Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
I'm very excited to have Taylor Moore back on the show.
While I was on vacation, I read his latest Cold Trail,
the fourth book in the Garrett Cole series, and we
got a lot to talk about.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
But I also want to mention to listeners.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
If I were to ask you a question, what are
these what do these people all have in common? Jack Carr,
Nilson de mill Mark, Grainey, Brad Taylor.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
What do all of these guys have in common?
Speaker 1 (00:27):
You might say, well, they're among the best thriller novelists
anywhere ever, and I'd say that's true, although the right
answer is that they've all been guests on my show
multiple times.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
As has Taylor Moore now.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
And the other reason I mentioned it to you is
all those guys are have blurbs on the back of
Taylor's new book talking about how.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Great the Garrett Cole series is.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
Taylor Moore is back on the show, former CIO officer
and best selling thriller writer, joining us from his home
in Texas. Hey, Taylor, it's good to see you again.
Speaker 3 (00:59):
Rush to see again. Thanks for having me on.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
Yeah, glad to do it.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Before we talk about the book, I want to ask you,
as a former spook and I mean you, not me,
And I don't know just how spooky you were in
your in your spook work.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
But dude, what about that? What about that operation.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
Planting bombs in the hesbalot pagers? Do you want to
say anything about that?
Speaker 4 (01:21):
Here's what I'll say that, Yeah, it's just insane. And
in fact that I was telling somebody the other day
that if I wrote it into my books, it would
be too over the top, it would be too bizarre.
People who say this could never happen, but they did it.
So yeah, I was just amazed by that.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
I had that same reaction. In fact, I said that
to listeners earlier.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
If you read it in a thriller novel, you'd say, now,
that's that's too silly, that's beyond belief.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
And yet and yet they did it. Just an unbelievable thing.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
So Garrett Cole has become a big hit, and he's
a really interesting, unusual thriller character.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
And we've talked about this with each one of your books.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
But just give us a sense for listeners who don't
know about Garrett Cole, what this guy is like and
what you think makes him different from you know, the
characters of other thriller writers.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
Yeah, I think he is different. I'm glad you noticed that.
Speaker 4 (02:17):
You know, a lot of these guys are sort of
these over the top action heroes, and Garrett, just by
his own background, he has the sort of the definition
of it. He's a former Green Beret, he's a dea
special Agent. He's done these sort of over the top
outlandish you know, had this.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
Kind of wild career. But forget, he just wants to
come back home. The book is set, you know.
Speaker 4 (02:39):
Of course he's been all around the world, but the
book is set in the high planes of Texas, and
so he's just coming back, trying to get his ranch
established where he grew up.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
And so he's sort of just in every man in
a way. He has this background, but he just wants
to be left alone.
Speaker 4 (02:54):
He for the most part, tries to stay out of trouble,
tries to avoid trouble, but somehow it always seems to
find him.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
And so, unlike.
Speaker 4 (03:02):
A lot of the protagonists you read about and thriller
series that are you know, maybe they're a current CIA
or Seal or whatever, they are out there sort of
in the mix.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Garrett trying to get and get that behind him.
Speaker 4 (03:13):
He wants a normal life, and of course for me
as the author, I can't let that happen because that's
the end of the series.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
Right.
Speaker 4 (03:19):
So Garrett always finds himself in trouble, but he's never
looking for it.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
It's this book is also, as you touched on, all
of these books are geographically interesting in the sense that well,
a fair bit of this book does take place in
another country, but most of your stories, of the Garrett
Cole stories take place in a part of the country
that really nobody writes about.
Speaker 2 (03:45):
Since maybe I don't know Louis Lamore or something.
Speaker 3 (03:48):
Yeah, you know, it's interesting.
Speaker 4 (03:50):
And you mentioned the Hesbela of the Pagers and all that,
And just like I said, if I wrote it, it's
two over the top the things that happen here on
the Texas high Planes and the Texas Panhandle. It's so
we're so far removed from everything, it's so by itself
and lonesome. And I tell you, I actually do tone
down the stories. And I tell people this all the time.
(04:11):
They probably don't believe me. I know they they seem
over the top. I tone it down because you know,
being former CIA, people always tell me, hey, here's going on.
You know, what's going on with the cartel, or here's
what the Russians are doing, or here's what's happening. I
actually tone it down because if I put in the
books some of the things that I hear, it'd be
two over the top.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Wow. Interesting. Uh.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
One of the things that I have never seen uh
to in any significant degree in a thriller writer. And
you you keep going with this consistently, is have you
have a very important character who's a kid, and and
you you talk about the mind of the kid and
the ways the teenagers think. And I think that's really
(04:54):
really interesting. And I've asked you about this before with
at least one, probably more than one.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
Of the previous books.
Speaker 1 (04:59):
But why is it important to you to have a
teenager as an important character in your thrillers?
Speaker 3 (05:05):
I think for me it was.
Speaker 4 (05:07):
You know, when I started to set out to do
this series, I was reading a lot of books.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
I'd go to the library and just.
Speaker 4 (05:11):
Readbook after a book, and I find myself entertained, and
I thought they were interesting. But some of these books
I could read hundred and fifty pages and put them down.
And what I realized is that I wasn't really invested
in the characters. And the reason I wasn't because their
their lifestyle and who they were. It was so beyond
who I was that it didn't resonate with me. Well,
(05:33):
I wanted a character like Garrett, who is again sort
of your every man. So he has a teenager, you
know what I mean, So you know, it resonates with
people who have kids, and so Garrett gets themselves in
embarrassing situations. He gets himself in a situation where he's
got this teenage kid and doesn't know always know how
to handle them.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
And we see it from.
Speaker 4 (05:52):
The point of view from the kid, because even though
he's from another country, he faces the same struggles. He
gets bullied, he has girls that he likes, he wants
to be cool, he wants to be you know, have
worth on the ranch.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
And so all those.
Speaker 4 (06:04):
Things I thought were important to put in the book,
because again, not everybody can can you know, hopefully you
don't have a situation where a cartel sakario has tried
to kill you. But but everybody has a kid or
a teenager, or has had family drama or some kind
of a falling out at some point with family, and
so that's the kind of things that I like to
put in the book because I think we can all
(06:24):
relate to that.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
I want readers to relate to Garrett Cole.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
We're talking with Taylor Moore about his fourth novel in
the Garrett Cole series. It's Kohl as the character's last name,
and the book is called Cold Trail. It came out
about a week ago, and you should.
Speaker 2 (06:40):
Go buy it and read it right now.
Speaker 1 (06:43):
I would say with Taylor's books, it would benefit you
a bit to read them in all, to read them
all in order.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
But I wouldn't say it's an absolute requirement.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
You could have never read a Garrett Cole story and
pick this up and absolutely love it.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Do you think that's fair?
Speaker 1 (07:01):
Are you trying to write books that people need to
read them all in order or not?
Speaker 4 (07:05):
No, that's absolutely fair and exactly what you said. So
each book I write it as a standalone story. However,
the stories do build, so if you want to know,
you know about the family. So each book is about
nine months later, so it does build on each other.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
But they but you could read each one.
Speaker 4 (07:22):
And I've had people and I'll ask, like, you know,
you read the third one and then I'll say, yeah,
I went back and read the first and second after that,
and they're like, no, it was it was fine, it
didn't bother me.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
So ever you want to read them, that's up to
the reader, all.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
Right, So let's just take a couple minutes, and I
don't want to spoil much, but I just want to
take a couple of minutes roughly on the on the
plot of the book, or at least the part of
the plot of the book that takes place in Texas.
We'll let people read the book to get the overseas park.
But a lot in your stories has to do with
(07:55):
scheming and crimes and other things surrounding the fact that
there's a lot of money in oil and there's a
lot of oil.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
In Texas and natural gas.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Yeah. Yeah, the story, I mean, the reality of the
world right now lends itself to.
Speaker 4 (08:12):
A lot of crime and corrupt corruption and graft and
all those things. And so so yeah, we start out
with a liquified liquified natural gas facility being built on
the Texas coast, and there's a pipeline leading up to that.
So basically this isn't going to give too much away
for people that like to come into a book fresh,
but almost immediately there's an explosion that takes place near
(08:35):
the ranch, and then another one takes place, and at
first everything looks like this accident, but you realize, with billions,
we're talking about tens of billions at stake here, it
makes room for a lot of corruption, and we, of
course Garrett is right there in the middle of it,
and he starts tracking down who's behind it. So like
with all the books that you know you've read, there's
(08:56):
a lot of twists and turns, and I hopefully try
to throw people off the sand and put them in
different directions, but you'll follow that trail and eventually find
out who's behind it.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
Yeah, you did. You did fool me a time or two,
which is good. And i'd also note just for for
listeners who will go read Cold Trail. You I'm sure
you've heard the stories, and I've talked about him on
the show, although not not that recently, that there was
a lot of funding of anti oil and anti gas
(09:26):
stuff in America by Vladimir Putin, who didn't want us
to produce our own fossil fuels because if we did,
it would drive down the price of oil and he
would make less money. Now that in a direct way
is no part of Taylor's book. But what I'm alluding
to is the idea that there are quote unquote environmental
groups out there that might have something going on behind
(09:50):
the scenes that isn't what it seems like, and that
that could be part of Taylor Moore's book, Cold Trail.
So one last, one last thing with you, Taylor. I
I wonder if you laughed out loud, because I did
laugh out loud in a you know, laughing with you,
not at you kind of way. I had Don Bentley
on the show recently, who just picked up the Mitch
(10:11):
Rap series, and little did I know that Taylor Moore
was moonlighting as an intel officer or something, you know, like.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
Hanging out with Mitt Trap. So what's it like hanging
out with Mitchrap?
Speaker 4 (10:22):
Yeah, you know.
Speaker 3 (10:22):
So I'm in that book, and I'm in Steve Verzeni's book.
Speaker 4 (10:26):
I don't know if you've had him on, but apparently
I'm the president in that book. And I think Simon
Dravais had me in one too. So somehow I keep
ending up in all these books, and so we like
to do that. We plant little easter eggs, and there's
Easter eggs in my own and so we have fun
with the authors, have a lot of fun because we're
friends and it's a small community and it's a tight knit,
close community, and so yeah, Don's a good friend.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
So I appreciate that.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
Fabulous.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Well, look, maybe for the next book, I'd love to
host you.
Speaker 2 (10:54):
For an event in Denver.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
I've done several for Jack Carr and I had Daniel
Silva and you know, and I'd love to have you
if we can work that out for the next.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
Book anytime, folks.
Speaker 2 (11:08):
All Right, Taylor Moore's new thriller is called Cold Trail.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
All of his thrillers are really thrilling, and that's why
you've got these blurbs by people like Jack Carr and
Mark Graeney saying how great the books are. Because they are.
It was a perfect book for me to read on
the vacation that I just finished. So Taylor, thank you
for entertaining me again and thank you for your service
to our country.
Speaker 3 (11:30):
Thanks for having me on. I'm glad you enjoyed the book.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
All right, we'll talk again.