October 29, 2025 • 42 mins
Get ready to dive into the exhilarating world of thrillers as Thriller Zone host Dave Temple chats with the brilliant Robbie Bach, the mastermind behind not just Xbox, but also a gripping new novel titled *The Blockchain Syndicate*.
Right off the bat with Episode #242, we’re unraveling the layers of intrigue, murder, and the high-stakes game of technology weaponized against democracy. Robbie’s journey from leading a gaming revolution to penning edge-of-your-seat narratives is nothing short of inspiring.
We’ll explore how real-world issues influence his writing, like the complex dynamics of crime syndicates that might just parallel some of the shady dealings he’s witnessed in boardrooms.
With David at the helm, listeners are treated to a light-hearted yet insightful discussion that ranges from the intricacies of the gaming industry to the dark, thrilling narrative that blends technology and crime.
With plenty of playful banter and humorous anecdotes, this episode is a delightful mix of entertainment and deep exploration of themes that matter in today’s digital age.
So, grab your headphones and buckle up, because this episode promises a rollercoaster of fun, insight, and a few laughs along the way!
Takeaways:
- This episode features Robbie Bach, the mastermind behind Xbox, who now writes thrilling novels.
- We dive into Robbie's transition from tech innovator to thriller novelist, exploring the creative process.
- The conversation touches on the role of technology in our lives and how it can be weaponized.
- Robbie discusses the importance of character depth, using his villain to explore complex motivations.
- Listeners learn about the intertwining of technology and storytelling in Robbie's latest book, 'The Blockchain Syndicate'.
- The episode emphasizes the need for writers to just start writing and embrace the creative chaos.
Links referenced in this episode:
Companies mentioned in this episode:
- Xbox
- Microsoft
- Greenleaf Book Group Press
KEYWORDS: thriller podcast, Robbie Bach interview, blockchain technology, Xbox history, writing thrillers, political thrillers, character development in novels, technology in fiction, creative writing tips, suspenseful storytelling, authors and technology, AI in writing, impact of technology on society, contemporary thriller novels, book marketing strategies, Seattle authors, social media and privacy, writing process insights, narrative authenticity, best-selling thrillers
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:08):
Hello and welcome to theThriller Zone.
I'm your host, David Temple.
So glad you have joined us today.
And today we've got a veryspecial guest.
Now, this guy.
This is his second novel, andwhen you read it, you're not going
to believe it.
You're going to like.
Now, this cat's been writingfor years.
No, he's been doing otherthings for years.
Mainly one of the chiefoperating brainiacs behind a little
(00:33):
thing called the Xbox.
That's right.
Today we're talking to RobbieBach, former Xbox employee mastermind,
and now the mastermind behindthe blockchain syndicate.
Oh, baby.
If you like intrigue,assassinations, murder and mayhem.
Well, Dave, it's the Thriller Zone.
(00:54):
That's what we come here for then.
You're gonna like this book, folks.
Put your hands together,unless you're driving, of course,
for Robbie Bach, right here onthe Thriller zone.
Yeah.
And what happened to your shoulder?
Is it raining outside?
I ran through some bushes, butyes, that's why I was trying to brush
this off, because I ran through.
(01:15):
I had to go upstairs to get myheadphones because I forgot them
and they're.
The gate has some bushes nextto it, so I. I hit the bushes.
So anyway, that'll.
Hopefully that'll dry off inthe meantime.
All good.
Well, I am very glad thatyou're here.
It's so funny.
I always make all my notes.
And then this morning overbreakfast, I. I started scribbling
(01:37):
more notes.
It just kind of came to me.
So if I'm a little all overthe place, bear with me.
But that's kind of the fun andthe magic of this show.
Totally, totally happy.
Happy to go wherever you wantto go.
You direct, and I will.
I will follow.
Wow.
I like that.
So much power in my hand.
(01:57):
Now It's a Monday.
It's a Monday.
Yeah.
Where do I find you today?
I'm in Seattle.
Just outside of Seattle.
Okay.
Thus the rain.
Got it.
Yeah, it poured here yesterday.
It rained a little this morning.
You know, now we got clouds.
Then it'll have a little sun,then it'll rain again.
(02:17):
Seattle, is it true that itdoes nearly always rain, or is that
just kind of.
Is that the.
No, that's.
That's just people in Seattletrying to keep the Californians out
of here.
That's exactly what I wasgonna say.
We get.
We get probably less rain ininches than significant parts of
(02:37):
the country because we don'tget thunderstorms, we don't get heavy
rain.
The problem is we get a lot ofdays Overcast with occasional drizzle.
Okay.
I haven't used an umbrella in20 years.
Oh, see, isn't that funnybecause you.
Yeah, they have fed themachine to keep us from coming and
(03:00):
ruining everything.
The thing they tell people whomove here is it's all about the gear.
So do you have the right shoes?
Do you have the right coatwith a hood?
And do you have a four wheeldrive car?
If you got all those things,you're great.
Yeah.
You know, they say here youneed sunblock and a surfboard.
It's pretty much.
(03:21):
Wow, that works.
That works.
Yeah.
Well, today we're talkingabout the Blockchain Syndicate, Robbie
Bach, of course, our guest,and this.
Love the COVID by the way.
I don't know who did this.
Right, yeah.
So good.
Everybody who listens to theshow knows I love covers.
I have so much to talk aboutand I know we got like 30ish minutes,
(03:43):
but I'm going to cram as muchas I can.
What some of my guestlisteners do not know is that you're
kind of, I'm sure you're notthe actual brainchild, but you are
one of the, can we say,insurmountable forces behind a little
thing called the Xbox.
(04:03):
Yeah, the way to think aboutthat is I was the leader of the group.
Okay?
So my, my title was, this isthe title we made up.
My title was Chief Xbox Officer.
So I was the leader of the group.
I'm not a, I'm a productperson, but not a deep, technical
person.
So the people who created XboxLive, that'd be a guy named Jay Allard.
(04:26):
The people who created theconsole hardware, that'd be a guy
named Todd Holmdahl.
The guy who bought Halo,that'd be a guy named Ed Fries.
And I kept those guys together as.
A group, which was probablyquite a challenge in and of itself
because you're talking aboutright brain, left brain, circling
of cats, right?
(04:47):
Well, yeah, and, and I alwaystell people, the Xbox team, in my
22 years at Microsoft, thatoriginal Xbox team was by far the
most talented, individuallyincredibly talented people.
Getting them to work togetheras a team was, Was no easy feat.
And I didn't do a great job of it.
It took me probably three orfour years to sort of figure out
(05:08):
how to get everybody to sortof work together.
And the second version ofXbox, Xbox360, that team was really
humming and yeah, that was alot of fun.
Fun little note.
Everyone on the show wholistens to the show knows my wife
Tammy, who is behind that doorright now on a conference call with
a bunch of big wigs.
Otherwise she would be in herebeaming about this very thing.
(05:32):
So we're coming back from thegym this morning, it's probably about
6:45, 7 o'.
Clock.
And she goes, who's on yourpodcast today?
I said, well, little fella whohas written a very, very tasty novel,
number two, to be exact.
And, but here's something.
He's behind one of thesomething that you, you might know
(05:55):
a little something about.
And, and she's just deadpanlike this.
She goes, really?
What's that?
I said xbox.
She goes, oh.
And she just lit up.
She goes, well, tell Mr. BachI'm he pro.
Something like.
He probably built his secondhome on the amount of money I spent
on Jake, our son.
(06:16):
Right.
You know, the funny thing is Ido a lot of public speaking.
So I'll go around and, youknow, a mom or a dad will come up
and say, can I take a selfiewith you?
Not because they want theselfie, but because they want cred
with their kids.
Yeah.
And so they, they want me tosay I met the guy who helped start
Xbox.
(06:36):
And then that gives themsomehow cultural credibility.
Yeah.
And to that very same point,I'm gonna get you to say a little
shout out to Jake, becauseJake is who we were mentioning before
and he's.
I don't know if he's ever,ever even listened to my podcast.
Finds out that you're on,he'll go, oh, maybe, yeah, I think
I'll listen to that episode.
(06:57):
Hey, Jake, I, I hope you'reenjoying your Xbox.
Have fun with it and play whenyour parents aren't looking.
There you go.
Well, this.
I want to, I want to get intothe blockchain syndicate.
Another thing I love about itis the title.
And that title does a coupleof things.
(07:18):
So we, we've now establishedthe fact that you built one of the
most, you know, successfulentertainment platforms probably
in the history of mankind.
But now that you're writingthrillers about technology weaponizing
against democracy, it makes mewonder, what has that trans transition
been like?
Because I'm, I'm thinking I don't.
(07:38):
And you have two differentwebsites, which we'll talk about
in a second.
I see your corporate, youknow, speaker, champion for causes
and so forth, and I think,what is it like to go from that world
after 22 plus years and go,you know what?
Now I'm going to go solo.
We all know what that's like.
Now you're, now you're insideYour mind, you're inside your own
little world.
(07:59):
Probably spending anywherefrom a year to a year and a half,
two years crafting this thing.
What has that transition been like?
Well, I think the good news isI have a little bit of balance because
I spend almost half my timeworking with nonprofit boards, which
is an intensely social activity.
You end up in meetings.
(08:20):
I've met some just amazing people.
Boys and Girls Comes AmericaHabitat for Humanity, Bipartisan
Policy Center.
So they're great boards andthey're wonderful people.
So that's my social side.
And you're right.
When I'm writing, it's me andmy almost 14 year old lab and that's
it.
And some music in the background.
(08:41):
And so I have sort of a yinand yang about that.
I, I was, I've become prettycomfortable being by myself, but
I need the balance of beingwith other people.
And those board work is how Ireplaced all that social time for
Microsoft.
Yeah.
Okay.
That makes total sensebecause, you know, on a, on a similar
note, I was on radio shows myentire career, so.
(09:03):
And I had a team around in theroom with me.
So it's about 10 people andyou're constantly in an entourage
and then you switch to writingbooks and it's just you and you're
lonesome.
And it can be, for some peopleit's, it can be a little disconcerting
because all of a sudden youfeel lonely.
Loneliness can lead to alittle bit of, you know, myopia,
(09:23):
you know, self reflection,depression, et cetera.
But I'm with you.
That's why I love to get outand just be around people to kind
of counterbalance that thing.
I also think that myopianloneliness leads to writer's block
too.
And one of the things, one ofthe things I'm actually, you know,
fortunate is I have not had acircumstance when I'm in writing
(09:43):
where I just kind of say Idon't know what to write next.
Yeah.
And I think part of that'sbecause I'm, I'm only writing about
half the time and I've got allthese other things that are keeping
my brain engaged andgenerating new ideas and those kinds
of things.
So I think having a balance isactually really nice.
Yeah.
Well, you, you've mastered itcertainly here.
(10:04):
It's fascinating watchingsomeone who has gone from that world
and I, and you draw on somerather dark aspects.
Sure.
That many of us don't think about.
And, and I, I wonder if peoplehave approached you and said, robbie,
how much of this is real?
Because we we get this a lot.
Are you making this up?
(10:25):
Is.
Are we in that kind of a mess?
Well, I'm not making it up.
Technology.
One of the things I value inmy writing is authenticity.
Both authenticity about thecharacters and authenticity about
what's going on in the world.
So there isn't anything inhere that's just like, pulled out
of the blue technically, or.
(10:45):
Oh, that's not possible or whatever.
The thing I try to reinforcewith people is technology is just
a thing.
Technology itself is not goodor bad.
Right.
And almost every technologyever created has been used for good,
and it's been used for bad.
And so you.
You have to think about thatas you look at things.
(11:05):
I think about social media.
There's a lot of good thingsabout social media.
There's a lot of downsides onsocial media.
I think about, you know,blockchain, which is the subject
of this book.
I think about AI, which ispartially in this book and, you know,
partially something that's,you know, coming down the tracks
pretty fast at us.
Those are.
They're just technologies.
I mean, it's like, oh,somebody invented the semiconductor.
(11:27):
Was that good or bad?
No, that was just an invention.
And by the way, it's been usedfor good things and for bad things.
And so what I try to exploreis that good and bad, and it's the
classic good versus evil thatmakes thriller novels come to life.
Yeah.
I met, and I cannot recall his name.
I was on a movie set.
I was doing a small movie inthe mountains of Virginia a few years
(11:50):
back, and I met the guy whocreated the technology that took
the phone from the big casethat we used to carry down to the
miniaturization.
And I asked him this similarquestion about, you know, how, you
know, look.
Look at how technology haschanged over the years.
And he goes, well, there's alot of good that comes out of that
technology.
And, you know, people lose bad.
(12:11):
And I.
And I couldn't help but thinkabout the fact that, well, kind of
like.
Kind of like these littlemachines right here that never seem
to leave our side.
You know, we're eithercompletely addicted to them and they're
gathering all this informationfrom us, or we're just doing something
called, oh, making a phone call.
Right.
No, and look, and phones,everybody, you know, loves their
(12:35):
phone.
They're attached to their phone.
And there's a lot of good thatdoes come from that.
Sure.
But phones are now acommunication vehicle for bad people.
Yeah, I mean, that's just.
That's just a fact.
And the Technology is soubiquitous and there's so many different
ways to use it.
Then you add GPS and a fewother things and, you know, facial
recognition and other stuffthat all comes from some of the phone
(12:56):
technology.
And, you know, you have atool, and the tool can be used for
good or for bad.
Well, you.
You touched on something justa second ago that I wanted to make
sure I asked you about becauseit's so prevalent.
And ask my wife and she'lltell you.
Yeah, you only talk about it,Dave, like, every single day.
But AI, sure.
(13:16):
Do you find yourself worriedabout that again, using the good,
bad?
And do you see yourselfpotentially writing about it in the
future?
Because when I'm readingBlockchain, I'm thinking, boy, this
cat's got it dialed in for anything.
He wants to go down the AI path.
Yeah, look, blockchain, thething that's different about AI from
(13:40):
Blockchain.
Blockchain is a really cool technology.
It's very interesting.
It is not a generational shiftin how people work and compute.
AI is a generational shift.
It's like the move frommainframe computers to PCs, that
was a generational shift.
It's like the move from DOS tographical user interface in Windows,
(14:02):
that was a generational shift.
Social media was agenerational shift.
AI is a generational shift.
And so it's going to changealmost everything we experience and
do.
And I am not a. I'm a believerthat there's a bunch of things AI
will do.
I think about medicine.
It has the potential to makeour healthcare system dramatically
better.
Not because we're going toreplace doctors, because we're not.
(14:23):
But if you're a doctor andyou're trying to understand somebody's
condition and you have theability to describe that condition
and get some guideposts froman AI agent who can.
Who has collected data fromaround the world, that's powerful.
Yeah.
And at the same time, AI canbe used to fake an ad, fake an action,
(14:43):
create a character that didn'texist, create a digital twin for
somebody and make it look likethey're someplace else.
There's really bad things thatcould come from it.
It's rich fodder.
Look, if you're a thrillerwriter, it's rich fodder.
No debate.
Yeah, yeah.
And.
And don't think I'm not usingit to its absolute fullest opportunity
in my current book that I'mworking on right now.
(15:05):
Yeah.
All right, so I'll tell you soin this book, I didn't use in Blockchain.
Syndicate.
I didn't use AI to write asingle word, so the book is all mine.
I did use it dramatically in marketing.
Oh, yeah?
How do you do a summary of the book?
I literally gave AI the bookand said, tell me how to summarize
(15:25):
this.
There's a video trailer on mywebsite, the blockchain syndicate.com
as a trailer for the movie.
The script and the video forthat trailer was all done in AI.
They say the dead don't sendemails, but there it was in my inbox.
A message from someone Iwatched die.
(15:48):
Someone who knew secrets thatcould destroy everything I've built.
I'm Senator Tamika Smith, exAir Force.
I've served my country in warzones and Washington.
I thought I'd seen every kindof enemy.
I was wrong.
(16:08):
When they took Johnny,kidnapped him in broad daylight after
his daughter was shot, I knewthis wasn't random.
Someone wanted me broken.
Someone wanted America broken.
The FBI calls it sophisticated professional.
A shadow network usingblockchain technology to hide in
(16:28):
plain sight.
But I've learned somethingabout shadows.
They only exist where there'slight to cast them.
They're threatening democracyitself, using our own technology
against us, turning ourdigital infrastructure into a weapon.
But I didn't survive combatmissions to surrender to cowards
hiding behind computer screens.
(16:50):
They want to fix America their way.
They'll have to go through me first.
Some fights choose you.
This one chose wrong.
The Blockchain Syndicate.
When the ledger finallybalances, justice will be the only
currency that matters.
And, you know, it cost me $300.
I mean, it was great, right?
(17:10):
It was awesome.
So there are ways to use itthat I think are really responsible
and supportive, but the corecreative work has come for me.
Well, and let's.
Let's break that down for asecond, because core creative is
nuance.
It's emotion, it's empathy.
It's so many of the tinylittle things.
And yes, I know AI is gettingsmarter by.
(17:32):
Not the day, the minute, butstill, there's a matter of reasoning
and emotion, maybe intellect,heart, things like that.
So I'm with you.
I.
So many of the red threads inthe Blockchain Syndicate are.
I mean, there's a bunch ofthem that are about the core plot
of the book, obviously.
Yeah.
But a bunch of the red threadsare about the characters themselves.
(17:55):
Yeah.
And emotion.
And I don't.
I. I have to come up with that.
That has to come from me.
Sure.
And.
And back to your point.
It is hard not to use something.
And.
And, folks, hear me out hereon this, because Robbie just said
this.
The amount it really comesdown to, let's be honest, it's about
(18:15):
the amount of time and moneythat you can save.
Now, do I feel badly that I'mputting a copywriter out of business?
No, because.
Oh, that's right.
I'm a novel writer, so I'mwriting the copy myself.
I'm just trying to make.
Yeah, I'm just trying to makeit better, more polished, faster,
(18:35):
more easily digestible,whatever the word is.
And it's really about expediency.
And to your second point iswhen you can make a TV commercial
slash trailer for $300 versus3,000 or 30,000, it kind of begs
the question, wouldn't it makemore sense to put that money into
(18:56):
marketing things that reallyare tangible than otherwise?
No, that's exactly right.
And that's sort of the way Iviewed it.
And the other thing I willsay, I think you have a responsibility
to tell people whensomething's been AI generated.
So, like my video is, it sayscreated using the following AI tool.
And I think that's a, it'skind of like footnoting a piece of
(19:18):
work, and I think that's valuable.
And I don't think anybody'sgoing to fault you for that.
I mean, who in the wide worldof Xbox would fault you for taking
the time to save time andmoney when you're saying, hey, by
the way, this created by me,that created by some force out there.
Yeah.
Yeah.
All right, we've, we've kickedthat one.
(19:40):
So it's nice to see SenatorTamika Smith back now.
We met her first in the WilkesInsurrection, which came out, I want
to say, 21.
Yep, good memory.
All right, so four, fouryears, which I'm hoping that we don't
have to wait another fouryears for the next one, because when
you dive into this, when yougo, robbie, please, for the love
(20:02):
of God, don't make me wait for years.
Well, that's.
I, I, I hope not to wait that wait.
I hope not to wait that long.
I have some ideas already.
Yeah, I, I, I wouldn't be surprised.
I was going to say, David, areyou kidding me?
It's, it's right over there inthe box.
I, I finished it last night.
(20:23):
Well, I don't want to spoilanything, but how does she, Senator
Tamika, how does she evolve,grow, mature between Wilkes Insurrection
and now Blockchain Syndicate?
Well, I think in WilkesInsurrection, her motivation is more
about what I would callmilitary duty.
(20:45):
You know, that book startswith her still serving as A reservist
in the military.
And so she has this patriotismand sense of duty that comes from
her family background, herfamily experience.
And she's living that out inwhat she does in Blockchain Syndicate.
She's made this transition tobeing in the U.S. senate, and now
(21:08):
there's a focus on democracy,governance, how we lead people.
And so there's still that sameinternal drive and focus on doing
the right thing, but it comesfrom a slightly different sensibility.
And she's engaged in acompletely different set of activities.
And in Wilkes instruction,she's wrestling with a terrorist
(21:32):
in blockstling with bothpoliticians and others.
And it's just a different.
It's a different environmentfor her.
And so she has to learn herway through that.
And I'll be honest, the reasonI asked that question is because
I did not read your first book.
I apologize right out of the gate.
I should have read everysingle solitary thing I get my hands
(21:53):
on, but yet I didn't.
Now, this book opens with aschool shooting.
That's not what it seems.
And again, I don't want tospoil it, but it is a hell of a way
to start.
And it begged the question.
As I'm sitting there reading,I'm like, I wonder how Robbie felt.
Was he a little bit nervousabout using school violence as a
(22:14):
plot device, given where it isin our world today?
It's an excellent question.
And here's what I would say.
I. I think about my books as areflection of contemporary society.
So when there are things thatare real happening.
I mean, in WilkesInsurrection, there's an attack,
(22:37):
multiple attacks, lots ofpeople die.
And do I feel bad about that?
I mean, I feel for the people,even though they're fictional.
I feel for them, sure.
But.
But I.
You know, unfortunately, thisis where we are.
Yeah.
School shootings.
I mean, every child in.
In an American school knowswhat the protocol is if there's an
(22:59):
active shooter on campus.
Yeah.
And that may be sad, we maynot like that, but it's the reality
of what's going on, and wejust have to deal with that.
And so I don't.
I don't feel like I should shyaway from those types of things.
I think that's an importantthing to just take on head on and
deal with it.
Yeah.
And you said the word that wascoming out of my mind just the minute
(23:23):
you said it was.
How sad it is that we havethis mirror that we have to hold
up to ourselves as we see theway society has gone.
Oh, it's Almost like, oh,what's that, honey?
Oh, another school shooting.
Oh, it's terrible.
Well, and this is why you haveto write about it.
(23:43):
Yeah.
Because you have to forcepeople to, you know, hopefully over
time people have a connectionto the characters in my books.
And if you have a connectionto Phoenix Humboldt or Tamika Smith
or Bryce Raskovich, allimportant characters in the story,
that shooting is an emotionalevent for you.
It's not just something thathappened on the news someplace.
(24:05):
Yeah.
And you know, we have to bringthese things into our conscience,
into our, the part of ourmorality and our soul that deals
with them.
And the only way to do that isto confront them.
And you can't, you can't skirtaround that.
This is, this show is allabout you.
But I'm going to mentionanother author because when I was
reading this book, I thought,oh, Robbie has got to read this book.
(24:29):
And I don't generally do this.
I don't recommend otherauthors to the authors I'm talking
to because I don't want to, Idon't want to steal your thunder.
But the reason I do this is asimilarity and a powerful story,
but even more so because ofwhat you just said.
We have to write books like this.
(24:50):
And it's a book by EricRickstead called Lilith L I L I T
H. This is probably one of themost emotionally riveting books and
I'm not going to tell you asingle thing about it, but just trust
me and pick it up.
I just, I, I just put it on my list.
I, look, I write in thethriller genre for sure and I write
(25:14):
techno thrillers.
I think the best part, theparts of my books that I love the
most are the character driventhemes and plot lines that flow through
it.
Well, and, and so for me, themain plot line is super interesting,
super exciting, super meaningful.
And I have to use that tocreate my, the thriller environment.
But I love Tamika's story, Ilove Bryce's story, I love Phoenix
(25:37):
Humboldt story.
They're important.
Well, and I want to, I want to bounce.
I'm going to bounce back andforth a little.
Couple more things betweenyour Microsoft years, your board
work with the Olympiccommittee, civic involvement, which
you do a lot of, and otherbusinesses, you're involved in one
of them.
I have a note here that I wantto make sure I do not forget because
(25:57):
it lit me up this morning.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna come backto that.
But you've seen how poweractually operates behind closed doors.
So how much of Rally Americaand Break down for me, for my listeners,
what Rally America is and howmuch of that Rally America conspiracy
mirrors real dynamics thatyou've witnessed in boardrooms and
(26:19):
policy circles that you'vebeen in.
Yeah.
So think of Rally America inthe non digital world.
Rally America is a crimesyndicate and there's a syndicate
boss.
Now, what's unique about RallyAmerica in this book is nobody who's
in the syndicate knows anybodyelse in the syndicate because of
blockchain.
(26:40):
Right.
And nobody knows who theleader is, which is why the leader
set it up that way.
And so there's this sort ofanalog part of the story that is,
oh, this is a mafia syndicate,I get that, but it's not a mafia
syndicate.
Nobody knows who the don is.
There's no family.
Right.
And the FBI and theauthorities chasing after it can't
(27:02):
treat it like a mafia syndicate.
So that, to me is the magic ofRally America and why it plays kind
of a pivotal role in the bookand the direction it goes.
You know, do I think that isgoing on in the world today?
Crime syndicates have beengoing on since the 1500s.
(27:24):
So yeah.
So I don't think,unfortunately, I don't think that
part of human nature has changed.
Right.
Are they going working exactlythe way Rally America works?
Using blockchain to hide their identities?
Maybe.
It's not like I wrote aboutone I knew about, but the technology's
there.
Yeah.
I mean, it's not, it's not,it's not magic.
(27:46):
It's.
It's actually real.
Now, I want to.
I want you to talk to me aboutthis female Russian assassin that
you have hunting throughoutthe story.
Talk to me about her.
And, and how, how do you makesomeone so ruthless, so cunning and
ruthless, but yet alsocompelling that readers just going
(28:07):
to hang on every little aspectof it?
Yeah.
Nazian Drop off is aninteresting character.
And, you know, as I waswriting, I had the idea that there
would be somebody who would dothe shooting at school.
I didn't have the idea thatthat character would then become
a main character.
And then I did what I do withall characters.
I wrote a little backstory andthen I started writing the backstory
(28:30):
and she starts to become real.
And now you start to realize,okay, this is a woman who's motivated
by something and hermotivation is about Russia.
This isn't giving anything away.
People will find this out inthe book pretty quickly.
She's motivated about MotherRussia because of her family history
and her family background.
And so now you start to putthat together and then you plop her
(28:51):
in my favorite country in theworld, the Netherlands, which is
a really nice, sweet place.
So she has to be nice andsweet because she's hiding in plain
sight.
And so you have this.
Now she becomes threedimensional for me and she's not
just a one dimensional or twodimensional sort of stock villain
(29:14):
now.
She's a human and she hasthese characteristics and she talks
with her cat and she has fearsand anxieties and, and yet she is
determined and ruthless atwhat she does.
So she's a great foil for Tamika.
And that's, that's the, thelogic of the, of the story.
Two things there.
I was going to say, reason Iloved her so much was it was a great
(29:36):
polar opposite of your mainprotagonist, which of course you
want.
But the other thing was, andyou took the words right out of my
mouth, I'm like, she wasn't,you know, she wasn't a cardboard
cutout, standard littleruthless killer, blah, blah, blah.
There was this character, andI talked to my wife about this all
the time about why we're soattracted to certain shows and, or
(29:57):
characters inside of shows.
Like we just wrapped thisseries called Task.
Yep.
Which I won't.
Okay, you know what it is?
I'm not going to bore mylisteners with it, but the, the,
the reason I think it was sosuccessful, besides it was great
acting and a good story.
But it was the fact that inall this brokenness and murder and
(30:17):
mayhem and, and, and stolendrugs and money and all that stuff,
it was the characters that shecared about and the heart that wove
the story together.
I would never have.
Matter of fact, I was late tothe game.
She started it first.
I saw her keep watching.
I'm like, okay, I gotta, Igotta dive out.
Because I'd walk through theroom and I saw.
(30:38):
What's this?
Oh yeah, water.
It's another one of those shows.
Yeah.
And then I, by about thethird, second or third episode, I'm
like, holy, this thing is dynamite.
And then by the wrap, whenyou're sitting there almost crying,
these biker gangs and, and thestory that unfolds characters is
(30:58):
what I'm getting at.
Sorry, I'm going off thebeaten path.
But characters in the heart,which is what you did here.
Yeah.
Well, look, I'm a huge fan of ncis.
Yeah.
And you know, there's greatstorylines, really good writing,
some incredible acting.
But for me, the heart of thatstory obviously is Jethro Gibbs.
(31:19):
And in part because his lifebackground is so fascinating and
there's so many Dimensions tohim as a character and who he is.
And he's crotchety, but he has heart.
He's a soldier, but, you know,he's compassionate.
You know, the story worksbecause the plotting is great and
the acting is quite good.
But to me, it works becausehis character comes to life.
(31:42):
And I think with him leavingthe show, it's been harder because,
you know, you don't feel thatconnection to his character as much.
Yeah.
Well, we start to wrap up.
You left some threads hangingpotentially for some more books.
I'm just going to say, folks, I'm.
That's.
I'm not spoiling anythinghere, but Tamika feels like it's
(32:04):
just.
It's just my opinion here, buddy.
Feels like a little bit ofRobbie's Jack Reacher, because I
think I see where we have yetanother conspiracy.
As though she didn't haveenough on her plate already.
I know that you gotta be.
And we mentioned it earlier,but come on, give me some inside
scoop.
Well, the.
The thing to.
(32:26):
The thing to focus on whenyou're writing, when you start to
decide that you're going towrite a series.
So now you have threads withinthe story.
So threads within, in thiscase, a book, but now you have to
have threads that go acrossbooks as well.
Yep.
And so there clearly are somethreads for her and for a couple
(32:46):
other characters in the story.
Bryce Raskovich has somethreads that run across books.
In this story, Jerry Jessup'snot done.
He has a thread.
Threads that run across this.
So there are characters thatrun across this that I think the
way I say it is this.
I'm their curator for theirstory, and they have more to tell.
And I think of myself as their.
(33:09):
As the person who brings themto life.
Yeah.
Well, let me ask you aboutGreenleaf Book Group Press.
I had not heard of them before.
This is the publishing group,I'm assuming.
Yes.
Is this Seattle?
I'm just curious.
No, no.
They're based in Texas.
(33:31):
Greenleaf's what's called ahybrid publisher.
So in a traditional publishingmodel, they buy your book or you
self publish, which is yousubcontract everything.
Greenleaf is that beautifulthing in between where they don't
buy my book, but I contractwith them to do all the work.
And so they're a mainline publisher.
They do everything a publisher does.
They do editorial, they do copyright.
(33:52):
They do all the things they do.
They did that beautiful cover.
They do all the distributionand everything.
I still own the book.
And so it's a.
It's a nice mix of ofprofessional publishing.
And they're really good.
They've done both my fictionnovels and they're, they're spectacular.
(34:13):
And yet there's work I have todo because I'm the owner of the intellectual
property.
Well, a little inside scoop,RB is the fact that you go to any
traditional house right now,and this is so funny, I'm talking
to my friends who have justlanded deals and they turn to me.
I'm a self published guy, bythe way.
Sure.
And they turn to me and theygo, you know, Dave, I was kind of
(34:34):
expecting me to just walk inand go, you know, somebody signed
me a great big fat check andme go write the next book.
And someone says, and hey, youguys got this right?
Because I got another book to write.
And then like, no, booby, yougotta go out there and hammer the
streets yourself.
Totally.
And you know, the public, thepublicity and all the work you do,
no matter who you sign with,you have to do it yourself.
(34:57):
Yeah.
And so for me, theintellectual freedom.
And I get to decide the titleof the book, I get to pick the COVID
They're wonderful aboutpresenting options and I get to make
those decisions.
And that to me has been leftme with some creative freedom, which
I really enjoy.
Well, call me crazy, and youjust laid this on me right now, so
(35:17):
I haven't really had a time todigest it, but it sounds like I'm
going to call it Best of All Worlds.
Well, here's the only, here'sthe only challenge.
You pay them up front.
So.
Right.
So, you know, this is the,this is the slight advantage of 22
years at Microsoft.
During, during really good years.
You have to put up, you haveto put up your own capital to make
(35:39):
it happen.
Now if you're doing selfpublishing, you do as well.
So that's not completelydifferent from that.
But I just love the idea thatI have seasoned professionals doing
the work and the idea thatthere's one person who is making
sure everything stays on track.
Here's the other secret.
From the time they first readthe book to tomorrow's publishing
(36:01):
date is nine months.
Wow.
Yeah.
That is.
Now that's an anomaly, am I right?
I mean, we're talking, I hear,I hear two, two years to two and
a half, kind of as the sweet.
Spot, which, well, atraditional publisher has a list
(36:24):
of books they're going topublish and they have a schedule.
Yeah.
And so they can only releasecertain books at certain times.
Greenleaf doesn't have that.
And so they, in fact, in theircase, the faster the Better.
So they basically said, look,if you want to launch before the
holiday, here's your schedule.
You're going to have to doediting with us on this schedule.
And I said, sign me up.
I want to launch before the holiday.
(36:45):
Yeah.
And so that's where we are.
Here's another question.
Were they also responsible foryour two stunningly handsome and
I mean that websites, they are not.
Okay, so I did that.
My nephew, Matt Brown is aprofessional website developer who
(37:07):
now runs a travel service.
Not a travel agency, but atravel service.
But he got into that throughwebsite design.
And he does really, reallygood work.
I love working with him.
He's great.
Dude, between your book coversand your websites, I think they are
absolutely right, tip top, onpar with all the biggies.
(37:31):
Well, it's, that's great to hear.
I mean, I, I, I love the workthey do.
Greenleaf is awesome.
Matt's, you know, obviouslyhe's my nephew.
He's a great, he's a greatfriend and he's just really talented
at what he does.
Yeah.
Well, it does start withtalent in that big chair right there.
Mr.
I'm going to say that.
And I do always wrap all myshows with this one closing question.
(37:52):
And it is a best writing advice.
Now, I know, I know you'reonly two books in, but I bet you
some of the wisdom that you'reabout to bestow upon us will reflect
a little bit of your 22 plusat the, @ Microsoft.
Because there's going to beadvice that trickles down in that
because that business adviceand acumen is probably going to help
(38:17):
direct some of that writingadvice as well.
Yes.
Yeah, I suppose that's true.
The thing I would say topeople who are looking to write a
book, you have to just start.
I mean, this is the hardest thing.
The number of people I talk towho say, yeah, I've thought about
writing a book and I kind ofwant to respond to them and say,
(38:37):
well, thinking ain't going tomake it happen.
You might want to sit down andstart writing.
And so for me, my firstfiction novel started with a hundred
pages of character sketches offive people.
No plot, no genre.
Tamika wasn't intended to bethe main character.
I wrote a hundred pages and Ijust kept writing.
(38:57):
I didn't worry about the quality.
I didn't try to like, oh, thatparagraph wrong, whatever.
I just wrote.
And once I got into that flow,I now am comfortable just sitting
down saying, all right, I'mgoing to write the next chapter.
I have no outline for my Books.
I'm going to write the nextchapter and I'll come back the next
day and say, 60% of that was great.
I'll rewrite the other 40% andthen write the next chapter.
(39:20):
So my, My advice to writersis, and this is gonna sound really
silly, you gotta write.
Yeah.
If you're, if you're thinkingabout doing a book, that will not
make it happen.
Yeah.
Just spend some time writingand if you love it, keep doing it.
Well, you know, my golf gameis not as good as Tiger Woods.
Probably gonna be a little bitof a surprise to you, but me standing
(39:42):
around going, you know, I wantto be really good golfer one day.
I want to really crushstraight drives me thinking, ain't
getting.
Well, that's sort of the point.
And.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And look, some people, somepeople like to learn from others.
So go take a class, go to awriter's camp, do all that kind of
stuff.
Some people are experiential,like me.
You know, the first draft ofWilkes insurrection was 550 pages
(40:05):
long.
It was terrible.
It was way too long.
Yeah.
So I had to cut 200 pages ofwork, but I learned a ton.
Yeah.
And now I feel like I have thecore skills I need to be able to.
You know, book three will beless painful than book two.
Book two was way easier thanbook one.
Isn't that true of mosteverything once you just give it
some time?
Yeah.
(40:25):
Well, Robbie Bach the bookagain, folks.
The Blockchain Syndicate.
You got, you got three websites.
You got the blockchainsyndicate.com, you got wilksinsurrection.com.
you've got robbiebock.com.
you are covered and smothered,as we used to say in the South.
Well, and if you go torobbiebok.com, those will link to
the other two.
(40:46):
So.
But yeah, I mean, each bookneeds its own sensibility, and the
websites reflect the book.
Yeah.
I am 100% with you.
Yeah.
You go to, you go toblockchain syndicate.com, it looks
and feels exactly like the book.
And you go through it, youfeel like you're experiencing the
book in a.
In its own kind of way, butnot until you pick it up and read
(41:08):
it, which you're going to wantto do right now.
Awesome.
Now with this, you mentionedearlier that the show, that the book
was going to drop on the 22ndof 21st, which is tomorrow.
This show will drop later.
So don't be confused, listener.
By the time the show drops, the.
The.
The book will already havebeen out so just the good news is
you don't have any delays.
You can just go pick up thebook right away.
(41:30):
Yeah.
And Amazon has this amazingthing where they will deliver it
to you the next day.
They're really awesome.
So.
Or go to your local bookstore.
I love local bookstores.
Go to a local bookstore, askthem to bring it in, and they'll
bring it in quick.
Yeah.
Well, Robbie, thank you somuch for your time.
This is great.
I really enjoyed it.
Thanks for being on.
Great questions.
Love the conversation.
(41:51):
Thank you.
Number one podcast for Storiesthat Thrill the Thriller Zone.
Hello and welcome to theThriller Zone.
I'm your host, David Temple.
So glad you have joined us today.
And today we've got a veryspecial guest.
Now, this guy.
This is his second novel, andwhen you read it, you're not going
to believe it.
You're going to like.
Now, this cat's been writingfor years.
No, he's been doing otherthings for years.
Mainly one of the chiefoperating brainiacs behind a little
(00:33):
thing called the Xbox.
That's right.
Today we're talking to RobbieBach, former Xbox employee mastermind,
and now the mastermind behindthe blockchain syndicate.
Oh, baby.
If you like intrigue,assassinations, murder and mayhem.
Well, Dave, it's the Thriller Zone.
(00:54):
That's what we come here for then.
You're gonna like this book, folks.
Put your hands together,unless you're driving, of course,
for Robbie Bach, right here onthe Thriller zone.
Yeah.
And what happened to your shoulder?
Is it raining outside?
I ran through some bushes, butyes, that's why I was trying to brush
this off, because I ran through.
(01:15):
I had to go upstairs to get myheadphones because I forgot them
and they're.
The gate has some bushes nextto it, so I. I hit the bushes.
So anyway, that'll.
Hopefully that'll dry off inthe meantime.
All good.
Well, I am very glad thatyou're here.
It's so funny.
I always make all my notes.
And then this morning overbreakfast, I. I started scribbling
(01:37):
more notes.
It just kind of came to me.
So if I'm a little all overthe place, bear with me.
But that's kind of the fun andthe magic of this show.
Totally, totally happy.
Happy to go wherever you wantto go.
You direct, and I will.
I will follow.
Wow.
I like that.
So much power in my hand.
(01:57):
Now It's a Monday.
It's a Monday.
Yeah.
Where do I find you today?
I'm in Seattle.
Just outside of Seattle.
Okay.
Thus the rain.
Got it.
Yeah, it poured here yesterday.
It rained a little this morning.
You know, now we got clouds.
Then it'll have a little sun,then it'll rain again.
(02:17):
Seattle, is it true that itdoes nearly always rain, or is that
just kind of.
Is that the.
No, that's.
That's just people in Seattletrying to keep the Californians out
of here.
That's exactly what I wasgonna say.
We get.
We get probably less rain ininches than significant parts of
(02:37):
the country because we don'tget thunderstorms, we don't get heavy
rain.
The problem is we get a lot ofdays Overcast with occasional drizzle.
Okay.
I haven't used an umbrella in20 years.
Oh, see, isn't that funnybecause you.
Yeah, they have fed themachine to keep us from coming and
(03:00):
ruining everything.
The thing they tell people whomove here is it's all about the gear.
So do you have the right shoes?
Do you have the right coatwith a hood?
And do you have a four wheeldrive car?
If you got all those things,you're great.
Yeah.
You know, they say here youneed sunblock and a surfboard.
It's pretty much.
(03:21):
Wow, that works.
That works.
Yeah.
Well, today we're talkingabout the Blockchain Syndicate, Robbie
Bach, of course, our guest,and this.
Love the COVID by the way.
I don't know who did this.
Right, yeah.
So good.
Everybody who listens to theshow knows I love covers.
I have so much to talk aboutand I know we got like 30ish minutes,
(03:43):
but I'm going to cram as muchas I can.
What some of my guestlisteners do not know is that you're
kind of, I'm sure you're notthe actual brainchild, but you are
one of the, can we say,insurmountable forces behind a little
thing called the Xbox.
(04:03):
Yeah, the way to think aboutthat is I was the leader of the group.
Okay?
So my, my title was, this isthe title we made up.
My title was Chief Xbox Officer.
So I was the leader of the group.
I'm not a, I'm a productperson, but not a deep, technical
person.
So the people who created XboxLive, that'd be a guy named Jay Allard.
(04:26):
The people who created theconsole hardware, that'd be a guy
named Todd Holmdahl.
The guy who bought Halo,that'd be a guy named Ed Fries.
And I kept those guys together as.
A group, which was probablyquite a challenge in and of itself
because you're talking aboutright brain, left brain, circling
of cats, right?
(04:47):
Well, yeah, and, and I alwaystell people, the Xbox team, in my
22 years at Microsoft, thatoriginal Xbox team was by far the
most talented, individuallyincredibly talented people.
Getting them to work togetheras a team was, Was no easy feat.
And I didn't do a great job of it.
It took me probably three orfour years to sort of figure out
(05:08):
how to get everybody to sortof work together.
And the second version ofXbox, Xbox360, that team was really
humming and yeah, that was alot of fun.
Fun little note.
Everyone on the show wholistens to the show knows my wife
Tammy, who is behind that doorright now on a conference call with
a bunch of big wigs.
Otherwise she would be in herebeaming about this very thing.
(05:32):
So we're coming back from thegym this morning, it's probably about
6:45, 7 o'.
Clock.
And she goes, who's on yourpodcast today?
I said, well, little fella whohas written a very, very tasty novel,
number two, to be exact.
And, but here's something.
He's behind one of thesomething that you, you might know
(05:55):
a little something about.
And, and she's just deadpanlike this.
She goes, really?
What's that?
I said xbox.
She goes, oh.
And she just lit up.
She goes, well, tell Mr. BachI'm he pro.
Something like.
He probably built his secondhome on the amount of money I spent
on Jake, our son.
(06:16):
Right.
You know, the funny thing is Ido a lot of public speaking.
So I'll go around and, youknow, a mom or a dad will come up
and say, can I take a selfiewith you?
Not because they want theselfie, but because they want cred
with their kids.
Yeah.
And so they, they want me tosay I met the guy who helped start
Xbox.
(06:36):
And then that gives themsomehow cultural credibility.
Yeah.
And to that very same point,I'm gonna get you to say a little
shout out to Jake, becauseJake is who we were mentioning before
and he's.
I don't know if he's ever,ever even listened to my podcast.
Finds out that you're on,he'll go, oh, maybe, yeah, I think
I'll listen to that episode.
(06:57):
Hey, Jake, I, I hope you'reenjoying your Xbox.
Have fun with it and play whenyour parents aren't looking.
There you go.
Well, this.
I want to, I want to get intothe blockchain syndicate.
Another thing I love about itis the title.
And that title does a coupleof things.
(07:18):
So we, we've now establishedthe fact that you built one of the
most, you know, successfulentertainment platforms probably
in the history of mankind.
But now that you're writingthrillers about technology weaponizing
against democracy, it makes mewonder, what has that trans transition
been like?
Because I'm, I'm thinking I don't.
(07:38):
And you have two differentwebsites, which we'll talk about
in a second.
I see your corporate, youknow, speaker, champion for causes
and so forth, and I think,what is it like to go from that world
after 22 plus years and go,you know what?
Now I'm going to go solo.
We all know what that's like.
Now you're, now you're insideYour mind, you're inside your own
little world.
(07:59):
Probably spending anywherefrom a year to a year and a half,
two years crafting this thing.
What has that transition been like?
Well, I think the good news isI have a little bit of balance because
I spend almost half my timeworking with nonprofit boards, which
is an intensely social activity.
You end up in meetings.
(08:20):
I've met some just amazing people.
Boys and Girls Comes AmericaHabitat for Humanity, Bipartisan
Policy Center.
So they're great boards andthey're wonderful people.
So that's my social side.
And you're right.
When I'm writing, it's me andmy almost 14 year old lab and that's
it.
And some music in the background.
(08:41):
And so I have sort of a yinand yang about that.
I, I was, I've become prettycomfortable being by myself, but
I need the balance of beingwith other people.
And those board work is how Ireplaced all that social time for
Microsoft.
Yeah.
Okay.
That makes total sensebecause, you know, on a, on a similar
note, I was on radio shows myentire career, so.
(09:03):
And I had a team around in theroom with me.
So it's about 10 people andyou're constantly in an entourage
and then you switch to writingbooks and it's just you and you're
lonesome.
And it can be, for some peopleit's, it can be a little disconcerting
because all of a sudden youfeel lonely.
Loneliness can lead to alittle bit of, you know, myopia,
(09:23):
you know, self reflection,depression, et cetera.
But I'm with you.
That's why I love to get outand just be around people to kind
of counterbalance that thing.
I also think that myopianloneliness leads to writer's block
too.
And one of the things, one ofthe things I'm actually, you know,
fortunate is I have not had acircumstance when I'm in writing
(09:43):
where I just kind of say Idon't know what to write next.
Yeah.
And I think part of that'sbecause I'm, I'm only writing about
half the time and I've got allthese other things that are keeping
my brain engaged andgenerating new ideas and those kinds
of things.
So I think having a balance isactually really nice.
Yeah.
Well, you, you've mastered itcertainly here.
(10:04):
It's fascinating watchingsomeone who has gone from that world
and I, and you draw on somerather dark aspects.
Sure.
That many of us don't think about.
And, and I, I wonder if peoplehave approached you and said, robbie,
how much of this is real?
Because we we get this a lot.
Are you making this up?
(10:25):
Is.
Are we in that kind of a mess?
Well, I'm not making it up.
Technology.
One of the things I value inmy writing is authenticity.
Both authenticity about thecharacters and authenticity about
what's going on in the world.
So there isn't anything inhere that's just like, pulled out
of the blue technically, or.
(10:45):
Oh, that's not possible or whatever.
The thing I try to reinforcewith people is technology is just
a thing.
Technology itself is not goodor bad.
Right.
And almost every technologyever created has been used for good,
and it's been used for bad.
And so you.
You have to think about thatas you look at things.
(11:05):
I think about social media.
There's a lot of good thingsabout social media.
There's a lot of downsides onsocial media.
I think about, you know,blockchain, which is the subject
of this book.
I think about AI, which ispartially in this book and, you know,
partially something that's,you know, coming down the tracks
pretty fast at us.
Those are.
They're just technologies.
I mean, it's like, oh,somebody invented the semiconductor.
(11:27):
Was that good or bad?
No, that was just an invention.
And by the way, it's been usedfor good things and for bad things.
And so what I try to exploreis that good and bad, and it's the
classic good versus evil thatmakes thriller novels come to life.
Yeah.
I met, and I cannot recall his name.
I was on a movie set.
I was doing a small movie inthe mountains of Virginia a few years
(11:50):
back, and I met the guy whocreated the technology that took
the phone from the big casethat we used to carry down to the
miniaturization.
And I asked him this similarquestion about, you know, how, you
know, look.
Look at how technology haschanged over the years.
And he goes, well, there's alot of good that comes out of that
technology.
And, you know, people lose bad.
(12:11):
And I.
And I couldn't help but thinkabout the fact that, well, kind of
like.
Kind of like these littlemachines right here that never seem
to leave our side.
You know, we're eithercompletely addicted to them and they're
gathering all this informationfrom us, or we're just doing something
called, oh, making a phone call.
Right.
No, and look, and phones,everybody, you know, loves their
(12:35):
phone.
They're attached to their phone.
And there's a lot of good thatdoes come from that.
Sure.
But phones are now acommunication vehicle for bad people.
Yeah, I mean, that's just.
That's just a fact.
And the Technology is soubiquitous and there's so many different
ways to use it.
Then you add GPS and a fewother things and, you know, facial
recognition and other stuffthat all comes from some of the phone
(12:56):
technology.
And, you know, you have atool, and the tool can be used for
good or for bad.
Well, you.
You touched on something justa second ago that I wanted to make
sure I asked you about becauseit's so prevalent.
And ask my wife and she'lltell you.
Yeah, you only talk about it,Dave, like, every single day.
But AI, sure.
(13:16):
Do you find yourself worriedabout that again, using the good,
bad?
And do you see yourselfpotentially writing about it in the
future?
Because when I'm readingBlockchain, I'm thinking, boy, this
cat's got it dialed in for anything.
He wants to go down the AI path.
Yeah, look, blockchain, thething that's different about AI from
(13:40):
Blockchain.
Blockchain is a really cool technology.
It's very interesting.
It is not a generational shiftin how people work and compute.
AI is a generational shift.
It's like the move frommainframe computers to PCs, that
was a generational shift.
It's like the move from DOS tographical user interface in Windows,
(14:02):
that was a generational shift.
Social media was agenerational shift.
AI is a generational shift.
And so it's going to changealmost everything we experience and
do.
And I am not a. I'm a believerthat there's a bunch of things AI
will do.
I think about medicine.
It has the potential to makeour healthcare system dramatically
better.
Not because we're going toreplace doctors, because we're not.
(14:23):
But if you're a doctor andyou're trying to understand somebody's
condition and you have theability to describe that condition
and get some guideposts froman AI agent who can.
Who has collected data fromaround the world, that's powerful.
Yeah.
And at the same time, AI canbe used to fake an ad, fake an action,
(14:43):
create a character that didn'texist, create a digital twin for
somebody and make it look likethey're someplace else.
There's really bad things thatcould come from it.
It's rich fodder.
Look, if you're a thrillerwriter, it's rich fodder.
No debate.
Yeah, yeah.
And.
And don't think I'm not usingit to its absolute fullest opportunity
in my current book that I'mworking on right now.
(15:05):
Yeah.
All right, so I'll tell you soin this book, I didn't use in Blockchain.
Syndicate.
I didn't use AI to write asingle word, so the book is all mine.
I did use it dramatically in marketing.
Oh, yeah?
How do you do a summary of the book?
I literally gave AI the bookand said, tell me how to summarize
(15:25):
this.
There's a video trailer on mywebsite, the blockchain syndicate.com
as a trailer for the movie.
The script and the video forthat trailer was all done in AI.
They say the dead don't sendemails, but there it was in my inbox.
A message from someone Iwatched die.
(15:48):
Someone who knew secrets thatcould destroy everything I've built.
I'm Senator Tamika Smith, exAir Force.
I've served my country in warzones and Washington.
I thought I'd seen every kindof enemy.
I was wrong.
(16:08):
When they took Johnny,kidnapped him in broad daylight after
his daughter was shot, I knewthis wasn't random.
Someone wanted me broken.
Someone wanted America broken.
The FBI calls it sophisticated professional.
A shadow network usingblockchain technology to hide in
(16:28):
plain sight.
But I've learned somethingabout shadows.
They only exist where there'slight to cast them.
They're threatening democracyitself, using our own technology
against us, turning ourdigital infrastructure into a weapon.
But I didn't survive combatmissions to surrender to cowards
hiding behind computer screens.
(16:50):
They want to fix America their way.
They'll have to go through me first.
Some fights choose you.
This one chose wrong.
The Blockchain Syndicate.
When the ledger finallybalances, justice will be the only
currency that matters.
And, you know, it cost me $300.
I mean, it was great, right?
(17:10):
It was awesome.
So there are ways to use itthat I think are really responsible
and supportive, but the corecreative work has come for me.
Well, and let's.
Let's break that down for asecond, because core creative is
nuance.
It's emotion, it's empathy.
It's so many of the tinylittle things.
And yes, I know AI is gettingsmarter by.
(17:32):
Not the day, the minute, butstill, there's a matter of reasoning
and emotion, maybe intellect,heart, things like that.
So I'm with you.
I.
So many of the red threads inthe Blockchain Syndicate are.
I mean, there's a bunch ofthem that are about the core plot
of the book, obviously.
Yeah.
But a bunch of the red threadsare about the characters themselves.
(17:55):
Yeah.
And emotion.
And I don't.
I. I have to come up with that.
That has to come from me.
Sure.
And.
And back to your point.
It is hard not to use something.
And.
And, folks, hear me out hereon this, because Robbie just said
this.
The amount it really comesdown to, let's be honest, it's about
(18:15):
the amount of time and moneythat you can save.
Now, do I feel badly that I'mputting a copywriter out of business?
No, because.
Oh, that's right.
I'm a novel writer, so I'mwriting the copy myself.
I'm just trying to make.
Yeah, I'm just trying to makeit better, more polished, faster,
(18:35):
more easily digestible,whatever the word is.
And it's really about expediency.
And to your second point iswhen you can make a TV commercial
slash trailer for $300 versus3,000 or 30,000, it kind of begs
the question, wouldn't it makemore sense to put that money into
(18:56):
marketing things that reallyare tangible than otherwise?
No, that's exactly right.
And that's sort of the way Iviewed it.
And the other thing I willsay, I think you have a responsibility
to tell people whensomething's been AI generated.
So, like my video is, it sayscreated using the following AI tool.
And I think that's a, it'skind of like footnoting a piece of
(19:18):
work, and I think that's valuable.
And I don't think anybody'sgoing to fault you for that.
I mean, who in the wide worldof Xbox would fault you for taking
the time to save time andmoney when you're saying, hey, by
the way, this created by me,that created by some force out there.
Yeah.
Yeah.
All right, we've, we've kickedthat one.
(19:40):
So it's nice to see SenatorTamika Smith back now.
We met her first in the WilkesInsurrection, which came out, I want
to say, 21.
Yep, good memory.
All right, so four, fouryears, which I'm hoping that we don't
have to wait another fouryears for the next one, because when
you dive into this, when yougo, robbie, please, for the love
(20:02):
of God, don't make me wait for years.
Well, that's.
I, I, I hope not to wait that wait.
I hope not to wait that long.
I have some ideas already.
Yeah, I, I, I wouldn't be surprised.
I was going to say, David, areyou kidding me?
It's, it's right over there inthe box.
I, I finished it last night.
(20:23):
Well, I don't want to spoilanything, but how does she, Senator
Tamika, how does she evolve,grow, mature between Wilkes Insurrection
and now Blockchain Syndicate?
Well, I think in WilkesInsurrection, her motivation is more
about what I would callmilitary duty.
(20:45):
You know, that book startswith her still serving as A reservist
in the military.
And so she has this patriotismand sense of duty that comes from
her family background, herfamily experience.
And she's living that out inwhat she does in Blockchain Syndicate.
She's made this transition tobeing in the U.S. senate, and now
(21:08):
there's a focus on democracy,governance, how we lead people.
And so there's still that sameinternal drive and focus on doing
the right thing, but it comesfrom a slightly different sensibility.
And she's engaged in acompletely different set of activities.
And in Wilkes instruction,she's wrestling with a terrorist
(21:32):
in blockstling with bothpoliticians and others.
And it's just a different.
It's a different environmentfor her.
And so she has to learn herway through that.
And I'll be honest, the reasonI asked that question is because
I did not read your first book.
I apologize right out of the gate.
I should have read everysingle solitary thing I get my hands
(21:53):
on, but yet I didn't.
Now, this book opens with aschool shooting.
That's not what it seems.
And again, I don't want tospoil it, but it is a hell of a way
to start.
And it begged the question.
As I'm sitting there reading,I'm like, I wonder how Robbie felt.
Was he a little bit nervousabout using school violence as a
(22:14):
plot device, given where it isin our world today?
It's an excellent question.
And here's what I would say.
I. I think about my books as areflection of contemporary society.
So when there are things thatare real happening.
I mean, in WilkesInsurrection, there's an attack,
(22:37):
multiple attacks, lots ofpeople die.
And do I feel bad about that?
I mean, I feel for the people,even though they're fictional.
I feel for them, sure.
But.
But I.
You know, unfortunately, thisis where we are.
Yeah.
School shootings.
I mean, every child in.
In an American school knowswhat the protocol is if there's an
(22:59):
active shooter on campus.
Yeah.
And that may be sad, we maynot like that, but it's the reality
of what's going on, and wejust have to deal with that.
And so I don't.
I don't feel like I should shyaway from those types of things.
I think that's an importantthing to just take on head on and
deal with it.
Yeah.
And you said the word that wascoming out of my mind just the minute
(23:23):
you said it was.
How sad it is that we havethis mirror that we have to hold
up to ourselves as we see theway society has gone.
Oh, it's Almost like, oh,what's that, honey?
Oh, another school shooting.
Oh, it's terrible.
Well, and this is why you haveto write about it.
(23:43):
Yeah.
Because you have to forcepeople to, you know, hopefully over
time people have a connectionto the characters in my books.
And if you have a connectionto Phoenix Humboldt or Tamika Smith
or Bryce Raskovich, allimportant characters in the story,
that shooting is an emotionalevent for you.
It's not just something thathappened on the news someplace.
(24:05):
Yeah.
And you know, we have to bringthese things into our conscience,
into our, the part of ourmorality and our soul that deals
with them.
And the only way to do that isto confront them.
And you can't, you can't skirtaround that.
This is, this show is allabout you.
But I'm going to mentionanother author because when I was
reading this book, I thought,oh, Robbie has got to read this book.
(24:29):
And I don't generally do this.
I don't recommend otherauthors to the authors I'm talking
to because I don't want to, Idon't want to steal your thunder.
But the reason I do this is asimilarity and a powerful story,
but even more so because ofwhat you just said.
We have to write books like this.
(24:50):
And it's a book by EricRickstead called Lilith L I L I T
H. This is probably one of themost emotionally riveting books and
I'm not going to tell you asingle thing about it, but just trust
me and pick it up.
I just, I, I just put it on my list.
I, look, I write in thethriller genre for sure and I write
(25:14):
techno thrillers.
I think the best part, theparts of my books that I love the
most are the character driventhemes and plot lines that flow through
it.
Well, and, and so for me, themain plot line is super interesting,
super exciting, super meaningful.
And I have to use that tocreate my, the thriller environment.
But I love Tamika's story, Ilove Bryce's story, I love Phoenix
(25:37):
Humboldt story.
They're important.
Well, and I want to, I want to bounce.
I'm going to bounce back andforth a little.
Couple more things betweenyour Microsoft years, your board
work with the Olympiccommittee, civic involvement, which
you do a lot of, and otherbusinesses, you're involved in one
of them.
I have a note here that I wantto make sure I do not forget because
(25:57):
it lit me up this morning.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna come backto that.
But you've seen how poweractually operates behind closed doors.
So how much of Rally Americaand Break down for me, for my listeners,
what Rally America is and howmuch of that Rally America conspiracy
mirrors real dynamics thatyou've witnessed in boardrooms and
(26:19):
policy circles that you'vebeen in.
Yeah.
So think of Rally America inthe non digital world.
Rally America is a crimesyndicate and there's a syndicate
boss.
Now, what's unique about RallyAmerica in this book is nobody who's
in the syndicate knows anybodyelse in the syndicate because of
blockchain.
(26:40):
Right.
And nobody knows who theleader is, which is why the leader
set it up that way.
And so there's this sort ofanalog part of the story that is,
oh, this is a mafia syndicate,I get that, but it's not a mafia
syndicate.
Nobody knows who the don is.
There's no family.
Right.
And the FBI and theauthorities chasing after it can't
(27:02):
treat it like a mafia syndicate.
So that, to me is the magic ofRally America and why it plays kind
of a pivotal role in the bookand the direction it goes.
You know, do I think that isgoing on in the world today?
Crime syndicates have beengoing on since the 1500s.
(27:24):
So yeah.
So I don't think,unfortunately, I don't think that
part of human nature has changed.
Right.
Are they going working exactlythe way Rally America works?
Using blockchain to hide their identities?
Maybe.
It's not like I wrote aboutone I knew about, but the technology's
there.
Yeah.
I mean, it's not, it's not,it's not magic.
(27:46):
It's.
It's actually real.
Now, I want to.
I want you to talk to me aboutthis female Russian assassin that
you have hunting throughoutthe story.
Talk to me about her.
And, and how, how do you makesomeone so ruthless, so cunning and
ruthless, but yet alsocompelling that readers just going
(28:07):
to hang on every little aspectof it?
Yeah.
Nazian Drop off is aninteresting character.
And, you know, as I waswriting, I had the idea that there
would be somebody who would dothe shooting at school.
I didn't have the idea thatthat character would then become
a main character.
And then I did what I do withall characters.
I wrote a little backstory andthen I started writing the backstory
(28:30):
and she starts to become real.
And now you start to realize,okay, this is a woman who's motivated
by something and hermotivation is about Russia.
This isn't giving anything away.
People will find this out inthe book pretty quickly.
She's motivated about MotherRussia because of her family history
and her family background.
And so now you start to putthat together and then you plop her
(28:51):
in my favorite country in theworld, the Netherlands, which is
a really nice, sweet place.
So she has to be nice andsweet because she's hiding in plain
sight.
And so you have this.
Now she becomes threedimensional for me and she's not
just a one dimensional or twodimensional sort of stock villain
(29:14):
now.
She's a human and she hasthese characteristics and she talks
with her cat and she has fearsand anxieties and, and yet she is
determined and ruthless atwhat she does.
So she's a great foil for Tamika.
And that's, that's the, thelogic of the, of the story.
Two things there.
I was going to say, reason Iloved her so much was it was a great
(29:36):
polar opposite of your mainprotagonist, which of course you
want.
But the other thing was, andyou took the words right out of my
mouth, I'm like, she wasn't,you know, she wasn't a cardboard
cutout, standard littleruthless killer, blah, blah, blah.
There was this character, andI talked to my wife about this all
the time about why we're soattracted to certain shows and, or
(29:57):
characters inside of shows.
Like we just wrapped thisseries called Task.
Yep.
Which I won't.
Okay, you know what it is?
I'm not going to bore mylisteners with it, but the, the,
the reason I think it was sosuccessful, besides it was great
acting and a good story.
But it was the fact that inall this brokenness and murder and
(30:17):
mayhem and, and, and stolendrugs and money and all that stuff,
it was the characters that shecared about and the heart that wove
the story together.
I would never have.
Matter of fact, I was late tothe game.
She started it first.
I saw her keep watching.
I'm like, okay, I gotta, Igotta dive out.
Because I'd walk through theroom and I saw.
(30:38):
What's this?
Oh yeah, water.
It's another one of those shows.
Yeah.
And then I, by about thethird, second or third episode, I'm
like, holy, this thing is dynamite.
And then by the wrap, whenyou're sitting there almost crying,
these biker gangs and, and thestory that unfolds characters is
(30:58):
what I'm getting at.
Sorry, I'm going off thebeaten path.
But characters in the heart,which is what you did here.
Yeah.
Well, look, I'm a huge fan of ncis.
Yeah.
And you know, there's greatstorylines, really good writing,
some incredible acting.
But for me, the heart of thatstory obviously is Jethro Gibbs.
(31:19):
And in part because his lifebackground is so fascinating and
there's so many Dimensions tohim as a character and who he is.
And he's crotchety, but he has heart.
He's a soldier, but, you know,he's compassionate.
You know, the story worksbecause the plotting is great and
the acting is quite good.
But to me, it works becausehis character comes to life.
(31:42):
And I think with him leavingthe show, it's been harder because,
you know, you don't feel thatconnection to his character as much.
Yeah.
Well, we start to wrap up.
You left some threads hangingpotentially for some more books.
I'm just going to say, folks, I'm.
That's.
I'm not spoiling anythinghere, but Tamika feels like it's
(32:04):
just.
It's just my opinion here, buddy.
Feels like a little bit ofRobbie's Jack Reacher, because I
think I see where we have yetanother conspiracy.
As though she didn't haveenough on her plate already.
I know that you gotta be.
And we mentioned it earlier,but come on, give me some inside
scoop.
Well, the.
The thing to.
(32:26):
The thing to focus on whenyou're writing, when you start to
decide that you're going towrite a series.
So now you have threads withinthe story.
So threads within, in thiscase, a book, but now you have to
have threads that go acrossbooks as well.
Yep.
And so there clearly are somethreads for her and for a couple
(32:46):
other characters in the story.
Bryce Raskovich has somethreads that run across books.
In this story, Jerry Jessup'snot done.
He has a thread.
Threads that run across this.
So there are characters thatrun across this that I think the
way I say it is this.
I'm their curator for theirstory, and they have more to tell.
And I think of myself as their.
(33:09):
As the person who brings themto life.
Yeah.
Well, let me ask you aboutGreenleaf Book Group Press.
I had not heard of them before.
This is the publishing group,I'm assuming.
Yes.
Is this Seattle?
I'm just curious.
No, no.
They're based in Texas.
(33:31):
Greenleaf's what's called ahybrid publisher.
So in a traditional publishingmodel, they buy your book or you
self publish, which is yousubcontract everything.
Greenleaf is that beautifulthing in between where they don't
buy my book, but I contractwith them to do all the work.
And so they're a mainline publisher.
They do everything a publisher does.
They do editorial, they do copyright.
(33:52):
They do all the things they do.
They did that beautiful cover.
They do all the distributionand everything.
I still own the book.
And so it's a.
It's a nice mix of ofprofessional publishing.
And they're really good.
They've done both my fictionnovels and they're, they're spectacular.
(34:13):
And yet there's work I have todo because I'm the owner of the intellectual
property.
Well, a little inside scoop,RB is the fact that you go to any
traditional house right now,and this is so funny, I'm talking
to my friends who have justlanded deals and they turn to me.
I'm a self published guy, bythe way.
Sure.
And they turn to me and theygo, you know, Dave, I was kind of
(34:34):
expecting me to just walk inand go, you know, somebody signed
me a great big fat check andme go write the next book.
And someone says, and hey, youguys got this right?
Because I got another book to write.
And then like, no, booby, yougotta go out there and hammer the
streets yourself.
Totally.
And you know, the public, thepublicity and all the work you do,
no matter who you sign with,you have to do it yourself.
(34:57):
Yeah.
And so for me, theintellectual freedom.
And I get to decide the titleof the book, I get to pick the COVID
They're wonderful aboutpresenting options and I get to make
those decisions.
And that to me has been leftme with some creative freedom, which
I really enjoy.
Well, call me crazy, and youjust laid this on me right now, so
(35:17):
I haven't really had a time todigest it, but it sounds like I'm
going to call it Best of All Worlds.
Well, here's the only, here'sthe only challenge.
You pay them up front.
So.
Right.
So, you know, this is the,this is the slight advantage of 22
years at Microsoft.
During, during really good years.
You have to put up, you haveto put up your own capital to make
(35:39):
it happen.
Now if you're doing selfpublishing, you do as well.
So that's not completelydifferent from that.
But I just love the idea thatI have seasoned professionals doing
the work and the idea thatthere's one person who is making
sure everything stays on track.
Here's the other secret.
From the time they first readthe book to tomorrow's publishing
(36:01):
date is nine months.
Wow.
Yeah.
That is.
Now that's an anomaly, am I right?
I mean, we're talking, I hear,I hear two, two years to two and
a half, kind of as the sweet.
Spot, which, well, atraditional publisher has a list
(36:24):
of books they're going topublish and they have a schedule.
Yeah.
And so they can only releasecertain books at certain times.
Greenleaf doesn't have that.
And so they, in fact, in theircase, the faster the Better.
So they basically said, look,if you want to launch before the
holiday, here's your schedule.
You're going to have to doediting with us on this schedule.
And I said, sign me up.
I want to launch before the holiday.
(36:45):
Yeah.
And so that's where we are.
Here's another question.
Were they also responsible foryour two stunningly handsome and
I mean that websites, they are not.
Okay, so I did that.
My nephew, Matt Brown is aprofessional website developer who
(37:07):
now runs a travel service.
Not a travel agency, but atravel service.
But he got into that throughwebsite design.
And he does really, reallygood work.
I love working with him.
He's great.
Dude, between your book coversand your websites, I think they are
absolutely right, tip top, onpar with all the biggies.
(37:31):
Well, it's, that's great to hear.
I mean, I, I, I love the workthey do.
Greenleaf is awesome.
Matt's, you know, obviouslyhe's my nephew.
He's a great, he's a greatfriend and he's just really talented
at what he does.
Yeah.
Well, it does start withtalent in that big chair right there.
Mr.
I'm going to say that.
And I do always wrap all myshows with this one closing question.
(37:52):
And it is a best writing advice.
Now, I know, I know you'reonly two books in, but I bet you
some of the wisdom that you'reabout to bestow upon us will reflect
a little bit of your 22 plusat the, @ Microsoft.
Because there's going to beadvice that trickles down in that
because that business adviceand acumen is probably going to help
(38:17):
direct some of that writingadvice as well.
Yes.
Yeah, I suppose that's true.
The thing I would say topeople who are looking to write a
book, you have to just start.
I mean, this is the hardest thing.
The number of people I talk towho say, yeah, I've thought about
writing a book and I kind ofwant to respond to them and say,
(38:37):
well, thinking ain't going tomake it happen.
You might want to sit down andstart writing.
And so for me, my firstfiction novel started with a hundred
pages of character sketches offive people.
No plot, no genre.
Tamika wasn't intended to bethe main character.
I wrote a hundred pages and Ijust kept writing.
(38:57):
I didn't worry about the quality.
I didn't try to like, oh, thatparagraph wrong, whatever.
I just wrote.
And once I got into that flow,I now am comfortable just sitting
down saying, all right, I'mgoing to write the next chapter.
I have no outline for my Books.
I'm going to write the nextchapter and I'll come back the next
day and say, 60% of that was great.
I'll rewrite the other 40% andthen write the next chapter.
(39:20):
So my, My advice to writersis, and this is gonna sound really
silly, you gotta write.
Yeah.
If you're, if you're thinkingabout doing a book, that will not
make it happen.
Yeah.
Just spend some time writingand if you love it, keep doing it.
Well, you know, my golf gameis not as good as Tiger Woods.
Probably gonna be a little bitof a surprise to you, but me standing
(39:42):
around going, you know, I wantto be really good golfer one day.
I want to really crushstraight drives me thinking, ain't
getting.
Well, that's sort of the point.
And.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And look, some people, somepeople like to learn from others.
So go take a class, go to awriter's camp, do all that kind of
stuff.
Some people are experiential,like me.
You know, the first draft ofWilkes insurrection was 550 pages
(40:05):
long.
It was terrible.
It was way too long.
Yeah.
So I had to cut 200 pages ofwork, but I learned a ton.
Yeah.
And now I feel like I have thecore skills I need to be able to.
You know, book three will beless painful than book two.
Book two was way easier thanbook one.
Isn't that true of mosteverything once you just give it
some time?
Yeah.
(40:25):
Well, Robbie Bach the bookagain, folks.
The Blockchain Syndicate.
You got, you got three websites.
You got the blockchainsyndicate.com, you got wilksinsurrection.com.
you've got robbiebock.com.
you are covered and smothered,as we used to say in the South.
Well, and if you go torobbiebok.com, those will link to
the other two.
(40:46):
So.
But yeah, I mean, each bookneeds its own sensibility, and the
websites reflect the book.
Yeah.
I am 100% with you.
Yeah.
You go to, you go toblockchain syndicate.com, it looks
and feels exactly like the book.
And you go through it, youfeel like you're experiencing the
book in a.
In its own kind of way, butnot until you pick it up and read
(41:08):
it, which you're going to wantto do right now.
Awesome.
Now with this, you mentionedearlier that the show, that the book
was going to drop on the 22ndof 21st, which is tomorrow.
This show will drop later.
So don't be confused, listener.
By the time the show drops, the.
The.
The book will already havebeen out so just the good news is
you don't have any delays.
You can just go pick up thebook right away.
(41:30):
Yeah.
And Amazon has this amazingthing where they will deliver it
to you the next day.
They're really awesome.
So.
Or go to your local bookstore.
I love local bookstores.
Go to a local bookstore, askthem to bring it in, and they'll
bring it in quick.
Yeah.
Well, Robbie, thank you somuch for your time.
This is great.
I really enjoyed it.
Thanks for being on.
Great questions.
Love the conversation.
(41:51):
Thank you.
Number one podcast for Storiesthat Thrill the Thriller Zone.
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