
They're hustling.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
They're hustling really hard, um, and they might
get some times when they don'thave to cause.
You know you, you get about sixweeks, two months after a book
is out.
You know the sales typicallypretty much not plunge or bottom
out, but they go downsignificantly.
So you can kind of lay low andwork on your next book or get
everything else ready.
You know you don't have to doit 24 seven.
I'm in the position where,since I don't have that big
(10:05):
publishing help um, for aslittle as it might be sometimes,
it has to be fairly constant.
You know, I just have to andI've also had enough stuff
coming out last couple of yearsthat there's always something to
kind of bring to people'sattention.
So the hustle is real.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
What are you doing, like about a thousand words a
night, or four or 500 words anight, or how do you?
How do you set yourself up?
Speaker 2 (10:27):
The truth would be I have no set rules.
I wrote a bunch on the trip.
I've written since I've beenback from the trip.
I've not.
I've done some editing onsomething.
I wrote the last couple ofnights but I've not really
written anything since Babylonof Rise came out.
I haven't written on the nextbook, supreme Justice, in a few
(10:48):
nights.
I'm in writing mode now.
So when we get done tonight,I'll do writing tonight and I'll
do writing for the next couplemonths pretty consistently.
But almost years ago, when thekids were little and I was
married, everyone went to bedand I would just.
That would be my time, my wifeat the time went to bed early,
got up early I was a night hawk,slept in a little more.
(11:10):
So my writing window where Ihad no distractions was like 10
o'clock till 12.
And that's when I did it.
I still gravitate towards thattime now, but it's sporadic,
like there's times I'm writingand then there's a month where I
might write hardly anything,just because I'm trying to
format the next book.
I'm trying to work on this withthat.
(11:31):
So, yeah, there's no and there'sno secret formula.
I mean, there are people outthere that swear you've got to
write every day.
It's BS.
It might work for them andmaybe for them they have to.
I can start a chapter, put itdown a week later, go right back
to where I left off and startwriting again.
It's just and I'm not sayingit's the best thing in the world
but my brain is able to just gookay, you're back.
(11:53):
Keep that thought going,although I try to stop at a spot
that I don't have to rememberwhere I got to jump off to the
next time.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
So where are we at, with Babylon Will Rise.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Well, it's out in the world.
It is available on Amazon ebookpaperback, hardcover.
It's actually, out of all thebooks I've been putting out and
put out the last couple of years, this one people the advanced
readers are saying that theylike this the most.
And part of the reason I wantedto talk with you tonight we're
talking about Pivot and talkingabout what you're doing for
(12:29):
veterans is Babylon Will Rise ismy first full-length novel that
really focuses on militarypersonnel.
I never served.
I don't pretend to—no impostersyndrome going on here that I'm
pretending I've done something Ihaven't.
It's all creative stuff goingon in my head.
(12:49):
But I've had friends that haveserved, so I've kind of gleaned
from them what it's like.
I've been around them in carsfor hours at a time and just the
endless ball busting thathappens.
So I've kind of integrated allthat and when I want to tell
stories of, I think I at leasthave a good idea of what happens
when soldiers are getting readyfor a mission or they're out on
(13:12):
a mission.
So I've really enjoyed.
I love telling these charactersstories.
And for this story, you knowthe Omega group's a six person
group there.
There's a person in charge ofit as well, a seventh member
who's not involved in theday-to-day action, but in this
one I brought in a femalecharacter.
So the boys meet up withCharlie and when they first hear
(13:35):
who Charlie is, they think it'sa dude Little.
Do they realize it's Charlene?
She goes by, charlie, and thefeedback I've got from her has
been incredible.
Incredible enough that Iprobably want to do something
with her in a couple years.
Give her and her group offemale office soldiers their,
give them their due.
So I'm excited about it.
Speaker 1 (13:58):
Now, when you put this all together, like one
thing I do want to talk abouttonight is indie authoring.
And yeah, because I indieauthored mine, I was going to go
the traditional route and tryto pitch it blah blah, but my
goal with the pivot book was I'mlike look, this is my
information from 30 years ofbeing in the government on how
to get hired, how a veteran anda service member can get hired.
(14:19):
I could go the traditionalroute and wait a year, but I
don't want to do that.
I want to get this informationout now because to me, that's
like 200,000 people leave theservice every year.
That's potentially 200,000people that are missing out on
the information.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Right, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (14:35):
I'm not talking about the marketing-wise.
I didn't write the book to makea ton of money.
I made a book to break even andto get the information out
there, because to me indieauthoring is this I wrote, I put
the information down, I put ittogether and then as soon as my
manuscript's ready, or as soonas all that everything's ready,
I send it away to some guy, metsome group, I met on fiverr to
(14:58):
do the inside editing and then Ifound someone to do the cover
and then I had to go and uploadit to KDP, amazon, kdp, then
Barnes Noble.
I had to hire someone to do thecover for that specific thing.
But what I like to tell peopleis like, if you have a book,
write it.
You don't always have to gotraditional and you're fairly
(15:21):
successful for going this route.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
Yeah, again, and I've said this on even recent
podcasts.
The thing is, is what do youwant out of it?
So if you want to be a New YorkTimes bestseller, it's never
going to happen.
Going indie Just not going tohappen.
New York Times doesn'tacknowledge that you exist,
basically, unless it becomeslike a Fifty Shades of Grey.
(15:44):
You know, something happens tothat, and then a bigger
publisher picks up something,because that started basically
as kind of like a self-publishedkind of thing, and that's an
anomaly, like a complete anomaly.
But generally speaking, if youwant New York Times bestseller
list, you're going to have to gotraditional publishing.
I've said this one in otherpodcasts before.
Guess what?
New York Times bestseller isnot necessarily the most bought
(16:06):
book for that week.
It might be, but it also mightbe some politics thrown in there
.
There might be a lot ofpolitics.
Yeah, there's a lot of crapthat goes on.
Enough that I've learned aboutit in the last five, six years,
as I've taken this reallyserious.
That sure would I like to beEric Bishop New York Times
bestseller.
Yeah, I'm not stupid.
Of course that sounds great.
I'll mark because I can marketit.
If I never get that, though,will I feel like I'm less of an
(16:29):
author.
No, not at all.
Again, when I get thoseresponses from readers, that's
who I care about.
When people read my book and Iget a legit review back, or
someone sends me a message andsays man that touched me or man
that made me excited, orwhatever, that's my juice.
That's my juice.
(16:52):
It's not does.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
Kirkus.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
Reviews, or does this other company that I pay money
to say nice things about my book?
I don't care about that, that'snot my thing, and if that means
I'm not going to be embraced bythe publishing world, then so
be it.
I think I will at some point,and it will be because of what I
write and maybe it's becauseI'll build myself
self-publishing wise and it'ssomething that they take notice.
But ultimately, if they takenotice, it's because they think
(17:14):
they can make money off of meand that's not a negative.
It's a business.
Publishing industry is abusiness and it's not a
charitable business.
It's a for-profit business.
Oh, absolutely.
So they're bringing on peoplethey think they can make money
on.
You might make money too not asmuch as you think or more than
you think, you never know.
But you've got to look at itand that's the lens that changed
(17:37):
with me in the last three orfour years, especially of
realizing, okay, this isactually a business.
So I want to tell stories.
But once I start going down theindie route, I have to look at
it from a business, like what Idid marketing for the body man,
even though it was a smallpublisher.
I did a lot of marketing myselfas well.
I don't do the same things nowbecause I look at it like okay,
(17:58):
what's my bang for my buck?
Am I pissing money away on thislittle thing?
That's not going to get mesales, and that's just
experience.
You just learn how to do itbasically, and sometimes you
fail.
Sometimes you know you do an adand the ad falls flat, and
again you kind of just have toroll with it and ultimately you
have to tell a good story, butthen you got to figure out how
(18:19):
to market it.
You know you're in that mixright now and I know yours is
nonfiction, so it does sometimes, you know, not always crossover
identical, but it's the sameconcept.
You don't put a book outbecause you want to sell two
(18:40):
copies.
You want to put a book outbecause you want it to get the
masses and for you, what Iadmire about what you're doing,
and what you even just said, isyou're trying to help people
that have served our country.
That you know what's the number22 soldiers a day on average
commit suicide.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
I think that's a low figure too.
Speaker 2 (18:51):
It probably is a low figure.
And how many of those soldiersthat get to that end and get to
that point, it's because theyhaven't found a purpose, a
mission.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
Yeah, they need a mission.
One thing I wrote in this bookwas this I'm like look and this
covers really the whole gambitso if you're a service member,
the first chapter is going to beabout hey, you're 24 months out
, how do you want to setyourself up, whether or not
you've been in for two years,four years, eight years, a
career, whether or not you'reenlisted or an officer?
But the big thing was, you know, I have a whole chapter on like
(19:24):
the bridge job, your first jobout of the service, or your
first job.
Let's say, you get out and yougo to college and your first
real job doesn't have to be yourcareer, it doesn't have to be
your dream job.
I call it the bridge job.
So what you do is you'resetting yourself up to build
your experience and then move onto the next thing, because a
lot of people don't realize youdon't have to.
(19:46):
You know, I grew up, I was inlaw enforcement for 23 years.
You know federal lawenforcement and it was always a
career to me.
I knew I had to stay in thegovernment in order to finish
out so I could retire, and I didRight.
But you, nowadays, you don'thave to, and that's one thing
about this book too.
It's not set towards you goinginto the corporate world of
(20:06):
entrepreneurship or anything.
It's really set towards peoplewho want to continue serving in
one way or the other, whetherthat's in a federal government
or the civilian, private world.
But it's more along those linesof how do I get that job?
I have whole chapters on thefederal hiring process, how do
you use USA jobs?
How do you use your veteranspreference?
And even if you were in amilitary, you get like a ton out
(20:27):
of about.
Let's say there's 18 chapters.
If you were not in the military, you can get a lot out of about
12 of those chapters.
It's all about interview prep.
It's about resume building,it's about what to even wear to
an interview, because you knowthey tell you in the government
when you're getting out of theservice.
Sometimes you're like, oh, youhave to buy a really nice suit.
(20:48):
I'm like, no, you don't, youneed to go to TJ Maxx, you need
to go somewhere If you need toget a secondhand.
You don't need the dress toimpress as far as a lot of money
Because, remember, you're goinginto a job but you don't want
to go into debt to get that job.
No, and you know, when you getout of the service, a lot of
people don't have a ton of moneyand, as a matter of fact, a lot
(21:11):
of people leaving this and Ihave a whole chapter on debt.
Yeah, a lot of people areleaving the service with some
amount of debt, whether it's carpayments or whatever.
So it's a very realistic look,and I think that's what sets
this book apart from anythingelse is because when I did the
market research, when I waswriting this thing, I was like,
okay, what kind of job books areout there, what kind of how-to
(21:32):
books are out there?
And they're more geared towardsthe hiring manager, not the
individual looking for a job,not the individual looking for a
job.
So I said, hey, you know what,if I was a service person,
service member getting out, oreven a veteran, what do I need
to succeed?
Yeah, and so that's why I wroteit.
(21:53):
Man, I think it's 437 pages ofjust guts Facts.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
Have you thought about maybe especially down the
line a little bit further, maybedoing some kind of an online or
videos that kind of breaks downsome of the stuff for everybody
, or as companions to the book,or something.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Yeah, one of my friends was like you know, do
you have TikTok?
And I'm like yeah, and they'relike you know what?
So now I'll start doing like,probably next week I'll start
doing like little TikTok blurbsabout getting hired.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Oh, I thought you were gonna say tiktok dances.
I was gonna say jason, come on,bro, 51 years old now.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
The other thing is I'm going to be giving um
speeches to military programs,because that's that's really
where this came from.
I was a.
I've mentored veterans foryears, for over a decade so
that's kind of where I'm like Ineed to put something down, so
when I'm talking about thesethings, I can just be like here,
it's all right here, it's righthere, yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:39):
Yeah, the giving back , I think, is.
So again, I think that circlesback to some of the stuff we
talked about is, people are.
A lot of times it's so easy inlife, especially we live in an
extremely materialistic world.
I mean, a couple hundred yearsago you live to survive.
Now, I think a lot of times ofcourse we were just talking
about traveling and going tosurvive.
(23:00):
Now, I think a lot of times ofcourse we were just talking
about it traveling, going toconcerts.
Now we live for comfort.
Hey, man, when can I, can Ihave a filet for dinner?
Hey, can I go, you know, towhatever a nice fancy, you know,
people Experiences.
Yeah, experiences andexperiences are super important,
but if that's all your life isabout and if you're not helping,
if you're not giving back withyou wanting to help with
(23:20):
veterans, with other people likemyself, I try to um, I try to
help as much as I can.
When it comes to authors,especially indie authors.
It's like I don't have anysecrets that I won't give out.
There's nothing that I'm goingto hold back and say I want to
sell books.
I don't want to tell this to, Idon't want to, you know, share
this, because that might causesomeone else to sell books that
(23:40):
I could have sold or know mysecrets.
Everything I learned I meanlike David Darling was one of
those authors that I will praiseto the high heavens, because
David would just be like hey,you got a question, just message
me or whatever we get on.
You know Facebook Messenger orthe video version of Facebook
and he would just be like okay,and he'd actually show me the
screen sometimes.
Okay, go in there and clickthat and all that Stuff.
(24:03):
That's like it meant so much tome that someone's willing to
spend hours to learn somethingand then, in two minutes, show
me what they learned, and it'slike I have the responsibility
to do the same exact thing whatsomeone did.
For me it's like show peoplehow it works and, like you were
talking about with you, knowjust what you can teach veterans
(24:27):
and what you can teach in theprocess.
I think there's an exactparallel to people that are
trying to get into thepublishing world.
Don't get in debt If you canput a book out and go as basic
as possible.
That should be your goal,because we both know and we've
been doing books in the industrylong enough to know that
there's a lot of people outthere that will promise you the
(24:49):
moon.
Hey, for $2,000 or for $3,000or for $4,000, I can get you
this, this, this and this, andmaybe they can.
Maybe they can get you this,this, this and this, and maybe
they can.
Maybe they can get that.
But if you're having to putthat on a credit card because
you want to achieve your dream,maybe you should work a side job
for a couple months and save upand put that in.
(25:11):
You know it's a gamble.
There's definitely a gamble inthere, and also the other thing,
too, that I always tell peopleis try to get someone.
You know, if it's a bookmarketer out there that's trying
to offer their services.
Try to figure out whether it'sposting stuff on social media or
whatever.
Try to find out if someone hasused them and get a firsthand
account of are they reliable?
Do they take your money and notdo what they promised?
(25:32):
Because I've heard so manystories of that over the years,
where I'm gun shy.
Now when I get messages frompeople and says, hey, man, for
150 bucks I can do such and suchfor you, I seriously are like
okay, do I got 150?
Sure, I got 150.
Do I want to get to this person?
Can I do it myself?
Or can I find a way to do it?
Or is there an actual value inthat?
Speaker 1 (25:54):
So you got to be really careful, so you got to be
really careful.
The book promotion deals Likeas soon as I put that on
LinkedIn the other day, I'minundated with people saying,
hey, have you ever thought aboutdoing this?
And then they want to chargeyou.
Yeah.
So that's one thing I wouldcaution If you're going to indie
author this, any book is itjust watch your money?
Yeah, absolutely Watch yourmoney Like whatever you put into
(26:16):
it, like when I Watch yourmoney Like whatever you put into
it.
So with my other book, withUnwavering, I initially had a
publisher for that one, a smallpublishing house and then there
they are.
I eventually got their rights.
That's me, brother.
My mom calls it my beefcakephoto.
But as soon as I got the rightsback to my book, I went through
(26:38):
it because it was horriblyedited before and I really
wanted to get it out there.
But at the time I was throwingmoney at this thing and I'm like
I'm never going to get themoney back, right, I mean.
And nowadays I wish I could goback and rewrite the whole thing
because it's really it's mystory, but it's not my story,
it's just a disjointed book andI'm not my story, it's just a
(27:02):
disjointed book and I I'm notproud of it as much as I am.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
I'm very proud of this book pivot because to me
it's like my unwavering is moreself-glamorization of like this
is me and this is what I've done, but this is more like this is
you and this is what you can doright so I think, you're seeing
as a way of giving back andhelping others and that, yeah,
that changes your philosophy onstuff, when you're putting
(27:24):
something out there to helpsomeone versus necessarily to
help yourself or to inflate yourego or whatever people do stuff
and that comes down to themarketing aspect of it too, is
like marketing that book iscompletely different than this
one.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
yeah, this one.
What I'm doing is I've beenreaching out to a lot of
colleges.
What I'll do is actually gobeen reaching out to a lot of
colleges.
What I'll do is actually gogive a speech and talk about it
and give them free copiesbecause I want to help out the
veteran community.
Now, what I would love to see,in order to make the profit off
of it at all, is just acorporation that volunteers with
veterans to buy a handful ofcopies.
Buy some copies in order for meto break even with it.
(27:59):
But overall, I'm very proudbecause I'm like I have
something that could beworthwhile and I was a hiring
manager for years with the Fed.
I was a veteran, so I kind ofknow where things are going.
Speaker 2 (28:12):
But yeah, man, so speak to this because I'm
ignorant to the process.
So you have someone thatenlists at 18 and I'm just
thinking off the top of my headon this.
Someone enlists at 18 years old, very wet behind the ears.
They kind of learn life'slessons, you know, with a four
year.
You know time in the with uncleSam and in one one branch or
(28:34):
another, four years is up, theydon't reenlist for anymore,
they're.
Four years is up, they don'treenlist for anymore.
They're you know they're intheir wind down period.
However that works.
I know retirement's, probablymuch.
I know how it works forretirement from some friends
that have gotten out recently.
But you're done after fouryears.
Okay, tell me what happens,what, what is the?
What does the military do toJoe?
Joe blow here that just got outafter four years?
Speaker 1 (28:55):
Well, you're supposed to have the transition
assistance programs.
You get like a little littletraining, a little resume prep
and stuff, but reallyessentially you're given a
little bit like really just a, alittle snapshot of what you
need to get out, and then you'reout, you're in a world.
You're boom.
There's no more paycheck everymonth.
There's, there's really nothing.
(29:16):
I mean, yeah, you can collectunemployment for six months or
so, but you're really out in theworld.
I mean it's like, hey, you knowwhat uncle sam said, thank you
for your service.
Boom, I mean, yeah, youprobably have some college fun
if you want to go to college,but not everybody's, you know,
gonna go to college, right, andif you do go to college, you're
still gonna need a job.
Yeah, so I mean and like I wassaying before, a lot of are
(29:37):
saddled with debt.
So you got to think about thosekind of circumstances too.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
Yeah, one of my buddies was based up in Campbell
and I went up several times tohis house and you know I was
asking questions, I was tryingto figure out how things work.
And so we came out of the baseone time and he just said and I
can't remember now the name ofthe main boulevard there outside
Campbell, but let me just takeyou down and you can see what's
here and you're going by stripclubs, car dealerships, all the
(30:03):
stuff.
It's like Payday loans, yes,payday loans, and this is what
the privates, the privates arethere and they have people that
are willing to take that meagerpaycheck they have and start
using it for something.
Bigger paycheck they have andstart, you know, start using it
for something.
And of course you get adeployment.
(30:24):
Or you know a lot of people herein the last 20 years were in
active duty for war and maybethey re-enlisted so they
might've got a 10, 20, $40,000.
You know how many people go outand buy cars with those bonuses
.
They're not buying land,they're not buying 40 acres in
Montana.
You know for somewhere to go.
When they get done, they'retypically.
You know for somewhere to go.
When they get done, they'retypically, you know, maybe
they're married and they have,you know, trying to buy a house
for their family or whatever.
(30:44):
Yeah, it's wild what happens.
Speaker 1 (30:50):
It's nuts man.
So let's get back to your book,brother.
I mean, now you're into themilitary, the thriller genre,
and you know you mentionedbefore.
But some authors are like, hey,you know what, I'm not going to
help you out, but I've noticedour crew of people around us
around us even the New YorkTimes bestselling authors that
we know will always help out.
Because, I look at it this way,your book's 300-something pages
(31:13):
Normal people.
When they get into these books,they knock them out pretty
quick and then they're on to thenext.
When they get into these books,they knock them out pretty
quick and then they're on to thenext.
It's almost like you're in aYouTube generation, a social
media generation, where you need, need, need, right.
So when it comes to competitionunless you're rolling into the
(31:36):
New York Times bestsellingauthorship like you're a Mark
Rainey or something like thatthey are very helpful because
their books are selling, butthen they have six months until
their next book comes out.
So someone will knock theirbook out in a week and then they
need more.
Yeah, so I think it'simperative that authors help
each other out, because it'sjust cross-promotion.
That's the way I look at it.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
Absolutely.
Well, you're not really people,and I thought it originally
there'd be a real bigcompetition.
Most of the people that readdon't just read one book a year.
Readers are typically prettyferocious when it comes to like
(32:16):
a fan of my books.
He texted me Was it last nightor Saturday night, I can't
remember now Last two nights hetexted me, Started the book that
day and finished it Notsomething he normally does, but
again, because it's 330 pages orwhatever that one is, it's a
short amount, it's a fast.
My chapters are pretty short andit was intentionally done that
(32:37):
way.
I don't want people to stopreading.
I want to go to the nextchapter and be like Charlie did
what, oh man?
What did the jackal say thistime?
Something, probably stupid.
So, yeah, so that, though, ofhaving the fact of having a
quick read.
So they're done with my book.
Well, I don't want someone tojust buy.
Babylon will rise and go.
I'm done.
(33:00):
I'm good for a while.
They're going to go readwhatever.
So, whether it's Mark Graney orJack Carr or Anderson Wilson or
Don Bentley, any of these, anyof these guys and most of those
are all veteran, really veteranauthors Um, they know there's no
competition there and they knowthere's no competition coming
from me because I don't have thebig you know big five behind me
that's helping to publish orpush.
It's me doing it and hiringpeople and stuff.
(33:22):
So, yeah, but always been super, super supportive.
Kyle Mills put something reallynice out the other day.
Brad Meltzer, who's not onTwitter really anymore, he went
on Blue Sky and Instagram andyou know he has kind words to
say.
So, yeah, the community'salways been super supportive and
it's humbling.
(33:42):
It's humbling to know that someof your favorite authors are
out there saying kind thingsabout the fact that you're
putting a book out as well.
And yeah, it's not a competitionto them.
They have their books come outand their readers are much
bigger readership than I havethat are going to pick up their
books and hey, yeah, maybe someof their readers will be like I
got time.
(34:02):
What's Babylon Arise?
Look like, who is the Omegagroup and who's this Charlie
girl who's going to kind of jackaround these guys a little bit
and put them in their place,basically.
So I think the best complimentI got was actually Aima Adair.
Aima basically said you knowagain someone who spent a career
serving in the Navy and she'slike I like Charlie, I liked
(34:24):
what you did with the femalecharacter, I like the
counterbalance to the boys andgetting that compliment from her
was kind of like okay, I guessI did do it.
I thought I did it because Ienjoyed the story and I'm my
first critic and my first fan.
But what is someone that'slived that world?
Think of what I've, what I'vedone with it.
So it's always great to getthat feedback yeah, she's great
(34:45):
man.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
I'm glad she's getting into screenwriting now
too yeah we need solid screenlike scripts out there, brother.
I'm telling you, man, I lovethe lioness show is not bad.
I really dig jackal.
I don't know if you saw thatone.
I have not seen it.
Speaker 2 (35:05):
I'll have to add it to my list.
My TV's been fairly minimalbecause I just have too much
crap to do the Diplomat's, mykind of like.
Oh, okay, that's my juice everynow and then I'm only like
three episodes into it.
I'm also savoring it because Ithink I found it by chance one
night months and months andmonths ago, maybe earlier this
(35:26):
year or whatever.
And I think I binged in likeseven nights or whatever, and so
I had to wait like six, eightmonths for it.
So now I said, okay, you canwatch one episode a week.
That's kind of like yourdessert after you did your job.
Speaker 1 (35:38):
So yeah, we need good screenwriters for sure.
I am on a Miami Vice binge now,like the original.
The old school one.
I'm on season one, episode 10right now.
Don Johnson baby, because Icould write while I watch,
because I don't have to thinkabout it.
Speaker 2 (35:52):
See, I can't.
So that's one way we'redifferent.
If I have the television on,I'm watching the television and
I'm not looking at my laptop.
Now, music motivates me.
I can get some, depending onwhat I'm writing.
It depends on what I want tolisten to, and sometimes it's
just silence.
Sometimes I just like silence,but that's one thing, and I was
going to ask you about that.
When it comes to writingbecause I can write, I finished
(36:15):
a chapter, I started a chapteron the paddy wagon on my way
down to Blarney castle and Ifinished that chapter over the
Atlantic last Sunday.
So I don't care where I am, aslong as I end up, I'll put in
noise canceling earbuds orwhatever.
If I block out annoying peoplemaking noise, I can write
anywhere.
So how about you?
Where, where, where's your.
Speaker 1 (36:35):
To me, mostly everything I write is nonfiction
, so I really just need facts,just facts.
I write a ton of op-eds now.
I write two or three a week, soI really just need facts.
As long as I have the facts, Icould write.
And a lot of times when I'mwriting that I need something in
the background, like noise.
Okay, so you do need that'swhat I need, like the tv or
(36:55):
something, because I need mymind is not.
I can't just have silence.
There's no way, even with music, and music to me is like I love
music so much that I want toenjoy the music so I wouldn't's
a distraction if you're tryingto write.
Yeah, I can't just write becauseI want to like.
I'm always listening to thelyrics and everything else and
(37:17):
relating it to my life.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
Let's jump back to Pivot for a second.
I had a thought pop throughwhen you were mentioning earlier
about USA Jobs and stuff.
Are there some misconceptionsthat, that, that that maybe
soldiers especially have asthey're getting out of uh, about
the process, or is there thingsthat um are aren't as obvious
as they should be for them whenthey're, when they're trying to
look into, you know, a careerafter the military?
Speaker 1 (37:42):
I think a lot of people think, because they're a
veteran, if they apply to a jobin USA Jobs, they should get it
automatically.
They should get an interviewautomatically.
But I've learned that you needto do the cover letters, you
need to have the resume tailoredfor that job, because, let's
say, there's one job opening andyou have three positions, they
(38:03):
get a thousand resumes.
What is going to set yoursapart?
And that is a lot of the adviceI give to people.
I'm like, when you look atthese jobs, your resume needs to
marry up to that job, becausethe resume goes to an HR person
first.
An HR person may know nothingabout these jobs.
All they know is keywords.
Well, they're going to look atthe job description, they're
going to look at the key pointsthat the government wants to
(38:26):
hire for, and then they're goingto look at the resume and if
you don't marry up to that orwhatever their algorithm they
use, if they're going to datamine it, if it doesn't marry up,
you're not going to get to thenext step, which is the
certification list.
The certification list goes tothe hiring manager and the
hiring officials and then theypick who they want to interview.
(38:47):
So then they look at the actualresumes and go oh, this person
looks like they align with thejob we want more.
If you just make a genericresume and send it to everywhere
, shotgun it to everyone ninetimes out of 10, you're not
going to make it to that nextstep.
Speaker 2 (39:03):
Okay, so there's a parallel to that too.
I know we're jumping back andforth, but I think it's
important to talk because we'retalking about the world of
fiction and nonfiction reallyNonfiction in the sense of jobs
and then fiction in the sense ofwriting novels.
Same thing happens when peopleare trying to get agents is it's
very easy for people to writeone cover letter, one letter for
(39:23):
an agent, a submission letter,and then where do you think that
letter is going to go?
If it's generic, it's going togo to what they call the slush
pile.
It's just going to sit thereand an intern might look at it.
And if it doesn't seem like it'stailored to that particular
agent, if you don't havespecific things in that letter
that kind of indicate maybe, whothat agent's clients are or
what other books they've soldyou're man, you're behind the
(39:47):
curve and I mean, I don't knowthe number of how many query
letters I sent from 2015,.
16 up until 2020, but it wasn'ta small number, and that's the
thing is, it's a numbers game.
And probably same thing,obviously, too, for veterans
that are looking for jobs.
It's like, you see, that youcan see that one job you want,
(40:08):
that's good, pursue that job,but you probably want to broaden
your scope and apply to morethan one job, just like you want
to go to more than one agent,because the chance of that one
being interested in you andgoing to the next step is not
super high for the most part.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
But with agents a lot of it comes out of networking.
You still have to do networkingin the federal government,
right?
You need to get your name outthere yeah and a lot of times,
once you get past the interviewand stuff, they're going to call
around and see anybody theyknow that knows you.
Yep, you know they're going totry to vouch.
Speaker 2 (40:42):
You need to have people that are going to vouch
for you yeah, my buddy thatretired a couple years ago and
this was this was man many yearsback now, probably 15 years ago
I think, when he was firstjoining up with SF.
He called me one day and he'slike, hey, I need some
information.
So I'm giving this information.
I was like, what's this for?
He goes.
You might hear from the FBI.
And I'm like, what the hell doyou do?
(41:03):
He goes, no, nothing, he goes.
I got to get security clearancefor my job and I'm like, oh,
okay, I said so, don't throw youunder the bus.
He's like, dude, dude, don'ttell the Tijuana story to that
guy.
Okay, good, Check, got that one.
So no kidding.
Speaker 1 (41:25):
No, I'm jumping all over the place.
I'll probably wrap this uppretty soon Now.
Did you go to IngramSparks ordo the Barnes Noble route too,
or are you strictly on Amazonright now?
Speaker 2 (41:35):
No, I did IngramSparks.
I don't like IngramSparkparticularly, but this book it
went smooth.
I've had Ransom Daughter.
Last fall IngramSpark was anightmare.
Cover kept getting kicked offand it was totally with their
specs.
And I went back and forth withthe guy that Todd Wilkins was
helping me do the cover, wentback and forth with Todd like
(41:57):
man.
They keep kicking it out andthis is the reason they're
giving.
Well, the reason is it's not inthe specs, it's in the specs
and so I always crossed myfinger with IngramSpark.
The reason I didn't go withBarnes Noble is because if I set
up an account with Barnes Noble, it only got me Barnes Noble.
So I always do Amazon, andAmazon makes up probably 98, 99%
(42:17):
of my sales honestly for everybook.
But I like to have it availablefor people that hate Amazon or
don't like Amazon and there's alot and they have reason to not
like it.
It just happens to be a goodplace to sell books if you're
self-published and if you'retraditionally published.
So IngramSpark this time wasreally smooth for me and
IngramSpark gets you everythingelse besides Amazon.
In fact, actually this time Ihad it set up a little bit ahead
(42:41):
of time and that's how you canget it.
So for authors that are curious, they'll see an author author
out there with a pre-order foran e-book.
Well, that's the only thing youcan do on Amazon.
You can't have an Amazonpre-order for your paperback or
hardcover.
They keep saying they're goingto have that ready, but it's not
ready yet.
It's not available.
So how you get a pre-order isyou actually do your IngramSpark
(43:02):
setup, and there's othercompanies that do this as well.
That will then get you apre-order that pushes over to
Amazon.
That pre-order will also go toBarnes Noble, it'll go to Books
A Million.
So, yeah, so I actually hadpeople, I had screenshots, you
know, a month and a half beforethe book came out and people
said, hey, I pre-ordered yourbook and I'm like, pre-ordered
the paperback.
(43:22):
How did you do that?
Oh, that's right, ingramsparkand I can see my numbers there.
So, yeah, it's exciting, but Iknow the majority of my people
are going to be going throughAmazon.
But I don't want to limit it andyou know, eventually we talked
(43:45):
about, you know, aspirations orpublishing and all that.
I'm comfortable with the indieworld right now.
Would I go traditional?
I have a book in my back burnerthat I started a couple of
years ago that I'll go back toin probably a few more years.
It's a high level concept thatprobably would be interested by
the publishing world.
(44:05):
If I can ever get that onewhere I want it to and get
comfortable, I might play thatgame of going down the
traditional publishing.
The problem with that and forpeople listening is I got a book
that I believe in.
That's really good.
I go to get an agent thatprobably is going to take months
it could take longer but say ittakes months.
The agent has a publisher thatlikes it.
(44:25):
They send it out, they go outon sub, they call it, they go to
10 different publishers ormaybe eight publishers, whatever
, and one of those publishersreally likes it.
From the time I submitted thatbook to the agent before, that
book is in Jason Piccolo's handsbecause I want to sell Jason
this book.
You're probably looking at twoto three years realistically and
to me that's what's kept me inthe indie world.
(44:47):
Now it's like man, I'm not donewriting Supreme Justice.
I can probably still have itout by summer without any
problems as long as I stay to mytask.
If Supreme Justice I was tryingto get traditionally published,
that thing wouldn't come outuntil 2027 probably or 2026.
And so that's part of the reasonpeople are afraid to commit.
(45:07):
You know, commit to sometimestraditional publishing, and
there's also reasons they'reafraid to commit.
Speaker 1 (45:12):
It's like not everybody wants to be a
millionaire, and to be amillionaire in the, the, the
literary world, is good luck.
But a lot of people have a book.
So many people, I know like,yeah, I'm writing a book.
Well, how long have you beenwriting it?
Oh, 10 People.
I know like, yeah, I'm writinga book.
Well, how long have you beenwriting it?
Oh, 10 years.
Write it finish it and publishit.
Yes, have it edited, have itlooked at, have people write it.
(45:36):
But indie publishing man it'snot.
You know, in order to upload itinto Amazon and everything,
you're paying minimal amount ofmoney for anything.
Yeah, so just if you want thebook out there, it's not like
you don't have to think the oldschool parameters that you have
to have a publisher, correct.
Speaker 2 (45:53):
Well, a couple of quick things.
If you think you're going towrite a book and be a
millionaire, don't.
You might, you might.
But the stats, and the statsare out there if people want to
go look them up.
The amount of authors that makenot a million, the amount of
authors that make $100,000 ormore a year, I believe, is 1.8%
(46:14):
in the United States.
So less than 2% of people and$100,000, while maybe 20 years
ago you'd be like, oh, I'm doingpretty good.
$100,000 in a lot ofmetropolitan areas right now is
you're probably close to thepoverty line.
I mean, you're lower in class.
You know your mortgage is$3,500 a month.
Well, $100,000, you can'treally afford a $35,000 mortgage
(46:37):
payment, you know.
So get that out of your head.
If you want to be a millionaire, can you be a millionaire?
Yes, the good news is you can.
A lot of factors are going tohappen and none of them are luck
.
Don't believe people when theysay luck Nope, but you're going
to have to work really hard.
However, just what you said ifyour goal is to put a book out
there, there's a lot of ways todo it.
(46:59):
Do it the best you can, if youcan afford it.
Get a good cover designer, geta good editor Cover design.
I love your cover man.
Yeah, thank you A cover.
My guy's in Serbia, my guy's inSerbia.
So I love it, man, and I likeyours.
I love I love the simplistic ofit.
I love the patriotism up top, soI wish the light would agree
(47:21):
with me better.
Let's get it better.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
You know what?
I probably should have made thecover not so glossy, but I was
like I do matt, so I learned mylesson.
Speaker 2 (47:28):
I do matt covers all the time, partially for all my
goofing up social media filmingstuff, um, but where I want to
go with that real quick, is ifyou want to do a book, do a book
because I have a corporate job.
I plan on still doing acorporate job for a while,
unless they can me for somereason, whatever.
But I try to work hard and Igot a great boss.
But but if something were tohappen to me, I have books that
(47:50):
I can leave my kids.
Even if I sell 10 copies of mybook, five copies or one copy, I
have something I can leavebehind.
So if you have like just whatJason said, you have the desire
to write a story, man, write astory.
Reach out to one of us in theauthor world.
We'll give you tips on where togo, maybe who the cover design
should be, or who to use forediting, because there's so many
.
And go to someone that someoneelse uses, like we talked about
(48:14):
earlier.
Be very wary of someone thatthat slides into your dms and
says, hey, I can do your coverfor 99 dollars, or marketing
well, how are you going tomarket and is your marketing
going to equate to sales?
Speaker 1 (48:28):
yes, you're going to everybody in the world look at
your book.
But sales is where the realmarketing is.
Speaker 2 (48:34):
Well, to add to that is everyone judges a book by its
cover.
Yes, so if your cover isabsolute crap, you could have
something that would makeHemingway cry inside that spine
and there's a good chance noone's ever going to read it
because your cover turned peopleoff.
The inverse is you could writeabsolute crap and have a good
cover designer and you mightsell a bunch of books, but it'll
(48:56):
be the last books you sell,yeah, but you got to find a way
to do them both.
But find good people.
Reach out to the writingcommunity, and we both know
people and we know so manyamazing people in this community
.
Reach out to the writingcommunity and people will
embrace you and they will helpyou.
Don't ask too much, but bereasonable and people will be
reasonable back with you andthen you know you might be able
(49:19):
to hold your book in your hand.
You might be able to, you know,go out and hold Jason's book in
your hand too.
Speaker 1 (49:26):
Well, brother, I appreciate their time tonight.
Man and everyone, check out.
Babylon Will Rise from theauthor of the Body man, Eric P
Bishop.
Speaker 2 (49:36):
And don't forget Pivot from the man that brought
you the Protectors, dr JasonPickle.
Don't forget the doctor part.
I did want to say this on mysister and on a funnier note so
and I've joked with you aboutdoctor in the past.
So my sister's got a master'sdegree and my mom made a comment
recently of I think she's goingto go for her doctors at some
(49:57):
point because she wants peopleto call her doctor.
Like I don't know if I can doit.
Even if she gets it, I don'tknow.
I can call Dr Jason Piccolo DrPiccolo, but my sister I changed
her diapers when she was youknow, she's much younger than me
, so I was a baby when I waslike 12.
It's like I don't know if I cancall her doctor, but kidding,
(50:18):
jason, thank you, thank you forthe book, thank you for what you
do for veterans.
You putting that positivity outand wanting to help people that
, like yourself, served ourcountry, is a higher calling and
it's a calling that should beapplauded.
So thank you.
Thank you, brother, you'rewelcome.
(50:38):
Take care everyone.
The Protectors and A Tale of TwoScribes.
We're out.
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