The Buddies finally crack open an airport bookstore staple with James Patterson’s 1993 debut of Alex Cross, “Along Came a Spider.” The Buddies debate whether Cross is a devoted single dad or a hypocrite who hates the media right up until he needs a favor, why the D.C. police desperately needed a PR person, and who thought hypnotizing the defendant in the middle of a trial was a good idea. Plus, they dig into Patterson’s 300-book co-author empire, mount a passionate defense of Yorkshire pudding, and debate the merits of the egg-and-jelly omelette. So, stop saying “cool bean” and sneaking sneaking in the back door with Sampson, and instead join us to chat about an Alex Cross original.

Intro (0:00-1:39)

Stock Up/Down (1:40-34:23)

Favorite Scene/Love/Hate (35:26-48:29)

Movie/TV Show Discussion (48:30-51:28)

Conclusion (51:29-53:45) 

NEXT BOOK: Small Mercies by Dennis Lehane

Transcript for SEO purposes 🙂

All right, welcome buddy, welcome.
I’m Dylan here with my fellow backdoor man, Keith. What’s up buddy?
I’m here with Dylan who may have to change his catchphrase from cool beans to something else.
What’s that for?
The serial killer guy would just be like, “Kill someone, be like cool beans.”
Oh yeah, sure, sure.
Did you catch Alex Cross and his buddy doing the, he’s like, “Yeah, we’re the backdoor guys.”
I was like, “Huh? What?”
No, I’m a side.
Yeah, it was like, “Why would you say that about yourself?”
It seems a little weird.
Yeah, but here at the buddy book called “We’re Read As The Best Selling”
this week we’ll be discussing James Patterson’s first novel, published in 1993,
A Long Came A Spider.
If you’d like to recommend a book for us to read or read, just read past episodes.
You can visit our website, but at bookup.com.
Slide into our DMs on X or Instagram, that’s buddy book called “Park Asking Let’s Just High
Teen Spontify Wherever You Are.”
You’re podcasting, please download and subscribe to us, five star review, please.
And thanks Keith, “A Long Came A Spider.”
It’s the first Alex Cross book.
It’s a 4.13 in Goodreads, 500,000 ratings.
I kind of thought it would be more because who’s more read?
I feel like then James Patterson books.
You go into a airport library or airport bookstore or whatever,
and it’s just full, right?
So many James Patterson books.
This is the first of the Alex Cross books, like I said.
I think there’s 30 of them or something absurd.
Oh, really?
Yeah.
And we’ll get into a little bit more of James Patterson’s prolific writing career.
Yeah, I guess we’ll jump into it with some stock-up stock down for “A Long Came A Spider”
Keith. What do you have for your stock-up?
A stock-up having a likable lead character?
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, I didn’t think I’d have to be buying this stock.
I mean, we’ve read a ton of action thrillers.
We’ve had a bunch of Mitch Raps.
We’ve had a bunch of other lead characters.
They all have their flaws.
They all, the other day, though, you’re kind of rooting for them and respect them.
I got to say, I didn’t really like Alex Cross at all.
Oh!
I don’t know if it’s just me.
And it makes sense that they cast it for the movie, “Morgan Freeman,”
because no one can’t love “Morgan Freeman.”
You know, everyone loves “Morgan Freeman,” so you’re like,
All right, in order to get rid of this image that we have in the book, we got to get Morgan Freeman in here, which made a lot of sense.
But I came to the conclusion after they arrest Gary and Alex Cross is like,
Well, I need to be the one that’s like psychovalued.
They’re like, “No, we don’t want this, dude.
We don’t want to get any out to this guy.
Let’s just fucking put him in the chain,
lock him up, get the fucking rid of him,” which I’m like, “100%.
Yeah.”
And Alex Cross is like, “No, I need to understand his brain.
I’m a doctor.”
And I’m like, “Okay.”
And so instead of convincing, using power of persuasion,
he goes to the media, which he’s criticized the whole book.
And is like, “Yeah, I need to be on the case.
So why don’t you write a story about how I should be on the case?”
So this is just a selfish, personal thing.
It didn’t make any sense.
So I was like, “Oh, you’re not using the media to,
you know, for justice and freedom and a quality,
for all the things that are–
To find Maddie Rose.
Yeah.
Yeah, or that.
He’s using it to get onto a certain thing in order to be able to use his talents.
And it’s like, “Oh, you’re just really selfish, I guess.”
And he goes on the whole rest of the book,
hating the media.
And like, he’s like, “I don’t tell anything of the media.”
And then he gives like, he’s quotes to the media.
I’m like, “All right, you’re just a complete hypocrite liar.”
So that’s the first thing.
The other thing is, we got the relationship with Jezy, who, listen,
Barbie for me to criticize, you know,
a hot, sacred, service lady.
Yeah, carry on.
You know, looks good in a bathing suit.
No problems here.
You know, everyone gets tricked once in a while.
Not a big deal.
My issue is he has two young kids that just lost their mom.
He says he’s working 80 to 120 hours per week,
which is insane in about hours to work as a police officer
as it is.
His grandmother is basically raising the kids by herself.
He’s off-galivating with Jesse on these weekend trips.
He’s putting himself in consistent danger,
not just in the case where when they’re like,
You get to do the exchange.
He should, the first thing he should have said is like,
“I’m a single dad.

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00:04:00,000 –> 00:04:01,040
I have two young kids.

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00:04:01,040 –> 00:04:03,440
I’m not putting myself out there to get in,

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like, any sort of danger that’s unnecessary.”
Well, he’s a cop.
What’s with this?
For his-
But, I know he’s a detective.
That’s way different.
Whatever, he’s a detective.
He’s a cop.
I mean, but he, but he,
they’re like, “We don’t want this person handing off the money.”
It’s like, “No.”
You, that’s no.
You’re, I mean, you should literally be taking less risks,
just because, I mean, I just think it’s selfish.
If you’re not, if you have two young kids like that,
the other thing is he’s going 130 on the motorcycle
with Jesse driving.
That’s not a good idea.
What, what do we do?
There’s no mention of wearing a helmet.
What do we do here?
No, we had a helmet.
There was a mention.
Maybe for one second thing about your kids first.
Maybe once, I mean,
I don’t think, I think he says, like,
kisses them on the forehead good night.
Once, like, every like five chapters.
I’m just going to, the relationship he has with them.
The worst part too is that like, I looked up like his character
and they describe them.
Despite being very dedicated to his job,
he managed to be a devoted father to his two children,
devoted.
I think the 90s, like parents,
or like maybe like the 70s parents,
maybe that was just a, that was devoted.
Maybe that’s just changed what it is today.
But yeah, because yeah, tough, tough,
having a character that’s not super like Paul’s lead.
So, stock up to that.
Yeah, the whole Jezzy thing was interesting.
I would agree.
I was wondering, he’s a big dude.
What motorcycle does she have that the two of them
can be driving 130 on the highway?
And also is that safe?
Like, maybe I don’t know.
I had a motorcycle.
I had like a 250cc Honda.
Like the thing, if I took it on the highway,
he was like, “Ahhh!”
Like, it was so loud.
And it was giving everything it could just
get my 160 pound frame uphill on a highway.
So, I mean, I’m sure that she has a super sick ride.
And I was actually thinking when they brought
up the motorcycle, I was like, “Do you have a ride, bro?
Do you have a ride?”
Thank you, your favorite from, what is that?
Wall Street 2.
Wall Street 2.
Be very clear on that one.
Yeah.
Be interested to know what the Rotterdam Skoor is on that.
Yeah, so, I agree with him.
I don’t know how, with him not being a great dad.
But I don’t know how recently his wife died.
He said she died pretty recently.
I didn’t take it as that was the case.
I think it was had been several years.
Well, as kids know the mom.
So, they’re very young kids.
So that leaves me to believe it’s not a good point.
Yeah.
But, at the same time, yes, he’s working his butt off,
understood you’re a detective in a big city,
the Washington DC area.
I get it.
But, probably when you’re not doing that,
I know you want to let off a little steam.
You said you can play par cheesy, dude.
Go play par cheesy with your kids.
Go home, take care of your kids.
They’re stuck with your grandmother,
Nanobesi or whatever her name was.
But, yeah, probably not a good look for Alex Cross.
And then, with him forcing his way into
the being the psychiatrist or psychologist or whatever,
for what’s the guy’s name?
Gary. Gary Sanji.
Oh, my God.
That also the Sanji Murphy thing throughout the book.
That was a nice one.
Yeah, I didn’t.
Just stick with one.
Yeah, just say one of the names, yeah.
But, yeah, I think that’s just such a conflict of interest
or whatever the case is.
The arresting officer is the guy who’s also
going to be the psychiatrist.
You get an impartial third party for a court.
I don’t know.
Oh, 100%.
I feel like that’s what you would have to do.
And also him pushing for the hypnosis
seemed kind of sketchy because I feel like
there’s no way that can work in your favor.
It’s just going to work poorly.
And the point of the hypnosis wasn’t to find
Mary Rose, Emily Rose, whatever the girl says.
Right.
Maggie Rose.
The point wasn’t to find her.
It was just to figure out if he’s got
like a split personality or not.
So, yeah, I mean, my, it’s kind of lesans, which my first
stock down is, which my first stock down, excuse me,
stock up is a good PR person.
This is usually something that I feel like is pretty
standard across all law enforcement precincts
or other cases, especially in big cities.
I’m sure in my little town, they don’t have one.
But in a big city, they have a whole, at least one person,
probably a group of people who are dedicated to being
the face of the police department in situations like this.
It’s the point is, okay, you’re the detective.
Yeah, you can answer a couple of questions
in the environment that we allow.
But outside of that, you’re not talking to the press.
You’re not doing any of that.
They start off by allowing the judge
allows the press into the courthouse, which,
which happens, you know, in some big cases.
This is a huge story. Two kids were kidnapped
from a prestigious private school.
One of them is the son of the treasury secretary.
The other ones, the daughter of some famous actresses.
Like this is probably the biggest story in the country.
And Cross starts off by yelling at the press in the supply.
And he’s the peanut butter man, which is his job.
I will say peanut butter makes a lot of sense
in that kind of situation.
Great, caloric intake and like pretty good for you.
So yeah, that makes sense that everyone gets a like a jar peanut butter.
But that was a non-secretary.
He’s yelling at them saying some crazy nonsense.
I get it. They’re there.
They’re not supposed to be there.
These people don’t want to be filmed
taking a hand out in the supply.
And I appreciate where he’s coming from.
But he’s just like straight up yelling,
this guy on this tirade to the press.
And why?
He then, like you said, he’s,
throughout the book, he’s talking about how you don’t talk to the press.
I mean, the anti-bull truck.
He says I never miss a good chance to shut up.
And then continues to go on to just keep talking.
He goes, when he’s going to the corner house.
He’s like one liners, too.
It’s like, bro, this isn’t your stand-up venue.
That’s a kidnapping investigation.
What are you doing?
Yeah, he made a joke about, they’re like, what’s your relationship with Sanji?
And he’s like, oh, it’s not that serious right now.
But, you know, we’re still working things out.
It’s like a little girl is missing detective cross.
Yeah, what’s that?
Together, yeah, a little boy just died.
What are you talking about?
They, at one point, he’s him and his buddy.
They sneak into the corner.
So they’re like, all right, we’re going to go on the back door
so that we don’t talk to the press.
And somehow the press gets in there,
even though they’re going to avoid him.
And he just starts talking to them.
They’re asking them if it’s about race,
like if this thing’s about race, which I get.
This story is, there is a lot actually about race in this story,
and a lot of it really just centers around the family of the black people that died
who were murdered by Sanji.
Yeah, and then not getting any attention
while these rich white kids are.
And I get that, you know what I mean?
I’m okay with a conversation happening about that.
And if Alex Cross feels like that’s his place to have that conversation,
then fine.
But outside of that, he’s just spewing all his feelings
to get into, like, to become his psychiatrist.
And he says this weird stuff.
They ask him how the court case is going.
And he’s talking about, he’s just happy to be in the Super Bowl.
Yeah.
What?
What is, what is happening?
There needs to be a good PR person that comes in
and just zips him up.
All right, so you agree with me that he is wasn’t likeable then?
I thought you were going to, you’re pooing now.
He advocated to hypnotize Sanji during the trial.
It’s a case where the court, what are we talking about here?
Yeah, it’s no longer–
They turn the lights down.
I’m like, what do we do?
Yeah, this is no longer a fair and impartial trial.
Some crazy things are going on.
Yeah, and then the dad of the kidnapped girl being mad at him.
I’m like, yeah, you’re making this all about yourself.
Obviously, I’d be pissed and they think that he blew it, which
up from his perspective he did, not obviously.
But from there, that’s all they hear.
So yeah, obviously, he’s going to be fucking pissed to you.
Like, what do you mean?
Yeah, the handoff, the whole money handoff thing was handled so poorly.
I don’t even know what they were thinking,
like the police department was thinking in that whole process.
I’m okay with him being the person,
if that’s what’s going to get these kids back,
like the person actually does the handoff.
But I don’t know, just seemed like allowing himself
to be handcuffed on an airplane.
None of that would have worked out well.
You know, there was no way that he was going to give them
the be handcuffed on airplane fly to some island
and the kids were just going to be there.
It’s…
They’re like, we can’t put any trackers or anything on this.
They’ll know about it.
It’s like, what?
It seems like the only people that handle
kidnapping handoff’s well is like the Mexican cartels.
Because people get kidnapped all the time and people pay their ransom
and then the people are released.
So you got to figure out whatever they’re doing
and just do that.
So talk to the cartel.
But yeah, the whole police department
needed a better PR person.
What else do you have for stock up?
Oh, I’m going to keep it back to something more light
and friendly here.
Workplace sexual harassment, stock up.
Go on.
So apparently saying someone looks good in a bathing suit,
the first time you meet them is appropriate for a juzzy to do,
but when I do it, I’ve got to go to a HR.
I’m going to get talked down to about this.
What’s going on here, demon?
Yeah.
Yeah, that was an interesting…
And then she’s the biggest thing she can point to.
Alex about was like, it’s so tough being in this industry.
Everyone just looks at you and judges you by your like,
what you look like.
I’m like, “Didn’t you just, wasn’t that literally the first thing you said to him?”
You’re a little bit a little bit of a critical to basically do,
to objectify him immediately and then be pissed when other people do it to you.
But…
The whole relationship and the twist of her being in on it was,
it was whatever.
It was still whatever to me.
Every scene that was them going on a vacation or then hanging out,
I just did not care at all.
Well, it was also my hate is like,
we’ve read a lot of YA and a lot of smut books at this point.
I mean, listen, what I need is a little,
will they won’t they?
I need a little…
Yeah, why don’t you die in them before you’re 69?
Animes to lovers.
I need a little buildup before the release.
I can’t just have you going right into like,
hey, we were swimming and then she said,
I want to bang you at the pool and then a couple days later we’re banging.
I’m like, what are we doing here?
I need to get me something.
Yeah, and give me a little buildup.
Once again, aren’t you concerned about Maggie Rose?
Isn’t anyone concerned about…
Who’s that, Dan?
You have to understand how this is going to play to the media when they find out.
They’re obviously going to find out in how it’s going to play.
It’s not going to look good and you’re both supposed to be trying to find someone.
So, yeah, I hated it.
My next stock up was stock up to voice acting.
We’ve listened to lots of audiobooks.
I feel like in general,
the people that are reading these audiobooks are voice actors.
That’s what they do, right?
I think Will Wheaton does a lot of…
He kind of transitioned into voice acting and he’s done a lot of audiobook reads.
He’s probably one of the most prolific audiobook readers,
you know, that does these that I’ve seen.
Who else? Steven Frye has done a bunch.
He’s kind of a mix. He kind of does it all, but I would consider him an actor.
And I know you love Tay Diggs who did the voice for this in equilibrium,
which is 40-81 on Rotten Tomatoes, by the way.
And I’m partial to House on Haunted Hill, 31-40.
He’s also in a rom-com, I like to know.
I still got his group up.
It’s with the new good-looking guy from Texas.
What’s his name?
Matthew McConaughey?
No, it’s like his successor.
Who’s the new guy that’s in all this stuff?
Oh, I watched that football show.
I watched the first episode.
It was so bad.
Oh, like the Eli Manning one?
It was so bad.
I heard you got that.
Oh my god.
Do you watch Hitman?
Oh, yeah.
I thought that was great.
That was like…
Yeah, that’s good.
I like the ending.
Yeah, he just played a bunch of different characters,
and he did them all really well, I thought.
But yeah, Tay Diggs, back to Tay Diggs,
probably best known for House on Haunted Hill to groove back,
or potentially the Wood, which is a 61-92.
I haven’t seen it, but I feel like I need to watch it.
But yeah, he was just not good in this.
So my point and my voice actors there was,
if you’re an actor, maybe don’t just think,
Oh, if I can act, then voice acting is the easier job.
It’d be like a professional golfer
going into a Golden T tournament.
And be like, “Oh, I can golf.”
So of course, I can play Golden T,
and just getting absolutely crushed.
Because maybe the jump for Tay Diggs was an attempt for Tay
to get his groove back,
because he hadn’t been in anything in a while.
But yeah, it just didn’t hit.
He was so monotone and any kind of emotion that was happening,
it was once again just monotone.
It felt like he was reading a book to me,
not doing a performance.
Yeah.
So it’s like even when I’ve read books to my daughter,
like I do the voices.
He couldn’t do the voices.
I don’t need him doing Jeze,
he’d be like, “Oh my God, Alex, put that weiner in me.”
You know, I didn’t need that,
but I could have at least used,
like in these exciting scenes when he’s in a shootout
out of McDonald’s, or the bad son-gives in his house.
It’s still monotone.
I agree.
So, yeah, sorry Tay, just wasn’t a huge fan.
Sadada, that’s the movie, by the way.
But yeah, yeah, it’s got a 92% on Ron tomato,
69% user score, but we don’t hate that either.
Yeah, okay.
My last one, this is a nod to James Patterson.
So stock up to the co-author publishing model,
which is what he has done in so-have many others at this point,
but he has written over 300 books due to this model,
which is basically, he provides a, you know,
sometimes they’re long outlines,
like sometimes they can be, like, supposedly,
like 80-page outlines of what happens in the story,
and then he gives it to someone to actually write the story.
And, of course, you know, how he said it,
is it allows him to work on tons of projects at the same time?
I feel like this is pretty much like what Taylor Sheridan now does
with all of these TV shows and movies, like this guy is just,
there’s no way he’s just churning out all of this stuff.
No.
Um, I don’t, I think it’s the other way around.
I think someone comes with him with a outline idea,
and he models it and then puts his name behind him,
pays them for it.
That’s what I would guess, but that’s just me.
No, I don’t, I mean, I’m not, we started Land Man.
I watched some of it.
It was okay.
I watched some Yellowstone, it was all right.
Like, it’s just not necessarily all for me, but, um…
Land Man’s a comedy, that’s not, uh, that’s just like…
Uh, yeah, it’s…
That’s also…
A Republicans’ wet tree, and it’s…
It’s, it’s, it’s, if you just go and knowing that, it’s funny.
Yeah, except for the part when he’s, like,
in his bed with his daughter, and she’s in her underwear,
and he’s like, “Oh, she blows on.”
That was weird.
And she’s like, “Oh, daddy, it’s like, oh, my God, like what?”
Yeah.
What? Like this?
Do you know, um…
James Patterson co-authored a book with Mr. Beast?
I just saw that, yeah.
Like most dangerous game or something.
Yeah, 3.6 on Goodreads, yikes.
Yeah, it’s not, yeah, I, always, I was headline that was, it’s terrible.
Which, of course it is.
Like, all ’em all for good for Mr. Beast,
whatever he’s done to create this massive empire for himself.
But, yeah, probably, this is a bridge to far,
and clearly, the publisher was down,
because it’s gonna sell, you know, it’s kids are like,
Oh, Mr. Beast.
And the old people would be like, “James Patterson.”
So it gets the whole male demographic 18 to 500,
however, all these people, I love these books.
But, yeah, there’s 34 Alex Cross novels.
He’s worth, James Patterson’s worth, like, $800 million.
So, uh, yeah.
Whatever he’s doing, keep doing it.
Supposedly, he, unlike others, I didn’t really vet this,
but he puts the names of these other writers on the book cover.
Like, obviously, it’s massive, James Patterson,
but then it will say, like, also written by whoever,
where some of the other ones just have their own name,
and you don’t really even necessarily know, it’s ghostwritten.
So, but yeah, it’s a, it makes sense for a model.
It’s cool that he has all these ideas,
and is just like, “All right, cool.
Like, I’m gonna just gonna put these out.”
And then he probably kind of reads them and says,
Yeah, good to go or not.
So, yeah, I respect it.
All right, I think we were gonna do one of his more recent ones too,
and I started and I was like, “Let’s not do this one.”
I guess it was pretty bad.
Yeah, well, the reason why I wanted to do this is because it’s like, guaranteed to be his.
It’s not some, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right.
Some knock off coach purse or something like that,
which I feel like some of this stuff, you don’t know who’s actually writing it,
which is still crazy that, however much Stephen King has written,
that he just does that all himself and all these crazy ideas come for his head.
He’s worth like 600 million, I think.
Damn, I didn’t know that was there like that.
They did, yeah.
Well, then not only do they sell all these books,
but they get into film adaptations and TV deals,
so you probably get a lot of money in there.
I’m sure speaking engagements at this point for those,
I mean, I doubt Stephen King does much of that, but what about stock downs?
Multi-personality disorders, lockdown?
Oh.
I guess I don’t really understand that it works or anything about it because
this is my whole issue.
I don’t know why they didn’t bring it up.
So Gary Sanji falsifies his record.
Slash, no teacher.
You have to say, “Sash, Murphy” every single time.
Tell me where he’s Murphy at this point.
He falsifies his record to become a teacher.
He learns everything he needs to know to be,
teach the class is a model teacher.
Everyone there is like the nicest guy ever, all these things,
but he, that means he’s the whole time Gary Sanji,
right, because he’s not the nice person because the nice person doesn’t
teach class. He’s not a teacher.
He doesn’t know anything about teaching.
So he’s blanking out this nine to five every single day,
teaching, being a nice person.
So where is the evil persona?
I don’t understand, like, isn’t that the whole thing is that if he’s an evil person
for this one thing, that’s only because he snapped and became evil for like a minute,
or is he just evil all the time but hiding it?
Yeah, just for some reason.
Not blaming if he’s a good person when he’s not at school or when he’s with his family.
He’s supposed the good Gary Murphy is supposed to be working this job that he’s just not showing up at
and then stealing money from the company to fund his murder sprees.
Yeah, like where is the good guy?
And even Gary Murphy when he’s at home, he’s thinking about like,
I could just like kill my wife and do something else.
Or like, “Kill her brother-in-law.”
But that’s the whole thing is like, if I just wake up and I’m in a bad mood,
I’m like, “Ah, that’s Keith bad mood, Keith.”
Like he’s a dickhead. Don’t worry about him.
It’s like, “But can I just do that now?
I can just be a blame it on some other personality.”
Yeah, you’re like, “It’s DM-key.”
I’m like, “But you’re being nice now.
Yeah, I’m all I’m acting nice.
I’m a dickhead right now.
I’m dickhead-key-free now, but I’m being nice.”
It’s like, “So you could just be nice within your bad personality?”
Yeah, that’s right.
So it doesn’t make any sense.
So the whole multi-personality thing, I was like,
“Once they start going that angle,

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I think this is dumb as shit ever.”””
And I thought Alex Cross,
or do I would have fucking been so pissed,
was gonna be like, “No, I think he’s multi-personality.”
I would have fucking lost it.
He pretty much did, didn’t he?
I remember getting that up.
You didn’t help them put him away.
But if anything, he created doubt.
Yeah, when he was talking to him, he’d be like,
“Oh, he doesn’t remember anything.

610
00:24:31,120 –> 00:24:32,320
How does he not remember anything?”
He’s like, “Oh, he’s probably a multi-personality.
Let’s hit the target.”
I said, “I mentioned I’m a doctor that went to an Ivy League school.”
I was like, “Jesus Christ.”
He’s like, “But I’m very humble about it.”
I’m like, “All right, buddy, get the fuck out of here.”
He’s supposed to be able to read people,
and he’s like, “Oh, he was so blank.”
And then all of a sudden he lunged to me,
and, “Oh, Samji came out.”
He’s like, “Huh?”
Well, he reads Jesse really well, too.
He’s pretty good with that.
Good detective.
My first talk down is private schools.
Oh, okay.
I mean, you’re paying insane amounts of money
for these kids to go there, right?
Like, who even knows?
I mean, private, there’s private schools around us
that, like, for kids, like preschools.
Or, like, 20 grand a year.
So, I can only imagine what this private school is.
But what a half-assed background check that they did.
He, Samji’s going full Mrs. Doubt Fire Act,
you know, living as a math teacher at this private school.
They, he had, he just faked all of his stuff.
They didn’t, they weren’t able to talk to anyone.
You didn’t get on the phone with anyone,
and just say, like, “Hey, this guy worked for you.
What’s the deal?”
Or, “Where did he come from?”
None of that?
Yeah, especially you’d think almost
if you’re going to have secret service at the school,
they would probably interview all of the people
who had background checks.
Massive background checks.
They’re already talking for each time
that they introduce one of the police officers.
It’s like, “Oh, they have to be on file on him.
There’s an FBI file on him.
There’s an FBI file on him.”
If it’s the Secretary of State, it’s their kid
at the school, then you should be doing background checks
on all the teachers.
What, what are you talking about here?
And there, and there should be a clear, like,
you don’t get into anyone’s car no matter what.
I thought that whole thing was pretty dumb,
so private school is stocked out and you’ve got to do a better job.
Agreed, agreed.
What else do you have to stock down?
Next one is one in the hand is better than two in the bush,
stocked down?
Robert Fischerner, who we meet for like one minute,
clearly didn’t know this, right?
Who’s that?
He’s the prison guard that helps Gary escape.
So just from our understanding is like,
Gary is like, “All right, I have a bunch of money.
I stored half of it away in this house or whatever,
and I, first of all, do you understand who got the ransom money?
Because it made it sound like he got it,
but didn’t, didn’t know.
The two guys, the two guys and Jezy got it.
So it was like, Jezy was,
So how does he have ransom money?
How does Gary have it?
Gary doesn’t have it.
Gary had some money that he had left.
It wasn’t the ransom money, but he like,
hit it in a barn.
And so he, that’s why the corrections officer,
or whoever, he was bringing,
yeah, he was like bringing to his barn.
It was basically bug out money.
You know, if he got in a pinch, he’d have this money.
Okay, so yeah, that’s, that’s my whole thing.
I thought it was way more money, but I maybe wasn’t a lot,
but he’s like, I have all this money.
I had half of it here and he shows up.
Robert Fischer is seized the money.
And instead of being like, awesome,
I’m gonna go put my two weeks in.
I’m gonna take all this money and get to see you later.
He’s like, all right, now I’m gonna break him out of prison.
I’m to get half more.
It doesn’t make any sense.
Like, why would you take all that risk to get, to double up?
You know, I’m saying, like, go, go put the fucking lottery or go,
go to gamble, put it all on black.
There’s not gonna be a criminal.
Wait, I think you’re misunderstanding.
He didn’t give me money upfront.
Did he?
No, Robert, yeah, so Robert Fischer,
like, so they’re getting in the chapter
where we first introduced him.
He’s like going to the house that they’re like, he’s like,
all right, I’m gonna see if he was lying to me or not.
Like, Gary hit away this money.
So he finds the money, probably like half of the,
the ransom money, which that’s why I was confused.
I was like, I don’t get where the ransom money’s coming from.
So he finds that big amount of money.
And then he’s like, great, all right, this is real now.
It takes the money, it goes back and is like, okay,
and you aren’t lying to me.
Now I’m gonna break you out because I want another,
or what, you have to split with him.
So you’d really be getting one fourth more money.
Yeah.
I’m like, I don’t understand the lodge.
Is he just a complete idiot?
Is he, I don’t understand the lodge, get it anyway.
It doesn’t make any sense to me.
I’m like, why would you ever take that risk?
This is a mass serial killer.
Why would you?
And he’s like, oh, he’s not, doesn’t pose a threat to me.
It’s like, yeah, he gets in the car with him and whatnot.
And how do you not know you’re going to die?
Yeah, I feel like if you just find that money,
like, awesome.
All right, I’m gonna take this.
I’m not telling you when I found it, obviously.
And fuck this guy that’s in prison, I don’t care.
Yeah, take the money and be like, I need to be transferred,
don’t say why and just never see him again.
Well, I’m retiring.
It’s that much, but yeah.
It also seems like if you’re Gary Somjee,
you’d probably be in more security than just having
this one guy able to shuffle you out the door or whatever
it was that he was able to do to get him out of there.
Yeah, well, I just assume it’s the rock.
So I mean, anything’s possible, you know.
God, that is such a good movie.
I got a lot of sparse the rock any day of the week.
Yeah, great movie.
VX gas, good stuff.
Yeah, what do you got out of?
Being a missing child, stuck down.
No one, I mean, I’ve said it a time and time again,
I’m the only person that’s saying it.
No one is looking for Maggie Rose.
They catch Somjee.
And they don’t even really say where the kids are.
He killed one.
So it’s like, okay, this kid’s dead.
Where’s Maggie Rose?
They don’t even ask him when he’s arrested or hypnotized.
It’s just not part of the conversation.
The only people that are interested
are the spectators of the courthouse who are holding signs.
You know, Maggie Rose is alive.
They’re trying to just throw a freaking Hail Mary pass
at hopefully someone will see their sign and go,
oh, right.
There’s a missing girl involved.
Yeah, this is a battle.
It’s like no one’s carrying her flame,
but her parents and these people
across is not even interested.
He’s out joy riding with, with Jezzy.
Not interested.
He’s such a good dad, but he doesn’t care about anyone else’s kids.
He’s not, no one is looking for,
I was like, as I’m going through this book,
it’s like, is Somjee going to mention
that this girl is missing
and you haven’t found a body?
Like, they just assume she’s dead,
which I get, assume she’s dead.
But at the same time,
look to find out what happened
because whatever happened with the kid,
you know, was an accident, right?
They figure out, oh, he tried to use this,
you know, concoction.
It didn’t work out.
It could have had a heart attack or whatever the case was
and then he did all this terrible stuff to him.
That part was fucked up.
That was a little Stephen Kingy
where they’re talking about all this stuff
that he did to him.
I was like, Jesus Christ.
God, really dark.
That’s a little nine-year-old kid.
My fucking God.
But yeah, it’s like, okay,
so that was clearly an accident.
He didn’t mean to kill that kid.
So, or at least not at the moment.
So then what happened with Maggie Rose?
No one’s asking.
It was wild to me.
Wild.
Can we also ask,
how the fuck did she get to Bolivia?
What?
Did she just like ran, like,
through a name, like, a country in the hat?
And was like, Bolivia?
Fuck it.
Yeah, she flew all the way out to fucking Bolivia.
Like, that’s something you would say
and just to mean,
I don’t know what the fuck it is.
I don’t know what it means.
It’s like, so you know, you have to cross,
like, you have to fly
multiple vultual hours to another country
to multiple countries to get to Bolivia.
You know how I got my own?
Can you drive to Bolivia?
Where is Bolivia?
South America, right?
I mean, yeah, it’s, it’s landlocked.
It’s Peru is between Peru, Chile,
and Paraguay, and Brazil.
Yeah, so they, I mean,
they’re secret service people.
So they smuggle to route.
So they’re smothered until like Mexico,
then flying to Mexico to like,
probably to Peru.
I don’t think Bolivia has like a major city here.
How are they flying?
I think they’re just driving through central America.
I think, I will look this up.
I’m guessing,
this 1993,
I’m gonna say it’s gonna take 70 hours.
How far is the drive from DC to Bolivia?
Yeah, oh, it’s DC.
Yeah.
If there’s even roads, I can do that.
Of course, of course there’s roads.
What do you mean?
I dare you.
What do you try to say?
Well, I was thinking like Panama Canal.
Doesn’t that break up?
No, no, you can just drive right there.
Is there land?
Is there no idea?
Is there a bridge?
You probably got to take a ferry at some point, but
it’s not even giving me options.
Really?
Okay.
But then what about like, you and McGregor?
He does those motorcycle journeys from Alaska
to the tip of Argentina, a southern tip.
Yeah, they must have a walk across the Panama Canal.
I don’t know how you…
But either way, they were able to somehow smuggle this child.
Google maps on breaking Google maps in this system.
All right, it’s 81 hours to Panama.
Okay, yeah, so it’s like a week.
You just drive for a week.
You’re good.
And then to Bolivia.
I don’t know if there’s…
I might not be wrong with that because it’s not giving me any details on driving there.
Well, the secret service, they got all this money now.
So they just take a jet.
And obviously they have contacts in Bolivia, right?
Yeah.
I mean, they probably have access to a PJ.
And if not, some sort of confiscated jog plan.
And so…
If you get by Panama and get to Medellin in Colombia,
it’s 95 hours from there to…
It’s also weird to me that they’re moral these people that stole the money.
Like, their moral line is like, okay, we’re not going to kill this girl.
So instead, we’re going to ship her off to Bolivia to live on a coffee farm or whatever.
And…
Why do they give her lethal injection?
I don’t even understand that.
For kidnapping, you get this injection?
Jesse?
Yeah, I guess.
I mean…
And then Sanji, they’re like, now he’ll come back.
He’s behind us like, what?
What?
Yeah, I guess…
Yeah, I guess…
I guess kidnapping a child.
Oh, I don’t know.
Yeah, I guess so.
I don’t know.
I was like, and then she’s getting lethal injection.
I’m like, Sanji is.
That’s okay.
It makes sense.
No, he died at that point, didn’t he?
Oh, no.
He died after.
No, he survived.
He survived.
He was like the joke.
He ended it with like the Joker.
He’s like, yeah, I take a bullet shot.
But I’ll break out.
Don’t worry about me one of these days.
And I’m like, oh, is he just like a super villain?
Yeah.
Maybe James Farrerson was like, I got to make more of these out.
I guess it’s going to be a script tonight.
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Do you have a favorite scene or favorite plot point or something?
Something that you had a favorite about in this one?
I liked kind of that.
Jezi was actually bad.
I mean, there was least gave it some sort of twist or something.
I don’t know, I don’t know.
I guess.
I don’t really– it was like not.
It’s expected because it didn’t make any sense.
And she had no motivation to do it at all.
Sure.
She’s also the smartest, hardest working, first woman
to rise to her ranks.
Running against all the critics and everything
at that only to then kidnap someone for no reason.
It didn’t make any sense at all, but at least there
was an interesting turn because I literally
couldn’t never predict it.
Yeah, you go with like, oh, nice.
She really broke through the glass ceiling.
We’re proud of her.
And then it’s like, oh no, she’s actually a bad guy.
It’s like, oh, yeah.
We even do suck.
You’re right.
We– you’re right, James Patterson.
Well, I mean, he also was like, she didn’t have any weaknesses.
It was like, she’s too good looking.
She’s too smart.
She’s too hardworking.
OK.
So she could’ve done anything she wanted then.
Yeah, she’s going to kidnap people then.
Yeah.
Oh.
All right.
Biden was pretty much anything Gary, Sam G. Sash Murphy
was on his own, just doing his own stuff.
I thought the background stuff about him
really being obsessed with the Lindbergh baby
was interesting for his kind of bad guy origin story.
And his murders were horrific.
That was for sure scary.
Him when he finally caught the Secret Service agent
or whatever, who had actually stole the money and brought him
in the bathtub and was like, you know, I’m
going to murder you either way.
And either, you know, door number one is going
to be the most terrible and ex-recipating of your life.
And if you tell me where the money is, then door number two,
I’ll kill you easy.
Those ones always hit for me in books and movies.
It’s not a negotiation.
It’s like, oh, I’ll let you go or this other thing.
It’s like, no, no, you’re going to die.
It’s just how bad are you going to die?
It’s the real question.
Because you believe that person, someone says,
I’m a board.
I’m a board.
Him calling his family dumb bitches
and they give ways to murder them while they’re reading dinner.
That’s actually–
Can you relate to that?
No.
Absolutely not.
I love my family.
But I just found that to be–
Is this the dude Dylan?
But which person am I talking to now?
BM Dylan, the bad man, Dylan.
But yeah, I thought that was kind of funny in general.
We forgot to not even address how he was able to escape
the birthday party.
What kind of half ass operation were they doing?
Where they just walks up to the front door and we’re like,
where’s Gary Murphy?
Where’s Gary Murphy?
Where’s Gary Murphy?
They didn’t have that–
he kidnapped these two super important kids.
You don’t have a helicopter in the air?
There’s no helicopter in the air looking out for this guy.
It’s just people going in the front door.
Yes, I know he had a little secret side door
and he was able to go through his neighbor’s yard.
But it’s in the middle of the winter.
There’s snow on the ground.
You should be able to find this guy.
What are we doing here?
It’s such a terrible, terrible operation run by them.
It was like, he was like Tony Suprano running in the snow,
trying to get away from Johnny’s house.
And–
It’s dropping gobbagool in the way, leaving them with bread crumbs.
Except there’s no–
There was just like a couple of guys trying to arrest–
they weren’t even coming for him.
They were just trying to arrest John.
And yeah, they’ll bird in the air.
But the fact they don’t have a helicopter in the air
is just insane, insane.
So–
Well, yeah.
I think after the exchange, it wasn’t really too shocked.
They’re incompetence, that was–
Sean.
Not a good joint effort from all the departments involved
with the Metro police, the city police,
the secret service, the FBI.
It’s like, wow, maybe too many cooks in the kitchen
kind of situation.
It’s knocked out to that.
It pre-dawn 11, too.
So they weren’t even sharing information with each other.
They were like, ah, I want them.
I want to get them.
I want to get them.
Yeah, so those were kind of favorite things.
There was anything Gary Murphy involved.
I thought he was a pretty good bad guy.
I think that was– we can just jump right into love
because I don’t think there is a best character.
Unless you have–
I’ll give you one.
John Sampson.
You like Sampson?
That was the best guy.
He was like a football player, like size, huge guy,
just strong and quiet, just backed up his partner.
I was like, oh, he’s just doing your job,
and keep your head back door-boys.
Yeah, back door-boys.
Oh, OK, good.
So you’re an actually a good person.
I’m like, fucking Alex Cross.
I mean, what?
Yeah.
I was OK with Sampson.
Yeah.
I mean, I would have just chose Gary Murphy
because that’s in my loves is the fact
that he was a good bad guy.
I don’t know how a serial killer is able to go
and kill 200 plus people.
I guess he’s killing hookers and people, you know,
people, other people don’t care about, which, you know,
probably says a lot to the race thing.
Out of all the people and out of all the kind of bad guy
serial killers, he was a particularly good one, I thought.
Yeah, no, I agree.
What do you love?
I can tell while all of his books have been adapted to me,
is this because written very cinematically,
it was, you know, there were scenes that were obviously
like chase scenes, and you could just picture them
in your mind, like the cops swarming and escaping,
and all this stuff.
Now, didn’t it make any sense?
Most of the time, no, not really,
but it was written very cinematically so.
I like the multiple acts.
I don’t think they necessarily played out very well,
but I like the idea of it because when I started the book,
I was going to be, I was under the impression
it was going to be the whole book was them trying
to find Sam G in the kids.
And then a third of the way through
were less even.
They’ve captured him.
You know, I thought it was going to be more cat and mouse,
like that other book where just them chasing him,
always being one step ahead of Alex Cross.
But the next thing you know, he’s going to make Donalds,
and he’s like shooting a cop in the face.
And it’s like, oh, well, okay, this is, this is going to end
interestingly.
Yeah, it was like halfway through the book.
I was like, all right, I guess he’s escaping.
Or, you know, that was the only problem.
It’s like, all right.
Yeah, exactly.
I was like, oh, how is this how he must escape or something?
Because I, so, but I did like in general,
the multiple acts where was the chase, the murders,
the chase or the kidnapping, the chase,
and then the trial aspect and then the aftermath.
So I think that’s a good kind of cadence for it,
but I don’t think it necessarily played out very well
when it was actually red.
What else do you love?
I think you’re a mention.
I just like to get the Gary’s a bad guy.
Yeah, I didn’t have a ton of.
What about hates?
I think I went over most of them.
I think the year mentioned hypnotizing someone in the courtroom.
I was like, this is the dumbest thing I ever
ever can see.
It was basically just a show how smart Alex Cross was.
He was like, all right, we dim the lights.
And I was able to take center stage.
Everyone could look at me.
I’m like, all right, buddy, you’re like Jesus Christ.
Yeah, I talked about the Alex J.
Z relationship, not a fan of that.
There wasn’t a lot of thrills, you know?
It was, I guess it was somewhat of a page turner
and that it was, it was short.
And so, you know, you were, you were there
and there was always something happening
whether it be a terrible Alex J.
Z relationship or some hypnosis.
But in general, it wasn’t captivating, you know?
I thought the beginning was we were meeting the characters
and then the kidnapping and you’re learning about
like who these characters are
and the Sam J.
Slash Murphy character.
Pretty much up until the McDonald’s shooting was good.
And then after that, I was like, okay, when does it get good again?
And I’m still wondering.
I also was, you’re a big dialogue guy.
I thought you were going to be all over the dialogue
was very, very tough.
No, it was, it was whatever.
It was so, it was, yeah.
We’ve read YA books that had better die.
Yeah, exactly.
It felt, it felt very, very, very, very, very, dialed.
Because it became a movie, you know, where it’s like,
Yikes, anyway.
Yeah, well, I feel like a screener can actually make that dialogue
more interesting.
Yeah, yeah.
Linger in questions, did you have any?
What’s his best book?
James Petersen?
Yeah, I know.
Yeah.
Oh, do you write the firm?
Is that his?
No, that’s the other guy.
No, it is by you.
I wrote that, that was actually good.
Yeah.
So that was a legal thriller in 1991.
He’s got good books.
The firm is a phenomenal film.
It’s hard to watch in this house because the wife’s
not really a big Tom Cruise guy.
And I’m learning more and more that I just love Tom Cruise movies.
Super nervous.
He’s also like a really good actor, but he’s, he’d do what I would do.
He’s just like, I’m just going to do action movies
and be the fucking man.
Like, yeah, okay.
Yeah, after he did draw movies, it was great in them for the most part.
I mean, I haven’t seen eyes wide shut in a while, but it’s for you
about Tom Cruise movies.
Have you seen, I think it’s called American Made?
Yes.
Yeah, that’s like based on a ghost story.
Yeah.
I’m like underrated good movie.
Yeah.
Just a great, like shitty Sunday movies.
And around it’s really enjoyable.
Tom Cruise is just doing his thing.
But yeah, so, okay.
Rainmaker, I’ve seen that movie, very good.
Me, maybe not very good, but it was good.
Firm, phenomenal.
Time to kill, phenomenal.
So yeah, I mean, I haven’t read the books, but I’m sure he’s got some other good stuff.
Yeah.
I had a lingering question.
Mine are most about food, so they’re him and Jesse are eating dinner one night, and he was
wondering what was on his plate.
And he said it was something masquerading is Yorkshire putting.
And he said, or either he or she said, I’m not, I don’t even like good Yorkshire putting.
And I’m not sure James Patterson knows what Yorkshire putting is because it’s a pod is,
it’s just kind of like, it’s a pretty much like a really light pancake batter that you fry
in a muffin tin and it rises up because of the eggs in it.
And it’s like crispy.
It’s not, yeah, it’s not putting.
It’s the British version of putting whatever that means.
I’m still trying to figure that out after watching so many seasons of Bake Off, but it’s
like a, you know, it’d be a weird thing to one not like because it’s fried, it’s like
fried dough, but it’s a roll.
So it’s delicious with some gravy.
I know you used in it.
That’s basically the only difference between that and the roll, right?
Yeah, it just uses the eggs and the, the, the hot oil to basically make it rise.
They’re absolutely delicious.
A place down here that does Yorkshire putting breakfast sandwiches.
It’s, they’re insane.
So yeah, and it’s also one, what’s not to like about Yorkshire putting?
Two, what could be masquerading as a Yorkshire putting?
It’s, like I said, it’s just a fried roll pretty much.
So…
This is a Yorkshire, this is a wine.
I’ve seen it where it doesn’t rise up, but even if it doesn’t rise, it’s still a piece of
fried dough.
So yeah, that was weird to me.
Yeah.
It basically French toast.
I don’t like French toast because I’m like Aggie.
That’s the only problem.
So that’s, I can see people not liking it.
It doesn’t taste Aggie though.
Oh, okay.
It definitely has like a, if you do a right, it’s like crispy on the outside and that’s
like a little custardy in the middle.
So maybe it’s a little Aggie, I don’t know.
But speak about eggs.
And mama, she makes eggs and jelly omelettes and the kids, I guess love them.
That sounds fucking disgusting.
Just straight.
Is that like hot jelly?
I don’t really understand.
I mean, usually you don’t put sweet stuff inside an omelette, right?
No, for sure not.
For sure not.
Yeah.
I mean eggs, sure, they’re in things that are sweet, but it’s not like the forward note is
eggs and jelly.
So it’s like a flan kind of thing going on there.
I don’t know, but eggs and jelly omelettes sounds disgusting.
I’m not going to hate it, honestly.
I mean, you put jelly on grits, right?
Or something like that, right?
But that’s delicious.
That’s like putting jelly on oatmeal or something.
Eggs don’t have a ton of taste.
So it’s just you’re masking the taste with something sweet instead of something salty.
So I don’t think it’d be bad.
It’s just, yeah, it doesn’t make it.
I don’t have an Italian house, but I’m going to make myself an egg and jelly omelette
and I’ll let you know.
I need to eat toast with butter with eggs just because I feel like I need something
to scoop it up with.
But if I put jelly on that toast, it still would be good.
So I think that would probably be the…
Oh, this is interesting.
Do you have ever done that at the diner?
I’ve done it on intentional where I’ve been like, let me try this jelly here.
It’ll be a…
Oh, huh.
If there’s like fresh jelly, then I’ll put it on my toast and then I’ll obviously put
eggs on there just to fuck around.
So yeah, I don’t think…
No, I’m on her side.
I’m changing my opinion.
So I…
Okay, interesting.
I used to be like you where I needed toast for my eggs.
I mean, definitely if we’re talking over easy eggs because like you need something…
Oh, yeah.
…stop up the yolk.
I get that.
Um, something.
You need something in there.
But lately, especially if it’s scrambled, I’m just like…
I’m just a carnivore.
I’m just like going and eating it or over.
Oh, are you making them like the French way?
Are you putting like a shitload of butter?
No, no.
I just…
A scrambled eggs, salt and pepper and…
Okay.
…cull it a day.
Wow, good for you.
And I found that to be enjoyable.
But what I do if I’m at the diner and I get scrambled eggs.
Is I used to always treat the toast as dessert so that I’d eat whatever was on the plate.
Especially if you’re like eggs and bacon together.
Like I’m fine with that.
I don’t need toast.
And then the toast is saved for jelly at the end.
And that’s like dessert.
Did you cast the movie at all?
No, I assume there’s already movies.
Yeah, so it was already adapted into film in 2001 starring Morgan Freeman as the Alex
Cross Roll, something you alluded to earlier.
32.53 on Rotten Tomatoes.
Not very good.
He was 61 at the time.
So at the time of filming he was 61.
And he was reprising the role after making Kiss the Girls, which is another Alex Cross story,
which is a 39-62.
He made that four years earlier.
I think there was…
Probably there was plans for him to kind of continue it, but one he’s 61 and two.
It was kind of over.
So they tried again in 2012 with Tyler Perry playing Alex Cross in 2012.
That fell flat.
I think it basically broke even.
So there’s plans for a sequel and who knows what else.
Fell flat.
They canceled the sequel.
And then it was rebooted again as an Amazon series in 2024 with all this Hodge in the
Alex Cross Roll.
And it’s had two successful seasons and it’s slated for a third.
I don’t know.
It’s tough to know shows on Rotten Tomatoes, but I think it’s like an 80.
And this time around, I think it, honestly, I think it worked out because all this Hodge
is hot.
I haven’t seen an episode, but that’s my take.
It’s like, oh, you just needed a hot Alex Cross and you’d be fine.
But isn’t he the guy that’s a bad character and Friday night lights?
I don’t care now.
Is he?
I can’t have him.
Yeah, Ray Voodoo Tatum.
I can’t have him.
I can’t have him.
I can’t have him.
I can’t afford him.
Can’t root him quite on the team kid.
Come on.
Is he on the bad guy team or is he on the deal?
Ray Voodoo Tatum is a skilled tough quarterback displaced from New Orleans by a hurricane
at Trina.
He joined the Don’t Pans of Mealy and challenges coach Eric Taylor’s authority, creating
friction on the team and fans are fiercely loyal to the injured Jason Street.
Can’t you get in?
Have that type of leader.
I can’t have it.
Was this before the backup quarterback got the job or was this like a lay, lay, lay
there down the road?
This could have been also a season two when the writers were on strike and they were
just doing the absolute worst storylines.
So I could be, I’m going to have to apologize to all this, I’m not in his fault.
I tried rewatching for a night lights and it doesn’t really hold up.
I mean, it’s a romcom.
Yeah, it’s a really a romcom that has football is like a somewhat of backdrop and then obviously
it makes you question your sexuality with, you know, obviously.
Timmy Wiggins.
Timmy Wiggins.
Yeah.
I mean, obviously you started to think I could be gay.
I mean, what?
Do you believe that?
Also fun fact with Aldousage is he’s in die hard with the vengeance.
He plays, he plays one of the, one of the boys in the shop like this.
It’s his uncle shop or his dad shop or whatever.
And Samuel Al’s character.
He’s like his, the kids in there.
And I think if there, those are actually brothers in real life like one’s Aldousage and the
other is his actual brother.
Just a little bit of fan, fan stuff for you there.
Fear into the die hard series.
All right, Keith.
How long came a spider?
What do you give it?
New Year’s of four out of five?
I’m giving it a two.
I think, I mean, it was readable.
I think like I said, it’s cinematic.
I erled my eyes a lot, but it’s at least it kind of went by and, you know, it’s a story.
So there’s that, but yeah, two out of five.
What about you?
Yeah, I’m agreeing with you.
We’re in lockstep here.
It’s a, it’s a two for me.
Yeah, it is crazy that it blew up because you read like the first books of most series.
It’s like such a good book that they’re like, well, I’m four.
My hands are four.
I have to write like ten more of them, you know, which, so he must have picked up steam as
it went on.
Yeah, it is wild that it was like, oh, this is ours, Cross.
I think we need to, this is a character that we need to get in.
He’s a, I mean, I get the general idea.
He’s a detective, but he’s also a psychologist and he’s got a, you know, Harvard psychology degree.
Like, yeah, that, you know, I could see it being a TV show, but I could see it being a TV
show, like one of those summer ABC shows, you know?
I guess there’s probably, it probably came out before those really caught on, maybe.
Maybe that’s why it was so popular because like the CSI is in the, I guess, but what’s called
to interrupt really long order?
So I don’t know.
Yeah, but I mean, they, they must have, they’ve always had these, you know, since people have
been making TV shows and films, like, there’s always this character.
So it’s not a novel.
Yeah.
That’s true.
So, yeah, I guess it must, I mean, it must have hit somebody, but it didn’t hit us and
probably won’t be revisiting James Patterson.
Sorry, buddy, to James Patterson.
Yeah.
Probably won’t be revisiting it for a while here, but hey, you know what?
We tried.
We tried.
That’s all we can do.
All right.
Well, that was a long case, but when we get coming on next, moving away from the race stuff
into another race thing, unfortunately, which I didn’t realize most of his books, I didn’t
realize where that, but you know, Dennis Laheins book.
It’s called Small Merces, which I guess is a book that is a book that is a book that is
This is a little bit of a history lesson in terms of what’s going on in Boston back in
the day, which I was in Prevy too so it was interesting to start.
– We’ve never anything to do with it.
I’m enjoying it thoroughly so I’m excited to talk about it.
Well, like I said, those logn became Spiderman Keats.
Been good talking to you and I’ll catch you for a small mercedes.
Indeed, shot then, bye-bye now.

The Buddies are in the cutting room this week for Rough Cuts, the brand-new comedy from Glenn R. Miller, and the author himself stops by to talk shop. Set in the 1920s, the story pits a Hollywood director chasing his legacy against a young Ohio minister who’s just been handed the power to censor movies. Glenn tells the story behind the story, which starts with a box of real censorship cards found in his mother-in-law’s attic. The Buddies talk satire, silent film, and how every page of this book has a joke. They also look up too many fancy words, argue about oatmeal, and debate communion wine during Prohibition. Press play, and don’t censor yourself.

Intro (0:00-0:49)

Interview (0:53-32:09)

Post Interview Discussion (33:13-50:16)

NEXT BOOK: Along Came a Spider by James Patterson

Transcript for SEO Purposes 🙂

Hi, welcome to my book club.
I’m Dylan, here with man who is in the silent
film era of podcasting, Keith, what’s up buddy?
Facebook radio and a voice for typing.
– We’re here with my book club where we’re gonna
have some best sellers.
And this week we’ll be discussing brand new
hot off the presses Rough Cuts by Glenn R. Miller.
If you’d like to our kind of book for us to read
which is our past episodes, you can visit our website
buddybookub.com or sign door DMs on Twitter or Instagram.
That’s buddybookub podcast.
Listen to us on iTunes, Spotify, wherever you’re podcast,
download, subscribe, five star review will be helpful.
We’re gonna jump right into an interview with Glenn.
So have a listen and I hope you enjoy it.
Today we’re chatting with Glenn R. Miller
about his newest novel Rough Cuts.
We’ll be hitting the shelves.
September 29th.
– That’s right, Glenn.
Yep.
Glenn, appreciate you taking the time to chat with us.
I do have a first initial question.
Do you include the R so that people don’t confuse you
with Glenn Miller, the military band leader
who disappeared over the English channel in 1944?
Good for you, Good history there.
Yeah, that is absolutely right.
I always throughout my professional career
I was just Glenn Miller.
And the publisher said you need to stick some letter
in between Glenn and Miller
’cause that other Glenn Miller is sucking up half the warranted.
And so I simply went with my middle initial.
And as it turns out, there is a director by the name
of Glenn R. Miller.
And he focuses on, I think it’s either zombie or vampire
or some sort of movies, but he’s mainstream.
So he’s not taking up quite as much as the big band leader,
but he’s out there as well.
Yeah, I could be worse.
It could be more like a Boogie Knight’s director.
So, you know, yeah.
Absolutely right.
He’s not.
He’s a very credible man.
– And what’s going on with the original Glenn Miller?
It’s been 80 years people like, let’s move on.
Let’s figure it out.
– You know, the fact is it turns out lots of people,
all generations like that big band music.
And I get it from 23 year olds as well as 93 year olds.
It is college football season.
So, you know, that makes sense.
But we had the opportunity to get an advanced copy
of Rough Cuts and boy, you know, it was a rip snorder.
Yes, a fine book indeed.
Clearly extensive research went into the book
and considering, you know, your inspiration,
it’s in the back of the book.
Hopefully I’m not spoiling anything.
But your inspiration came from your mother-in-laws,
your mother, I think she stumbled on some no cards
of her grandfather.
– Yeah, it’s a fun origin story.
My mother-in-law was telling me one day, a few years back,
that she had been clearing out her attic in essence
and she was going through her grandfather’s files
and possessions.
And her grandfather was a minister
for Methodist Church in the relatively small community,
Maryetta, Ohio.
And he had been appointed to the Ohio Film Censorship Board.
This is back in the 1920s.
And she said these cards from his files pertaining
to the cuts that needed to be made to Hollywood films
were crazy.
I was not aware at that time that states had censorship board.
So, Ohio was one of eights.
– Yeah, he’s a handful, right?
Mostly he’s a handful in some Midwest.
– That’s right, yeah.
And I said, that to me is a story.
If people on a committee in a small town in Midwest,
in this case, in Midwestern state,
if they’re able to change the product
of Hollywood producers and directors,
I said, that’s a story.
I would love to write it.
And she said, go for it.
And so I went through those cards very carefully
looking at the types of cuts that were being made.
And I just, I was kind of salivating at the story.
It just seemed totally made for a satirical approach
to art and censorship.
– Sure, well, your previous book,
Dorman wanted a different origin story.
And we’re here to talk about rough cuts,
but I just want to say that you just walked by,
a “Dorman” and kind of started thinking
about different scenarios and almost turned it into
like an Eddie Murphy accruid trading place.
This kind of thing, except without the places
being traded by two individuals.
That one seems easier to research
than this.
And so I’m kind of wondering,
was the silent film era something
that you were interested in beforehand?
Or because of this idea you felt the need to go into it,
because there’s so many films that are referenced in the book,
the “Goldrush” “Battle Ship Attempt”
and “Domwa” and “Babit.”
The famous tracking shot in “Wings.”
And that’s just a name of few.
And then outside of just the film industry itself,
you have, I mean, you even talked about the Florida land bust.
I mean, it was just briefly referenced,
but I was listening to a history of the United States,
great courses, and they had a minute on that.
And yet you had figured out a way to pull that in
for the time period.
So, yeah, how did you decide that you wanted
to dig so deep into it?
– Well, the research began with those cards,
with my mother-in-law’s grandfather’s cards.
Between the time That I learned from my mother-in-law
and my committing to writing,
there was about a two-year gap.
That’s when I was focused on “Dormann” wanted,
the rollout of that book.
So, by the time that I committed to writing rough cuts,
my mother-in-law had donated those cards along
with other files over grandfather’s Marietta College.
She no longer had them in her possession.
So, my wife and I spent a week in Marietta
and every day of that week, I would go down to the archives
of Marietta College and go card by card.
And I just wanted to get the flavor
of what was objectionable at that time,
what he might object to.
And where I could, I would compare her grandfather’s cards,
these individual cards to the movie,
where I could find them.
Now, a lot of silent films, 90% of the films
that were produced back in time period in the teens
and the 20s, 90% are gone.
Combustible film, they were destroyed, whatever.
And oftentimes the studios would throw the films out.
They needed more storage space.
They didn’t realize that decades later,
there might be this hunger for these films.
They just thought, okay, we’ve shown it, it’s done,
move it on, give rid of it.
So that was part of the research,
was going through the cards and then comparing them
to the films that I found on YouTube.
The other part, as you mentioned,
is really immersing myself in that era.
I didn’t major in film studies.
I do know more about silent film era than anybody else.
But, I’ll tell you, it’s fun research.
I mean, going back and watching those films
and reading, I read probably 15 biographies
on the directors and the stars of that day
just to understand what that era was like.
Also, in addition, I did a lot of research,
obviously, on the film’s censorship period.
So a lot of that went into it.
And I have to say, in terms of research,
silent film era, pretty darn fun research.
So hard fun, not hard work?
– That’s right.
Good name, right.
– So we’re a comedy podcast, or at least we try to be,
try to be a light artist.
So we’ve read a lot of quote unquote comedy books
and things like that, which end up being a lot of
very depressing reads with splash of comedy here or there.
Congrats to you for actually writing a very light heart
and very funny book.
It was much needed from our end,
’cause that’s not usually what we get into, unfortunately.
Thank you, Mr. President.
– And I really loved Shepherd and Tubby’s relationship
in particular, but you come from a world of soap operas
in drama, how did you get from there to writing,
is your second kind of comedy, “Cetero Go Book”?
How’d you get to that, sage?
– Well, it was fun for me to write about,
and you referenced the director, Patrick Jay Shepherd,
and his assistant director, Tubby.
You know, it was fun for me to write about that
because it brought me back to when I was working
in studios at NBC and Burbank,
but also throughout my career,
I had very nice relationships with,
I was a video and event producer
back here in the Twin Cities,
and had really nice relationships with the videographers,
the editors, the graphic designer, the makeup people, et cetera.
And now that I’m retired,
it allowed me to kind of revisit what made that period
for me so special.
It’s the relationships that come about through this
creative teamwork, but also, I look back very fondly,
working at NBC in those studios.
There’s a scene in there that you may remember
where the director, he has completed his final film,
and he decides to go into the studios on a Sunday morning.
He just wants to walk around those studios
for what may be the last time,
and that was something I did when I was leaving NBC.
I went in on a weekend and just walked around the studios.
I knew that I was leaving this setting.
I knew that I was leaving this milieu,
and I just wanted to say goodbye in my own way.
Did a security guard also stop you and tell you,
sir, you can’t go in there?
That’s where it comes in.
It just allowed me to kind of revisit that,
and I wanted Patrick to feel that special goodbye
as well.
It would have been great if he stopped you,
and you said, I’m Glenn Miller,
and you said, the famous band director?
We’ll come on in.
Oh my gosh.
I didn’t know you were off.
Yeah, there was great.
I mean, it seemed like every page had,
you know, humor to it.
There was a lot of quippy dialogue.
I mean, I’m just thinking back to the confusion
between Carnival and Carnal.
I especially enjoyed the banter between Dodgery and Miss
Deshinbach.
Is that how you say your name?
Yeah, so they had great stuff between the two of them.
I feel like every page, it was just, there was laughs.
That’s, you know, hard to find while also getting to a point.
I think Dodgery briefly just mentioned him who is the minister.
He is a uniquely unlikable antagonist,
yet he’s funny in the way he interacts with others
and the way he sees the world and himself within the world.
How much fun did you have writing that character?
Because he is that.
He’s a character, you know?
I feel like you can’t just base it on somebody
and kind of go from there.
This has to be made from whole cloth.
I had loads of fun writing the Harold Dodgery character.
This story is, it’s a braided story where the reader will bounce back
and forth between the Hollywood scenes
and the Marietta Ohio scenes up until the time where they come together.
There is a collision at the end.
And I always enjoyed going back to Harold Dodgery, the minister,
yet I find great humor in those who take themselves too seriously.
And that was the attribute that I gave this young minister
who essentially had been on his job for six months
and he was ready to run the church.
He is the junior minister in a two minister church
and he feels that his talents are being gravely wasted
by the senior minister, minister Reverend Cox.
And initially I have his character
because this church is the oldest church in Ohio,
the governor felt that there should be religious representation
on the film censorship board and they wanted a representative
from this church.
Senior minister physically could not sit in the movie theater for hours
so he gives this task to Harold Dodgery.
And Harold feels that the senior minister is sloughing off his responsibilities.
He doesn’t know anything about film.
He doesn’t care about this.
But he quickly realizes that this can be his avenue to power.
So he wants power.
The film director Patrick Shepherd wants legacy.
He wants to be remembered.
So that’s where this collision comes at the end.
But yeah, to your question, he was a fun character.
I mean, quite honestly, well, obviously a writer, a novelist,
will read his or her book multiple times.
But I was pleased that Harold Dodgery,
even with the 15th reading or the 16th reading,
continued to amuse me.
And a follow up on that is the takeaway
that you should be entitled and poppised
and then when given the opportunity blackmail your way into a grape roll
because that’s kind of what I was like, hey, I’ve been doing it wrong.
This guy knows he’s doing.
Well, there’s a bit of redemption at the end.
He has a bit of realization in those final pages.
Yeah, I hope it is seen as somewhat of a touching scene
when after Shepherd has died, that’s not a spoiler.
It’s known at the beginning of the book
that he is very grievously ill.
But after he has died, Dodgery, the minister,
has a hope is a touching moment when
he reflects on Patrick Shepherd.
And the impact that that man has had on him.
I guess a big part of the book seems like it’s centered up, obviously.
And we look back then and say, oh, I can’t
believe they did that 100 years ago.
100 years from now, is there anything particularly in the art and cinema world
that you see as like, I can’t believe they did that.
They’ll look back at what we’re doing today as like, I can’t believe they allowed them
to do that.
Is there anything that stands out?
Because obviously we’re not really in touch with that side of things.
But I feel like you probably have an interesting perspective on that.
That’s a fun question.
A little bit difficult for me to project on that in looking at the films during my research
of the book looking at the films of 100 years ago.
I was surprised to a certain extent by what they got away with.
I mean, when you view these old films, there was nudity.
There was a lot that was implied in that era.
And you find it was a lot more innuendo than–
There was a lot of innuendo.
A lot of innuendo.
I think compared to today, compared to what we see on the streaming or HBO, et cetera,
it would probably be regarded as tame.
But there was no doubt what was being implied.
And there is the pre-code era, which technically is from 1930 to 1934.
It’s a very specific term for that period in time.
There is so much innuendo, you guys, in these movies.
It is quite striking.
There was a director came from Germany, Ernst Lubitsch.
He’s mentioned in the book, yes.
Yeah, who he is a brief cameo.
And I wanted to mention him because he was famous for the innuendo within his films.
What he got away with–
oftentimes, these scripts were looked at by the Hayes office before they went into production.
When they’re just on paper, that’s the least expensive time to make changes.
Once you start filming, once you start editing, it changes become far more expensive.
But those with the sensors were unable to catch a lot of the innuendo because so much of
it was nuance within, now that we’re in the talkie era between 1930 and ’34, so much of the
innuendo was in the way the actors delivered their lines.
And that was very specific to Ernst Lubitsch.
He got away with so much when you watch some of his films.
They’re highly entertaining.
They’re wonderful films.
But yeah, a lot of innuendo as you watch.
There seemingly–
I know that there was a code period or whatnot, but there was seemingly no rules or, I think,
as you say in the book, guiding principles for these censorship boards.
They could pretty much just start their own, like, fake leaf campaign, a lot, Pope Pius,
and start cutting the metaphorical genitalia out of these films.
So, why do you think censorship became so prevalent in the United States at the time and not
so much abroad?
Boy, that gets into characteristics of America.
I–
The Puritan Fiendies.
I mean, we still can’t– I’m in Boston area.
We still can’t have happy hour here, so yeah.
You know?
Well, that’s funny.
Our son lived for a couple of years in Salt Lake City and the Hoops one has to go through
to order a drink at the table.
And I mean, barriers are always, I think, in American society.
There are barriers that are often put up and one needs to be clever to find their way around
it.
You know, I think– I do want to say– and this is an important part of the censorship– the
film censorship period– to begin with, film was a new medium.
And a lot of people weren’t quite sure what do we have on our hands here.
But it did come out of those first state censorship boards in the 19 teens.
They did come out of the progressive era.
This was a time when America was starting to get its arms around meat inspection, food
inspection, inspecting imports to make sure that teas from abroad were made of tea leaves
and not sawdust.
So this was an era in which consumer protection was– was felt to be a good thing for the consumers.
And so films fell into that category.
I think the initial impulse was to protect the consumer from what was being created, whether
it’s being created in Hollywood or New York or Europe.
And so I think the intentions started out well.
But people very quickly discovered, wait a minute, but we’re censoring.
We are controlling what people are creating and controlling what people can see.
So keep in mind that early movie theaters were oftentimes being used– or not oftentimes–
but were being used as a babysitter, people working to income couples get their kids somewhere.
And so oftentimes they were being left to movie theaters without any sort of oversight as
what those kids were seeing.
So I think I don’t want to lose the fact that they were trying to do something that ultimately
benefited their populations, be it in Ohio or New York or Pennsylvania or what have you.
So yeah, the censorship is really a nuanced, gray subject.
So with that, when Doddry first meets with the censorship committee, he’s floored by
the amount of power he now has, which is like you said, his ultimate goal is to gain power.
And he asked why they are doing it with books or stage plays or paintings.
And I thought I stopped that.
I was like, that’s actually a good point.
Why did they just jump to film and not start going around New York museums and knocking
genitalia off statues?
Why?
You know?
Well, I think because of its newness, quite honestly.
I think they felt, all right, here’s a new medium.
We are now at a point in time where we can at least control this one.
And by the way, book censorship, the most banned titles in history are now in terms of libraries,
of public libraries or school libraries.
That’s why I throw that little line in one of the book censors, or, sorry, one of the
censors on that committee after Dodger asks that question that you just mentioned, one of
the censors said, oh, he’s a dreamer, that one.
And it was meant, there was a historical wink, wink, because it is happening so much now.
But yeah, I would guess, concisely, I would guess, it was just a new medium that they felt
they could control.
Yeah, I think there’s a new documentary coming out.
It might be on like HBO or something, but it’s about libraries and what’s happening with
libraries now and librarians specifically, you know, the unsung heroes trying to protect
the books in their own libraries and just them getting decimated by interest groups who
aren’t so into having books that people can read and learn about.
I would have asked one.
Just inform me that that documentary has come out.
I’ve got to see it.
Yeah, I want to see it too.
As someone that went to church every Sunday growing up and I think Dylan did as well, the idea
of reenacting movies, I thought that was brilliant.
Yeah, Dodger’s on to something.
Yeah, I would have given you a die hard, good fellow’s reenactment.
I mean, you know, I would have been paying much more attention in church.
Where did that idea come from?
Was that something that actually happened somewhere or was that, or maybe you also said
in a church, I think I wish they had did this?
Now that’s just where the satire, I mean, my satirical approach to this topic, hey man, I just
wanted to keep pushing it with this goofy character, Dodger.
Where would he take it?
But he realizes that simply by telling the congregation about some of the lines that
he feels should be cut, he is seeing the attendance slowly increase.
So he simply takes it to the next step, what if I bring some people up and he learns of a
young couple within the congregation who did some acting back in high school, they’re an
attractive young couple.
So they are his first stars and then once others see their fellow congregants going up
to act things out, auditions are held.
It just is pushing an idea.
As far as I can, the interesting thing, after I had finished the book about a year ago, I
read that there was a biography that came out on Amy Simple McPherson.
Amy Simple McPherson is a name that I simply toss in in a very brief scene.
But she was considered to be the leader of America’s first mega church out in Los Angeles.
And she was somebody who started to borrow the production values of the Hollywood scene
that she was living in at that time in the 1920s.
She did it through lighting and stage decoration and that type of thing to my knowledge.
She was now bringing congregants up to act out Hollywood films.
But she did look towards Hollywood and look towards Hollywood films as a means of bolstering
her own Sunday morning attendance.
But more through decoration and that type of thing.
And now that’s like everywhere with the mega churches for sure.
Well, the entertainment.
I went to my cousin’s church in Tampa, Florida when I was six or something and they had a
band.
I was like, there’s a band here.
What’s going on?
Everyone’s standing up and dancing.
And I was like, this is not the Catholic church I grew up in.
So he’s always thinking about his legacy.
It’s kind of the duality that he talks about between him and Dodger.
And what he’s leaving to the world and ultimately will it mean anything?
I think it’s something we all think about probably a little bit.
But as you were finishing writing this book, did you kind of associate with those ideas?
Because the book is tangible.
It’s not going anywhere.
It’s here.
So do you see that as part of your legacy?
Now that you’ve become a writer with these last two books?
Yeah.
I was writing this in my 60s.
I am in my 60s.
And I was writing it as I was retiring as I was making the decision to retire.
And so yeah, very much.
I was thinking, well, how will I be remembered?
How will my children or my grandchildren remember me?
So yeah, I think leaving for me, leaving behind now two books, possibly three, leaving that
behind.
I was definitely focused on that.
And I wanted, as I’m thinking about it, I wanted to give Shepard some of those same thoughts
and concerns.
Yeah, absolutely.
I think sometimes I have a daughter.
She’s too.
And I’m like, please don’t ever find anything that we’ve recorded when you’re older.
Please do not.
Maybe this interview.
We’re okay with this.
We’ll be deleted off the internet by now.
Yeah, outside of that, Keith has the red briefcase or whatever to blow everything up.
I think we just got one more for you.
And I do really appreciate your time.
But at the end of the book, Shep says, “All creativity is propaganda for something.”
So what is rough cuts propaganda for?
Yeah, he said that in a heated moment.
I gave him a line there at the end.
You know, rough cuts, what I hope that readers will take away from reading this.
I hope they enjoy the read.
I hope they find it funny and humorous.
But I also hope they find it thoughtful.
And forces them to kind of examine their thoughts on censorship and how they find art appropriate
or inappropriate.
You know, it’s an issue and I give Shepard these lines as well.
It’s one thing to not want to see a film personally.
It’s one thing to not want your child necessarily to see a film because perhaps they’re not mature
enough for the subject matter.
It’s a totally different thing for one to not want anybody to see a film or to read a book
or to look at a painting.
And so those are the arguments.
And when there is this crescendo at the end between this clash at the end between the minister
and the director, I hope that readers will look at both sides of the argument and not only
feel that the director Shepard has good points, but I hope they look also at doggries pushing
back and feel, you know what?
Maybe he has some good points around this difficult topic as well.
Yeah, I mean, I guess that was my last question or the same time I’m just thinking back
in the book and there was a lot of references to like DW Griffith who famously made birth
of a nation which was shown in the White House.
And obviously, race has been a huge part of this country for such a long time.
And do you want to just go and get rid of those things because of that or should people
be able to look at that and kind of realize maybe how far we’ve come?
You know, to that point, one of the biographies I read of somebody involved in the film community
who I found to be fascinating the director, Victor Flemming, he started out as a cameraman,
he was a technical guy, started out as a cameraman, primarily working on Douglas Fairbanks films
and then he ultimately became a director of those films.
But one of the films that he directed was Gone with the Wind.
And in the same year that he directed The Wizard of Oz, which to me is incredible that he
did those two films within the span of nine months, almost had a nervous breakdown.
But I mention it because my wife and I rewatched Gone with the Wind, I haven’t seen it in
probably 40 years.
But what I really appreciated, there was like a 10 minute introductory piece that an African
American woman introduced the film and she said you should watch it through these eyes,
understand this about this film, it’s a time piece, it is considered a classic, etc., etc.,
but she really positioned it beautifully, which I appreciated rather than the streaming
service simply going into the film or rather than them deciding these films, these portions
of the film are now objectionable and need to be removed.
So I like understanding that position before positioning, before seeing a racist film or an
objectionable film.
Yeah, I watched it earlier this year myself, I had never seen it before and felt like I
needed to watch it.
And I had the same experience.
And I was so glad because there was also a bunch of scuttled about going around about it
when I started researching on the internet about them potentially cutting out scenes or
stuff like that.
And I’m so glad they didn’t and instead went the approach that you’re talking about because
it was made then you should see it as the director wanted you to see it and having that
prelude ahead of time with someone giving you a little bit of perspective was not only knowledgeable
but also I think just the best way to kind of approach that kind of thing.
But I’m sure there will be people that disagree with us and that’s fine.
That’s the whole point of this country is you can disagree with anyone.
And those who disagree with what you just say would probably want a sensor, the film,
if not eradicated, get rid of it.
Glenn R. Miller, thank you so much for stopping by the Buddy Book Club.
The book is Rough Cuts and comes out on September 29th.
Well, we really appreciate your time and hopefully we’ll catch you for the next book.
I so enjoyed this conversation.
Thank you guys.
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So we just chatted with Glenn, great combo.
I like the controversial stuff.
You know I’m interested in that stuff.
People get really upset or lots of stuff and what else did you feel like you wanted to chat
about outside of what we talked about with Glenn?
I didn’t ask him about cribbage.
I wanted to ask him about cribbage.
Dang it.
I forgot.
Yeah, a couple of games where I was just going to compliment him at the end.
I forgot too.
But the first of all, it’s probably the book that I’ve looked up the most words for.
I wrote it down.
First of all, I didn’t know what a Nickelodeon was.
I was like, the TV station was back then.
That’s first, firstly.
And then, let’s see if you know these words.
Soupcon.
Soupcon.
S-O-U-P-C-O-N.
Yeah, it’s when you tell someone you’re giving them soup, but it’s just like check the
stock.
Yeah, it’s a fake.
It’s not.
It’s a fugacy?
Yeah, it’s a different.
Difference?
What is the soup con?
You didn’t tell me.
Oh, I didn’t look up the definition.
I was looking up on it.
You just wrote down words.
You didn’t tell me.
Oh, then these are not.
These are not.
These are not.
So it’s French.
It has like an accent.
Oh, you didn’t tell me that.
A very small, so cool.
A very small quantity, trace or hint of something.
So that’s that one.
I’ll give you the next one.
Difference.
It’s when you’re not feeling so hot about something.
Yeah, lack of self-confidence.
Shine us.
Well done.
I’m different in all the time.
That’s the one.
Did you make that up?
Yeah, I just made that up.
Just when I think, you’ve probably heard a bunch.
Mercurial?
Mercurial.
Yeah.
I have– see, this is– and I do this with my nephew and niece
because they’re seven and nine.
So they always ask, what does this word mean?
And I’m like, I can’t define it.
I can use it in a sentence.
But whenever you’re trying to define it,
you end up just sitting there going like, ah, it’s–
you know, mercurial.
And you just say the same thing.
Just means, what it means.
Unproductive change in mood or clever and quick-witted.
So it’s too very–
Yeah, this–
Yeah, it feels like you could be being
a dick to someone by saying they’re mercurial,
but also being nice to them.
All right, last one is–
I’m going to put you to the name, in SoCans.
I-N-S-O-U-C-I-A-N-C-S-E.
In-N-S-N-C-E, sorry.
What?
I really read.
I don’t even know what words you’re saying.
Yeah, that’s right.
It comes out right away.
I look for it.
It’s a French word.
So it looks like it means carefulness in French.
It’s too call.
In-S-O-C-I-A-N-S-E.
Yeah, all right.
All right.
There you go.
Those are the half of them are French words.
Yeah, what’s that?
Yeah, what’s that?
You get no four words.
This book is 300 pages.
If you only didn’t know four words, that’s pretty good.
That was within the first 30 pages,
and I stopped doing it because I was like, oh my god,
there’s too many.
I didn’t know when he was–
there was the confusion over carnal and carnival.
Doddry makes a joke, and he says, oh, like an organ grinder.
And I was like, what the heck is an organ?
That sounds like something from a butcher factory.
But it’s those trolleys from all timey carnivals.
It was basically an organ that, I think, as it moved
or you cranked it, that due to steam would make sounds.
I’m sure you’ve seen it in an old timey video
or something like that, but it’s like a horse-drawn organ.
An organ that you crank, what’s that?
This is what I said.
I did it while my daughter had listened to this in 20 years.
No, they’re coming in.
This is a sub-shamble high brow than that I have.
I don’t have anything.
That’s a problem.
How did you–
I feel like we’ve done maybe at a 10 or so interviews.
I don’t even remember anymore.
But I really read this book and thoroughly enjoyed it
from beginner to end.
Yeah, no, absolutely.
Like I said before, it actually is a lighthearted comedy,
which we don’t actually get many of.
Yeah.
I wasn’t joking when I said every single page had some comedy.
So I really liked the kind of witty banter back and forth
that’s happening.
Even if some– usually it was one side, especially with Doddry,
it was one side of the conversation,
didn’t understand that there was a joke going on.
And I really enjoyed that.
I was talking to somebody–
I can’t remember who it was, but I was talking to somebody
recently.
I think it was like my cousin’s husband.
And people were coming up to us and saying stuff.
And he would always have, based on what they said,
this kind of like, quippy joke in there, where I was just like,
hi, whether’s good.
You know?
I was like, how do I do that?
How do I become that person?
So–
Well, the key is–
I went golfing up in the richer part of San Diego.
What’s your show?
Yeah, and it was a super nice course.
The guy comes out– you know, like the starter.
I’m always a little nervous around them because they’re–
I have a push-light.
The couple would remind you.
I’m classin’ it up.
Did you buy it from the clubhouse?
No, absolutely.
Obviously not.
So that’s strike three.
But he comes up and he just says like seven jokes
to write to my face, making fun of me,
before I can even get a word out.
He’s like, look at this piece of shit from Boston,
and I’m like, oh, and then he’s like, yeah,
he probably come down here from the mesa where you’re from.
You come back and find this area.
I was like, and he just kept on going.
He just rattled him off.
He wouldn’t let you talk and get a quit back in.
I was like, just defeated.
I was like, well, I’m done.
I don’t know if it’s saying him or so.
That’s the guy at the blue–
The blue teas are for the low-handy capers.
Why it is for everyone?
And you, sir, you can play from the reds.
That’s on four-w and tea.
That’s exactly what he was saying.
What’s going on here?
Yeah, those guys can either be really good or are really bad.
Really bad.
No, you’re the nice dude.
Usually, if you don’t drive 90 degrees,
I’m going to come to the course and kill you.
So I go, OK.
Yeah.
Yeah.
We had some guy pull up to us.
We were playing with friends.
It was a casual round, and there was no one really there.
But he was like, you’re, he pulled up to us
and I was going to be mad at us.
He goes, you’re friends in front of you are an hour behind.
And I was like, that’s unmake-up-able.
Like, what do you want me to do?
He was like, make him play faster.
I was like, I can’t possibly do that.
So I’m sorry, sir.
But here we are.
What else do you got?
No, I think, I like I said, I think all the relationships
had like a kind of a funny–
you were kind of waiting for the next joke, which I really
liked.
I mentioned I liked the Tubby and–
I liked the name Tubby Versal.
That’s a hilarious–
That’s a great name.
Tubby and Shepherd relationship was good.
Shepard and the financier relationship was funny.
Like all the relationships were good.
And then he did mention it too, but don’t you
like, even though you kind of didn’t like him,
you kind of did like him.
And then so when the story ends and he’s like,
has like a positive note of like, actually,
you became a productive person in the business.
You’re like, oh, so there was no like actual bad guys
in the book, you know what I mean?
It was like, he was an antagonist, but he kind of did
humble himself, which you didn’t think would see happen.
I don’t know if he humbled himself.
I think he–
He was good at his job.
It was a good hire.
And like he actually was actually helping
do the opposite of what he first intended.
He was actually helping–
Yeah, but the only reason why he did the first–
the thing he first intended to was because it gave him power.
And now he was job was the power.
So he now had the power on the other end
and had 10 people working below him or whatever the case is.
So–
Yeah.
He didn’t have–
But he still had a–
Right, just crusade to go on.
Yeah, but he still had to listen to–
like they said he was like, ah, he’s going to be tough to like
reign this guy in and have someone–
but he like immediately was like, oh, I’m working for you guys,
not the other way around, type of thing, which you don’t
think that kind of telling a guy would be able to do.
Yeah, well, it’s nice when you’re making tons of money.
He lived in a hotel though.
I feel like that was the thing that people used to do.
Remember when we read the Matthew McConaughey documentary
and he– or whatever–
Greenlight.
And he lived in a hotel for like two years?
Just seems weird to me.
I feel like it’d be good if you’re just
have your bed made every day and cleaned up after you all the time.
It’s not bad.
I don’t think I like that, really.
I’m like George Costanza.
I don’t want to be tucked in.
I don’t want the bed tucked in, you know?
No, no tucking.
No tucking.
And then she probably threw away my jokes,
like she did to Jerry when they went to LA.
Yeah.
I forgot to ask him about Doddry’s breakfast, which
was two cups of black coffee, a hardball day,
an 11 drop.
And I’m assuming a lemon drop is not like the boozy drink
that co-eds get when they go to bars.
And instead was like a hard candy.
Or how do you feel about that breakfast?
Two cups of black coffee, hardball day, lemon drop.
That would be like, consider a super healthy breakfast,
right back then.
I mean, it is healthy.
It is healthy now.
It is healthy.
Yeah, it’s healthy.
I mean, it’s probably not healthy now.
I was going to say back then, the three pieces of toast,
forex, bacon, you know, that was just to start your day.
And then like, which me, I’m like, I’m doing like a Bolognese
no milk and just straight, you know, tea, black.
That’s the only way I can–
Dry Weedies?
Oh, yeah, kid.
I’m– you know my– I’m wearing a tune.
I do black tea, benafiber, green juice mix,
and we eat dry Weedies.
Do you eat it with a spoon?
No.
You just hands.
Interesting.
Hmm.
I had oatmeal for breakfast.
Every time– you know what?
Every time I have oatmeal, you’ll like this.
Every time I have oatmeal, and I eat oatmeal a lot,
and my daughter eats oatmeal all the time.
I think about you because we had a conversation
probably 15 years ago that was–
you said that oats, you can eat them raw.
Like, they’re– you can just eat them.
They’re fine.
You don’t need to like cook them.
And I thought that was blasphemous.
And I was so hard-lined, you know, as I am stubborn and whatnot.
I was like, that you’re an idiot.
You’re stupid, too.
That’s just not the case.
And then we googled it, and you were right.
You can just– you know, I mean, I make energy bites that just
have raw– I mean, routs in them.
And so now every time I think about that,
and it reminds me to be humble, you know?
I thought my thing was that I like to pour hot water into the oats
versus, do you put the water in and then microwave it?
Or do you–
I put the milk in, and I was savage–
OK, I had a milk in and then microwave it with the milk.
Yeah, I’ll do my great– every time I do water if I’m making steel
kind of oats on the stove top, then you’ve got to mix in some–
I think my argument more was that I like to heat the water or milk
and pour it over it like cereal and then it–
because you can control the amount of water.
And it’s not just like–
when you get served oatmeal at a restaurant,
it’s just kind of like dead in the water.
It’s just mush.
It’s kind of like– I don’t like cereal that’s
been sitting in milk too long.
I like to–
No, of course not.
-do less milk.
So I like– that’s how oatmeal.
I like it like hot water.
That’s just hit it.
And it’s not like finally ground oats.
It’s like– OK, yeah, that makes sense.
I think our friend, Nevin’s broke the cereal mystery.
She had two bowls, one of milk and one of cereal,
and would dip the cereal into the milk and then eat it
so she could control the saturation.
I mean, I don’t like that at all.
That’s genius.
I was like, that is–
I mean, you got to clean two bowls with that–
Yeah, that’s what I thought.
-well worth it.
And you kind of look like a cat a little bit
with like the bowl of milk and your–
So it’s for milk table two, bro.
Yeah.
Got to get our Austin Powers in.
Let me think.
I was wondering how these censorship panels were formed.
He’s– you know, in the book, he’s
talking about the governor coming in and giving you this power.
And it had to be one man of the cloth was involved.
But I’m just wondering in all of these bureaucracies,
like how they decided who these people were,
because it seemed pretty willing–
I’m sure.
-really nilly.
Yeah.
I mean, that’s what politics have always been.
It’s like, oh, I know someone.
So they’re going to give me this role that I’m not qualified for.
And then give me a ton of power that I shouldn’t ever end
or I didn’t get voted in for.
But that’s how it works.
I think that’s my problem with all this stuff in general.
And I know Glenn said it comes from a good place,
and it does.
But I’m just a small government guy.
So it’s more of–
let us figure it out by ourselves if we want that or not.
I don’t need it.
And I know this is a different time we’re talking about.
It’s also pro-ohibition error, which we really didn’t
discuss at all the pro-ohibition, which is really interesting.
And just the way that everyone’s drinking the whole time
is great considering it’s the pro-ohibition error,
if you have money.
Which I was going to bring up was that I’m surprised
that churches didn’t boom during this time,
because you could drink wine at church.
So you could be like, this is a special–
-substant wine.
-could come on.
What’s this being?
Let’s be honest here.
I need all of–
Jesus is blood right now.
I need all of it.
You just go at church and everyone’s just holding the cops
like–
–let a Christ do your–
Yeah, I actually wonder in general–
and there’s no way to know this– but how much wine
they went through during the giving of communion–
-during pro-ohibition compared to now?
Not once.
Never.
Me neither.
Disgusting.
I was always looked at that.
And I’m not a germ person at all.
I’m not–
But it’s still about–
I don’t wine in two.
I’m going to be the 35th person drinking of this thing.
I was like, now I’m good.
And I was like 12 when I was saying I was like,
that’s the dumbest thing ever.
And I’m not like the least germ of all person of all time, too,
which is so–
Yeah, but you would–
you would if someone that you knew had a drink,
it was like, oh, try this.
And they had already drank from it.
Oh, you would–
You would try it, no problem.
I had people get a drink out of it.
If someone had a drink out of it, whatever.
But this is–
Oh, really about it.
I didn’t like.
There’s something about it.
Because I feel like there’s a number for me.
And the number is probably three.
OK.
They get any more than three, and I’m out.
I feel like after COVID, I’m sure they change it.
Now they like straws for everyone.
Dixie cup, they just report it into dipsy cup.
Yeah, it’s a shot of Jesus.
Little shot of Jesus, but all right.
Yeah, I don’t think I have anything else.
But yeah, I would suggest people go out and get their hands on it.
It might be one of those things that comes on.
We didn’t ask them or anything.
But it could be something that comes out
on Audible in the future, or you could probably get it from Libby as well.
But you know what?
These are Glent’s a guy who’s retired.
He’s trying to write a couple books, make a little money
to supplement his retirement.
Go out there and buy the book.
It’s like $22.95.
Go out there and buy the book.
Enjoy it.
Stick it on your shelf.
And make notes in the margins like I did,
because there was lots of good stuff there.
I wish I had the same him being like I was super into researching the 20s and 30s.
I was like, I wish I liked anything that much.
Like that’s great.
Like that’s a dense topic and like a hard one to cover and he’s like all over.
I was like, I love that.
Yeah, one of the books, one of the movies he referenced, Battleship Potemkin is something
like my grandfather who loves movies like has seen every single movie.
He told me about it.
It’s been on my list and then I saw it on HBO and I was like, oh, this is in there.
It’s silent film from the 20s.
It’s been on my list for like sitting in my HBO list or whatever the thing is for six years
and I haven’t watched it.
So the idea that Glen went out and not only watched all of these, or at least all the silent
film movies that he could get his hands on, but then also did all the research.
I mean, you see it comes through the picture.
It comes through the picture.
Yeah.
And the thing is, I was like, I’m like, I’m like, I’m like, I’ve worked with someone for
10 years.
I don’t remember their names.
I can’t even remember the way.
I mean, like, I don’t know their last name or it’s like crazy that he could pull that from
his memory.
Yeah, if you didn’t think he was a bright guy just from being able to write this book, then
chatting with him for 15 minutes.
Yeah, that was a little nervous.
I was like, this guy was so much.
Oh, look at you.
You’re nervous.
Wow.
That was in the call you an idiot like this golf starter.
He was going to be like, oh, look at this guy.
Patriot set.
Great.
Great.
I also don’t like looking people in the eyes.
So you’re like, we should do a camera.
I’m like, yeah, totally.
I don’t do that.
We’re doing a camera.
I’m like, you know, one looks at you can’t look at people in the eyes of the camera because
you have to stare at the camera.
No, but I feel like you’re trained to do that.
And I can’t think as well when I have to look at someone like that beautiful as you do,
you know?
So.
Yeah.
Glenn is a looker, lucky guy.
All right.
Well, that was rough cuts by Glenn Armeller.
Like I said, comes out September 29th, 26th, 312 pages, easy read and 2299, 2295.
I nailed that.
Got that one right.
So, yeah.
And Dorman wanted his, his previous book.
Check that out.
All right.
What do we got coming up next?
Along Give Us Spider by, our, our, by James Patterson and Alex Cross Thriller.
That would be next.
Those rough cuts and book at you for a long game of Spire.
All right.
All right.
Bye now.

The Buddies head down under for Sally Hepworth’s darkly compelling “Mad Mabel“. The Buddies had a lot of questions after reading the newly released mystery/dark-comedy. Namely: How old does a child need to be to take accountability for their actions? What makes a good/bad neighbor, and what is the definition of ‘dark humor’. Find out the answers to all of this and more on this weeks podcast. So, pack your umbrella and some tissues, we guarantee you’ll be Mad/you are Mad if you miss this one.

Transcript for SEO Purposes 🙂

All right, welcome to Book Up.
I’m Dylan here with my bosom buddy, Keith. What’s up?
I’m here with Dylan, aka Demon, aka Oloss, because it’s easier to say than that’s my favorite frozen characters.
Oh, look at us. We’re like, “cess and mess.”
Finishing each other’s– this is where you’re supposed to know.
All right, here’s the buddy book, I hope we get out the best others.
And this week we’ll be discussing Sally Hamper’s latest novel, “Mad Mabel.”
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Keith Mad Mabel, it’s a crime story about the two kinds of people,
no one ever expects to be murderous, little girl, little ladies.
But is it really about that?
Stick around here to hear our thoughts.
437 on Goodreads, 225,000 ratings.
Like, this thing’s only been out for eight months or something like that.
I guess a little bit more, 10 months.
But yeah, pretty wild.
I definitely haven’t read anything else.
First, you got like nine novels.
And I don’t even know if we’ve done any Australian writers.
I don’t think we’ve done a lot of international there than British.
Yeah, and I guess she said in like her acknowledgements,
which I listened to, that were quite nice.
She was talking about how she wanted to keep a bunch of the Aussie Lingo in there.
And you know, maybe had a little bit of pushback from publishers or editors or whatnot,
but she kept it.
And I just love, give me all the Aussie Lingo.
Like, have this thing so Aussie Lingo that I’m not sure
that I know what’s happening.
100% agree.
Yeah, when I went there, I kept on getting tripped up when they would say,
what is it?
It’s not how you’re doing.
It’s how you’re going.
I think they say.
So they’re like, hey, how are you going?
I’m like, going to good.
I couldn’t think of how to respond to it every time.
I’m so goddamnit.
Yeah, that’s kind of like whenever, both from the East Coast,
whenever we say we’re all set, which is like, yeah,
do you want some more guacamole?
It’s like, no, I’m all set.
In other parts of the country, people have no idea what that means.
Oh really.
At least I’ve experienced it a few times where someone’s like,
does does that mean you are more like, what?
All set.
Let’s get this stuff up stock down for Mad Mabel Keith stock up what he got now.
Accountability stock up.
I mean, I’ve said it once.
I’ve said it a million times, demon.
I don’t think we should treat kids differently than we treat adults.
Yeah, you’re big.
It’s not as baby talk.
None of this, you know, treating them like they’re,
you know, you know, they get our kids gloves literally, you know, with them.
Sock them, boppers.
And Melbourne, Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia.
They take this to heart.
Yeah, you’re three years old.
Yeah, you can barely walk.
You can barely talk.
You can’t make core memories, whatever.
Nothing excuses.
We got three-year-old LC.
She should know better.
Polio is super contagious.
You know, you should know that, right?
Yeah.
So it’s one or two options, demon.
She’s either a malicious killer who did it on purpose.
That’s.
Or she’s a complete idiot.
And we all know she’s not idiot.
She’s smart, you know?
So, I mean, this whole community blaming a three-year-old and not the parents,
it’s completely right.
It’s the right response.
And can we, can we address a little bit of the elephant in the room, though?
But with the, with the blaming of all the three-year-old, what about Kitty?
Yeah, exactly.
She not take any accountability in this?
You know, you’re going to walk into the room.
You’re not walk out.
And someone has polio?
Like, Kitty, grow up, walk yourself out of the room, or crawl out of the room.
What do you have to do?
Like, that’s the only thing I’m a little upset about is that there’s no accountability
from Kitty’s perspective.
Other than that, you know?
She’s dumb.
Completely outflying all of this.
But, uh, in all seriousness, yeah, I didn’t really understand that whole thing.
All right, does everyone in the whole society just like,
complete idiots?
I don’t know to get, like, how that would work?
And it’s not just, I mean, it is the whole society, but even
ness, sass rather, at one point, she’s like, yeah, your dad really, really loved Kitty,
just like your mom, all this stuff.
But I always loved you way more.
I knew you were going to be way better.
I’m like, Kitty’s 12 months old.
What are you facing that often?
She can barely as a personality.
Like, what are you talking about?
So everyone there, apparently, is, and I was thinking, like, do they count?
Like, you know, I think in China, when you’re born, you’re one-years-old.
I was like, oh, yeah, they may be like a year older.
Like, she’s actually two.
Is that the only thing I can think of that would make sense?
Even then, though, I don’t know.
What age do you think they have to get to before it’s not all the parents involved?
In terms of giving someone a contagious disease?
I feel like, yeah, that’s like 18.
Yeah, what are we talking about?
Just in general, like, the percentages start to swing.
If a three-year-old touches a stove, that’s 100% on the parents, right?
But if an eight-year-old touches a stove, you’re like,
yeah, come on, you know.
Oh, you know that this boy.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, you’re saying I’m saying like the scale,
it starts to move as you get older.
Yeah, I think it depends on how egregious the thing is.
Like, a virus or whatever the thing is,
disease you can’t see that, you know.
It’s also, she’s on the porch.
They just put their kids.
So this is, we’re talking, I think, late 40s, early 50s.
I think we’re talking like early 50s here.
And they were talking about how they just would put the kids that had polio,
like, on the patio.
Which, in my mind, I’m thinking of a house that has kind of like a small porch
that’s really just for collecting Amazon packages.
And they’re just putting the kids out there to be like,
okay, live out here for a couple of weeks until this polio thing either kills you
or you get over it.
Because you’re not going to affect anyone else.
So that was a little bit weird.
So I guess if we’re talking hot stove,
I think probably like five, you know,
five’s probably the point where you should know better in the sense of,
you know, like even my daughter’s almost two.
And whenever she walks by the stove, I’m like hot.
And she goes, hot.
And I’m like, yes, hot.
So she understands that that’s a thing.
Would she still do it?
Yes, absolutely.
At the same time, who knows?
Just recently had some time with some family.
And my brother, law who’s 44 or, you know, definitely past that age,
we’re both putting things in the oven.
The oven doors open.
It’s 450 degrees.
I go to put my sheet tray in the oven and he just closes the door.
Like just straight up closes the door on my hand.
It’s like, are you insane?
So yeah, I think it’s younger than 44,
but probably older than three,
which is the age maple is when her dad takes it upon himself to blame her for Kitty’s death.
And, and pretty much starts that ball rolling to blame her for literally everything else.
And you briefly mentioned it, but the exact quote from Cess is,
to be perfectly honest, she was far less interesting than you.
Yeah, she didn’t even talk.
It was kind of like she was terrible.
It was her deal.
Like she shattered her pants and couldn’t speak in, not in full sentences.
She couldn’t even put two words together.
She was just a loser.
Imagine you go and meet someone.
She just hammered all the time it sounds like.
Like barely, it was not locked, could barely do anything.
It’s like how Jerry Seinfeld would act towards a baby, you know,
is pretty much how Cess is acting towards this one year old.
Yeah, she’s like good riddance.
I’m glad she’s dead.
She’s way less interesting than you.
Yeah.
Well, I was going to say like the, uh,
I don’t even blame the dad because the dad is just an evil character.
So the evil character is supposed to be evil,
but everyone in the town being like,
I can’t play if she killed her, her sister.
Yeah.
What are, what are wrong with you people?
Well, I wanted to kind of talk about this in general before I get into my stock up,
because it’s, that’s so absurd.
But it’s, and the book is a lot about the court of public opinion and just how,
the kids are kind of terrible, you know, um, probably it’s knocked out, but
and they’ll believe anything, you know, it’s like if there’s a story that’s circulating,
people will just believe it.
So it’s like, oh, did you hear that she killed her sister when she was three?
One person says it and it just spreads like wildfire.
I remember in high school, there was some girl in high school,
she’s like a few years older than me,
but somehow it like made the rounds that she had had an abortion because she had a scar on her
stomach, which now as an older person with a brain clearly realizes that is like an appendectomy
scar or something like that.
And that is not how abortions work whatsoever.
But because this storm happens in these places where people just pass things on and people
believe them, and we’re all idiots when we’re 12 and we kind of want to put people down, you know,
kids are so group-orientated and they want to always be, there needs to be a them, you know,
if it’s us as your group of friends or the people you trust, there has to be a them.
And we always pick someone and it’s terrible and it shouldn’t happen like this, but that’s how it is.
And someone decided that this girl was a them and she because of that she was like labeled as a
harlot because she had this abortion that she obviously never had because she had a freaking scar
on her stomach. So I thought about that when I was reading this book because one of how
great just that is that we would just make that up and ever and believe it. And two,
that it just happened to Mabel over and over and over and over again.
It’s tough being a kid and especially, I mean, we don’t know, we’re both guys, but I can imagine
being a girl and a kid, especially like in puberty times as way harder.
Which takes me to my first stock up, fuck around and find out, stock up.
Billy, he fucked around and he found out. We don’t even know what happened to Billy, right?
He just hit his head somehow walking down the stairs at the beach. No one did anything to him.
I mean, I was hoping again, this is what I really wanted to book the Tardew 2.
Is that her imaginary friend would just go off and like do all these things that she could know
she was happening, but that’s okay. That’s why I’m hoping for, but I don’t think you can really root
for Elsie at the end if that’s the case, but that would be dark and humerus. And I think that would
be great. That would be a great way for this book to turn instead. It was just sad and emotional.
Have any of those books, but go. Yeah, no, I was it’s interesting you brought that up because
it’s something that I thought as well. When, you know, Daphne’s revealed in one, I was like,
holy smokes, I wonder if it was this, there was a darker book than it had been the whole time.
And she was actually having psychotic breaks and Daphne was just going around to people.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, because a lot of, you know, her mom, she just shoved her out the window.
Because even her mom, I mean, her mom’s not on the fuck around and find out list. Billy is of course,
but if her mom was on the fuck around and find out list, yeah, I was going to say wouldn’t be that
crazy. Her mom said, what did you see? She said, I saw some thrusting. And the next thing you know,
she hits her in the face and then nose dives out the window. So yeah, she could be on the
fuck around to find out list. Mr. Lucas clearly one pedophile, two terrible human being uses her,
which murder was it her dad’s her mom’s her mom’s yeah and uses that to like getting close to her.
He fucked around and found out he’s dead. And actually that one probably, oh no,
isn’t Mabel’s fault because even though she did the, this she used her compass to like
stab his tire, his girlfriend was already going to kill him. She just then used that as an alibi.
Mabel’s dad, he really fucked around and he found out he fucked around for years.
And then eventually he found out and she killed him in a very enjoyable way like stabbed him with
a umbrella to death. Yeah, I like that. Yeah, very league of extraordinary gentleman. I appreciate it.
So yeah, I guess if you’re around Mabel and you fuck around, you’re going to find out and now we
have earned our explicit writing on Spotify and Apple. What else did you have for stock up?
Being a good neighbor, stock up. I do think it was kind of funny while we’re reading and we’re like
getting interested, Joan. I’m like, fuck this Joan. She’s the worst. She’s the absolute worst person
ever. What a terrible neighbor. But then you like take a step back. If you’re a neighbor and you’re
like, oh yeah, the person that just moved in next door is a mass murder and she had imaginary friends
that she talks to and oh, we need to protect everyone in this little community. We have a little girl
here. We have, like, you know, I need help, you know, make sure people are aware that there’s a
crazy person here. And so she’s got to do that. And then she finds out that she’s actually not that
crazy and she’s actually probably a pretty good person. And then she apologizes, oh, she’s kind of a
good person. Joan gets a lot of hate, but she’s fine. And then she’s like bragging about her nephew,
is actually a good lawyer. Like he comes in and helps out. So like, you know, most of those
neighbors that are talking about their, their kids and all these things, none of that helps you.
You’re like, yeah, like Timmy ran really fast with the me like, I don’t give a shit. That’s not
going to help me unless Timmy’s like, you know, running down and saving me for something. No, I know
who gives about a speed, but she’s talking about some a lawyer and then they won’t behold that lawyer
comes and helps them. So that was a good brag. It was useful. So yeah, I’m on team Joan after
it by the end of there. So I was like, you know what? But she’s actually a good person. So being a good
neighbor, stuck up. Yeah, Joan has a good story, has a good story arc. And she’s not the only good
neighbor which we can get into the other ones. But I enjoyed that Joan is so hateable at the beginning.
She’s the classic neighbor from every neighborhood movie or whatnot that’s just always
ease dropping and putting her nose in places they shouldn’t be. But yeah, if you think about it from
her perspective, even if you’re a little nosy, sure is the youngest killer in Australia’s history
that moved in and extort you. And now someone’s dead on your street. So yeah, you have a, you have a
reservoir. But then the second she goes human shield against those like pita protesters or whoever
those random people were shooting blood out of square guns. And Mabel that is and puts
Persephone behind her. Joan’s like, oh, maybe, you know, everything that she’s done has been pretty
chill and she just did this, but just super chill. So maybe she’s not that bad a person. And then
instead of just being like the mea culpa, she goes hard the other way and helps her out and
and whatnot. So so yeah, great stuff. In terms of other neighbors though, Peter obviously turns out
to be her son, spoiler alert. Seemed like a good guy for the most part helped out when he was
needed. He was kind of like the man around town. I in my head thought Peter was in Joan were both
a lot older. I thought they were Mabel’s age, but clearly, I mean, they’re still like six years old.
Yeah, they’re still older, but yeah, if she’s 81 and he’s 15 years younger than her. So 65 is not like
elderly. All right. Jeez. But you know, what I’m saying. And I guess the only one that was a tough
one to me besides the neighbor that died who just has a happy dog and no one likes that is Roxanne.
Like is Roxanne a good neighbor? What’s her deal? Her story is just to introduce another way that
men are terrible essentially. It’s like, oh yeah, there’s Roxanne. Yeah, she has a terrible, terrible
husband slash. Yeah, it’s like a kindergarten cops type situation going on there. Yeah, that’s
pretty much it and just to make it the story even sadder to end. That’s that’s her that’s her
better job. Yeah, I thought there were like no guns in Australia. That was the big thing. Yeah, that’s
not terrible. And no one has any guns. Well, this guy’s Italian. Oh, check what they’re asking.
No, it was more about Roxanne. They said she had gentlemen callers at all hours of the night or
whatnot. And hey, I’m not here to yuck anyone’s yummy for Roxanne wants to get laid and whatnot,
like good for her. But she does have a seven year old kid at home. So I thought that was more of like
the rumor mail saying that was the real. The LC was spreading that or at least LC. I mean, LC is
not up at 1 a.m. So I don’t really know unless she is, but I thought that was more the rumor mail
and she’s like, oh, she’s, you know, that’s what’s been happening. What she’s like, funny, because I’m
like, LC, aren’t you the person that was getting accused of these things when she’d be like the last
one, you know, throwing stones. Yeah, yeah, interesting. I didn’t take it that way. I thought it was like
that was actually happening, but if that is the case, then my bet I’m not here to spread rumors
because, you know, no, no one likes that. But leaving her kid at home, even though I know she’s kind
of, she needs a night time, she needs a job, pays a lot more. I get all that. And the setters,
too expensive overnight. I just couldn’t imagine leaving a seven year old and not telling them,
like they have no idea. Yeah. Or even just telling a couple of neighbors just a check out. It goes
back to your ear. Yeah, you’re seven. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Go back to sleep. Let’s see if you
can answer the door and fight off that 30 old man that’s at the door. Whatever. Yeah, you wake up
and I’m not home. Who cares? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Something.
Figure it out. Go get yourself a glass of water. Yeah. That’s a good point. We got to treat those
kids like adults. So maybe your exam is right. She just wanted to get to grow up a little faster.
My next stock up is Jonas Salk. Stock up. I’ve heard about polio, obviously, but I didn’t really
necessarily realize that it was this giant epidemic. I’ve seen the pictures of like, oh, the iron kids
and the iron lungs and I knew FDR had it. But polio is just pretty wow. It’s contagious. You know,
it attacks the nervous system causing paralysis or death. And I guess he, like Jonas Salk introduced
the vaccine in 55, but it was killing or paralyzing over half a million people a year before that,
which is wild to me. I was up at my mom’s lake, like, I don’t know, maybe 10 years ago or something.
And I got bit by leech, which is supposedly the only time that’s happened in that lake. And
because of it, I got a staff infection. And I went to the clinic there. And the doctor walks in
and gone like crutches or something like that. And he said, oh, yeah, it’s pretty,
like, this nobody deals staff infection. Like, staff lives on your skin will give you some antibiotics
and you’ll be fine. And he was like, good thing we got antibiotics, right? And I was like, yeah, sure,
great, great thing. He’s like, because in my day, we had polio and there was nothing to do it. And
that’s why I’m in these crutches. I was like, wait, what? And it was like, wait, how old was he? He’s like
in his 50s or 60s, something. But yeah, I guess he somehow got polio. And imagine just like your
kid, everything’s chill. The next thing you know, your nervous system shuts your legs off. Yeah,
it’s just it’s great. You know, you’re thinking we just lived through COVID and you know, that I’m,
I’m not downplaying it. It was wild for a lot of people that had terrible times. But like a lot of us
have had COVID and it was like a cold and you get away with, but polio, although society looks like
a lot of people that had polio either had no symptoms or it was fine, but a lot of people
your body just decides, no, no thanks, no moss and you’re dead. Yeah, crazy. I think pre
1940 though, you just assumed the more like it’s like a one in five. Yeah, it doesn’t make it to like
18. Yeah, you’re just like, uh, they probably won’t make it. You know, it’s just like one in five. I
also always parking back to a freakonomics book where they, the way they learned the germs were is
that the mortality rates of people delivering babies in hospitals was significantly higher than it
was in just home births. They’re like, why is that there’s got to be something going on? And they
went into the doctors and the doctors would go to the, the morgue work on dead bodies and then
come up and deliver babies and they’re like, I don’t understand what constantly got me to cause
like this. And so they didn’t know that germs were a thing and then they eventually they’re like,
oh, yeah. So there you go. There’s, there’s people are idiots. So maybe we have to change the,
the hot stove number to, yeah, yeah, you’ve been going to the morgue, then delivering a baby. Oh,
my god. That’s terrible. Well, if you, if you watch the, you know, there’s a Netflix series too on,
forget which present it was, but one of the presents, like, got assassinated and turns out, like,
you got shot and then they were trying to get the fun to pull it out. And the reason he died is
from infection, not because the, the bowl was fine. It wouldn’t have mattered. Yeah. So, yeah,
it’s just because they were so bad with like, they didn’t wash their hands. They didn’t do all these
things. You’re supposed to do. And there’s, there’s like, drilling into his back to find the
bowl. Like, ah, it’s not there. And they’d be like, whatever. And then let them, you know, rest there.
And be like, let me squeeze some human feces between my fingers. They all get back in there. Yeah. Yeah,
yeah. Exactly. Crazy. Yeah. Holy August does transfer from human feces, which I didn’t know. But in
the way that poops kind of everywhere, you know, which is as disgusting as that sounds, you know,
people don’t wash their hands and they touch something or yeah. So it’s like surface contact and whatnot.
But blaming Mabel, who’s on the porch and is locked out on the porch and then her one-year-old
sister somehow gets out there, which is still unclear is very confusing at the same time though. She is
three. So if she can unlock it from her side, it’d be hard for that kid not to do it because she doesn’t
even understand what’s going on. I don’t know. It’s wild. It’s just wild to blame a kid. My last one is
probably the most important one, but it’s in kind of what the book’s all about, but stock up friendship,
you know, it has to be whether it’s real or imaginary. It’s it’s kind of a big deal. So yeah, we’re
talking about how you know, Mabel obviously is has this terrible childhood. I really know one to turn
to. So she’s she’s bookish. I couldn’t imagine not having a safe space with your parents. And I guess
maybe another stock up would be having siblings, even I mean, assuming you don’t murder them by giving
them polio, but you know, because there’s I couldn’t imagine just not having anybody to turn to. And the idea
that she has all this trauma and then because of this trauma creates a imaginary friend like Harvey
in that 1940s movie or whatever it was made, you know, uses that because she’s so into and of green
gables and to create Daphne who was her friend in kindergarten but then moved away. So she kind of
just like brings her back to life. It makes a lot of sense to me, although I mean, we’ll get into it
later, but it’s probably going to hurt you in the long run if you’re trying to continue to
get friends. She got her off only five years in prison or mental hospital. Yeah, that’s for sure.
But I’m just saying if you’re trying to get some friends and you’re like chatting, chatting with
yourself by the locker, people are like, no, that’s the other reasons. Like people maybe people
work calling her mad Mabel because of all this crazy stuff that happened. Maybe they’re calling
her mad Mabel because she is a little mad in the sense that she has this imaginary friend that she
somehow thinks other people can see and interact with to some degree. Although all of her neighbors
like her and she’s still she still has a imaginary friend then, you know, she’s like still talking
with her all day. I don’t understand why her neighbors like her. She just mean to everyone and they’re
like everyone loves you here. It’s like, right? Yeah, she’s like nagging everyone. It was great.
That’s people love that. Yeah, I guess they were into it. What about stockdowns?
Quick one on the fight club stockdown just because you mentioned it. Fight clubs like that. But
that’s mainly because her imaginary friend really didn’t wasn’t about that life. Didn’t
help with the whole fuck around. Find out like you mentioned earlier. I was hoping that she was
kind of going to come out and sort of murdering people. But I also wanted to ask you when did you
know? I didn’t know if it was supposed to be pretty obvious, but I thought it was I knew within
like the first quarter of the book that was a imaginary friend. Did you get that sense right away?
Good for you. I’m also always looking for it just to let you know. I think I’ve talked about this
multiple times. I’m pretty sure that’s a person’s imaginary. Oh yeah. Never imagined. Yeah, it’s like
you’ve been sick sensed. So you’re just like always. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Well, it was one of my
stockdowns was reading the same book at the same time as just a significant other was a stockdown
because we were both listening to it on our car ride back from Michigan and separately though.
A different, a different, you know, different. I was listening to it on my headphones. She was
doing her headphones and my daughter was watching Seinfeld. That was pretty much how her how her
ride back went. Yeah, we were watching Seinfeld actually yesterday morning and she’s like having a
bottle and she’s like, “Ded, like what?” She points to the screen. She goes, “Creamer.” And I’ll
say, “Yeah, that is great, right. Good for you.” Yeah, she’s got it. She’s like, “Get it.” Yeah,
because she knows all the characters. She legitimately watched Seinfeld for 10 minutes this morning
and just stared at it and was so enthralled and then she picks up the clicker somehow. I’m like,
doing work. I don’t even know how she got to it, but she’s watching always sunny and she got to
always sunny and it’s the gang’s racist episode. They turned the bar into a gay bar. Yeah. She watched it
for a solid like five to 10 minutes of just sitting there walking, like actually just watched it.
Is that you got? Okay. Well, here we go. Hopefully you have a good sense of humor.
Good app. But yeah, they’re reading the same book at the same time as we should have together a problem
because about 20% through Caroline goes, “So, Daphne’s imaginary, right?” And I was like, “Oh, God,
dammit.” Yes. They did make it pretty obvious when the cops come to replace. She says, “Oh, like,
Daphne’s like right there in the corner or whatever.” And then he was down and pets the dog when he’s
like, “Oh, Daphne, he pets the dog.” So I’m like, “Oh, okay. She’s not actually there.” So that’s when I
knew I was like, “Well, I guess the thing that threw me off and kept me questioning it for a lot of it
was when she had sess a ness over to Daphne’s house or something and she was blue collar and she
lived in a kind of a rundown house or something. Didn’t that happen? When she was like, “Oh, this is
Daphne that I’ve been talking about and there was no one there.” And they’re like, “What the hell?” And
and her mind was like, “Oh, it’s because she talks with a lower-class drawl and so people always
are taking it back by that.” Or something like that. Yeah. Yeah. I obviously wasn’t sure when Caroline
said that. I was like, “Oh, that makes a lot of sense.” But it was kind of interesting then reading
it from there on out because at that point I was then at every scene. I was watching how Sally
here are Sally Hempworth, the author, how she did it. I was kind of seeing a magic trick happen
in real time and she did it really well. Throughout every time there was some points where
Christos was like, “Oh, is Daphne your friend?” And she’s like, “Yeah, blah blah blah, this is the other thing
because she was supposedly right there.” But so it could be misconstrued that he was addressing that
person, but really he was just talking to Mabel about it. So overall I think it was really well done.
I don’t think the point, this was a big pushback on a lot of the like goodreads reviews was that,
Oh, so obvious that she was imaginary. I don’t think, you know, Sally’s out here trying to make it seem
like this is a huge reveal at the end. You know, it was like, “Oh, okay, this is becoming clearer and
clearer throughout the book that she’s not real.” And then it’s like, “Hum.” Like I said, I thought it was,
you were supposed to know and like reader was supposed to know almost, that’s what I thought,
because like she kind of does give it away right away. I was like, “Oh, okay, I think it’s fine.”
Yeah, and I think either way is either way is good, but acting like, and it’s maybe because people
are obsessed with fricking twists and turns, like we talked about at Nazum, but it doesn’t have to
be this huge reveal twist. It’s just like, “Oh, okay, if you didn’t know at that point, it’s like
that’s cool.” And if you did the whole time, then you got to enjoy the ride of how was we’ve did
and seeing that happen in real time. So, yeah, I kind of knew at the like 20% mark, I was holding on
to a potential that it wasn’t, and then about like halfway through, I was thinking, is definitely the
one murdering all these people. Yeah, which would have been pretty crazy. My first stockdown is the Salem
which trials stockdown. I mean, there is no way Mabel survives on the North Shore match, just Massachusetts
in the late 1600s, right? There’s just no way. There are way too many deaths and mammings in her
presence. No, it’s the deaths and mammings that happen while she’s there to not be considered a
witch. Like Kitty, her mom, Mr. Lucas, Billy Harris, Sess, her dad, Ashon, and then ultimately,
herself. So, it’s like, maybe after Billy, it’s like, she’s 14 and she’s already been in the presence
of, this is her fourth death. And even though Mr. Lucas, she wasn’t there for it, she was there right
before it. So, yeah, she’d probably get burned at the stake, but kind of like we said before,
the court of public opinion is just so cruel. Her mom dying and no one being there to
console her or just have her ear, you know, just to spend time with her is so messed up. And instead of
getting twisted into, did she kill her mom? Did she then, because she killed her sister, I heard, is,
it’s just messed up. And, yeah, I mean, it makes her the person she is obviously and creates
Daphne. And she seems pretty well adjusted as a, after, you know, she gets out for how terrible her
life was. You don’t really know what happens, right? She goes and helps Ness as a librarian
or something along those lines. But I assume that she had a fairly lonely life
until she came to the realization in her 80s that she was loved, you know? So, yeah, I can’t
imagine the rest of her life was, was very good. She obviously has a great, she’s a good hang.
She’s clearly a good hang when we have whatever the two, Adnan and Lillier, whoever the people were,
that that came to her, the interviewer is like, she’s got a great sense of humor and she’s a good
person to talk to. But no one knows that because no one gave her a chance except for Christos,
which we don’t really even know what happened to him. So, lingering question there.
Did you have any other stockdowns? I mentioned a little bit, but dark humor is stockdown.
This book is categorized as darkly humorous crime mystery. So, I think that I think in the vein of
psych or the third, there’s a murder club if you’ve seen that Netflix movie/book or only murders in
the building. You know, like the kind of like, yeah, someone died, but it’s a funny, it’s cutesy,
you know? There’s gonna be some humor around it, like lighthearted type, you know, crime mystery.
Yeah. That’s what I was thinking. And dark humor to me when people, I think we’ve read a few of
these books that are there. They call them dark humor. It seems like in books, dark humor is,
okay, someone being sassy with a terrible, terrible backstory and an awful childhood and all these
things that are happening. It’s like, yeah, it’s dark. And then there’s some a slight bit of humor at it.
It’s like, oh, because I think, I think dark humor, I think, it’s always sunny or
sign-filled. That’s my interpretation of what dark humor is. I think the perfect scene,
I always think of it for a sign-fell, like what dark humor is is it’s a Jerry and Elaine
and George at the diner and their, someone comes up with a, a child who was like adopted parents,
so you know, got killed all these things. We want to send you to France and they’re telling this
whole story about like the parents and everything like that. And Elaine starts crying and is like, oh,
my god, that’s so crazy. And she’s using tissues like what, like, rise and then she hands a,
or an African rather and she hands a napkin to Jerry assuming he’s crying and Jerry just uses
it a wipe his mouth off because he doesn’t give a shit at all. Doesn’t care. That’s dark humor.
Is that the one with George is like the big brother program and George hasn’t sent the letter,
fastened, sent the letter from France? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So that’s what it is. Like, it’s like not
caring at all about other people or anything. Like, not being a part of society, what I think dark humor is.
Or just, that is like, yeah, what Larry David is, is just that kind of person where there’s not a lot of empathy.
Selfish, like, yeah, exactly. This is like, okay, you want to hear about literally the worst childhood of
all time and though, you know, how terrible it could possibly be and be super depressed. And then
the woman’s witty. It’s like that. She should be way more fucked up than just saying some, you know,
necks like you mentioned to our neighbors. Like, that’s not really, you know, a big deal in my mind.
But anyways, I think it’s just mislabeled, I think, as other book was in my mind. Yeah, I could,
I could see that definitely. It was dark. And there was humor, for sure. Like, maybe,
people’s a riot, you know, as, as LC, mostly. And the, like, the relationship with her and Persephone
is almost like an odd couple type relationship. So it has fun moments. And the banter that happens
pretty much in the now time, there’s not a lot of funny in the before four time, but in the now time,
the banter is great. It’s really well written dialogue. But yeah, I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t necessarily
consider it dark humor, although I don’t, I don’t really like what I’m trying to think, because what I
equated it to, it reminded me a lot of anxious people. Yeah. And well, I think it was closer to the
second one, the, anxious people, I think was actually a little bit, was actually somewhat lighthearted.
Yeah, the person’s robbing this place, but it’s, you know, there’s all these funny stories along the way.
And it’s like not the, the, the, you never had at any point during the robbery and being like, oh my god,
kids are, yeah, yeah, you know, something, you know, I’m saying where it’s always light the whole time.
This one is 90% of the book is, holy shit, you know, maybe you feel things, which I don’t want to do, you know.
Yeah. More than before times though, than in the later ones, except for maybe at the end when,
when I’ll see sacrifices yourself for Persephone and then the whole Peter reveal. A couple,
a couple more stock downs. The one we’ve already kind of done was like, stock down to kids, especially
those in the, in the puberty stage, you know, they pick on Christos for being like, they’re like the
Masuka monster or something, and it’s like kids have to come up with the stupidest things to say.
Like I said, try to do like the us, us them thing. But, you know, it does also say something that when
they start picking on Mabel at the bonfire, and she come claps back by picking on them, it’s like,
oh, all of a sudden it’s like now everyone’s laughing and maybe a bit of banter can help. And I think
that might be tough for some kids, but, you know, it usually is helpful if you just kind of
give them something back. But my other stock down was living in a sheltered environment,
stocked down. So Mabel goes from kissing and not really knowing what homosexuality is,
and also not understanding what she’s seeing with her dad in Susan what’s her name,
to all of a sudden having sex at 15. Yeah, in like a week period. And there was no, you know,
sexual intercourse already like that with the teacher who she’d been with forever. Yeah,
which they got. Yeah, that was, obviously. But I was, I think, again, I think this goes back to
the dark part, but I think initially the kid was going to be the teachers and she was like, I’m not
doing that. That’s going to be fucking weird. So I’m going to do it where it’s the, the Greek dude who,
I guess, meets her one week and then they’re having literally sex immediately. So yeah, I think
it was probably more stretched out. I felt the same way when I was in my age, but I felt like it was
probably more stretched out, but at no point did they make it seem like they had like a childhood
kiss kind of thing. And it was like, okay, cool. Good for them. But then all of a sudden,
I’m having a baby. So, like, whoa, what? What? So, yeah, maybe you teach people about intercourse and
stuff like that as kids, then they’ll know how to do the right thing and stay protected and all
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I don’t necessarily have a favorite scene, but I would say any scene that has LC and Persephone
was an enjoyable time. It’s like she puts her bed next to you and she’s sleeping next to her like
snoring and you know they come over and she makes me and she can’t say that’s not kids are.
They can’t say no to it’s so hard to say be like oh I’m not gonna make you banana bread are you
crazy? And then she’s like well I do have a couple of right bananas maybe you know so yeah I just
thought every scene that had the two of them and the the back and forth. You really felt the
relationship. You know you really felt her growing on LC kind of like the the yapping dog to to some
degree but way more obviously with Persephone that you’ve felt by the time that she actually sacrificed
herself like oh she would definitely dive in front of a moving bust to save this little girl.
And she obviously sees a lot of or a bullet. I’m moving bullet what she does. Yeah but she
obviously like sees a lot of herself in Persephone but then she has friends although she then adopts
Daphne as her own as Daisy but what about you did you have favorite scene for this one?
She’s like when the dad got killed I was I was really hoping that there wasn’t one of those books where
the twist is like that that person that died was sass and then she got blamed for it. I was like
not there’s don’t fucking give me this bullshit where like oh it’s mad Mabel that did it and that’s
what she went to present for she never killed anyone then she beat him to death of the umbrella I was
like thank god that would have been so that would have sucked if she didn’t actually kill him so that
was nice that was a nice nice thing. Yeah I’m glad that guy’s not around total pieces shit Elliott what
kind of name is Elliott terrible Elliott Ness. Yeah I guess I’m into the prohibition smuggle those
booze over I’m good I’m good with it although untouchables is a phenomenal phenomenal film.
What about your favorite character? I like Sess and Ness I just really even though the
the one thing like you the quote you had already pulled up on the one year old not liking her but they
are the only real adults in the book they’re like you shouldn’t say this in front of your daughter
and you shouldn’t do these things and they’re not even parents and they’re just like yeah this is
obvious so it was nice to see some real human adults in the book which you know they weren’t shitty
so that was nice. Yeah the only other adults we had were at her parent sex parties and yeah
right which was weird they all sucked I like that Ness just hangs out in rips or Sess just hangs
out in rips heaters like a lot of that. Got a marble reds doesn’t hurt it. It was hanging out in
their slacks and button downs you know just making martinis on a casual tattoos they have to
bring out martinis and rippin heaters. Yeah just they’re great but those are our role models indeed
I liked we’d already talked about but I like the turn my Joan I didn’t I don’t think she’s
best character but I like the turn and I just think the best character really has to be LC you know her
her 81 year old self is someone to aspire to doesn’t give an absolute fuck speaks her mind swears
like a sailor. I mean that’s every person that’s when you get old or all gonna do that. I hope so
you know I don’t want to be the person’s like oh I got sweets you know I got some candies come
grandchildren come have candy and sit and watch Wheel of Fortune with me although that that
sounds pretty great too. I will say this is my loves but I I like the relationship with a
Dean a Dean walks in and she’s like you fat piece or shit and then she’s like oh you’re so whipped
you might might call you whipped cream you’re fat and you’re whipped I’m like holy shit yeah
that’s all we know about a Dean. The answer for coffee was sugar which is like a small
mountain which is normal and she’s like now I’m not gonna do it you gotta lay off the sugar fatty
it’s like whoa all right yeah I like I like the relationship between them her and the the two
YouTube YouTubers as well for me for loves like I said they reminded me a bit about anxious people
more just in the way that these friendships are happening you know the relationships that are
happening between the people who you you might not think necessarily would would get there
but another thing I liked was you know it was a story about something you know the crimes and what
not but but really it’s a story about something else and we always our least I always enjoy those
kind of things and and this being you know friendship specifically probably female friendship
and you know the importance of that and kind of how how that changes who you are and throughout
you know later in life when she has this this neighborhood of people even though it’s just her
in Daphne she actually does not realize that you know all these people are there to support her
and you know sometimes it has to be something crazy like your your neighbor overdosing on vitamins
to to make that clear to you that was the only dark humorous part yeah it’s like also is that clear
people he’s been getting vitamins and taking them nonstop they take they come every day it’s probably
he’s like RFK Jr.ing it over there so for Christ sake uh what else do you love my that was well written
interesting story you already mentioned it also it was a great narrator I think they’re just
well told I like the imaginary friend part I did like that it made me feel emotions which I didn’t
want to feel but you know I was getting some airplane you know up in the air that feelings yeah yeah
I was like oh I’m not flying right now what’s going on so didn’t didn’t care for that but
I also liked it so uh did you like the audio book because we both listen to the audio book yeah
though the audio book is great I do like that they did two different voices I think that was actually
really really um smart yeah I thought the audio book was fantastic I think both the narrators were
were really good and yeah I just thought overall it was a good story that had a lot to it
the story itself was interesting but also it got you feeling certain ways and you would
necessarily think that from basically like what you’d read on the inside slip cup yeah yeah
what about hates I think most my hits are gonna be more like lingering questions but yeah sure well
you can I got some a little bit of both so we can go into okay yeah I didn’t understand why
her dad killed ses what led to that like he wasn’t violent with his mom or her mom rather like so
why did he all of a sudden just killed like it just seemed like a little bit we don’t know that he
wasn’t violent with her right I thought uh else you said that he he was never violent with my mom but
he’s like oh like yeah like emotionally emotionally yeah yeah yeah which so it seemed like there
is should have been some impetus of like you hate skays or something you know I mean like where he’s
like gets so angry that he does she just came back and she’s dead oh I’m like what why like I don’t
get it and then where was where was Ness for that by the way I don’t understand why Ness wasn’t there
yeah so from the questions that I saw around this were that supposedly Ness was potentially out
looking for Mabel because Mabel like ran away and Ness went but but yeah I mean who knows on that part
I think for Elliot he also just hates a woman that has a voice ses was showing that she wasn’t
going to be a pushover like every other woman she was gonna speak her mind and she was gonna be
a roadblock for him and he just thinks of women as things that their objects you know the things
that you can do whatever the hell you all with and when he ran into Ness as the brick wall he
just snapped but yeah that would make more sense if he was like embarrassed in front of people or
something like that’s what I feel like it was should have been added in she embarrassed him in public
or did something where like a person like that can’t take that embarrassment especially from a woman
and it’s like all right fucking I’m killing him yeah well it was a cry of passion for sure wasn’t just
you know it wasn’t pre-meditated it was the whole thing with the house and whatnot and then he just
snapped and and killed her speaking of which how did Elliot not know who would inherit the house
seems like pretty standard figure this out when his wife dies who owns the house and supposedly
owns the inheritor I think you just said I think he was just gonna you thought he could just
bully his way into it he’s like I’m taking the house you know type thing yeah but he has the
audacity to tell sess he says what would you know about legal documents sessally it’s like well
what would you know you didn’t even read like there was a will read yeah you know there’s a legit
will read that said who gets this house that you’re obsessed with and it wasn’t you so
huh how do you not how do you not get that yeah what about other hates we already mentioned the
Christos thing I don’t understand what happened with him he just you know hit it in quiddit type
thing oh yeah he just gone I don’t know he doesn’t know he is a baby maybe I don’t know so I thought
that was weird so yeah I just thought that that twist with the Peter stuff I was like I didn’t
need that I just thought it was rushed it seemed like it’s like what yeah it’s funny break that
up because I was the next day I want to talk about was you know initially I wasn’t in on the
Peter thing obviously when she has all the photos and stuff of him you’re like oh she’s into him
I love what the man yeah yeah and she just doesn’t you know doesn’t know how to address that
but then it’s like oh she had a baby and it’s Peter so that’s supposed to be like a big uh-huh
moment and I was like whatever it seems kind of forced yeah but when she for some reason for me
because then they like stop and it goes back in time or whatever and they come back and she’s
talking to the youtuber and she tells her about the story of having Peter and when that happened
combined with the end where like Peter then gives some money to Persephone and her mom so they can
it it made a little bit more sense to me and I it tied it up I’m not I I also wasn’t necessarily
in love with this whole like oh she had a baby thing it seemed somewhat
also Peter knew that was it was her mom but he like never talked about I was like what all right well
I guess that we’re talking about it so in the middle of her life or after she moves to this neighborhood
to stay close to Peter because it’s her because Peter’s being raised by nests so they’re like
neighbors right so he’s like oh my mom died he said to like stay close you know stay close to
or whatever the case is so Peter knew but she didn’t know that Peter knew yeah I mean just was
yeah I guess I thought it was a little bit a little bit forced yeah uh philosophical question is
murder ever justifiable like she murdered that of course yeah good yeah all right what did you say
to that oh hell yeah I just you know some people are like no you can murder murder is murder but um
but yeah I mean if there’s a German machine gun nest shooting down at my Higgins landing craft
so I don’t know how beach I’m gonna go up there I’m gonna shoot that you know see in the head that’s
for sure uh follow up question was Mabel actually mad because she’s in the library and she’s
solemnly swearing to be faithful to her buzzing buddy she’s hugging herself she’s crying she’s
farting and snorting and laughing and this is all happening well she’s doing the actions of the
other person or is you know what I mean like is she is it actually just hard doing those things or is it
even if it’s not even if it’s not and she’s just she has to be hugging because she’s doing an action
so she’s hugging herself she was crying and then she definitely she’s snorted and she was laughing
so I was getting a lot of smiegool golem vibes in in the library if she was doing the low class
accent for her also that would be great that would be yeah then she’s definitely crazy about
she’s in a library like getting shushed and she’s just talking to herself you know so yeah I think
to her she’s like oh ever calls me mad Mabel because I’m associated with all these murders it’s like
people are calling you mad because you’re walking around talking to yourself like holding hands
with an imaginary person so yeah if you saw someone around town just always talking to
themself you’d think they were a little mad yeah no that’s the thing it’s better so how did
Kitty get out on the patio because they you know we joked about at the top but they said the door
was locked and someone’s like oh her you know people are the dad unlocked the dad unlocked it yeah
that was that was method made clear because she couldn’t reach the lock but dad could and she asked the
dad at one point when they’re in the hospital like so who unlocked it huh and he was like fuck you
and then you know so obviously it’s him but why would he do that because I probably just forgot or
maybe he wanted to so he’s not getting murdered just forgotten he blamed any game yeah pretty much
yeah yeah yeah with the parties that they were having it there were those like eyes when it
shuts X parties or were they just like rock is drinking parties and what’s the difference yeah I
think they were I mean were there drugs out I don’t remember but I think it was like I was
imagining like flapper you know 20s there everyone’s drinking champagne you know yeah this like
a little bit too promiscuous wasn’t that like the biggest time for babies yeah yeah yeah yeah
okay yeah I think I think they’re just getting they’re gonna after and obviously there was some
promiscuous behavior occurring you know doing it did you have anyone that you could cast for the
for the film I don’t know how they do the imaginary friend thing I was talking about Harvey which is
like an old movie where it’s sort of his best friends like a rabbit but I don’t know how you do a
movie like this with Daphne it’d be hard yeah well I mean they did a they did fight clubs so yeah
that’s true I was just thinking Helen Marin oh that’s why I had Helen Marin oh nice yeah yeah
oh my center name wrong yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah little too hot for mebel but you know what
well out did you have right hair growing up I’m gonna look I don’t think so yeah I think she’d
belong there yeah she was a fox still is oh yeah so we that’s funny well that Helen Marin there you go
she got a strawberry right here from the picture I’m looking okay perfect yeah well it’s not gonna
matter for Walter one I don’t know who would play a 15 year old version of her but that’s actually
you know they could they could get the girl from Stranger Things oh the right hair yeah she’s just got
cast X-Men right yeah yeah I think so yeah she’s probably a little older now but she could play it down
what do you give it out of five stars and his a four I think I give it a 3.75
five I thought it was it was very good I like think the my little my almost biggest issue with it was
that I didn’t want this type of book so I think I just like I said I think it was mislabeled
but it was a good read I do think there was some lingering questions at the end that I was like
yeah but I feel like most I guess you know twisty-turny books that we’ve had kind of always have some
sort of like I don’t know why they did that but nonetheless great writing made me feel for the first
time in a long time and yeah well yeah I give it a four five yeah wow I just thought we’re talking
this book is like nine hours long or like 10 hours long it felt as quick as it was but it also was
like just a good book you know it’s probably what 300 pages or something like that I have no idea
but all the characters were built up fleshed out had their own stories I think there’s obviously
going to be a couple of misses like the ones we talked about but overall I just thought it was a
really enjoyable maybe it’s a maybe it’s less than that maybe it’s like a four two five but four
five is like I for me at least it would be I’m doing things just so I can listen to the book yeah
but I think that’s tough because this is not necessarily like our wheelhouse like if we if we get a good
fantasy book or like a good sci-fi book I’m like okay I’m all like even we read that like expeditionary
force book about the marine guy like befriended an alien like it was kind of like projectile Mary
but it was like a machine or something I thought that was super like I was enjoying it and I was
like oh I can’t wait to read it but it wasn’t like that phenomenal book so I think because you’re
you’re judging on a weighted scale yeah I agree with you this is a top tier of this genre which but for
me like the highest that this genre can go is like a four four four okay you know I mean so like
but if you’re waiting it then I agree it would be probably like four point two five four five right yeah
okay so I’ll I’ll I’ll dip down to like four two five just to cut cut I mean would it get
into your top ten I guess is the question like would it kick out Daisy Jones six green lights
sounds like killing no okay so that’s yeah I guess that’s yeah no yeah anyway sorry hey I don’t want to
I don’t like keep the four five no but I just think this is more this is one of those books where
people sometimes I would say always I wish people sat there were like hey wish I read but people
some that’s like I was on the golf course saying some guys like hey can I ask your advice I was like me
me please he was like I shot a 108 the other day yes of course I thought he’d be like tell me
what to do so I could do the opposite but if someone asked me you know like my mom or something like
that is all we’ll always be like hey what are you reading like what’s a good book this is something
that I would just easily can throw out you know like bad me it fits it fits everybody everyone can read
it and I feel like everyone can enjoy it so I’ll go with a four two five all right what do we
come to next a long game of spider by James Patterson I believe right it’s his first book it’s the
end of beach season this is a we’re grasping on the beach season here keeping it keeping it alive here
yeah well I guess in Southern California it’s always beach season yeah but we still got like another
good month of beach season here and yeah it’s nine hours it’s a quick book and then there’s a
Denzel movie that has terrible rot in tomato score that you can watch afterwards yeah they I think
they made it into an Amazon show or something like that so yeah we’ll do a long game of spider and then
in early September we had a couple interviews coming up so I don’t know if any of those books have
come out yet so I’ve been I don’t even I didn’t sign an NDA so I could probably say whatever the heck I
want but either way you won’t be able to read them I don’t think but you can read a long game spider
so check that out and then we’ll catch you for that in like a week or two all right well that was
mad mabel and Keith I’ll talk to you next week all right bye now bye now
you

The Buddies venture into the children’s section for Brian Jacques’ 1986 classic “Redwall,” and immediately wonder how a book like this was ever considered for kids. Good for the librarians for recommending a book that has more death in it in one chapter than most ‘young adult’ books have in a whole series. On this ep, the Buddies got into discussing whether Matthias should have just stayed home and helped defend the abbey instead of obsessing over a sword that turns out to be completely non-magical, why Constance the Badger is the real hero of the whole book, and whether Cluny the Scourge is actually a terrifying warlord or just a large rat with good intimidation skills and a very cool outfit. So practice your broken English sparrow dialect, keep an eye on the gate, and join us as we discuss a book that’s a kids version of Game of Thrones.

Intro (0:00-2:37)

Stock Up/Down (2:38-25:02)

Favorite Scene/Love/Hate (25:03-43:24)

Conclusion (43:25-46:16) 

NEXT BOOK: Mad Mabel by Sally Hepworth

Transcript for SEO purposes 🙂

All right, welcome to Book Club. I’m Dylan here with Asmodeus.
J.K., it’s Jiskeeth. What’s up buddy?
Hey, I’m here with D-Man aka, I don’t have one for you, but yeah, all right.
You listen to the audio book of this, right?
Yeah.
Okay, I did a little bit of both, so.
It was awesome.
Here at the Book Club, we’re eight out of the best sellers, and this week we’ll be discussing
some adolescent fantasy.
No, not a game that’s been in the bottle with the Panguin Wendy Pfeffa Corn.
I’m talking about 1986’s Red Wall by Brian Jekwez, Jekwee, I don’t know, I don’t speak French.
But if you’d like to recommend a book for us to read or reach out to us in our past episodes,
you can visit our website, www.blogon.com or sign up to our DMs on X or Instagram.
That’s buddy book up podcast, list of us on iTunes and Spotify.
Download subscribe, five star of you, all that good stuff, please, and thanks, Keith.
4.15 on Goodread, so it breaks the 4.0 threshold.
This is the first of 22 books in the series.
Our boy, Brian, was just churning him out.
He was legitimately churning him out until the day he died.
I think the last book in the series was released after he died, so he was legitimately writing these for his life.
Good for him.
Do you have a history of Red Wall?
The Red Wall series.
I don’t think I do.
I was just looking to there’s eight prequels.
The interesting thing about the series, I’m not a professional about it, so I’m sure people will just say, “No, you’re totally wrong.”
But it’s not like Matthias’ storyline, and it just follows him throughout.
It’s more of just stories in this universe.
Oh, okay.
So, yes, Martin, the warrior, appears in some of them.
But for the most part, they’re just like new characters, and just that happened to be either in Red Wall Abbey, or in Mosswood, or Mossflower, or whatever it’s called, or that kind of thing.
So, yeah, I feel like I might have read, like, I definitely read one, like this one, when I was a kid.
I want to say I was probably in like 4th or 5th grade.
And I don’t know, maybe one or two more, but I was never obsessed with it.
I read it, I definitely read it when it was a little bit too advanced for me.
You know, like, probably shouldn’t have been picking up a book this long, but I decided to.
It’s really like a high school, I don’t think this would be too advanced, honestly.
Well, let’s get into it.
Let’s get into some stock-up, sock down, keep what you have for stock-up.
If you’re ready, so you don’t have to get ready, stock up.
If the hero Martin the Warrior is the person you look up to, he’s a warrior mouse.
And that’s what you wake up to every day, being like, thank God Martin the Warrior occurred.
Which I think that would kind of spawn some people that are like descendants of him that want to be warriors, and like build an army, and, hey, we’ve got to protect it.
We got to do everything we can, make sure if anyone comes around.
Not just be like, well, someone’s about to tag us, and everyone’s like, what the hell do we do? And then bear arms all of a sudden?
I feel like you kind of got to be ready for this type of stuff, especially when this prestigious of a place, right? Am I wrong?
The other thing I want to just point out, too, is like, why are we hiding this great sword?
What are we doing here? Why we shouldn’t just be like hanging up on a mantle somewhere?
Like, what’s the point of, maybe this gets covered in the eight prequels, but what’s the point of hiding this sword?
Or misplacing it, and then no one knows where it is, and you have to go into this long adventure to find it?
Come on. What’s going on, right?
Yeah, that’s fair. I like it. I like it.
I also like that we’ve been going this long, long journey to find this sword, and then the cat’s literally just shits on it.
Yeah, it’s a good sword, but who gives a shit? It’s just about the person that has this sword. It doesn’t really matter.
I was like, we couldn’t just send this to him?
Yeah.
No, chapter one. What’s going on?
It is something that I will discuss in my stock downs.
But yeah, it was funny when he talks to the cat in a cat’s second.
Yeah, it’s just a sword. Like, it’s cool. We have all these heirlooms and stuff.
But this one’s super cool. It’s old, but yeah, it’s got no magical powers. It’s just a sword.
And he’s like, yeah, all right, cool.
Well, fuck me.
Yeah, I know what I did to get this sword.
My first stock up is librarians in the 80s and 90s.
Okay, okay, like the looks that they got going, or ponytails.
No, just the fact that they’re stocking these shelves.
Do we not supposed to still do that?
I’m not sure that this is appropriate for eight to ten year olds who it was marketed to by all the librarians in our schools.
I just think about when I hang around my sister’s kids, I’m not allowed to say death or die.
Really like, you can’t say that stuff around the kids.
They don’t, they know the kids obviously know.
Yeah.
But if you only have one pair of dice or one dice, what do you say there?
Oh my god, no, anything but that.
Don’t say it.
But we’re talking in this book, you have a rat that’s murdered in cold blood.
A chicken hound.
A young…
A lot of your deaths.
Yeah, a young, well, there’s some like crazy ones.
Like, chicken hound, who’s a young fox, delights is actually delighted in the death of his own mother taking a, like she deserved it attitude.
The second she’s eyes, I got one, an idiot.
Like, she deserves a die.
I was like, what? This is your own mom.
It’s like, you know, he’s like the McCalley-Calkin from the Good Sun.
Like, this, that’s pretty much who he is. I know I use that all the time, but it’s true here.
The fox goes out and then this same fox, chicken hound, he goes out and beats the lovable father, Muthuzala, to death with a sack of stolen goods.
And on top, well, at least you’re thinking, well, at least we have, these are the bad guys.
So, okay, I get it.
But then we have the pious abbot, who when the Horde of Rats is tunneling into the abbey and they break in, he pours two cauldrons of boiling water into the hole and basically murders them via boiling water and then like covers the hole back up and traps them with it.
This is the most pious of the bunch.
Yeah.
So, yeah, I think for a kid’s book, there’s a small step below Game of Thrones, but this book was honestly.
Yeah.
We got, we got to the end of the book and he get, how he gets into the actual abbey is he tells like, hey, one of the other mice, I can’t remember where he’s from, but he’s like, I have your family held hostage.
I’m gonna murder them viciously if you don’t open the door and he’s like, all right, I’ll open the door. He opens the door and then he walks in and cuts his throat or something.
I didn’t even flinch. I was like, yeah, well, that’s what happens. And I’m like, wait a second. This is, if I was in fourth grade, I’d be like having nightmares reading this.
Yeah, exactly. That’s what I’m saying. It was like, okay, at first, because at first it started and there wasn’t any deaths except for maybe the hundreds of rats that died in the overturned wagon.
But it wasn’t, you know, it wasn’t in detail. It was just like, oh, the rats flipped over and they’re crying for help.
Anytime something happened, it was a maming. There were some maming going on. I was like, oh, is this gonna be one of it? Like, it’s fine. It’s a kids book.
So I wasn’t like upset about it, but I was like, oh, this is gonna be one of those books where it’s a battle, but no one actually dies.
You know, like watching Captain Planet or something like that.
Well, we’ve been playing of YA books where, you know, a whole series will have less deaths than this one had in one chapter.
And it’s more matured writing than all the YA books we’ve read, too. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So I was like, Jesus.
I was just a little, I was a little surprised that I was happy that the librarians in the 80s and 90s decided to stock it on their shelves and introduced it to our generation.
So I appreciate it. Absolutely. That’s why we’re tougher, you know, maybe it’s the next generation, for sure. Definitely.
Or sicker. One of the two out of Ketra.
What else do you have for stock up? Jar Jar Binks stock up. I know the Sith Lord known as Jar Jar Binks. Binks gets a lot of shit after, you know, the first Phantom Menace came out, you know, is kind of broken English talking is kind of like comic relief.
That was until I read this book. Okay, listen to this book and we have what like three chapters worth of broken English talk.
I mean, I get it. It is cutesy. It’s funny. It’s whatever, but can we not do this for a whole fucking it was like three hours of audiobook listening to them being like me so talk a talk of like that.
I’m like, I’m like, just fucking talk normal. This is who gives a shit. I understand that it is me get different dialect.
Oh, this was the sparrows, I think, right? Yeah, I think it was really the sparrows. Yeah, it was so stupid. I mean, I’m all four.
Hey, all birds have French accents and all rats have Spanish accents and all I’m all for that. Give them accents. I’m good with that.
But don’t give me this dumbass broken English shit. What are we doing here? Jar Jar Binks wasn’t that bad after reading there.
I’m like, Jar Jar Binks, I would kill for after this chapters. So tough, real tough.
Yeah, I mean, I’ll just tie into your stock up here because I want to discuss it further.
But one of my stock ups was a professional audiobook cast as a stock up. Oh, suck. Wait down. I don’t know where you’re going.
This is not a professional audio book cast. Oh, okay. So our guy Brian did the narration. So you had issues.
I was fine. You had, okay, but you still thought it was a little odd having that accent at first. I think you told me that.
And his son does Matthias, which I thought Matthias was very amateur. I read the book too. So and I liked the reading much.
The reading of it was much more enjoyable. So yeah, whenever I listened to the audio book, I was like, oh, this is, this is tough.
Listen, and I did listen to some of the sparrow part and I just couldn’t do it because I agree with you. It was very Jar Jar Banksy.
And unfortunately, I was listening to it and then I said, oh, I can’t do this. I picked up the book. But then that’s all I heard in my head as I’m reading it.
You know, I was like, shit, apparently that’s stuck in it. Yeah, I think my biggest issue with the audiobook cast was.
It was, it was cloney. Yeah, oh my God, because the worst acting of that, I think I could be a better actor. I’m a terrible actor. I think I could act better than this guy.
He was the Simpson’s episode where Homer goes to New York and he’s trying to get some call call from the cart guy and the guy’s like, no, no, no, bull stick. Only stick.
He’s like, do you want something to do our crab juice? And that he’s that guy or maybe the guy in Seinfeld when Jerry goes to his restaurant.
He wants to like help promote the guy’s restaurant.
Oh, the Pakistan guy that’s doing the Wagon fingerwagon. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That guy. So that’s the accent that they decided to go with for cloney.
I was thinking it’s the movie that everyone makes fun of that they made a movie about the movie.
I know the room. No, no, it’s with Seth Rogen. Yeah, and it yeah, Seth Rogen. It’s him. Who’s the guy that’s canceled from pineapple express Franco? Yeah, it’s broken in Frank. Yeah, it’s them. Those are artists.
Is that a star artist? Yes. Okay. That’s exactly what I’m doing. Yeah. It’s Tommy. What’s that? Whatever. That’s who it is. That level of acting and overacting somehow within the same voice. It was terrible. But anyways.
Yeah, so I mean, I get it. I get your point of the Jar Jar Banks thing and I get my point of the professional audiobook cast. I think it should have been a little better. They really could have had.
I feel like it should have just been a really good woman who did the audiobook because she can play all the characters better. I thought, but that was my own. That was my own take.
Other stockups I had was fortifications stock up. So yeah, we’re kind of past the whole medieval castle thing and I was listening to some history thing where they explained like why?
And I don’t think it was as basic as well like why we got away from it. I don’t think it was as basic as like gunpowder because a cannon could just blow it up and that was that. It was something else.
But either way at this time with the weaponry that is available, thank God that Red Wall is as built up as it is and well maintained by the people within because it’s they’re all.
You know, not warriors. There’s not there’s not a warrior in the bunch. They’ve decided that and I guess this also ties into my other stock up, which is having a standing army stock up because yeah, there’s.
You ready to not get ready. Yeah, yeah, there you go because yeah, they decide they say at the beginning the father of it. I don’t even remember what that guy’s name was but RIP.
He’s like, yeah, we don’t we don’t have any fighters like don’t worry with the ice about like becoming Martin or anything like that because that was an old time.
We needed him for this one specific thing, but like we don’t have to worry about that now. We just help people like we’re just here to help people. That’s all we do.
And that never ends up ends up well for people in books and movies when that’s the kind of situation.
So if you have a warlord coming in, what are you going to do? So thank God they have these fortifications. Great. I got to give a shout out to all the people of Red Wall because all the people, excuse me, these the critters, all the critters, the woodland critters of Red Wall, because although they might not be warriors, they were stout defenders.
They all did everything they needed to defend Red Wall and most importantly courageous. They were willing to lay down their lives.
You know, it wasn’t they weren’t fleeing at the site of cloney, the scourge. They were they were ready. So I appreciate them from that aspect, but it’s kind of like the United States between World War One and World War Two when they just decided, hey, we’re going to totally demilitarize even though there’s this Hitler guy hanging about.
And then all of a sudden Hitler comes to power and they have to turn the whole machine on again. You know, I probably don’t support where we are now necessarily where like a third of the budget goes to defense spending.
But you know somewhere in between happy medium between doing nothing and doing something is probably where he should be.
Yeah, no, I agree. And I will say also the real reason that their defense was good is my next stock of his side characters is my girl constants the badger is who is just about that life.
Like she’s actual badass. But I think she’s actually the hero of the book. Yeah, she’s my favorite character.
Yeah, me too. Okay. Yeah. By far, while Matthias is off playing adventure story, she’s like, well, I got to actually stay here and actually defend this place because I mean, I don’t know what Matthias is thinking,
but wouldn’t it be helpful just to have him there without a sword, defense helping defend the place I never got to go for her.
But she’s there. She’s devising big bone arrow contraptions. And I wish they let her like off the hook when the scourge comes the first meeting.
Yeah, that’s the head of the snake just killing right there. Yeah, you walked into this place. That was stupid. Yeah, you’re dead now. See you later. What are you going to do now?
Yeah, take that leash off. Who cares about hospitality rights or whatever the case is.
But once you’re threatening someone, it’s like 300 ones. They’re threatening someone in your place. It’s like, well, you can’t fuck down. Yeah.
You came in here respectfully. Maybe we have a little partnership. Maybe you can come in. But now you’re fucking dead. See you later.
And that’s what my girl consents. What it done had they let her off a leash. But the brothers or whatever your boys. I was pouring oil on people.
But you end up like, we got to be hospitable. And next thing you know, he’s letting people on fire. Next thing you know, he’s dead. Yeah. Well, you die for the cause. That’s fine.
No, but I agree. Yeah. He’s like, let’s be hospitable. And then like you said, he’s pouring boiling literally boiling people’s faces off.
Yeah. But then we got, I mean, the main characters I didn’t really love. I mean, I think the day where that great, but all the side characters are awesome.
We got basil, stag hair, great. Yeah. That’s how shit love that loves to eat. Yeah. Basil exposition to we love that log of log. I don’t know. I just like that name.
Yeah. They’re square Julian, Julian ginger beer. I thought it was like ginger beard, but I like that better than the cast. Yeah. And captain snow. I mean, all these people were hilarious. Even the side villain characters were good.
So yeah, I loved it. I mean, the bunch should have been about those people because the good and bad guys like Martin and like what’s you could write. I could write those people.
Like they’re just two, you know, one note. Like they’re like, what’s that? I mean, you have a thought. Sorry. Yeah. They’re just all to one note and same with.
Did you like father Methuselah? They him in like all the other people inside kind of just blended together. So I didn’t really. Yeah. I thought that’s one of the things I really liked about the book. And it was in my loves was that he did such a good job with all the characters that they were all uniquely them.
Maybe Methuselah and the main Abbott guy could have been one and two. But the rest of them were all extremely unique. Any characteristics you knew who they were talking about for the whole time.
Except for maybe the mom and daughter Sparrow. Yeah, those were like the same people just one was the mom and one was the daughter. But yeah, the Sparrow King and he was his own obviously has Medeus was its own thing.
So yeah, I thought they did a really good job with that. Did you have any other stockups?
Last one quick one, arming kids stock up. I was a funny scene. It was a child arming. Basil Stagger is talking to one of like the children or child mice and his mom’s nearby. And he’s like, listen, I can’t give you a sword. Your mom’s right there. They would really be irresponsible for me. Here’s a knife.
I was like, wait, what? I was like, all right. Sounds good. I just like that. Yeah, because the knife yet again, of course, a personal. Yeah, he’s like, you want to feel the blood on your hands.
So already, you might not get that where this is you got to, you know, find that artery and then you feel it. Yeah, I was like, you’re gonna hear their dying breath in your ear. Yeah, this thing. Yeah.
This will affect you forever. My last stock up was cover art. I just had to give a shout out. I didn’t even look it up. That’s that podcasting in my part. But whoever did the cover art for all this stuff.
Not only for this one, but for all of them, honestly, as a kid, I just remember going in and that’s why I read it in the first place because I was into it. I just saw that cover art. And I was like, okay, there’s a mouse Pete Ryan Pete Pete. Pete, Pete, Pete, Pete line with this stuff. He’s got a great job.
Get a wonderful job, Pete. So yeah, I mean, you can look up the rest of the cover art for the other books, but it’s all just so well done. So I appreciate him there.
What about a what was stock down, stock down arranged marriages? Oh, how about the end? They kind of just throw in the marriage. They’re like, all right, as my dying last wish cornflower, you can marry to Matthias, which cornflour, I’ll be honest, we are really, really tough book.
She had a big stand at the Abbey where she saves a bunch of people from a big attack. And what how she rewarded, they’re like, all right, that’s good job. Go back into the kitchen now. I was like, oh, okay, no honorable name passed down door for doing that.
Nothing like and head, you know, mother of the Abbey or anything like that, right? Just something at least nothing given to her. And then they’re like, and Matthias is such a good warrior. He needs a wife to, you know, be there to cook him food and do everything for him.
You’re that now. It was like, that’s the marriage proposal. Like, oh, Jesus. It was kind of like Chabacca in a Star Wars, but they don’t give her, get a medal. She kind of just got shit on it. And then earlier in the book too, I don’t know if you got this.
Matthias is like crying in the corner. I forget why he’s something he’s upset about something cornflower walks in and she’s like, listen, you’re so money babe, you don’t even know it. You’re a brave warrior. You got that swag on top of swag. Every mice want mouse wants to be you.
Female mice want to be with you. You’re like, my boo. I love you. And he’s like, you know what cornflower? You’re right. And you’re okay to and you walks away. And I was like, wait, she’s like, and you’re maybe destined for something. I don’t give a shit though.
I was like, okay. He was crying. I remember he was crying for righteous reasons. You know, I think it was like for the Abby or something like that. So she was like, that’s how you’re a good person because you care this much that you can cry.
Because he’s like, I’m not a man because I’m crying. And she’s like, no, this makes you more of a man. He’s like, that’s so nice. But where is my fucking apple pie? Don’t get it now.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. I don’t know. I don’t know. Our girl cornflowers. She didn’t get the love she deserved. But I think she did love Matthias. So, you know, it was supposed to be one.
Here’s one note, unfortunately. But yeah. Well, speaking of Matthias, that’s my stock down. It’s, it’s Matthias. He’s just got to get his head out of his ass and quit the sub session with Martin sword.
It was the only thing that was in it. The second they clonnie gets there. He’s like, all right. I got to get this sword, dude. Why?
I didn’t even do this beforehand. Yeah. If you’re so into this sword situation, why weren’t you spending your the rest of your life before this doing?
He’s like, I got to find a sword. They’re like, okay, clonnie’s at the walls. He’s going to siege. Like, we need all hands on deck. He goes, I need to find the sword, dude.
What are you going to do with it? You don’t even know how to swing a sword. You’re amongst apprentice. You know, what are we talking about here? Like focus on the task at hand of protecting the abbey.
And I know it doesn’t play out this way. And he does use the sword to definitely defeat clonnie. But that whole thing doesn’t make any sense anyways, especially because the squire cat said the sword has no power.
He has no training. There was no montage of him learning how to fight with the sword. And then he’s able to just in single combat take on clonnie the scorch.
They say the sword is just a sword. So maybe there are some magical powers that we don’t know about or whatever the case is. But yeah, it was, it was a flaw and potentially potentially.
I can understand that part where their names carved in here. And I was like, oh, yes, they’re connected somehow. So maybe somehow he has like an innate ability to wield the sword.
He and Martin are connected as our clonnie and Matthias somehow that he’s been getting these dreams. But the whole sword quest is really what Matthias is a whole book.
Even at one point when he’s going to try to like get back the piece of the tapestry that has Martin on it, which I guess is a big deal. I don’t know.
It’s a painting or a banner. You said matter a lot back in the day.
Yeah, so I was thinking about that. I was wondering if you always want to hang out your banner. And it means a lot to people. So if it’s a morale thing, fine.
If you’re going to go in a soul mission to do it, even though like the the habit or whatever said not to then go do it. But in that process, he sees and saves some hostages.
But he’s not even really interested in saving the hostages. He’s like, I just need to find this tapestry.
They’re like, help save us Matthias. He’s like, where’s the tapestry? Tell me where the tapestry is. So yeah, Matthias.
Women and children first. Well, actually the tapestry first. So then I also still don’t understand you’re literally looking up to that tapestry every day being like, what a great guy. And everyone, no one thinks, you know what? I want to be like him. I’m in church training or anything like that.
Yeah, he’s a good guy. Right. We’ll talk about what we’re usually doing.
All we needed was a couple pages of that Matthias had a heavy stick that he was practicing with the badger.
He and Constance were just out there and he was fighting her with a sword, which is obviously she’s bigger and better than anybody else. So if he can take her down, of course, you can take anyone else. So that’s the only thing I needed.
I didn’t have any other stock up stock downs. That was the last one for me was finding Nemo stock down.
So I guess everyone else can talk in this world, all the animals, everyone and people are making alliances not to eat other animals, but murdering fish is completely fine. Even the vegetarian was like, yeah, occasionally have some fish salad, but those aren’t real.
No, it’s fine. Every other animal is okay.
All these animal books and movies and stuff, there’s always a line drawn as to where it stops, you know, in the Lion King, for example, it’s Tommon and Pumba just love grubs and they’re just slurping down grubs nonstop.
But if you were to zoom in a little bit, the grubs are going, oh my god, stop eating me.
So, yeah, that’s right. Good point.
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Did you have a favorite scene or favorite part of this one?
I think just the touch on a little bit, but I think the historical war aspect actually was my favorite.
I know that’s not really a scene, but like they had bettering rams and they had different strategies and they had all these kind of actual war things being talked about, which I thought was kind of cool.
Like for a kid’s book to bring in like historical things and just got to implement that as a siege warfare.
Yeah, it was like how do we get into this place because obviously it’s a well defended like castle like all right well we got to either knock down the door we got to come in from the top we’re coming from the bottom we got like so there was like trying all these different ways.
And frankly they were at a defendant pretty well other than the whole one guy can just open the gate I guess but yeah I mean that was the biggest issue was you got it and they even said like you got to protect the gate.
So I agree with you that that was some of my favorite stuff as well with the honey bee like having the barrel of the honey bees to drop on the people at the battering ram because you know I love battering rams scenes.
In every good siege movie there’s battering rams scenes I mean you have it in Lord of the Rings of course there’s pretty much anything you’re going to have some cool battering scenes and how they decide to do it.
You know usually it’s hot pots of oil or something along those lines so to use in this world a not only a barrel full of bees that then kills all the rats which is another terrible way to die but but then to pour vegetable oil over the side so they can’t.
Yeah make it slippery so they can’t use it was that was next level thinking the tunneling ideas were great from both sides of course you’re going to be tunneling.
I mean up until I mean probably Vietnam and stuff there’s there’s tunneling involves but but in world more one especially if you listen or boy Dan Carlin when he talks about the tunneling that was going on to get between the lines and no man’s land crazy it’s like the craziest job.
So if you’re going to read if you’re watching what’s a call you know about that yeah the blinders they keep on that was his job he was one of the people that was digging in one I can’t really call them but he was one of the the mole people so yeah I thought that was all was all well and good and I enjoyed it thoroughly so yeah yeah yeah I’m with you at that point and we both agree for for best character constants right yeah what did you think about cloney is a bad guy though.
I like I said I think it was little little to one note the accent was terrible I also thought he wasn’t very good like they didn’t really win anything he did so like I was going to say this the kind of in my love zone was but the hero’s journey is typically the hero that needs to do something and then something really bad happens and then something really good happens and it’s kind of cloney the tax and just gets defended against like five times a row.
So it wasn’t really any roller coaster it was basically just the the Abby winning every single time which is very rare at any story but I like that actually so that was kind of funny yeah it’s funny because it was in my lingering questions is cloney actually a warlord or is this all a farce is he just some giant rat who got people to follow him and he has a reputation but there’s no substance to it.
Because like you said he never won anything he never gained an inch until I guess it was a decent idea and I’m sure his idea to get the mouse to go in and open the door for them but one that should never happen there should have somebody on the gate who’s can’t do that so that was unfortunate but also he loses to Matthias he supposed to be this great fighter the only one he killed was the old habit guy who stabbed with his poison tail.
He couldn’t beat Matthias whatsoever and his whole army was pretty much looking to betray him whenever they potentially could have a chance so yeah.
He also like leaked the battering ran plans because he’s like I’m going to use a different plan I was like that’s pretty good idea but then they use the battering ram and then so they’re ready for it and then also he lets the other plans slip because he tells them I was like you’re an idiot then what do you like why would you give them any plans.
None of it exactly that’s what I’m saying I don’t think he was a very good he was a very good either good at intimidate or use ruthless but he was also so ruthless but somehow still have people falling in which I didn’t get that’s I was like yeah he should have been over throwing a while ago
I guess he was ruthless and he knew when people were trying to overthrow him is the two is two skills other than that he was not wasn’t very good but like half of his army got killed in that upturned wagon and some of them were just injured and he could have gone back and grabbed him got him healed up so they could still fight and say that was real that was real.
I thought they were just being like pretending like they’re injured so that they could know because I think at first before they even say oh we’re hurt to the happy people that will help you and they say no screw you before that he’s like someone comes in like no they’re crying out for help after the thing that I don’t worry about it they’re weak or something so I’m good yeah I thought he was a good character I really I mean he wasn’t good warlord but his outfit was pretty sweet.
His battle outfit and I just like to say it’s tail yeah his pure evilness was great you know he was legit the only thing he wanted was power isn’t he’s an 80s bad guy yeah we do love.
He’s a slightly foreign and as an accent based on the book and then he’s just one vote all bad hot screw was actually a great great character he actually had some some shades you know you can pull back the onion and have a little bit of shade.
Well I was going to say one of my loves is it’s just a straight up good verse evil and that’s nice everything that we read has to be layered and cloaked and especially with the thriller stuff you know it’s like yeah they this are they that who’s the good guy who’s the bad guy and then
save it all for the last five pages you know whoa twist wow that’s interesting here it’s just like Matthias is good clonnie is bad and good is going to prevail you know good is good to prevail so it’s like all right how does it prevail and that’s it these creatures are you a mouse you’re good are you a rat you’re
bad are you a weasel you’re bad are you a badger you’re good you know it’s like you’re a rabbit you’re good your fox you’re bad we know we know these things they’re they’re innate we understand these things just you know our own lives you know so
makes us to have the I think that was my that was my lingering question is what I do snakes hypnotize in real life that’s from a jungle book and I think also in Robinhood the Disney
is also in Aladdin okay yeah so is that just a known thing I didn’t know if that was a real or not right is it that I was like wait is it one of those things like sand traps or sand quick sand quick sand where it’s like no that’s just made up a wee every single person stole from it and uses everything now well quick
sand is real I think based on the entertainment we were watching when we were kids they made it seem like we were all going to come in contact with quick sand in our life you know well I think it’s like my theory on oasis is being fake I think there might be one or two but I think they’re not real also
always is yeah and the band thought potentially the band isn’t real yeah also I can assure you oasis are real but I’m a size always I was a side but I’m not real look look I’m pictures of an environment for me there’s not they’re like they’re like AI pictures of them there’s not there’s not humans in them I don’t they’re not real well I don’t think it’s enough that you can just like well some are big enough that you can
you know the any answers would fly out to it in the right is every place sick right I’m sure they do and would the happily don’t read the blog one time the
the blog one time would you get get learned one time yeah so this day I’m good for Ziva like and I don’t know if snakes hypnotize in real life I think it must be like a cobra thing or a snake
charmer but snake charmers they do their flute thing in the snakes move but for my understanding it’s just the movement of the the
is no snakes cannot hypnotize the prey the ideas and myth made by hopper by movies like the jungle book okay cool why the misses exist no eyelids freeze
response small animal freeze to in place let’s see predator they think I was about to get a guy to know eyelids and they move slow yeah
that all makes sense I like it I’m not I don’t believe there I think I think they do I’ll move a stumbling down yeah where what is you love about
right wrong I think it’s one of those books where I talk about a lot of books where I look back at anything it’s worse is one of
the most why look back I’m like that’s actually kind of cool it’s a crazy adventure I mean none of the parts within the
adventure were that great or that fun but like we look back it’s like damn climbed up within like the birds place and then they went to
you know a different field and saw these other one of those other mice called the oh yeah I was the they were like gorilla
true those guys yeah I didn’t know that was a sure was a different animal but I thought it was
yeah sure is definitely different animal I didn’t know that yeah but anyways there’s sure there’s like so much going on the snake
I just kind of a very cinematic like Lord of the Rings meets I mean it is kind of like a little rings there’s big war
than it’s kind of it was kind of pretty cool to think about and again this is an awesome kids book like if this is what I was reading
when I was younger I would have been way more into reading so and these amount of death we talked about which I love for
a kids book to one step down from game of thrones yeah and I think for me to and what attracted me to it when I first started reading it
and I think this I don’t actually remember but I think this is one of the things that got me into like fantasy books
even though this isn’t really there’s no there’s not a lot of fantastical elements besides them being like anthropic
and you know characters there’s no magic really or there shouldn’t be because that sort isn’t magical
but I just love an anthropic adventure you know maybe it was my 90s Disney upbringing where those were some of my favorite movies
and they were always animals or you know a group of like Winnie the Pooh and stuff like that so maybe that’s why I was like okay
this is that wheelhouse but then it’s more fantasy and obviously I have some sort of inclination towards fantasy because I grabbed onto it
but yeah I think that’s one of the things I loved about it was if this was people it wouldn’t have been as enjoyable
yeah yeah I agree with that that’s a good point do you have any other loss?
October a.l I didn’t know that was I thought that like that was something that’s more recent that was invented but that’s inspiring idea
yeah they put a little cinnamon sugar rim on top of it yeah maybe yeah yeah I don’t remember a lot of TV series or any even movies
really having this much death the last 40 years until like recently with HBO type shows right like I don’t remember
like main character yeah like real characters yeah you’d see your henchmen go you know yeah where they’ll get like a bomb
would go off and everyone to be injured but no you know what I mean so yeah it was kind of kind of interesting yeah yeah I loved any hunt for a mythical sword I’m in for and I know I’ve been
shooting on Matthias this whole thing but it was a fun storyline throughout this battle because you know Connie’s doing his whole
siege you’re trying to get in and Constance is really the number one trying to defend Redwall while the whole time Matthias is on the
side quest really to find this mythical sword and whether it’s you know Arthurian Legend which I love and we’ve talked about that
terrible 90s TV show where those football players go back and become King Arthur and his and his nights at the round table which is hilarious
but yeah you know whether this then figure out the stairs like oh the W matches in the middle so that’s the
stair to look at Emma that is or I am that is you know being Matthias and the way that it’s written is you can figure it out you know you can
figure it out right before the characters do so I think as a kid especially if you’re a kid that likes puzzles and stuff
it’s fun because you’re kind of with him on this journey and figuring it out with him the funny part about his hunt for Martin
sword to me though was that it always became a the princesses in another castle type of situation like from from Mario Super Mario Brothers where he
you feel like oh he did all the steps to get there and they’d be like here’s the scabbard it’s like wait what it’s like oh it’s the
weathervane you got to go up there it’s like oh cool the the sword is the weathervane oh that’s probably what it is it’s like nope that’s not it either which then
you know leads into the sparrow king who he asked to defeat which then like national treasure the man yeah yeah exactly it’s like it then it
leads him to the cat who then leads him to the owl which then leaves him to the the snake who he as Matthias who he has to beat to then actually get the sword and go back to red wall to defeat clenny so yeah any
hunt for a mythical sword I’m in for sword and the stone underrated Disney flick by the way what about hates I thought the ending was a little confusing just
lock on on but I did like that he got his bell run at the end I’ll be here all week okay anyways the and there was a lot of you just
mentioned like the the finger things out there was a lot of like by god I figured it out and the guys like what what have you
figured out and then he’d be like you don’t know and then he would explain it and I’m like all right I’m to the fifth time of this like just tell me
what it is I don’t give a shit anymore yeah no I think the biggest thing I wasn’t necessarily like hooks or like I need to go back to
this book it was kind of a little bit slow for me I think again we’re used to reading adult thrillers and this one’s probably set the stage for a lot of
better young adult and kid like books like they’ve taken from this but so I do appreciate that it’s it’s kind of like you know
a good fellows or a godfather where you’re like oh all the other movies just steal from it and that’s why if you watch them now
they seem slow or different or whatever but yeah so yeah it’s not a series that I’m excited to continue
because we’re not the target market I did enjoy it and I thought you it was well said by you in that
this is a type of book where it’s aging nicely in my mind where a lot of times it’s the opposite
and even as I was reading it or listening to it I was like all right this is a little a little childish
whatever the case is but now in retrospect I’m looking back at it that was fun that was a fun
romp like I’m glad I spent time with those characters and I’m not that don’t necessarily need need to go
back to it but it’s definitely something where you know when my daughter’s seven or eight and at least
like on the border of being able to do it it’s like oh I’ll read this to you you know like we can
release together I got you daddy what’s pouring boiling water on someone do it’s like all right well
let’s watch this video well that’s why you don’t charge a front facing castle wall you need to know
obviously that yeah we’re talking about siege techniques oh yeah she’s gonna be the next
Arthur I mean excuse me Alexander which is actually what Dan Carlin is doing his series on now
that’s phenomenal but but yeah so the great Alexander the great yeah okay yeah yeah we’ve
talked about some of the hates that I had so you know none of them were that big but you know the
whole sword actually not being magical yet him being able to kill him was kind of a whole whole
whole for me and I agreed with you on the audio book aspect so yeah I’m sorry of that nothing
nothing really I love in general fantasy books when they have a oh here’s what happened afterwards
but I didn’t really need it for this one and it’s not that long it’s like two pages yeah I didn’t
understand what that it was just like the crops are going in I was like all right what let’s go
yeah it’s a crops are on and they took the two bell they took the one bell and they made it into two
and they named it mithusel and they named the other one Matthias and cordflower is tied to a stove
and she can’t leave because now she’s you know it’s like I don’t need any stuff other news and notes in
that department Netflix did acquire the adaptation rights to the story in 2021 but then sadly in
April of this year it was canceled so they they will not be adapting but there is a kid series from
the 90s I want to say animated series about Redwall and some of the other stories so people can
check that out if they want to all right Keith Redwall what do you give it and who’s the four I
would give it just personally a three out of five but I think if I were a kid it’d be a four to four
to four point five I think that’s how I would raise it but yeah for me it’s it was nice I’m happy we
you know got to relive that but I wouldn’t go back to it as you kind of mentioned and then it’s for
obviously I think you know young adults who probably want a little bit darker like I was when I was a
kid probably would have liked this a lot more so yeah I think your whole mindset would change if
you had read the book and now listen to when I was young yeah no just now listen to the audiobook the
audiobook so yeah yeah yeah and some people love it supposedly I like did some look I looked up
online about the audiobook really oh it’s so great you know I was gonna play a clip for you because I
was like you don’t understand how bad this Clooney boys yeah I know I I listen to it and I and I
understood how bad it was so that’s why I was like as I was reading the book I was like this is great
and then I listened to the audiobook I’d say this is bad so that’s a difference I probably give it a
like I’m gonna say three two five to three five I don’t know exactly exactly where I land well
it’s probably closer to like a three five but okay I think not only it’s just like you said target
market the as a kid I remember loving it so there’s that but I never went back to as a kid so maybe
that tells you something there but like I said it definitely like read it to my kid or encourage them
to read it when they were older and I think if this was you know you’re at a ski house or something
like that and you’re there for a few days and this was it in the wall like this is they’re in the
bookshelf there like this is what I’m taking to the bathroom with me to read a few pages of well
I take it up so okay that’s good all right well that was red wall what do we get coming to next
long came a spider Alex Cross first book by James Patterson yeah James Patterson first book so
people love James Patterson so I feel like we should we should do that and that’ll that’ll be fun
so that’s on that’s on the list it may be coming out next it may not be but we also have
mad mabel is a new-ish book dark humor crime so 4.4 on good reads and it’s already got a lot of reviews
so we’ll get that we’ll get that to go yeah some crime thriller writer out of Australia so I feel like
it’s pretty we can try all both tests out our Australian accents so that’s good yeah yeah we’ll give
that a go I don’t know if the characters are I don’t know if it’s said no well test them out either way
yeah so we got we got those coming up with the next couple weeks so be on the look off of
those and if you’re interested in reading along you know check those out now and then catch up with
us when we do those episodes but Keith thanks for talking red wall as medeus and the like
and I’ll catch you for the next one all righty all right bye now

The Buddies escape into Gillian Flynn’s 2012 psychological thriller “Gone Girl”. The Buddies tried to lighten the mood after reading this dark twist-and-turny book. They got to debating about Amy’s parents and if they could have avoided raising a psychopath, the extremely short shelf life of eggs Benedict, and whether Desi Collings is a romantic hero or just a guy who watched The Notebook one too many times. So hide your frozen vomit, practice your treasure hunt clues, and join us for a pod that asks: which is harder, being poor for 10 days or framing your husband for murder?

Intro (0:00-0:52)

Stock Up/Down (0:53-41:19)

Favorite Scene/Character (42:22-51:04)

Love/Hate (51:05-58:27)

Conclusion (58:28-1:03:34) 

NEXT BOOK: Redwall by Brian Jacques

Transcript for SEO purposes 🙂

All right welcome to Booklub.
I’m Dylan, you’re with a man who smiles a lot to make up for his face.
Keith, what’s up buddy?
I’m here with D-Man aka Boney.
What? It’s terrible.
It’s so terrible.
Well here at the Buddy Booklub we’re going to get down to the best dollars
and this week we’ll be discussing
2012’s Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn.
If you’d like to recommend a book for us to read, which is how we got this one.
It was a listener reached out on Instagram and said, “Hey, I’d like to show our
projects episode, will you do Gone Girl?”
And I said, “Absolutely.”
So yeah, if you want to reach out to us any books you read or any past episodes
you can visit our website at bookhop.com,
site.org/dm/twitter/insurrem.
That’s BuddyBooklub podcast.
You can just tune Spotify, please download and subscribe.
But let’s get to stock up stock up.
What do you have for stock up?
Warning fame, stock up. Most people that want fame are just sickos that read books and start
a book called podcast and so they’re rambling so…
That’s why you got to do this?
…get me a hurt.
But I think that the aim of this book, which I didn’t see pointed out when I was reading my
Wikipedia notes, is that people will kind of do anything for fame in this day of age.
You got Amy’s parents who are basically promoting their books while pleading for Amy’s return.
They’re like, just like amazing Amy would do.
They’re like, on sale now!
Okay, tone it down a little bit.
Hey, the creditors are not getting their door, you know?
We got Noel Hawthorne interrupting a candlelight vigil to announce Amy is pregnant.
It’s like, you couldn’t do that any other time.
You’re just trying to get a little bit of attention to yourself.
We got Tanner Bolt, who kind of specializes in offending murderous husbands.
And his whole thing is like, I got, you know, at the end of the book, he’s like,
I got Nick off, so like all these other guys are innocent now.
Questionable there, then we got Andy holding a press conference.
If I’m Andy in a hersage version, I’m just not telling a soul about this, right?
Oh, absolutely not. No way. So you would be telling?
No, no, I’m not telling. I’m not telling.
I’m not telling. I wouldn’t.
Yeah, so weird, so it just seemed like everyone…
Plus the woman who took the photo with him.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I couldn’t do anything.
Cornered Amy at the thing, yeah, I didn’t get her.
He was like, he was being flirtatious.
It’s like, jeez, a lady, like…
So your pushing is like Mexican Mac and cheese on him or whatever it was?
Amy at the end of this itself who writes a book about it.
So obviously she’s caching into it.
So it all seems like that was kind of a big theme for me.
Was it the fame aspect?
The other thing that kind of hit home for me was now the people that are actually victims,
the Hillary handies, the Tommy O’Hara’s, the desi callings of the world,
are, don’t have a voice because the people that are in want the voice get the most attention.
So kind of sucks for those people, but…
Yeah, I was tough for Nick when he said,
well, what about Hillary handy and the other guy?
And they’re like, oh, they’re both suicidal alcoholics now.
So they’re not gonna be real.
Not gonna be real.
Under a live on the stand.
So yeah, that’s not a safe bet because it seemed like that was the easy way out.
I did like how they weave, how she weaved those two characters into it, where
we had kind of heard about them, but mostly, oh, she had this weird boyfriend
or this friend who was a stalker, used to stalk her and dressed up like her.
Couple red herrings that actually were not red herring because they’re important to the story.
Yeah, exactly.
And they just seemed like something to say in there,
but then they came back to be actually important to showing who Amy was.
So yeah, that’s a really, really good job with that.
But in your fame thing, you also forgot Nick who also tried to write his own story,
but then Amy made him burn it or die.
Oh, right, I forgot.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, his was more of a truth telling thing, but he was, I guess,
oh, yeah, he wanted the, he wanted to, yeah, it wasn’t like, he wanted to get started.
He basically missed the devil.
I need someone, I need someone to believe me.
So yeah, that’s fair.
My first stock up is Amelia Bedelia.
Are you familiar with that piece of intellectual property?
Come on.
It’s a children’s book about a maid, Amelia Bedelia,
and it’s a series of books, but she always tough name from her parents.
Yeah, she takes everything literally.
So she’s a maid for this family, but they’d say go change the clothes or something like that,
talking about the laundry.
And she would like physically change one pair of clothes to another pair of clothes.
She was an idiot, you know, she’s AI.
No, I just remember there was a baseball book too,
and they were doing all the baseball pun things.
Who’s on first?
They’d say like tag him and she’d grab a tag and put it on him.
I guess that’s probably hilarious when you’re young, but go on.
My point being, Amelia Bedelia was, you know, it’s supposed to be fun loving,
and people like her at the end because she makes good food,
which is, okay, just once again, teachers do that.
That’s the moral of the story.
People say, yeah, it’s weird.
But you’re like cooking.
I took it when I was a kid, it was like, wow, this woman is pretty dumb, you know.
These aren’t hard to understand.
And it was always like, oh, Amelia, you didn’t get it right.
So it’s a stock up because if Amy’s parents had written Amelia Bedelia,
instead of amazing Amy, I don’t think we would have been here.
You know, it’s a little bit of a counterfactual.
Because her parents were so messed up on their own right,
that they decided to totally mess up their own child
by creating a character of her that was the idealistic perfect version of her,
where if she decided to not play an instrument,
that character decided to pick up the instrument.
And if real Amy decided, like, couldn’t make the varsity volleyball team,
amazing Amy did make the varsity volleyball team,
or whatever the case is.
It’s just such a, it’s an easy way to really mess your kid up.
And I think, you know, as a parent,
my goal, besides obviously keeping it good safe,
is like, just don’t screw them up.
You know, it doesn’t matter how many times you take them to like,
tennis lesson or something like that,
they’re not going to become a tennis pro.
Like, that’s just not how it’s going to be.
But you sure can mess them up pretty easily by doing things like Amy’s parents did.
So I don’t think she would have been this psychotic,
murderous that she was if they had just not done any of that.
And that also is like her trust fund thing when she said,
Oh, I have to give my parents that money.
That’s like, it’s their money at the end of the day.
It’s like, no, they put it in a trust fund for you.
They used you to create this character.
You know, you have some stake in their, you know,
you have some stake in their fortune.
And if they mismanaged their piece, that’s on them.
Like don’t, don’t come knocking.
You know, figure out a way to make another amazing Amy novel
or figure out something else to write.
If they’re such world-renowned psychologists or river cases
and have written all these books,
and their chosen books, I read a lot of chosen books.
They’re, most of them are terrible.
You can very easily just write another amazing Amy book
but do it for a different generation,
put iPads in it, whatever the case is.
Well, yeah, I had parents as a stock down,
so similar vibes.
I will defend Amy’s parents a little bit here in that.
They did set her up with a good upbringing and a big trust fund.
Yeah, I mean, it does sound that bad.
I mean, she had a pretty good life.
But as a child, she was always getting compared to amazing Amy.
Oh, you’re amazing Amy.
And so she felt like, oh, I have to be this character.
Yeah, LeBron James kid is named LeBron Jr.
Yeah.
What do you guys like?
It’s like, yeah.
Grow up.
And you’re in the NBA.
Yeah, exactly.
You’re getting a lot of things handed to that other people didn’t have.
I mean, look at Hollywood parents,
like young actors, they’re actually getting fucked
when they’re doing all the work and then
all their money’s taken by their parents.
Her parents at least, you know, I’m serious.
They obviously fucked her up in years.
Yeah, just don’t have her read the books and don’t present her as the Amy.
Or they should just change the name, really.
She just had her name.
She just they should have taken the story from her,
but use a different name.
Yeah, I mean, that’s for her.
Save it.
That’s pretty simple.
Yeah, amazing Amelia Bidelia.
Or they should have called her something different.
You know, or her name is Amy.
We’re going to call you Amelia Bidelia.
You know, that’s your real first name now.
But her being a psychopath is more to do with her
than it is to do with her parents in my opinion.
I will say Nick’s parents.
I don’t remember Nick’s dads.
In the movie, but I’ll be great to be cast as him is just the guy that only says
fucking bitch.
The whole movie is just, he just can’t,
would pop up and just say fucking bitch.
And then Nick would say that to other people because of him.
And I was like, yeah, that’s a weird, we’re tough dad to have.
Nick would have some like crazy serial killer type moments.
He’s like, fucking bitch.
Fucking bitch.
Yeah, okay, slow down, dude.
Yeah, kind of, kind of weird.
Yeah, so what else do you have for stock up?
Man and awareness rating stock up.
Oh.
So in Madden football for those unaware,
they would assign awareness ratings, which is kind of weird.
Like the left guard would have a awareness rating of 90,
which is mean he’d block the person in front of them.
But then like a bad one would have a awareness rating of 40,
until they just wouldn’t block the person.
Like it didn’t really make any sense why they’re,
they’re need for that.
But Nick’s awareness rating in Madden is like 15 out of 100.
It’s pretty tough here.
He’s just kind of oblivious of everything that’s going around.
You’re saying during post-Aime getting quote unquote,
just like 100% of the time.
Just overall.
Always.
Yeah, awareness rating permanently.
It doesn’t go up or down.
It might go down if anything.
But he’s just like doesn’t know what’s going on with Amy at any point
than the relationship it seems like.
He’s kind of like, oh, she’s drugging me, I guess.
Oh, she poisoned herself, I guess?
Oh, she has other friends.
It’s like, how do you not know?
I mean, you could show people to stumble on by accident
to one of these things.
You know, let alone.
Wouldn’t it be like one time when you was wake up and you’re like,
oh, my god, I just feel like I just got completely knocked out.
And that drink last night was really weird.
I just immediately passed out after drinking it.
Wouldn’t you like to have like some sort of light bulb
or you just be like, well, whatever.
Yeah, especially after they’re married
and the relationship is on the rocks.
Yeah, it is weird because he was at the bar, you know, all day.
Granted, it’s a bar, it doesn’t open until noon.
You know, he even says like, I didn’t have a,
didn’t set myself to an alarm clock.
I don’t wake up at all, different hours.
So when you’re waking up at 9 a.m.
and you don’t go to work until noon,
you and Amy are in the house together like,
what’s going on?
Like you having a conversation?
Because it sure doesn’t seem like,
granted, I know I understand that Amy was trying
to create this whole backstory narrative
that like she was hiding her friendship
from the woman down the street.
But he’s so oblivious to his surroundings
and at no point was she able to like see her
and like get a glower from her or something
because of all the stuff Amy had put in her hair?
Yeah, one point of been like, I talked to her wife,
whatever, whatever, you know,
and then though it was funny to me was that,
is he Anakin Skywalker?
People are like, yeah, he hates the beach, obviously.
I’m like, who would have nobody knows this guy at all?
Why does everyone know he hates the beach?
That’s such a weird–
Yeah, how do the random people from town know
that he doesn’t go to the beach?
Yeah, think about anyone in your whole life
that anyone you’ve ever met.
Have you ever met anyone that’s like,
oh, I don’t go to the beach, I hate the beach.
Well, probably, yeah, but I wouldn’t remember it.
Yeah, exactly.
I mean, that’s my whole thing is like,
you might hate the beach, but like,
is that something the people would be like,
oh, he would never go to the beach.
Yeah, what?
It’s like, they–
Do you know that he’s Skywalker?
Do you know that in the Dianne?
He says he was at the beach or, nope,
Nick Dumb was definitely not at the beach.
He hates it.
Unless people go into the bar and like, that’s his thing,
he just goes, I hate the beach.
He’s like, all right, cool.
My next stock up was honest relationships stock up to those.
So Amy spends the beginning of her relationship with Nick
pretending to be like the person that she thinks he wants,
which she refers to as a cool girl.
And one who doesn’t mind if he like,
skips on drinks with her friends and fallacious upon request.
But then once their marriage starts,
she reveals her true self.
One who would indeed be mad if he skips drinks with her friends
and does not graciously provide one sided sexual pleasures
upon request.
But, you know, and I think there is, well,
obviously it’s a problem for an honest, you know,
having an honest relationship that’s helpful.
And I think there is obviously,
we can all understand this to some degree,
because when you first start dating someone,
you do put on your, you know, your best face.
You put on your, you put on your best self,
shower regularly.
You know, that’s, that’s something that I would do.
No, but, you know, you try to be the person that they want,
you know, and the person that they want you to be.
And maybe you hide some of your, like, little flaws
in the room of the cases, I don’t know, I can’t think,
well, I guess, this,
wife could be mad at me, but when we started dating,
I think she contemplated herself for like two straight weeks,
was just, like, I will not, I will not poop in front of you, you know?
It’s like, at one point she told me to go walk the dog,
and I was like, why?
And it does, that’s so weird,
she just told me to go walk the dog.
She was like, I have to use the bathroom.
I was like, you can go to the bathroom, it’s not, this is, this is not a turn off.
This is just a bodily function that everyone, that everyone needs to do.
But, you know, that’s, you know, the people do things to make people
want to love them as most as humanly possible.
The one thing they don’t do then is get pissed at that person
for not loving the real version of themself that they hid for the entire time,
and then also being mad at them for being stupid enough
to think that the person they presented originally
was not the person that they are.
It’s like, how could you be so dumb to think
that I’d be cool with you not getting drinks with my friends?
Like, obviously, that was a show because I was just trying to put on my best face.
Well, I assume the divorce rate so high is because this happens probably a good amount now,
wouldn’t you say?
No, I don’t think, I don’t think that’s necessary.
I don’t think that specifically is it because
maybe with people who get married super quickly or those crazy people who don’t live together
before they get married, which is wild to me because,
you know, although you’re in a romantic relationship, you are also roommates.
So you got to, there’s a thing about keeping a house together
or over the cases that matters.
You know, what if someone just upper decked every single time, in fact, to the poop stuff?
It’d be like, wow, I can’t believe we are now married and I didn’t realize you don’t know
which part of the toilet to poop in. So, yeah, I could see that being a problem.
I will say too, but with Amy, one of my hates was that she’s like, yeah,
I’m supposed to be this perfect person. Which does suck. I feel like women have a much harder
than the dating world of having to be flawless. But then she’s like, I don’t want to do
these things. Be the cool girl and eat pizza on the couch and watch TV. But then she goes off
in hiding and she starts eating unhealthy and watching TV all day.
I’m like, so you’re just doing something you’re complaining about.
Yeah, you’re like, you’re like saying that’s so hard to do things.
She’s like, I want to read Jane Austen and she’s like reading trash books. I’m like,
so you’re just doing all the things you said that you hate that he,
like, I have to do it, put on airs and do.
Yeah, I mean, it’s just huge liar.
So, yeah. Some of her points I thought were extremely valid.
About, yeah, especially about the, you know, the roles women play in these relationships.
And like, what’s asked of them.
But then other stuff like the Jane Austen stuff, sort of the case was, it’s like, you can just,
you can do that, you know.
At some point you have to say, I’m going to be me because I can’t not be me.
So, if that’s going to, you know, turn this person off, then we probably weren’t meant to be together.
Anyways, so, yeah, so honest relationships, talk to your loved ones people.
Did you have any other stockups?
I just want a quick one watching the wire stock up.
Oh, that’s always a stock up.
Yeah, Nick Dunn is obviously a fan of the wire.
I mean, honestly, I think he’s character is very, very similar to Jodie McNulty,
Bit of a narcissist, Bit of an alcoholic, Bit of a blender.
Yeah.
He also picked up some tips, the burner phone, you know.
And he’s also playing criminal, criminal, like psychologist with his wife,
being like, I know she’ll like, if I wear this watch and this tie that she got me,
which is, to be fair, that’s the book, I think, I don’t remember this in the movie,
but in the book, you start to see, oh, Nick’s also an absolute psychopath also.
Like all the things he, he’s thinking and things like that.
It’s like, oh, he’s a crazy person.
So, yeah, the only thing they do in the movie from…
What do you mean?
What do you mean?
…was have, like, they had that sign that was like, oh, I love you,
and they’d like touch their face or whatever.
It was like, I’m always telling the truth or whatever the case is.
And they did that in the movie, but it just felt weird.
It felt like the guy who played Mad Eye Moody, the fake Mad Eye Moody in the Harry Potter movies,
who has the weird tongue thing.
Yeah, the weird tongue take is like,
*clap*
It’s like, that, why is that there?
Who put that there?
Yeah, so, I don’t think I liked that part of the movie very much.
My other stock up, or my last one, I guess besides Halath, no fury, like a woman’s gorned, you know.
That’s, that’s obvious.
That one’s too easy.
But, actually, no, I got to, I guess.
One is having a job stock up.
It’s another counterfactual, but I don’t think Amy would have the time to meticulously frame Nick
for her murder.
Had she just had a job, you know.
They’d be stuck in the standard doll drums of a 9 to 5 at the end of the day, and just,
you know, want to get some take out and watch Trashy TV.
Well, she wouldn’t want to watch Trashy TV.
She’d want to watch Broadchurch.
No, not Broadchurch.
Bridget, Bridget didn’t.
What’s the one, what’s the one on PBS that people really like about the,
The history of World War II presented by Tom Hanks?
No, but I did try to watch that.
I know.
It’s only on like, it’s on like Pluto or 2B or something, right?
I’m not, it’s on Hulu, yeah.
Oh, it’s on Hulu?
Oh, okay, yeah.
I definitely, I didn’t realize that.
I didn’t realize Russia was, like, legit allies, or not, uh,
With Germany?
Yeah, I didn’t realize that for that long.
I didn’t, I thought they were like, whatever, we’re fine.
I didn’t realize they were, uh, little, little allies.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Hitler was like, okay, I’m gonna go into Poland on this side.
You go into Poland on that side.
Yeah, I didn’t realize it.
Let’s just absolutely smash their faces in.
Yeah, okay.
Tom, Tom, David Poland.
But anyways.
Yeah, if I mean if Hitler had never turned around.
Our guys on that, by the way, too.
Okay.
Hardcore history guy.
Oh, Dan Carlin?
Yeah, they show like a one clip of them talking.
I was like, all right, I’m blocked in now.
And then they don’t show them for the next, like, episode five again.
I’m like, well, well, where’s Dan Carlin presenting?
I don’t need anyone else tell me about this shit.
I don’t know if Dan he Carlin.
Yeah.
Yeah, if Hitler probably didn’t do Operation Barbarossa,
which was the invasion of the Soviet Union,
we, you know, they probably would have been able to hold on
to Fortress Europa for a long time.
Oh, yeah.
For sure.
I know.
What’s that?
Whatever.
It’s the PBS show about the help in the house and people love it.
But English thing, whatever.
But yeah, so if she just had a job, I know it’s like hard.
Obviously she’s a writer and she’s now in Missouri,
or remember the cases.
So it’s hard to find a job.
But if you’re a writer, just write, like, don’t write her’s right,
that’s pretty much what Gillian Flindey,
that, you know, her character in this is pretty much Nick
because she was fired by Entertainment Weekly, I want to say.
I think she was fired by Entertainment Weekly during the recession
and decided to write a book and wrote this book.
So it’s like, yeah, like, put your powers to good use.
I guess Amy didn’t put her powers to good use.
She just has some psychotic powers.
Yeah, we’ve had a few of these books where it’s been like struggling artists
or artists that are like couldn’t, I couldn’t do it because you made me
whatever whatever it’s like, it’s art, you’re an artist.
Yeah, just do that.
Just do that.
You know people do that for fun when they get home for four to five hours.
You know what I mean?
Like it’s not a, it’s nothing that’s really holding.
It’d be different if it’s like, you know,
I want to play golf at the time.
It’s like, well, I can only play during the day and I work during the day.
So I really can’t go play golf.
I can go paint a picture at any time today.
You know what I mean?
Yeah, they invented electricity.
We got it.
You’re good.
But my last stock up was stock up to being an absentee father.
Ultimately, Nick has to go back with Amy and live with her
and pretend their marriage is what it is because she pulls this
her last straw card, which is she’s pregnant.
She like got ahold of his semen, got it and disseminated in her
and now they’re having a baby.
And that’s it, right?
That’s the whole thing.
It’s like, okay, now we’re having a baby.
He’s like, I can’t leave this baby.
So I have to put up with her.
It’s like, oh, no, no, no, you don’t understand.
You can definitely leave that baby.
You do not have to be in that child’s life.
I know it’s super messed up and you,
I appreciate that you want to be a father to this child.
But you’re with a absolute psychopath
who’s framed you in her murder that then she came back on it.
And is now like tried to frame you in a attempted murder
with a vomit thing and is now basically forced you into
fatherhood with her and who knows what she’s going to do.
You know, any one day she could do something crazy.
And it’s not going to get easier when you have a kid involved.
I can guarantee that.
So why not just say I’m out, right?
I mean, she’s been slipping on drugs a little bit this whole time.
Maybe a little what’s good for the goose,
so good for the gander, give her a little abortion pill in there, no?
Anyways.
Oh, yeah, no, that’s fair.
There’s nothing this child should not be brought into this one.
I mean, the child could be,
is probably going to be abused psychologically by me as well, you know?
So I do want to sequel with the child.
I kind of want to see looked up a psychopath is growing up.
It’s like what call the call from the good son.
That’s who it is.
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah, but I’m just saying he didn’t have to be there.
It didn’t.
Yeah, it wasn’t enough for me to do the ending was kind of some of my hates.
I was like, so I just leave.
I mean, I think that’s why they painted him as like dependent.
He’s like, oh, I have to be with her because we’re the only people
that can be together.
Oh, yeah, we’re going to get more to Nick.
Yes, I got issues there.
What about stock down?
Being poor stock down.
I don’t know if this is a stock down before, but being poor sucks for obvious reasons,
but I think this book definitively states that getting away with murder is
way easier than poor for like 10 days.
I mean, she’s just off doing her own thing, right?
Basically being the person that she says she doesn’t want to be because it’s, you know,
too hard watching TV, lounging out, being by the pool day.
But she gets her money stolen.
And instead of being like, well, this is the real world time to like figure things out.
Yeah, time to get a job.
I’m going to have to call other people and you know, and call Desi to come save me.
It’s like, oh, like that seems like you’re, like you, you’re like, oh, I have everything planned,
and everything mapped out.
It’s like, so you couldn’t handle being poor for 10 days.
So you could think of every impossible, magical angle.
You could literally plan a, replan and plan a murder multiple times over,
but you couldn’t figure out how to survive for 10 days.
Well, to be fair, she was planning on killing herself original.
True, but like if you’re, I think you’re that smart and that better than everyone,
wouldn’t you be able to be like, but I guess it goes back to getting a job,
but would you be able to get a job or write a book or do something that?
Yeah, I think really she’s just a silver spoon, baby, right?
She’s just used to that lifestyle, had it all, which Nick complains about to be like,
oh, I had to work so hard and you know, you had 10,000.
Nick’s a nice little bitch.
But yeah, so, you know, there was some validity of that where she just like,
hasn’t ever had Dylan and Sarah like pull herself up by her bootstraps.
So yeah, that’s true.
My first lockdown was mixing family and business,
stocked down.
So using the last of your wife’s trust fund to open a bar with your sister,
it’s just not, it’s not a great way to go about things.
One, it’s the last of your money, you know, your wife’s money for sure.
It’s a bar in a rundown town that isn’t going to be getting back on its feet,
you know, there’s a delapidated mall and like, it was a place where they broke blue books or something
like that, but now those aren’t a thing anymore.
It just, it seems he treats this as like this was a great business opportunity where
it seems more like prestige worldwide type of business opportunity.
Not going to work.
And Margot took a second mortgage or something on her house to pay for Nick’s legal fees.
So why didn’t she do that to open the bar?
If you guys are so passionate about this business opportunity and you think it’s going to make money,
why go crawling to your wife for the last of her trust fund instead of saying, hey, Margot,
like, we’re going to do this.
Let’s put a second mortgage in your house.
I believe we believe in this business model.
And Margot also, she was an investment, she was in investment banking.
She was seemingly an investment banker and then the market crashed and now
she’s poor.
So I’m not sure about her business acumen either.
It seems like she had a decent opportunity there to make some money and squirrel some away.
So to not have any money now, to put down for a bar, I guess the only thing she could do is buy
a house in her original hometown, which I assume houses don’t go for a lot, but yeah,
it’s just, I didn’t like the the taking the trust fund money to this, which is like the last
of your money. The pair has already squeezed everything out of it and now you’re coming in for the
last little bit to buy a bar.
I maybe his in next fantasy was like, all right, well, me and the wife will go and run this bar
and then we’ll be able to like work on our writing career as is like, all we’re doing it and we’ll,
I mean, it’s a bar. I mean, we’re all like the most famous writers at bars all day, drinking,
you know, writing.
So it seems to me like it’s not the worst.
Someone’s going to come up with some idea, right?
And she kept on saying it’s both of our money. So he’s like, all right, let’s let’s fuck around.
Let’s get it like, let’s invest in something here if we’re going to stay here.
Yeah, it’s not a terrible idea.
I hate actually trying to then go and sit there and write a novel, but they would go in and
just sit and drink, you know, it’s like Patty’s pup.
Yeah, yeah, I mean, I, he was happy about it, right?
Well, yeah, definitely.
He makes you happy.
He, I mean, he’s, Nick was live in the best life.
He’s sitting at a bar that his wife owns drink and in the movie too, I watched like the first
15 minutes of it.
I will finish it, but I watch like the first 15 minutes of it.
But he goes in and it’s been half like this is not in the book, but it makes a lot of sense for
the characters.
And he sits down with go and they’re having a they’re having blantons, which is extremely expensive.
The wall of the bar is on top.
Yeah, the one with the horse on top.
There are blantons at like eight in the morning.
So it’s not even, you’re not drinking the swill.
You’re drinking the top top tier stuff, which I understand.
You’re barbed, but at the same time it’s not, you’re not making him money hand over a fist here.
It’s your wife’s bar really.
And you’re sitting there at an M. Drink of beers and drink of blantons as opposed to, I don’t know,
doing whatever.
But yeah, if she, if she’s like, we need to say this money so I can do XYZ fine.
But if we’re not having any ideas thrown out here, I don’t, I don’t hate it.
Let’s get some, let’s get him put time money to make money.
Yeah, yeah, come on.
This is the capitalism 101.
I’m like invested in an index fund.
Yeah, you know, what are we doing here, kid?
He’s putting it into something that’s real bar and drinking are both real again.
How are you going to get some any inspired?
Who is, you know, one famous Arthur?
I can’t think of the guy that was an alcohol.
Anyway, anyway, what do you, that, he’s going to become having way with a, with a drinking kid.
Well, yeah, you also like go wrestle at bears and fight in this banish civil war
and like do other stuff that’s interesting, not sitting up on the top.
Can you grow up without a silver spoon in his mouth?
You don’t know what it’s like.
My last talk down is Nick Dunn and I’m just going to say it.
You know, Amy is, is actually psychotic, but Nick is a total dick, an absolute total dick.
Journal version of him or real, like his own real version of it.
Well, I also have questions about that.
We’ll talk about this as I’m going through it because I’m not sure, well, I guess we
can address this here because it’s going to be pertinent to the rest, but how
truthful was some parts of a journal?
Is the whole journal bullshit or is some of it real because it seemed like some of it
tied back to things that would align with Nick’s personality?
Yeah, I think every single thing was written in the worst possible lights.
So while some of the stuff may be real, I think she’s obviously writing it three years later,
or seven years later, whatever the date, like she wrote it like two or three months ago for
stuff that happened.
So if you’re looking back at me, like this guy sucks now, every single part of the story now
that was maybe good is now back.
You’re just like, oh, let me change these things to make it more reflective of this narrative.
So I think while I think Nick is like emotionally detached and probably not a very good communicator
and not a lot of things, I don’t think he’s an abuser, like physical abuser, like he’s obviously
painted it.
And I don’t think he’s money-hungry, which I think is obviously, I think there’s certain things that are
like the him buying a bunch of it.
I’m having a golfer.
Yeah, I get him buying a bunch of suits and throwing them in the corner.
I don’t think that I actually think that one was one, then I was wondering.
Okay.
I mean, that doesn’t fit his character really at all.
So it’s like, why would that all of a sudden happen?
Unless she’s trying to paint him as someone that wants money and wants, you know, it doesn’t
really make sense.
That’s fair.
But he’s still a total asshole and it’ll get to the things that must be true.
One of them being the whole treasure hunt thing.
So every anniversary Amy puts together an elaborate treasure hunt where at the end of
it he’s going to find something that aligns with whatever the gift category is for that
anniversary.
Like paper would forget a little, but I have no idea.
I’m not into the stuff.
I got no idea.
But what I am into is elaborate treasure hunts.
I mean, who doesn’t like an elaborate treasure hunt?
We got the goonies, Raiders the Lost Ark, the mummy, National Treasure, National Treasure
Come on people.
Like, these are…
I loved all of those movies and the idea of a treasure hunt is awesome to me.
If someone’s going to put that together, people pay for this stuff.
People pay for people to put these together for them.
We were in high school, meeting my couple of my buddies.
We had some friends and they put together a treasure hunt for us.
It was wonderful.
It was wonderful.
It took us to all of our favorite spots around town, including chilies where there was
nachos waiting for us.
Wonderful.
Yeah.
There was…
These treasure hunts are the ancient chilies, you know, my man.
We had…
One of them took us to a convenience store we used to go to and they had a richie’s Italian
ice for us.
Great.
Great stuff.
Wow.
Yeah.
It’s really nice.
Yeah.
So an elaborate treasure hunt is great.
And, you know, Nick and Go, and this is definitely true because it comes from Nick’s
perspective because it’s like, you know, the day of the first morning, Nick and Go sitting
at the bar drinking and they’re just complaining about Amy’s upcoming anniversary treasure
hunt.
It’s like she’s putting so much effort into putting this treasure hunt together for you.
Like, you have literally nothing going on with your life.
Shouldn’t you be excited about this?
And yeah, I get it.
The clues are kind of a weird test to see if Nick remembers my new details of, you know,
things that happened to them in the past and it’s probably set up for him to fail and feel
bad that he doesn’t remember, but it’s still a treasure hunt at the end of the day.
So…
I think, yeah, I think you’re thinking of a fun treasure hunt where there’s something in
the end that’s good.
His…
I think the treasure hunt he was getting where, like, taking the SATs or something.
You know, it was like…
No, not at all.
This is grueling and then at the end you get upset when I get an answer wrong.
Yeah, but it was like…
What the hell?
It was like, take me is like the place where I go when I feel blue and it was the little
mermaid statue in Central Park or something like that.
And she was like, oh, I told you that all the time.
I told you that all the time that that’s where I used to go when I was sad.
Like, I’d go to that and he was like, I don’t remember.
So he probably should do a little bit more remembering.
And if you made this fun throughout the year, you know, he was like, oh, okay, like she’s
putting stuff there.
You know, you can put on a happy face and go enjoy a treasure hunt.
It’s also not like…
If you got there and he didn’t get it or he was had issues with the clues, you’d give him
hints and they’d eventually go there.
And then they’d be like, oh, okay.
Here we are.
Nice.
Cool.
I got there.
I think I’m on his side on some of those.
I think if it’d be like asking someone like, all right, here’s the treasure hunt.
What was like my favorite player in college and what school did they go to?
What number was it?
And they were like, Simon, what do I care about this?
Exactly.
What number is it, good?
You don’t know.
You don’t know about anything about me.
Yeah.
But that’s what it seemed like.
It was just like a very personal test rather than like a…
It was a how well do you know me test?
But it is great.
It’s actually great that the final treasure hunt, which is the fifth anniversary when they’re
seeing throughout this story, it’s easy enough for Nick to figure out, but it’s not clear
to him until the end of it that it’s all the places he had used to cheat on Amy and then
you know, it ends at the shed with all the stuff that he was like, I never bought all this
stuff and it’s just all there.
So it kind of all hits him at once as to…
Oh, sure.
It was kind of like the awareness thing.
Yeah.
And she’s able to track him to all these different places and he hasn’t noticed at all one
time that she’s following him to all these places.
Like, get some awareness one time for me.
Yeah, how many cars on the street are your dad’s run down?
Like not many.
So…
Yeah.
So the thousand dollar suits, I didn’t know about that, but if that’s, you know, we’ll
say that that’s probably not true.
Fine.
Okay.
I’m okay with that.
But the pre-nut thing, because the pre-nut thing seemed pretty real to me.
He goes out with his buddies after they all get fired in one of the cases.
He goes home drunk after bar hopping and they go to the strip clubs and he’s crying over
the fact that they have this pre-nut between them, even though Amy says it’s our money.
And he’s using this whole time when he’s on this night out, he’s using her credit card that,
you know, that, or his credit card that Amy pays for, from her, trust fund, to get lap dances?
Like, what are we talking about here?
Is that real or is that fake?
Yeah, I think all of that.
I think anything that’s money involved, because whenever we were in his head, he doesn’t
really seem to care about money, like, money is not never like, and like, ah, I was struggling
all these things.
He never really talks about money.
So I assumed anything that was money involved was painted in order to show that he
killed over money.
Oh, like, the money is a big thing for him.
Okay.
That’s so, I just assumed it.
I was reading the same way when the first head, I was like, I don’t really get why I remember
Amy being a bad character in this.
She doesn’t seem that villainous here.
But I think all of that’s painted in that way for that direction because obviously, I think
the bad part about him is that he doesn’t really care and then he cheats on his work.
I mean, that’s the main two things.
No, there’s one way worse.
All right.
So you can throw out everything else.
Yeah.
I’m just going to throw out everything else.
The treasure on stuff because I’m going to stand behind that.
Okay.
But my final straw with him and for me, honestly, this is worse than the cheating and
would one thousand percent lead me down the rabbit hole framing my face significant other
for murder.
It’s the eggs Benedict situation.
The eggs Benedict situation.
I don’t remember this.
I said go on.
Amy makes Nick a beautiful eggs Benedict for breakfast and he decides when breakfast is ready.
It’s like, hey, breakfast is ready.
Let’s go.
He gets a phone call from go is like, I got to take this.
What?
It’s eggs Benedict.
It has a half life of 90 seconds.
You know, the poached egg is cooling by the second.
The holiday sauce congealing.
It’s already starting congee congee.
You can geal the second it hits the plate.
It’s hot food people.
We do not take phone calls when hot breakfast food is ready.
It’s not like, I mean, you can just whip up a holiday sauce.
You know, I understand if it was some over easy egg sitting on a plate and it’s like, okay,
I got to take a phone call.
Whatever.
I’ll give this one to the dog and I’ll make you another one.
This is eggs Benedict.
She went she, she toasted that English muffin.
There’s a little slice of ham on there that’s perfectly browned.
You know, we got holiday salt.
I like, I really don’t, the second he picked up that phone, I don’t care that the phone
call from go was him telling, it was her telling him that his mother had cancer.
I don’t care about that aspect of it.
Just the fact that he picked up the phone is absolute no non-starter.
I’m going to plan my own fake murder and frame you for it.
I didn’t realize I’d spend an egg tattooed such a short shelf life.
I didn’t know I wasn’t aware of that.
Have you been to diner and your food in ready in the window, but they don’t bring it out
to you and it’s eggs Benedict’s?
Yeah.
The top of the holiday sauce is just like American cheese if it has been left out too long,
you know what I mean?
I mean a diner I’d never order.
Maybe a nice bread order.
I’d never order eggs Benedict.
Come on get a diner.
We talk when we talk about it here.
Yeah.
I think diners go like the also special care.
You’re going high for gluten.
No, I usually don’t, I don’t get it anyway.
Mostly because it’s pretty decadent for me.
But yeah, if I was at a fancy place for sure, but yeah, I’m with you.
I get like the hungry man, give me actually the place I get is called the Cape Cotter.
It’s two eggs, how you like them.
Meat, your choice of meat and a grilled corn muffin.
Oh God, that sounds so good.
A grilled corn muffin is literally mine.
Yeah, that’s for last because I know that you’d be.
That’s amazing.
Damn, I’m pumped up right now.
God.
Also go is kind of a piece of shit too.
She doesn’t like it.
I was going to say it’s more than he’s banging his sister that you’d be upset about,
right?
Look at a terrible name is go.
Margo is a great name.
I love the name Margo.
Yeah.
Oh, good.
I kept it mean like, is this like a French fucking GOGH or some bullshit?
Like what it like bow, you know, bows like B-A-U-E-X or something?
I think so.
Is that her name?
Because that was in the audio book, obviously.
Yeah.
And then I was like her name is Margo.
Like, what a terrible, how about like Marg or something better.
Margarita would be better than go.
Go is such a terrible nickname.
I’m so upset about that mostly.
Yeah, but go she doesn’t like Amy, but she takes her money to open a bar just that she can
sit in the bar and shit on Amy the whole time.
You know, she’s mixed.
Yeah, that’s a great one.
She’s mixed twin and they obviously have a close relationship.
Bang in each other.
But she couldn’t pull together the nerve to tell him not to marry Amy.
The whole, it says, oh, they never really got along and go would always say these things
about Amy kind of like beating around the bush that she didn’t like her.
But it’s your twin brother and you never flat out said, hey, I need you.
I need to let you know that I do not think this is a good person for you and you should not
marry this person.
The whole thing is post partially goes fault.
So her being holier than that and telling Nick what he should and shouldn’t be saying
and that he’s such an idiot.
Like don’t cheat on your wife.
Like chill out.
Agreed.
No, there’s no chance for you.
I just didn’t like when they asked him, but Amy’s blood type.
Like, oh, you know what Amy’s blood type is?
He’s like, no, I don’t.
You don’t know Amy’s blood type.
That’s ridiculous.
We’ve on this part, very part, we’ve talked about this before and I have a theory that blood
types fake.
I don’t think it’s real.
I still don’t believe it.
Who is the first person to ever figure it out when you’re like transferring blood?
Well, some of them just kill you if you transfer blood.
I don’t know.
Jonas Salk, I have no idea.
Okay, that’s fake.
It’s all made up by the big blood.
The Red Cross.
I don’t know my blood type, honestly.
So, yeah.
I don’t know either.
I have blood type.
I don’t know my always phone number.
I don’t definitely don’t know if I can blood type.
Classic.
All right, we’re back.
Oh, it’s ridiculous.
Maybe we’re, I was reading this and I’m like, am I Nick Dunn at times?
Oh, I was like, am I Amy?
That’s why our relationship works, right here, is it?
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Did you have a favorite scene?
I just liked when the real voice of Amy came out.
I was like, oh shit, that was the best part to me.
When she just started shitting on people, she began the real villain.
I was like, oh damn, alright, I like her now.
She’s like, I’m not going around shaving my vagina for you.
It’s awesome.
Wait, what?
That was what you got from that?
That’s what she said.
Yeah, she was like waxing.
Yeah, whatever.
Yeah, yeah.
Sorry, anybody who’s a picture.
Oh, I got that’s the one.
I was like, yeah, when she started talking down to people and wanting to kill people
and all this stuff, you’re like, yeah, the vagina part.
Well, that was the first thing she says in part two.
Okay.
And she said, they’re what?
They’re cool, like, how I’m not like, I’m not the cool girl.
There was a part in the beginning of that book where she’s describing Nick.
She’s like, you know, what’s the thing about Nick is, he’s just such a caring, nice gentleman,
like, really good person.
Huge dick.
Yeah.
And I was like, I was like, wait, what?
I had her a wine at a few times and I was like, is that like messed up?
Because it was just so weird in context.
I was picturing Gillian Flynn in her office, like with the pencil and just like writing like
Nick, all these nice things about Nick and then like stopping for a second at the keyboard,
tapping the eraser to your mouth and then be like, oh, aha moment.
Huge dick.
Notting, being like done for the day.
I didn’t understand the character until that.
Then I said, got it.
That check checks out to me.
So if it was like, never mind, I’m not like Nick done.
Never mind.
Check it out.
Never if it ever seemed as the turn part two here.
Yeah, even though I knew it was coming, I still didn’t know it was coming.
You know, one of those things.
So I liked it.
Yeah.
I related, but unrelated and I kind of talked about it before, but when Nick realizes that
she’s been messing with him, you know, that she’s definitely not gone, which I think is
right before that.
It’s like he finds the clubs and realizes it’s more than golf clubs, but whatever.
He finds all that stuff and then realizes and then I think that’s the end of part one.
And then part two goes into like, hey, I’m Amy.
Haven’t been waxed yet.
Got it.
Um, character.
There’s not many characters in this.
Um, did you have a favorite one?
I think I pay tribute to, uh, to Desi calling.
I think we’re getting the view of him from Amy.
And so we’re getting the pain of the worst possible.
But like, if you think about him as a character, he comes and saves her.
And like does all these romantic gestures and doing all these things and is like, and
then she’s like, he won’t get out of my hair.
I’m like, but like he came and saved you, you know, like, and he’s also putting himself out
there.
He’s going to get arrested if it ever comes to, so he’s like obviously protective of
himself.
I don’t know.
I thought it was, I just weird, but the real character is Bony.
Oh, yeah.
No, I’m, I’m, I’m a Bony fan myself, but you couldn’t be further off based with, with
Desi. He’s a psychopath just as much as Amy just in a different way.
He has a whole room of like a greenhouse of tulips because, er, favorite, and high school
and he’s made it so they can bloom year round.
He never knew he was going to see this person again.
Okay.
She’s married.
Have you seen the notebook?
This is literally the plot of the notebook.
He’s going to notebook.
I have it.
I haven’t, I mean, I haven’t.
Oh, you’re a bad old bird.
I remember that.
Not to spoil it, but he’s like, builds a whole mansion for her and she leaves his wife for
him or his, her husband for her.
Oh, so maybe he’s just watching the notebook on rerun.
Yeah, it was basically the notebook.
It was exactly the notebook.
Everyone’s like, what a romantic, because he’s Ryan Gosling.
Doesn’t imagine him as Ryan Gosling.
Now do you think he’s a man?
Oh, instead of empty age, yeah.
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
So there you go.
I’d, yeah, I’m down, I’m down.
I’d go into his, I’d go into his love nest.
She was like coming onto him hard, which you would think would be all he was looking for.
And he was like, I don’t know, are you sure you’re ready for this?
Yeah, he was a nice guy.
Yeah, like I said, she’s like, let’s have sex.
He’s like, I don’t know.
Like let’s take it slow.
It’s like, whoa, dude, this is like you, you just, you’ve spent years planting tulips, literally
planting the seed.
So you should, you should do something about it.
Yeah, I’m going to go with Amy, you know, it’s mine.
I like their, yeah.
I do agree with her that all the like commercials for household goods, like air fresheners show
a woman, you know, presumably a wife and mother happily sprang furniture, sprang it in
the air, taking in the fresh scent, you know, looking pleased that her husband’s going to
come home to a clean house.
It’s so true that, you know, we’ve really just live in this society where those things
are, are pillars and you can’t get away from it.
It’s, it’s bullshit.
It’s sexist.
It is, you know, so I’m with her that there is, uh,
there are asks or, or, what, things that smell good is like not for men.
No, just talking about the commercials, how it would be, that would be a commercial of
a woman with a, you know, I just thought about the fresh thing is you think about a, for
Breeze commercial, it’s never, yeah, some guy, you don’t get upset when there’s like a
commercial of like some, you know, some woman baking cookies and they’d smell them like
the fresh baked cookies and it’s a woman and you’re like, I do that.
What the hell?
You don’t get upset about that?
I’m not like, I mean, I’m not upset with you, though, I just think it’s stupid, you know,
that there’s, yeah, that there’s these, these, like, some like, we’re being very, we’re
going to lose, you know, that, that the marketing departments go, go all in on and tell people
what to do.
And I agree that, you know, it’s one thing that, and then another thing with like, oh,
where panoeos to make your legs look better?
It’s just, it’s, it’s not, I, you know, I believe I agree that it’s, it’s, it’s not easy
being a woman.
But I do think Desi is, he’s maybe crazier than Amy, uh, and I kind of wish, it sure
is her eyes, though.
I kind of wish it went the other way.
And when she gets to Desi and all this stuff goes down, he shows how he’s crazy, sure through
her eyes or whatever, but he turns into like a full buffalo bill from sounds of the lambs.
And she thinks she’s in a safe place where now she is the upper hand and instead he throws
her down a well and tells her to put the lotion on her skin, you know, that, I would love
that.
Well, then she wouldn’t be as crazy early.
Well, actually, what is interesting is too is when she gets robbed by those people,
I’m like, fuck these people.
I absolutely hate those people even though she’s doing something way, way worse than they
are.
I’m like, these people are those scum and they aren’t.
Exactly.
Yeah.
They’re opportunistic scum.
She had planned this whole thing out.
Well, I guess the biggest thing too is loyalty.
Like she was being friendly and loyal to them and then they turned her back, you know, whereas
she’s kind of screwing over someone that was turned over back on her.
So it’s a little bit more, you’re not as angry about it.
Although I guess she’s screwed all the other people.
Anyway, I like the spitball.
Yeah.
Definitely not my favorite character, Nick, like we’ve talked about.
He’s so weird at the end when she’s been back for a month and he’s getting some of the
old feelings back.
He says at one point, he’s like, oh, I live with a murderous wife who’s also super fun.
And it’s like, oh, how fun do you ask?
Well, I had lobsters flown in like we did in the old days and we had so much fun.
I chased her around the house with a lobster.
She chased me.
Then we both pretended to hide.
We made the same Annie Hall jokes at the same time.
And then he gets to like leave the room because his heart was palpitating and he thought he was
going to cry or something.
It’s like, Nick, you got issues.
Like one, not fun.
That is not.
It’s fun to do with a kid.
If you got little kids around, you pull a lot live lobster out, but you know, maybe I’m
just a loser or should they’re like have a cold dead heart.
And the wife and I running around the kitchen island attacking each other with lobsters is,
it’s not going to make my heart palpitate.
I’ve seen Annie Hall though.
That’s the question.
I have seen Annie Hall and I understand that it’s like, oh, cool.
This is a reference for the same Annie Hall jokes.
Like, okay, whatever.
The guys are also a rapist.
So what’s, what are we talking about?
We thought the Mary’s daughter.
Like, we did Mary’s daughter.
I don’t even know one of them.
Step daughter, sir.
Or no.
Half daughter.
Yeah.
No, that’s you think about Elon Musk’s dad who married his stepdaughter.
Jesus.
Yeah.
Yeah.
All these good people.
Yeah.
And he married his stepdaughter when she was, she was a step, ex stepdaughter.
She was his stepdaughter from ages like four to 20.
And then, and then he broke up with her mom and then they got together when she was like
25 or something.
Yeah.
This is pretty fucked up.
That’s Elon Musk.
That’s the richest.
Well, it’s his dad.
Yeah.
But I’m sure the apple doesn’t fall too far.
Not a parent.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Parents definitely fucked him up for sure.
What about love hates?
Let’s get into some love hates.
What did you love about conquer?
You already mentioned that.
I really liked Amy as a bad guy.
I think the typical trope is like, this guy is perfect person and he’s so great and then
he turns bad.
But I like seeing, this is like a great character.
I thought it was a really interesting.
I mean, that’s why like when I first saw the movie, I was like, holy shit.
I was a credible movie because you don’t really see it coming.
Yeah.
Rosemond Pike is really good, isn’t it?
Yeah.
And I have seen a couple of like women revenge movies that I don’t think are very good because
they’re like, they don’t take it to like the real, they don’t do red rising.
Like, I’m gonna fucking kill a whole population until revenge myself.
Yeah.
There’s no score start for sure.
Yeah.
Which I, this was like holy shit.
This is like psychological score starts.
It was a mix of like, you’re kind of rooting for it times too, which even though.
Yeah.
Fuck me.
Fuck, Margot.
Fuck my parents.
Fuck the whole society.
But she’s so crazy.
It’s good.
You know?
Yeah.
So, yeah, I liked her a lot.
I like the structure.
I was a big fan of the structure with like part one being next narration at the time
of the disappearance.
And then that switching off with excerpts from Amy’s diary.
It just, it was a great idea and with the twist of like her not actually being disappeared
was great.
As a reader, messes with your mind and it’s unfortunate that I knew a little bit obviously
going into it from remember a little bit of the movie.
But it messes with your mind of, you know, I’m even still I’m pulling out things from her
diary and you’re like, yeah, that’s fake.
That’s fake.
I’m like, I don’t even know, you know?
But it doesn’t do that thing where sometimes when they do it little weird twisty thing like
that, you’re like, oh, so everything else was useless and I shouldn’t even read it.
Like, I don’t feel that way.
Because sometimes, you know, we’ve read some of these terrible thrillers where it’s like
they just throw out a hundred red herring.
So it’s like, you could have saved the pages like those are all stupid.
And then part two is starting with Amy and you’re like, oh shit, you know, what the fuck?
She’s alive and now she’s a totally different person than the person that we’ve been hearing
from, like the narrator that we’ve been hearing from.
So yeah, I was a big fan of the structure of it.
Well, and you mentioned it too.
We’ve read a bunch of these thrillers and like, I have usually on these I have, you know,
20 notes being like, why the hell would they do that?
That’s so stupid.
This person doesn’t make any sense.
And this is like the characters are very, very real.
It seems like you can see personality traits and even though they’re psychotic, you can see
those things that are like, oh, I can see what they would think that.
And so that is, I didn’t have like any notes on it for most of the book because I was like
just in it.
You know, I wasn’t thinking like, that’s so stupid that I would have, you know, I mean,
it was just the whole time in it.
So.
So the, you know, the relationship is so messed up that it would be easy for you to think
how do these people even get together?
Like that doesn’t make any sense that they would be together.
I don’t get it.
But because they’re, and they’re both so crazy, but they’re both so crazy in different ways.
And when you catch him at the right time, you know, it’s like, oh, sparks will fly, but
eventually it will turn into a fire tornado, like, Dresden or Tokyo.
I don’t know if you’ve gotten to that yet in your World War II documentary, but, oh, let’s
get to hate.
What do you hate?
I mean, I wish I read the book before the movie because I think the movie, obviously the
big twist was kind of, I knew it.
And then I think the movie, you’re also kind of picturing the characters beforehand, which
made it a little tougher.
I did think from the book standpoint, I did think the ending dragged a little bit too much.
I was kind of like, that was a one time where I was like, you know, once you walks in the
door, I’d be like, where you been?
And then she’d be like, well, this is all the things that happened, like cool.
And then I’d be like, all right, see you later.
And then I just pick up and I’d be 100% gone.
I would never talk to that person again.
Like she obviously framed you.
There’s no like, there’s no like, well, let’s just justify this one.
I’d be like, cops, your job is to find the reason, like, find out if she actually did this
shit.
I don’t care.
Good luck with their lives.
I’ll see you later.
That’s the end of the story for me, but I guess he is a crazy person.
So he wanted to stay deep down.
Yeah.
It seemed a little far fetch for me that her whole plan was to do this whole thing and
then murder herself in Mexico.
She decides not to, decide not to kill herself in Mexico.
So then she’s kind of going back through it all to rewrite the narrative about Nick specifically.
I understand how she gets away with her disappearance with the whole desi thing.
Like, okay, cool.
She did find there.
But when it comes to Nick being in trouble for murdering her, it’s like all of that kind
of gets thrown out the window and her diary starts to make less sense now that they’re
both there and there are things within it.
Like once she came back, they just seems like there’s way too many holes in the story that
couldn’t be filled by Amy.
And I know she tried and, you know, some of it was able to be done, but, but the golf clubs
too.
It’s like, okay, go to any, like check his credit card to see if he’s ever played around
anywhere.
It’s like he’s never played golf.
So why would he buy Mizuno $2,000 or clubs if he’s literally never played anywhere?
It’s just like, huh?
And also, it doesn’t matter anymore because now she’s back.
So it’s like, oh, well now I have this attempted murder thing.
It’s like, okay, well that, you can easily just be a crazy person and have done that to yourself.
You know, I don’t think a jury is going to convict him.
So you don’t need to stay around because, oh, there’s vomit, there’s frozen vomit somewhere
that she decided to hide.
If she didn’t think she was being murdered at the time, she just thought she was sick,
but it felt kind of weird.
Do you think she’d just like put her vomit in a bag and freeze it?
Yeah.
I guess she’s good to say, oh, this happened recently.
I don’t know.
Yeah, it doesn’t make sense.
The other thing that was like, does he shows up to the vigil or whatever, right?
Isn’t he currently kidnapped her and driving on the road with her somewhere?
Like, I didn’t know.
I was like, how is she in two places at once?
Don’t you think there’d be like multiple cameras he could use and all these other things
he could find being like, oh, he didn’t actually kidnap her?
Like, it seems like there’d be, seems like there’d be a way to find out that does he
was actually innocent.
Yeah.
But even without that, it seems like Nick could just leave, you know, like he’s at.
He could just be like, all right, well, I’m out of here.
So he wants it in a way.
Yeah.
He just wants it.
That’s the thing.
I do think I feel like the movie, again, I don’t remember.
I feel like the movie they have him trapped in a way a better way or maybe just quicker.
It’s like, oh, I have to stay like one of those things.
So I thought it was a little bit better in the movie, maybe?
I don’t know.
I can’t remember, though.
And I liked it being trapped, by the way.
That was a great ending.
I’m cool, but once you say that she was pregnant, it did go on for like a few more
chapters that I was like, all right, like, I don’t really need this.
I think I’m good.
And yeah, I guess the, you know, the ending was, you know, people had different opinions
about it.
You seem to like it.
I seem to feel like I didn’t necessarily like it, but I don’t hate it.
It wasn’t terrible.
I just thought.
Did you want like a, I would have liked some more definitive closure, but I also do like
the idea in whether it be movie or, you know, a book that we can kind of draw our own conclusions
to what happened, you know, it doesn’t need, I don’t need it to be put together with, you
know, it doesn’t need to be Star Wars, where it’s like, okay, I know exactly what happened
at the end here and I can move on.
I think with a, with a thriller type thing like this, I’m okay with a little more open
ended this.
What would you give it?
I get a 4.0.
I think it was, I like that.
I think, I like that.
Yeah, I think, I like that more than you.
It sounded like based off the text, but I just think she’s a great writer.
I think she’s, I like, I had to put the book down at times early on because I was like,
this is a little too real for me.
I don’t really want to deal with this.
I’ve had this before with her books where other thrillers, I think, they’re kind of like
goofy almost sometimes.
You know, where you’re like, this is so out there that I don’t, it’s almost like a
reading a fantasy book where you’re like, this doesn’t seem like the real world.
So whatever is not a big deal reading this where this one is like, this feels like I could
turn the news on this could be happening.
So I don’t really want to get into this today.
Yeah, it’s a great point because Gillian Flynn has said that she’s a huge true crime fan
and it felt like true crime.
We’ve read so many other thrillers that are exactly like you said, you know, they seem
fantastical or, you know, they seem like a farce, whatever the case is, but this seemed
like it could be a 2020 episode.
But each turn, like, holy shit, yeah, I wonder how do they do that?
So seeing, you know, seeing this relationship implode in front of us and then the aftermath
of what someone is willing to do to really punish someone for what they had done, I felt
real.
And it felt, yeah, it felt definitely like a 2020 episode.
And I, after I sat with it a little longer, I gave it a 3.5, which I think is very fair.
And it was mostly because we were talking about, I think we’ve read so many thrillers on
here and most of them were just so bad that this being good and I think it’s very good.
Her writing is good for sure.
But it’s hard to do this.
She put it, like, the twist is like halfway through the book yet we still want to continue
to read and know what happens.
And there’s a little like many twists in there throughout the, the desi stuff obviously.
But the big twist of her being alive and her, you know, diary being fake and her not being
that person is like halfway through the book.
It’s not, oh, last page, something happens and it’s like, that was what we’re here for,
you know, kind of like written by AI.
This is the opposite of that.
So 3.5, yeah, it’s, if someone has never heard of it, obviously, it should be hard to do.
I would definitely recommend it as a thriller, this and sharp objects, they were both really
good.
Yeah, great.
Well, what are you coming to next?
Uh, next we got Red Wall.
Yeah.
What a turn.
Yeah, I don’t know.
Did you read this one?
You were a kid?
Yes.
Like fourth grade maybe.
Okay.
Red Wall by Brian Jake.
Jakey’s, two of Jake’s.
Jack was?
Yeah, which, uh, the audio books a little bit tough.
Oh, yeah, I don’t, you can’t read the, you can’t listen to the audio book.
It’s a Scottish or not, uh, it’s either a Scottish or Welch person reading it.
And I’m like, this is impossible.
And I finally used to it in the bad guy’s voice is, I have no idea what the accident is.
It’s like, it’s the worst accident I’ve ever heard.
You can’t understand what the guy is saying.
What?
The main character is a mouse though.
Why didn’t they get a mouse to read it?
I don’t know anything.
And it’s, I’m, this is the first book I’ve read and I can’t remember one.
That’s like one X speed.
I’m not even speeding enough because I’m like, I can’t understand what these smokers are
saying.
Uh, nonetheless.
I don’t know how this is a kid’s book, but it’s hilarious.
But yeah, uh, I was like, I’m really surprised that you’d never read it.
It was like, it’s like a whole series.
And it’s like, I feel like I’ve heard this or read it or like another life I’ve read it,
you know, like deja vu reading it, but I don’t remember it.
This is like what gets kids into fantasy is this book.
Maybe I did.
I maybe, but we’ll see about the end.
I can recall.
I mean, I don’t recall any of it.
I just remember reading in fourth grade and being like, oh shit, like this and maybe
like the, the wrinkle wrinkle in time.
Isn’t there another like Disney animated show with mice that did similar like adventures?
All sorts of tons of that.
You’re talking about the great mouse detective.
What do you mean?
Yeah, maybe that’s why I’m like, rescuer is the rescuer is down under that’s what I’m thinking
of.
Yes, the rescuer is.
Yeah, this is definitely very different than those.
This is more like medieval.
But as I’m reading it, I was like, holy shit, I like this is for like, it’s a lot of
things.
Schoolers like some of the, and also some of the vocabulary is like, I don’t even know
what it means.
Yeah.
Good, good, good for them.
But the book has a map, which is already up for me.
Oh, geez, I maybe have to find the book.
The map is like the kids monopoly version of real monopoly.
If you were thinking about like Lord of the Rings to this map, it’s like Lord of the Rings
is middle earth is this massive place, all these different places.
This is like, here’s the abbey and it’s like a circle with like, here are the woods
next to the abbey.
Here’s the open gate next to the abbey.
That’s why the not coming back I want.
Yeah, it’s like a child through the map.
But yeah, we got a, we got Redwall coming up next and then, I think we’re going to have
a couple interviews after that.
So, it should be fun.
All right, Keith, well, that was Gone Girl.
Don’t go disappearing me.
I’ll talk to you for Redwall.
All right.
Bye now.

The Buddies take a detour from sword and sorcery for their first nonfiction read in a while with Patrick Radden Keefe’s “London Falling: A Mysterious Death in a Gilded City, and a Family’s Search for Truth.” By the way, it’s ‘London Falling’ and not ‘London is Falling’ the Gerard Butler action movie, although the Buddies may have stated that as the title on multiple occasions. The Buddies got to talking about whether Zac Brettler deserves our sympathy or was just a 19-year-old con man who got in over his head, how the British government basically rolled out the red carpet for Russian oligarchs and then acted surprised when people started dying, and whether this whole story could have been wrapped up with a simple Google search. This one got a bit contentious (sorry we’re used to arguing about fiction, not real people). So, brush up on your shell company law, don your investigative hat, and join us we jump into the underground world of London (unfortunately we’re not talking Knockturn Alley from Harry Potter). 

Intro (0:00-2:38)

Stock Up/Down (2:39-49:27)

Love/Hate (50:30-59:44)

Conclusion (59:45-1:02:42) 

NEXT BOOK: Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

Transcript for SEO purposes 🙂

All right, welcome back to the live.
I’m Dylan, here with my friend,
a Nigerian prince, Keith, what’s up buddy?
This is gonna be interesting.
All right, well here’s the buddy book,
we’ll bring it on to the best sellers,
and this week we’ll be discussing,
London is Falling, a recent piece of nonfiction.
Actually, the sub title is,
A Mysterious Death in a Guilded City,
and a Family Search for Truth, by Patrick Radden-Keefe.
If you’d like to talk about it in a book for us to read,
reach out to me at past episodes.
You can visit our website,
buybookof.com/darkdams,
on X or Instagram, that’s a plenty of book on podcasts,
you can list those iTunes, Spotify,
wherever you’re podcasted, download, subscribe,
five star review, please, and thanks.
Kate, this is maybe the most recent book
in terms of from publication to us reading it that we’ve done.
It came out in April of this year.
I mean, outside of the ones that we get advanced copies
from the publishers, you know, big deal.
But yeah, came out in April of this year,
four, four on Goodreads.
I read a New York Times article about the book
by Jennifer Slasia.
I don’t know how to say her last name,
and I apologize to her, ’cause I’m sorry.
It’s difficult for me.
But she wrote, “Zack is at the center of London falling,
but Keith situates his death on a bigger canvas,
a city that has tried to address its collapsing
and druster ill-based by becoming increasingly dependent
on oligarch money and a police force
that is woefully underfunded and plagued
by complacency and corruption.”
I thought that was a pretty good quick synopsis of this story.
’cause I think people want the mystery and, you know,
and unsolved crime, but yeah, no,
I think that actually is a better story.
because I was like, oh, this is actually what this is about.
I think we decided to read this book
because one, my mom told me I had to read it.
Like, gave me the text, can you talk,
you know, I need to talk to you right now,
which is like, oh my God, did something terrible happen?
What?
You need to read this book, London Falling.
And then the next day,
Caroline was listening to a podcast
and it was with our good buddy now, Patrick Radden-Keefe,
and so I just felt like it was a sign, so here we are.
So let’s just get into some stock-up, stock-down.
Keith, what do you have for stock-up?
For London is falling.
A mysterious death in a village in any family,
so there’s for sure.
Being poor, stock-up?
Oh, okay.
Wow.
Similar to Red Notice, a book we read.
a book before.
I understand That Being painted as a rich upper class snob
doesn’t really lend itself to sympathy,
so they try to be like, this is the every man, you know,
for all these people that are not that,
with that being said, really, like the brother family,
they’re not rich in the same way that,
a limpian running in a hundred meter dash
that comes in fifth place is not fast.
It doesn’t make any sense because they’re like,
yeah, man, it was tough growing up in the mean streets of London.
All these Russian oil garks, they’re so rich.
Man, it was really tough.
So we had to decide which private school
to send both our kids to while we were sitting
in our two thousand square foot London apartment
overlooking the city, but really tough part too,
just being poor is having to have then fly to New York City
to our Manhattan apartment that we also own.
He was like, oh yeah, totally.
That’s, I can totally relate to that being that poor of,
but yeah, that was kind of the essence of some of the issues
I had with the book is just,
it reminded me of the social network.
You remember the meeting,
the Winkle Voss twins meet with the dean?
Do you remember that scene?
And he says, this right here, this is the issue.
Is you’re getting this meeting and this book is written,
not because it’s really, and I feel like
I’m coming out hot right to start,
but not because it’s really this crazy mystery
or something like really unfair justice.
It’s written because it’s a rich family
that got, that wants answers
and they’re doing everything they can
with all the power they have to get those answers.
And I don’t really think, frankly,
there was that much of a mystery.
It was, again, come out hot here, but it was an adult man,
19 years old, he was young,
at such that he died that was a con artist
who wanted to be rich, he wanted to show a glitzing glam,
he tried to con people,
and then instead of facing consequences
and maybe getting beat up or something bad having to him,
he took his own life.
That’s the story.
Now, I don’t really know what an afferious part
outside of that is.
So that was my biggest issue,
and the only reason we’re hearing about the story
is because he’s a rich person.
If he were a poor person or a middle class person
that just jumped off of some high rise in poor housing,
the story’s over, there is no story, you know what I’m saying?
So that’s my issue.
Did I come out too hot or is that the right steam level?
you shouldn’t speak ill of the dead.
So, yeah, come in and out.
And could I say one thing versus that, usually read fiction?
So I apologize,
this is a real story, but I’m used to speaking like this
to fiction, sorry, go ahead.
to go from talking about like sword and sorcery,
sword and sandals, whatever it is, fantasy,
to a non-fiction where this was a real person,
he lost his life.
This family was obviously affected.
There are ripple effects from someone dying in this manner,
but to your point, I think PRK,
it sort of came to his attention
because he was on the set for a show,
for a mini series or whatever,
for a previous book he had done,
and he’s a producer on that series,
and someone there came up to and said,
“I have these friends who,

154
00:06:03,280 –> 00:06:05,760
and it was the breadler, the pep his parents,

155
00:06:05,760 –> 00:06:07,240
the exact breadler’s parents.”””
He said, “I have these friends who this happened to their son,
“would you talk to them

158
00:06:12,040 –> 00:06:13,920
because I think they were trying to explore”
getting it out into the media.
So, would they have had that access
to someone who writes for the New Yorker
and is a prolific author and a producer of this TV series
if they didn’t have the rich and wealthy friends,
probably not.
I think it’s fair that, however you wanna say it,
middle to upper class, white male who died
and they get the story.
So, I think that’s fair, but at the same time,
he’s using it, PRK is using this to tell a bigger story,
not that, and I mean using this as in telling his story,
he’s not using the breadler family,
I didn’t read that by any means,
but he’s telling the story of Zach Breadler
and the breadler family is a whole,
I’m sure there’s a couple things in there
about his grandfather and stuff kind of lying
about going to Cambridge or Harvard,
I don’t even know where it was,
but he lied about some of his provinces
and also had, I don’t know,
but the other grandfather had a fake family
or a real family that they didn’t know about.
So, I’m sure there was stuff in some stuff
that the breadlers didn’t necessarily want,
but I’m not too upset about it.
I think my stock up being, you shouldn’t speak all the dead,
I’m glad the elephant in the room was addressed
in that Zach throughout this book,
he’s not the most sympathetic of people.
Like you said, he was somewhat of a con man himself
and he was badgering his…
On some word, man.
He definitely was, It was like, con man.
Yeah, yeah.
the fancy car, you know,
just trying to keep up with the Joneses
that in his mind, the Joneses were these super wealthy kids
and the families that they were a part of
that he went to school with.
He was compulsively lying and I know they play that off
as when he was a kid, you know,
he would be able to kind of relate with people
and was able to kind of joke around
and that was like, these lies were almost playful
and then at some point they turned to be not playful
and instead were getting him into more and more trouble.
I’m not sure who he was really hurting, you know,
it seemed like the people that Zach was hurting
were the people that we don’t care about in really rich people.
Unfortunately, when you do that,
though sometimes you can cross pass with the wrong people
and then something happens to you because of that,
it’s kind of your own fault, you just hope it’s not dying.
You know what I mean?
And also, who is easy hurting?
He’s only hurting the innocent women, his mom,
you know, no big deal, it’s choking her out.
So, yeah, totally a good dude.
Yeah, at the same time It pales in comparison
to the total pieces shit, con man/grifter
that Akbar Shamji and the biggest piece of shit
Verinder Sharma were, you know,
those guys were real, real pieces of shit.
under his belt to do the same thing they were doing
’cause he’s gonna become them.
If he was willing to take a beating,
which he was probably gonna get beat up,
then he would just turn into those people.
But he wasn’t, so he jumped off the balcony.
That’s what it was, right?
he obviously didn’t have the safety net
that Akbar did with whatever con’s,
his dad was, his dad had done it,
and then his dad was able to set him up basically
in a much better situation for these cons to work
because of his accolades and closeness with Margaret Thatcher
and whatnot.
And Verinder has his own safety net in,
I mean, if you kind of believe what’s posed by PRK
that he was potentially a police informant
and had somewhat of a get out of jail card,
which when I read it, I thought that was likely.
I don’t know if it’s true or not,
but it was definitely likely.
But it seems that your take, and I guess where…
because this whole story in itself is cynical about society.
It’s, you know, I guess I’ll burn one of my stock downs,
but my first stock down is the institutions
that were meant to trust and believe in that being,
in this case, the government and the police force,
you know, these institutions sometimes they become
so corrupt or backwards that they end up like mirroring
the bad things and people that they’re meant to protect us
against.
The government, in this situation,
like the bigger picture that the zoom out,
you know, the 30,000-foot view or whatever the case is,
being with the breakup of the Soviet Union
a bunch of these, and we read of this,
and like you said, in red notice,
this other book we had read about finances in Russia.
But the British government basically seeing
their industrial complex diminishing,
and then being more of like a maritime trading industrial
place, all of a sudden, in the 2000s,
and I go, “What are we gonna do?”
So they turn to more finance stuff and deregulating finances,
and allowing in all of these Russian oligarchs
to their, the reason they got their money is ’cause when
the fall of the Soviet Union happened,
they pretty much just stole all the money
that was the people’s money and created their own,
you know, multi-billion dollar companies,
but then we’re like, “Well, we don’t wanna have this money
in Russia, so let’s take it to the UK
’cause they’re totally deregulating,
they’re allowing us to pay no taxes by living here,
which is wild.”
And then the whole Ukrainian thing breaks,
Ukrainian thing, the war in Ukraine breaks out,
and there are Russian people getting murdered
on the streets of London in very, you know,
spy, TICIA, spy type ways with, you know,
poisons and chemical agents and all this stuff,
and the British people, or the British government,
seemingly chill with it, and then the police themselves,
first, it’s pretty blasey about the whole,
Zach, you know, you seem to think it was a straight-up suicide,
not a murder, I’m gonna say murder,
’cause I thought it was more of a murder,
but they’re so blasey about the whole idea,
or so myopic, that they can’t see that there’s potential
for something else to be involved in,
I don’t think they took this case very seriously to begin with.
okay.
When you have a full-time investigator
that’s spending countless hours,
and I’m sure he’s backed by dollars from the family,
because clearly another reporter said they’d do it
for like 30K or something crazy like that,
so he’s getting paid in one way or the other,
obviously he wrote the book.
but my whole point is that,
so he’s– – How do I think he’s necessarily
getting paid by the family?
This is job, he’s an investigative journalist.
but he’s benefiting from the fact that he is unlimited access
to the people that are giving the narrative to him, right?
Okay, sure.
with the Brettlers and wrote the story.
He combed, at the end of this book,
there’s 60 pages of source material,
including all of the Brettlers.
Not a good job, Bracer.
My whole point is that he establishes these two dudes
are not good guys.
Fine, we all agree on that.
But then he’s like, why didn’t the police ask all these people?
It’s like, well, the police say they’re bad guys,
you say they’re bad guys, they’re all bad guys.
What exactly is someone that knows the person
now going to say, even if the person said,
Yeah, he wanted to kill Zach.
That’s hearsay still.
They have no evidence that what happened there
has just zero in things that could,
I mean, unless hearsay is not legal or legal,
and there’s nothing that anyone else could say ever,
unless they were in that room
that could potentially lead to the guilt
or the murder of Zach.
So I didn’t understand why he was like,
well, why don’t you go ask this person?
It’s like, okay, the person says that they hated Zach.
Okay, now what?
You’re still in exact same position
as you were right before.
you know, hearsay, sir.
Well, you could, I mean, cases are one
on circumstantial evidence.
You could have someone saying that Verinder was like,
Zach say he’s gonna give me $2 million,
turns out he’s a fake.
I’m gonna kill him tonight.
And then–
How many horror movies have you seen?
It’s like someone is chasing you around with a knife.
You jump out of a window on the second floor
to get away from them.
If you’re on the second floor,
someone’s in the room, they’re chasing you with a knife.
You would jump out the window, right?
to, deciding to jump off.
So there’s no, I mean, that’s the whole thing is,
but even if, again, someone says he didn’t like him
and he was gonna do something to him,
there’s still no evidence based off the video you see
or any stab wounds or any any,
like any actual crucial evidence to,
maybe in a civil court, you could win it.
There’s no way you could win it in the actual criminal court.
and I hope people have read the book otherwise,
they’re gonna be very confused.
You’re telling me that it is on a scale,
everything’s on a scale.
Let’s say one side of the scale, 100,
is that Zach committed suicide.
He was– – Yeah.
like what made you feel like he was in a mental space
to commit suicide and also, you know,
what evidence is there that he was going to commit suicide.
But 100 is that he committed suicide.
And zero is that he was murdered or forced,
basically, he had no other choice,
but to try to save his life by jumping off this balcony
into the Thames, what number are you at?
9,800 that he committed suicide.
I think– – So you’re saying–
way more likely than– – yeah.
Got it.
that maybe he did actually fear for his life,
whether that’s, again, how do we know he’s gonna get killed?
How do we know he’s not gonna get punched in the face?
There’s a big difference between those two things.
Do you really think a person that owns in the house,
owns the apartment would kill them, right in the apartment,
and then what was he gonna do with the–
He has to deal with all that stuff.
There’s video evidence everywhere, right?
Like so– – Yeah, but no one–
Do about the #REF! video camera, or any video On it.
’cause ultimately they could’ve just found evidence
that said, well, he pushed them off here, right?
Luckily exonerated him that there’s video.
there’s neither evidence that he committed suicide
or was murdered, which is very interesting.
So, to me, I’m on this– – One percentage,
let me ask you this, then, what percentage
did you say it was at Zaxfall?
Zaxfall. – That He was in That situation?
Yeah, that he’s in that situation
and then took his own life.
a hundred, or a hundred, four hundred.
Again, why do I have sympathy for this person then?
But– – And do you get my whole thing
as like the first half of the book you establish
is all these people are bad,
and the second half of the book is questioning
everyone why they’re not asking other people
about whether they’re bad or not?
Like it doesn’t track at all.
I’m like, I just don’t understand what they wanted the police.
So you want the police to now take more time away
from actual murders and actual people–
This may be murder, right?
Children missing And maybe people are kidnapped
or maybe people that are unsolved murder mysteries.
You want to take them away from that
to help with some thing to find out the mental state
of a guy that his parents don’t even know
was conning people or didn’t know the mental–
The parents are like, oh, he’s not suicidal.
So you don’t know anything about him.
How the hell would you ever know if you suicidal or not?
You don’t know nothing about him.
Yeah, And There was people That said
that he was particularly depressed and additional.
also, you might have been gay.
Oh, with him in Akbar?
which I was like, wait, what?
I think I had the last podcast that is like,
nothing wrong with a couple guys sleeping in the same bed
and you go on golf trips and stuff like that.
Things happen.
yeah.
as potentially like a lover’s quarrel
or something along those lines, which, yeah.
Yeah, that seemed a little far-fetched, but I’m glad.
I mean, PRK’s really stretched it out, that’s for sure.
So he brought in all evidence and maybe those were red herrings
or whatnot.
But yeah, I think I’m, and it’s also, it’s interesting,
because he also was running out of his money.
I guess he had Bar mitzvah money that his dad had given him
and he had like 20 cents left.
So that gives more weight to your side of,
oh my God, what am I gonna do now?
I’m a fugee, how am I gonna live with myself
kind of situation?
But it just seemed like the Verindasharma heating up knives
thing, it seemed to me more of someone
who was in fear for his life in that apartment
and thought my only way out of this is,
it’s five stories, it’s not doable.
And if you see a picture of the apartment,
there’s, it pretty much sits over the water.
It’s not an impossible jump.
And for someone that’s kind of obsessed with movies
and these characters who can kind of do these things,
the idea of being out, you know, there’s a high chance
I’m gonna die in this apartment.
So let’s take, you know, I can make the temps,
let’s see if I can jump into it.
Yeah, yes.
Yeah.
Let’s put it this way.
If there was some guy that had a massive gambling bet
and he knew bookies were after him and did the exact same thing,
would you say, we gotta get, we gotta investigate these bookies.
Like these bookies are not good people.
We need to find everything we can about the bookies.
Let’s ask everyone about the bookies.
Let’s, you know, would you do the same thing for them?
‘Cause that’s what it was.
Well, it sounds like what you’re saying is not everyone deserves
the rights that we all get in terms of a fair investigation.
Like if you’re a bad guy and someone kills you,
like you don’t deserve to be investigated,
your murder doesn’t deserve to be investigated.
No, that’s definitely not.
And there’s video evidence of him deciding to jump off.
Now, if you wanna establish that he was forced to do it in a way–
Have you ever seen a saw movie?
Like this is what the whole saw movie is in premise time.
What are they talking about?
Yeah, he forces people to do things that they don’t wanna do
so that they don’t die.
So they kidnapped and brought them to their own apartment
and made them sleep there, right?
Is that what happened?
I’m saying, did someone, did someone force
and it’s the same thing with the gambling thing?
Did someone force him to do all these things
that led up to him getting in trouble
with people that were unscrupulous characters?
Yeah, he made it, right?
Yeah, he made it, that is the word, good word.
Now, if someone pushed him off a thousand percent,
they should go to jail and they should be tried for murder.
Now, if someone, if there’s evidence of him being stabbed
or some sort of physical ailments before he jumped
that forced him, he was bleeding out
and he was like, I can’t make it to the hospital,
I gotta jump.
Fine.
If your parents knock on the door and say,
open this door, miss or write this in,
or you’re gonna be in big trouble
and you jump out the fucking door
when you charge the parents with murder,
because yeah, you do charge them with murder
because the parents got mad at you.
No, but that’s come on.
That’s taking you completely different.
What if a freaking verinder said,
I’m gonna cut you into little pieces,
I’m gonna put this hot knife into your eye until pops
unless you go outside and jump off
this that balcony right now.
So that’s what we’re gonna do.
I don’t know, it’s just as likely as your situation.
No, no, no, that’s what happened.
The book paints these two guys
as these crazy, unbelievable criminals
that are these masterminds that are also completely
most vicious people, even though it’s some tech nerd
that owns an AI company.
He’s also–
He’s no vicious person.
He’s an absolute idiot con man.
A car?
Yeah.
There’s no way he is like that.
So, but they also know he’s a con man,
but he doesn’t know he’s a con man.
The company he created afterwards
that PRK goes through are like the blurbs
are so corporate chat GPT created.
You live in the real world, that’s everything.
Yeah, no, I know.
Exactly, he’s just like, yeah.
I mean, you could look at any 90% CEOers are exactly him.
They’re just con-artists that jump from company
to a company, don’t do anything,
but they’ll like grade at their resumes.
I mean, we had a president like that, I get it.
Yeah, exactly.
But exactly, that’s my own point.
So, I don’t really know.
So, you’d be saying that’s the guy
that was so intimidating and you know, all these things.
So, I don’t know.
There’s also some of these guys are like,
and granted, there’s no reason someone
that’s 60 or 70 can’t be scary,
but they’re like 60 and 70 year old men.
I liked that picture of them and I was like,
these are the guys?
What are you doing here?
A 19 year old athletic 19 year old
couldn’t get away from these guys or like, you know,
do any, come on.
Juke about?
Yeah, right.
All right, well, I think, I don’t know.
I think we’re going to agree to disagree,
probably in 20 minutes on that.
But I like, hey, if it says anything about the story,
it says that it was written in a way
that got us feeling something because–
Yeah, that’s true.
And, you know, we’re usually pretty sympathico
about these things and I’m not necessarily saying
that you’re wrong.
I think some of you, the ways that you got there,
were terrible and should be misjudged.
But–
It’s not equal.
So, if you have to choose between someone
spending 40 hours on this case or someone
spending 40 hours on a missing daughter kidnaped,
which one do you want them spending it on?
Yeah, unfortunately, it’s not that simple.
Right, it is that simple.
There’s only sermon hours.
I wish it was that simple, but it’s not.
What are you saying?
Answer the question, sir.
Which one do you want them spending the time on?
I am spending the time on a missing woman,
is that what you’re saying?
Because it’s like a missing eight year old girl.
Oh, yeah, sure, of course.
There you go.
There’s only sermon hours in the day
that if you’re saying the police are underfunded,
OK, so which one do you want them spending time on?
A guy that seemingly either committed suicide
or maybe was forced to and will find out by asking
his friends or the person that actually is actively missing?
Well, you don’t only do the job that’s put in front of you
and the job that’s put in this guy’s desk
and he did a terrible job.
Simple as that.
What else you have for stock up?
The US prison system stock up.
I mean, everything I’ve heard about the art prison system
from our judicial system to the people putting them in there
for the for-profit prisons, treatment of prisoners,
recidivism rate, everything to do with our system’s terrible.
But then we hear about Indian daves,
like associates and things like that,
just beating the shit out of people and murdering people
and they were like, well, we’ll put you in prison for six years.
And then you only serve like two of them.
And I was like, wait, what’s going on?
There’s a bunch of characters that were just running around.
And again, I don’t know if the book is just painting them
in as the worst possible light, but it sounded like you
could go to London.
And if you just started pushing people around,
the British people, they’re like, oh my goodness,
what are you doing here, sir?
And just folds.
That’s what it sounded like.
So I don’t know.
I think either the prisons themselves are terrible
or people are the softest people ever, I couldn’t tell.
I wanted–
Get a read on that?
No, I was very interesting.
That’s the problem with a lot of situations, anyways.
I mean, Caroline watches these 2020 and date line stuff.
And people that–
these people that murder people or rape people,
and then it’s like, yeah, in the end of the story,
it’s like, wow, that was so crazy.
And then it’s like, yeah, they got 10 years.
I’m like, 10 years.
How do they only get 10 years?
So that’s like, yeah, they served six.
And then we’re released.
It’s like, what?
I mean, they literally did it together.
Yeah.
OK.
So yeah, that’s terrible.
I wanted to know more about the guy who did that heist,
the gold heist, or whatnot.
That was really interesting.
Yeah.
Because no one ever found the gold.
He served his time.
And people within the case were dying,
getting murdered.
Exactly.
It was like the worst–
The worst guys–
Yeah, yeah.
And it was– he then gets out of jail and just lives his life.
But presumably, he’s got millions and millions.
And the gold just goes back into the system.
Crazy.
That was fast thing for me.
But my next stock up was a simple Google search stock up.
So–
Go on.
Akbar and Verinder seemed like buffoons.
And I know that they never looked at–
Make a high point, by the way.
Yeah.
And–
And go on.
It’s 2019 this happened, right?
So it wasn’t like it was like, oh, 1990.
And they’ll think, you know, can’t find out
to sell on these people.
Yeah.
And I know that they said their argument
was they were familiar with these oligarch types
and they have ways of staying totally under the radar
completely off the internet.
That kind of thing.
And Zach can have a fake Instagram account
where he’s standing next to Lamborghini and saying they’re his
and getting picked up at one-hide park by whoever, the guy
who introduced him to Akbar.
And so they just assumed he lived there.
But there just seems to be a lot of assumptions.
If you’re going to get in– this isn’t a Akbar type where
you know that he’s at least been around
and you know people that he knows.
This is a 19-year-old kid who you’re doing deals with for,
like, Portugal real estate.
Like, Lisbon real estate.
You’re getting a 19-year-old involved.
But he’s never putting up cash.
And there’s always some excuse for one thing or another.
It’s like, oh, but he lives at one-hide park.
He’s like, well, I only picked him up outside.
No one ever thought, maybe I’ll just tell him or like pay
someone a couple bucks, play a private and get vestigated.
Or just a tell him just to see what his actual deal is.
Yeah, it’s like then when he eventually brought Akbar or someone
to his family’s house, he just took all the pictures off the wall.
And they were like, yeah, there’s nothing on the walls.
It was weird.
But he was renting out this play.
Everything just seemed so shady.
And if they were sitting there waiting for a payday,
where they’re going to get millions of dollars
from this kid at some point, you think if you’re
going to talk about investing time,
if you’re going to invest that much time into grooming
this young man, then you should probably
do a little bit of due diligence onto if he actually is who he
says he is.
That’s why everything’s so unbelievable.
But the picture thing in particular just shows, like, oh,
there’s no photos in the wall.
That makes sense.
It’s kind of like George, when he brings the woman back to his
parents place, and they’re like, oh, you have kids?
No, that’s a picture of me.
What?
The biggest thing is he didn’t speak Russian.
So it seems like that would be pretty easy.
He doesn’t have an accent.
Where maybe some people said–
I think they said he had passable Russian, which
was crazy to me because he didn’t.
And then some people say he spoke with an accent.
Other people say he didn’t.
I can understand not having an accent,
but–
I think that’s why the almost the relationship thing
makes more sense.
That him and that far were having an intimate relationship.
That makes more sense to me than any of this stuff, honestly,
because it’s just so–
The other thing too is when you read text,
other than the sexual stuff, which I think was like,
I don’t think you text stuff.
Maybe Britain’s different, or I don’t
know if the culture is different.
But I’ll text someone being like, if you write my text
out of context, I’ll text someone be like,
oh, I’m going to kill that person.
They’re fucking dead to me.
Or something like that.
If you read that from a transcript all of a sudden,
it’s like, oh, my god, this guy’s a murder.
You know what I mean?
But that’s not how–
That’s just how people talk about text.
So when he was like, get the knives ready,
I didn’t take that to face value until he tried
to explain it with like, get the knives,
or are they brothers?
Or what did he say?
He said something like, oh, that’s a slang word I use.
And I was like, OK, never mind.
He actually had an argument, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
It didn’t make any sense.
Yeah, also, Akbar was super weird.
Retroid is used to the N word.
It was just like–
What?
I’m not picking up on that.
Yeah, he had like a Motown record deal or something,
or not even a Motown.
It was like in California.
Oh, right.
In California.
Yeah, OK.
People.
And he was like, oh, like, I’m the same
because I’m from whatever, or I’m African,
because I’m from Uganda.
And it’s like, how a ton– that’s the problem.
So many of these people are just so out of touch
with just how to act like a human being.
I also– he was like, welching in all these deals.
And then like, after the third or fourth one,
I would probably be like, oh, maybe, you know,
fool me once, shame on you.
Like, so the first people, like, I fooled fine.
The 35th bank that gave him a loan, and he welched on it.
It’s like, are we even–
Isn’t that your fault at this point?
I think that was his dad.
That was his dad.
No, he was doing all the same thing.
Yeah, yeah.
He was just like, cutting, ripping people off,
not paying any debts, just bouncing,
and all of this all under– he had great lawyers, by the way,
amazing lawyers.
They all put like shell companies.
I didn’t even know–
That was his–
That was a big–
I mean, his dad started that.
And then– Yeah, smart.
Yeah, you can just put your whole–
you just have a company for your company for your company.
And then, by I think–
It gets so high level, and it’s unfortunate
that the system is set up that way,
because it’s really just set up for these people.
It just protects these people.
I mean, it’s the same reason why some of the biggest companies
in our country don’t pay taxes, because they’re like, oh, no,
I’m actually run out of Ireland.
It’s like, Facebook’s an Irish company.
It’s like, what?
You do all your business here.
It’s like, no, no, no, but the company’s in Ireland,
so we don’t have to pay taxes in the United States.
Yeah.
I mean, they should have made him put, like,
once you mess up a bunch of companies,
you should have to put, like, collateral and things.
Like, you should have had stuff they had to do
in order to get the agreements.
Yeah, species.
People are people.
Species.
That’s what they say in this American history thing
I’m listening to.
They keep saying it.
It means like hard coin.
OK.
But he says it all the time, because he’s talking about the,
like, early 1800s when they’re setting up like the US bank
and then the second bank and whatnot.
And they have to be backed by Species, which is, you know,
the gold reserve kind of thing.
And, yeah, but they say that the guy who narrates it
says it all the time, and I’m just like,
Species, Species, Species, like, I get it.
Just say, like, gold or whatever.
Yeah, say pearls.
I don’t care what it is.
But my last one was a single story dwellings stock up.
Go on.
Well, hard to jump to your death if there’s always
a single story dwellings.
OK.
That was last one.
I would have said stairs stocked up.
The single story dwellings is a little bit high, fluent.
That was– you went to your private school.
You’re showing your private school.
I did not.
I came to imagine not getting into number one
choice of private school when you were 13.
I would ruin me for my whole life.
I couldn’t– I can’t imagine it.
I said, thank.
Well, it’s funny, because my buddy–
I have a buddy who lives in London, and he
sends photos of these cars all the time,
like on the street.
He’s walking on the street.
Hundreds of $1,000 cars, like all over the place.
And I guess it takes me to my first stock down, which
is– I already did the institutions, but social media
stock down.
If you try to look at social media and figure–
and this is social media, but also just society as a whole–
if you’re using that as your barometer of what happiness is
and wealth is, then you’re just going to be sad and depressed
your whole life.
And also, just so people know, those people
are just as unhappy as all of us.
But it seemed like Zach kind of got caught up.
And it’s not necessarily just social media.
I think PRK said in an interview that he said he didn’t want
this whole story to be framed as kid dies,
because of the social algorithm.
He didn’t want that to be the story, but he definitely
was caught up in that.
But it’s also just the way the setting that he was in
with these private schools and being
surrounded by wealthy people that were–
even though he was wealthy, it was 100,000 x times that.
So he felt poor compared to that.
So if you’re just sitting there comparing yourself and saying,
that’s who I want to be, as opposed to realizing
how much better you have it than legitimately–
99% of the population of the planet
than you’re going to be in a bad mental way.
Yeah, no, I don’t know what the medicine for that is.
I’m not really sure, because I feel like, yeah,
if you’re just trying to keep up the Joneses
or not appreciating what you have, it’s tough to live out there.
I don’t know.
Yeah.
Yeah, I mean, I think, well, we all get caught up
in it to some degree.
It’s hard.
I feel like it’s hard not to, even if that’s not part of your
social algorithm or whatnot.
But it could be–
I mean, I have no idea.
You know what I mean?
It could be someone with a really big house
that you’re like, oh, I wish I had that,
or someone that did all sorts of fun stuff
that you like, I want to do.
I have no idea.
I honestly have very little of that.
I’m thankful for, however, I got that mindset of, you know,
I’m really happy with what I have,
and don’t want really anything more,
but that people would be like, maybe you’re a loser,
because you don’t.
So I don’t know.
I think some people are more materialistic, which I think is–
well, for him, it seems like that he’s well spoken, well-like,
really good family.
He’s got so many things going for him
that it seems–
it’s very, very hard, again, to really sympathize with him
because so many people don’t–
I just needed to maybe go to charities more, or, you know.
So I just didn’t have any perspective, which–
19, I get that, but–
Yeah, it’s tough.
I mean, 19, you’re still–
No, I agree.
I did so many stupid things, and I was 19,
and even into my 20s, you know, people do stupid stuff
all the time.
It’s just–
you don’t expect those things to kill you.
And he was putting on a con that was probably–
he didn’t realize how big of a situation he was getting himself
into, I think.
What do you have for Stockdown?
I just want to get a little bit cutable,
but being a concerned parent, stocked down–
I get it.
Being a parent’s hard, especially if a kid that’s got
just struggles, and we have 20, 20 hindsight,
going on here.
But I mean, I didn’t like Zack at all.
And we already talked about this.
Oh, Jesus.
Yeah, yeah.
I don’t really– I don’t think his parents liked him either.
I mean, I want point, they’re like, yeah,
so we didn’t get in the privacy we wanted to.
And the new one was like, 30-minute drive.
We were like, no, we’re not doing that shit.
So we just had him stay there for the whole week.
I’m like, wait, what?
They’re like, yeah, he’s really struggling,
but we didn’t want to have to deal with it.
So we’d rather not drive a 30-minute extra.
So we just had him live there.
I was like–
Well, Bord, I think you’re also–
Not super– like Bording is way more common in–
Oh, is it?
In the UK, like in England, going to a boarding school
is way more common than it is here.
They were like, making it sound like they had a drive
like five hours every day.
Can you imagine doing that over the 30-minute?
Yes.
If the kid is that struggling that much,
I think it’s probably important that you’re
maybe doing that 30-minute drive and talking with them.
I don’t know, maybe I’m crazy.
But– Yeah.
But also in the midst of the biggest time frame,
he just choked his mom out.
He was going to therapy all these things.
And then so we left for this weekend vacation
by ourselves, like the two parents.
And I was like, wait, pardon?
What happened?
Well, yeah, yeah.
So anyways, we set up a camera to watch him.
I was like, oh, yeah, good job parenting.
I didn’t realize you did that.
And then the kid doesn’t throw a ripper,
doesn’t have people over.
Nothing happens.
And then they’re like, so wasn’t that big of a concern?
And I’m like, no, that is red flag.
Number one.
What are you doing?
That’s where you–
You can have a party.
Exactly.
Not like no weird stuff going on?
Like, what?
That’s weird.
Yeah.
I mean, then they just aren’t curious at all.
Fake bank accounts, talking to random people at night,
being all stressed out.
I understand he’s a teenager.
He’s angsties, all these things.
I would never have to feel gridden because obviously,
I just don’t think they care that much
until after the fact it seems like so.
Well, when he showed his dad the bank slip or whatever,
and he had 500,000 pounds in it or whatever it was,
I don’t even know what the number was.
But it was a lot of money.
Like way more money than you would have in IT.
That would be like a hold on–
his dad said, oh, you think he about taxes and this stuff
and the other thing.
He’s a obvious response.
Are you putting some in your 401K?
But I’d be like, hold on.
Open your computer, log into your account right now.
You’re 19. I want to look and see what you’re doing with this
because currently you have enough money that if you were
to squirrel that away, you could retire off this money.
You could do whatever the hell you wanted in this world
and you could retire off this money.
So let’s take a step back, say congratulations,
but let’s– you know what I mean?
It didn’t seem like there was that next level of questioning.
And granted, Zach probably wasn’t able to do it.
But I feel like– and it must be so hard for them
because they see him one way, but then they find out later
on that he has this whole fake storyline.
And everything is just he has this whole life
that they didn’t even know about.
So you question yourself as a parent, I’m sure.
Like I’m sure they’ve thought about those terrible things
that you said about them.
But which brought me to my stock down, which is
stock down of being able to influence your kids.
And it’s a stock down because I have a daughter’s almost too.
And you want to be able to mold these human beings.
That is your goal pretty much.
It’s stuff– it’s trivial now.
But I have a little chipping that in the backyard.
And I got her little plastic off clubs
because I want to play sports with her.
Like I want that to be a thing that we can do.
So I’m trying to make those accessible and–
I’m trying to imprint that on her.
But we all have to realize that you really can’t–
they’re their own people.
And you can’t– you can only influence them
to a very small degree.
And at the end of the day, they’re
going to decide what they want to do and what they don’t
want to do.
And will it be extremely heartbreaking
if my daughter decides that she doesn’t
want to play sports with me or at all,
or doesn’t want to read books and watch movies and go on walks.
That would be absolutely terrible.
But that might be the person that she is.
And as much as you try to mold them, at the end of the day,
they’re their own person.
And I think that’s a problem for his parents where they
brought him out.
They gave him all the opportunities that he needed to succeed.
You know, it seemed like they were great.
They were great family and everything was good.
But then for him to get influenced by this outside force
and decide that’s the– that’s the trajectory he wanted,
it’s got to gut you.
Yeah.
Well, I will say just one thing that I
think about you, which I think is why you’re
going to be a great dad.
And if you’re a great dad is going to–
Thank you.
Keep going.
Well, I just know you, your personality,
is if she doesn’t into sports, but she’s into ballet,
but isn’t into ballet, or she’s into drawing,
you’re going to become someone that likes doing those things.
You don’t like ballet?
No way.
Well, I think you’ll start to appreciate it,
especially if you see your daughter enjoying it.
So that’s what I’m saying is, as long as they find something
that they like, I think just I know you.
You’re not going to be like, well, they don’t play golf.
I’m not talking to her now.
It’s like, no, it does not going to happen.
Well, it is funny you said the ballet thing
because I had friends or other people who have talked to her,
like, oh, yeah, my daughter’s doing dance,
and we have these dance recitals, why not?
I was like, she will never even know that dance exists.
Why?
If you heard bad things about it?
Well, my sister was into the tap dance when she was little,
and also all other kinds of dance.
And I’d have to go to these recitals
two years younger than her.
And just be bored out of my gourd.
Not your daughter.
It doesn’t matter.
Yes, it’s cute.
But they’re cute for like a minute.
And then it’s like, all right, I’m on the floor for this.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So yeah, that would be unfortunate.
Also, the wife grew up horseback riding.
And so she’s like, oh, it’d be great for her
to get into horseback riding.
I’m like, I’m trying to retire by the time I’m 60.
Like, I am not looking to get into, as I’m trying to say,
talking to her about getting into golf, which is definitely
not a cheap sport.
Yeah, that’s an expensive sport.
So I’m just going of the route of, sure, I appreciate
that was very nice of you to say.
But I’m thinking if she doesn’t even know these things
exist, then we’re good.
Like, the only thing she’s going to know that exists
are the things that I like, right?
Like, doing the exact opposite of what I said.
I’m going to cut all that.
So it sounds like–
Yeah.
Yeah.
She does like the cup.
She always–
Wow.
the morning.
She says, cook, cook.
She likes to make her pancakes.
Yeah, get her one of those easy big ovens,
and that will turn you right into her.
Things are just a hot light.
Yeah, I think those are not a lot of these sold out.
Yeah, I don’t think so.
Do you have any other stuff, guys?
Last one, dying mysteriously, stocked down.
Let me state this clearly.
If I die mysteriously, and most likely,
it’s because I got assassinated by Big Chicken
or some other conspiracy theory we expose in this podcast,
just go on living.
Do not investigate it.
The last thing I need is some tell all about my life.
I’m pretty– it’d be pretty sad.
It’d be fun.
It’d be like–
And then what’s interesting is at Keith that night,
before his disappearance, ordered Uber Eats
for the 30th time that month.
And this time, he ordered three desserts.
Something must have been going on.
Yeah, it’s like– he must have not been living here,
because the only thing in the cupboard was cheesets
and a box of honey and a Cheerios.
So there’s zero–
And the last thing he searched on the internet history
was something called a Swedish-made penis
in the double larger.
Zach came out looking absolutely terrible, nurse.
I mean, the more they dug, the worse he looked.
I mean, like I said, by the end of the zero,
sympathy for him, I was like, what are we doing here?
Fake it till you make it stock down.
Yeah, you know, Zach was trying to fake it till he made it.
And he didn’t even make it into the water.
So– yeah.
Allure Rich, stock down.
Yeah, I mean, that kind of speaks for itself.
Yeah, that’s terrible.
That’s terrible.
Yeah, that’s terrible.
Yeah, that’s terrible.
I didn’t say–
it’s just a weird one to get to those numbers.
Elon Musk being the world’s first trillionaire or whatever.
How is that even possible?
You know, like, why is that?
And it’s also interesting reading this book
in this whole financial stuff as I’m
listening to the history of the United States, which was–
you know, they’re talking about the original people that lived
in– and a lot of it is in Massachusetts and New England.
And the top 1% of the population in these areas
controlled, like, 15% of the states well–
or the commonwealth.
They controlled 15% of the states well.
And it was similar throughout the entire 13 colonies.
If you take them all, like, the top 1%, they owned 15, maybe
up to 20% of the wealth.
Now it’s like the top 1% owns 35% of the wealth in this country.
It’s insane.
We’re not– we are not a democratic republic,
whatever you want to believe.
We’re just a bunch of people that are at the whim of these
corporations.
There’s not countries anymore.
There’s just really rich companies that
decide what they get to do with our money.
It’s funny as you look up–
all right, the richest people from the 1900s or first
monopolies or any of those guys.
And you’ll like, oh, I recognize all these names,
because they built colleges.
They built libraries.
They built community centers.
They built hospitals.
They built all these infrastructure things with their money
to help other people out, seemingly.
I’m sure– I think Tim Dillon had a rant on this
who I listened to once in a while.
Yeah, he was like, they used to be fat and happy and rich,
and would do nice things to make up for the fact
that they’re shitty people, like, you know,
they’re monopolies and stuff.
Now our billionaires are shitty people that
have– and like, do all this stuff to tell people–
or have people tell them they’re funny,
or they’re whatever– to make up for the fact
that they’re shitty people.
Like, it’s not no longer helping everyone out.
They’re like, no, I’m going to spend a ton of money
and get on by Twitter so I can be funny.
And it’s like, what?
Are you helping society out?
Yeah, exactly.
And we’re not saying that the carnages and whatnot
were necessarily all good people.
But, you know, there’s a lot of union busting
and there’s definitely some shady deals
and using the government to fund their things.
But I do feel like there was more altruism at the end of life,
you know, when it came to giving back to the community.
But, yeah, maybe not.
I haven’t looked too deeply into that.
Maybe they were just, you know, still shitty people.
But, I was a damn if you do, damn you, damn you, damn you.
I remember the home depot, dude, died.
And the headline was, Republican donor dies.
And I was like, oh, I’m like, who’s this guy?
I know who he was.
It’s like, yeah, he’s the home depot founder.
And he had donated billions of dollars to charity.
And he had also given some to the Republican party.
And they’re like, this piece of shit Republican.
I was like, this is probably why people are just–
they’re like, yeah, there’s no winnings.
I’ll just be a piece of shit instead.
Exactly.
That’s definitely true.
Definitely true.
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What did you love about London as far as?
I thought it was–
I mean, we’ve talked about it.
It was very, very well researched.
There was multiple threads that were kind of interesting.
The history he paints, like the first–
a couple of chapters, I think, where you talked about it
on the last pod.
I was like, yeah, I’m going to like this book a lot,
because he was really painting an interesting picture.
I didn’t know anything about really the London history,
a lot of this stuff that was going on.
That I really appreciated it.
And I think the history aspects made it kind of come
to life a little bit more.
Yeah, we’ve been this whole time talking
about the Zach Brutler story, because I feel like that’s
the part that you can really converse about,
as opposed to just talking about the history of London
and the Asians in Uganda getting kicked out
and what happened to Akbar Shamjee’s parents and whatnot.
All that stuff was so–
the way the structure of the story itself,
the way he layered in the context by taking us
to different times in history, that ultimately tied back
to the story of Zach.
So it didn’t seem like we just went off
on this total tangent that had nothing to do with the story.
It built the context around the Zach Brutler story.
And I thought he did a really good job
of telling the history and how all these things happened
in London and why it coalesced into something
where this Zach Brutler story could even happen.
And agree with you, the journalism was incredible.
I mean, the research he put into the stories insane,
coming through countless hours of interviews and articles
and reading up on all the history.
And he also– the Brutler parents were audio recording
a bunch of their conversations, so he had to listen back
through all of that.
I’m kind of amazed by some of these journalists
and stuff they do.
And I recently, we were watching all the presidents’ men.
I don’t know if you’ve seen that movie, but an absolute classic
about the Watergate scandal.
These journalists are doing so much to get
to the bottom of what’s going on that I would have given up
5% in, you know, and they make sure they go 100%, so yeah,
I love those.
Do you have anything else?
Not really.
I thought he was a really good narrator.
Oh, yeah, he was.
Yeah.
He reads it.
I didn’t even necessarily know that he read it
until I was listening to interviews with him.
And I was like, oh, this is the same voice.
He’s like, dang, he was better.
And I might be giving a spoiler away,
but we’re reading a Gone Girl.
That’ll be next.
And maybe the worst narration I’ve ever heard in any book.
It is so terrible that I’m actually
going to probably go to the library tomorrow
and get the actual book, because I can’t pick it up.
I honestly–
I’m in the same thing.
I didn’t know maybe it was the narrator for me then.
I didn’t think about that.
I’m like, this is so bad.
This book is terrible.
And then I realize, why is this so bad?
I’m like, oh, because it’s the two people that are narrating it
are just– so it makes it seem like this B-level,
teeny-bopper book.
I think I’m reading Twilight or something like that.
Props a PRK for his narration skills,
because it was really good.
What about Hates?
Well, off the bat, the one thing I didn’t like about him is–
What else have you got?
You know what’s the baseball analogy here?
He says at one point, he’s trying to–
you know, he’s like, instead of joining something simple,
he’s trying to home run with the basses loaded.
It’s called a grand slam, but–
Yeah, I did that.
I did that.
Yeah.
Other than that, I’ve kind of already
gone in pretty heavily–
Yeah, it’s nice.
I’m about to get a seasoned assist or something.
I don’t even know.
The one thing I didn’t really like
is that once he starts using the i voice,
I didn’t really like any of that.
Oh, towards the end?
Yeah, he was like, it was funny enough, i.
And I was like, what?
And he’s like, yeah, I was like, I met them through this,
this, and this.
What an interesting tidbit.
And I was like, no, it’s not.
That’s not interesting at all.
And then he was like, yeah, and people wouldn’t talk to me.
And I’m like, that’s because you paint almost everyone
in the book as a negative light.
I’m sure people don’t want to be part of this story.
There’s no positive that comes out of this,
you saying one way or another, right?
So the last thing I’ll just say is,
Indian Dave’s daughter gets on the stand,
and I didn’t think she was, she just said,
like, you know, like, she wasn’t there.
She was just like, I like my dad, all this stuff.
And then like the parents were like,
how could she not like turn on him?
And she obviously has incentive to not tell the truth
and all these things.
It’s like, what about you?
You’re doing the exact same thing.
You want this story to be true.
So you’re crafting this, but they just,
you didn’t like mention that.
You just like, yeah, they’re probably right
that she’s lying.
I’m like, says who?
You know, if my dad was an or I would be in,
do not, like, there’s no way that I would even,
even if I got all the evidence, I just wouldn’t believe it.
So it’s also, he’s already dead at that point.
So what’s she gonna do?
Shit on her dad for no reason.
I mean, it’s like, it didn’t make any sense.
So yeah.
I thought it, I kind of liked it because,
at the end of the day, it showed for me
that he was acknowledging some of the bias
that he might have had because he was really just working
with the Brettler family.
You know, it wasn’t, he wasn’t paid by them,
like you insinuated or maybe you flat out said.
But, but at the same time,
if this story seems to lean in their way,
like towards their defense,
it’s because they, I have a personal relationship with them now,
you know, I’ve worked through this story.
So I appreciated from that angle,
from like a journalistic integrity angle,
especially because it seems like today
there is absolutely zero journalistic integrity
that is happening.
So.
’cause it’s not real.
Oh, It was like the last, whatever.
It’s the end of the book.
It’s what you wanna, what you wanna have.
But speaking about footnote in a 12 hour book,
the thing I hated was I just didn’t think
this necessarily needed to be novel length.
You know, I appreciated the extra info for context.
I think we could have got the vast majority
of what we needed here from a long article.
I think you get it entirely,
at least from the story about Zach,
from a couple sentences from his mom,
which he says, “Each was pretending to be something
“he wasn’t and each was caught up

1491
00:57:02,800 –> 00:57:05,240
in the glitzy mercenary aspirational”
“cultural of modern London.

1493
00:57:06,960 –> 00:57:09,320
It was three bullshit artists selling air.”””
It’s like, yes.
That’s exactly what it was between the three of them.
Obviously he takes a lot more into the story,
which I appreciate, but it could have been a novella
or like a really long vanity fair piece.
I mean, I know he works with a New Yorker,
but a really long New Yorker piece,
which I think it was, I think that’s how it started.
yeah.
but Yeah, It was just, It was a bit long.
And it’s unfortunate that, you know,
I think we both came into it,
especially because we’ve been reading a lot of fiction,
so the fiction’s have stories and endings.
And this story doesn’t have the smoking gun at the end.
And I think he wrote another story that he did actually,
like same kind of thing happened,
and he actually found out who the murderer was
through his investigation.
Oh really?
one of his other books.
like a big reveal.
And then just none of it happened other than,
it was just kind of like finger pointing at people.
They’re like, oh, they should have done this.
you’re able to pull the facts together on your own
without, you know, you know what happened
based on how he gave it, which is, you know,
that’s his feeling.
Subjective, yeah.
You clearly are of a different mindset, which is fine.
You know, I think that’s, yeah, that’s not the point of it all.
Yeah, So He, I think It is coming out with a show.
So there’s a mini series I think coming out of you
clearly will not be watching it.
I think if you had visuals, It would make things easier
to watch, I just don’t like really documentaries as it is.
So I think–
I could, it’s kind of like watching soccer for me.
If I sit down and watch it, I can get into it,
but it’s hard for me to get motivated to do it.
I mean, patriotism, I’ll get into, you know,
unfortunately, these day and age is not easy to do.
But, yeah.
we watched a Martin Short documentary, Life is Short.
It was very good, very good.
For those good, yeah.
which was good, it was good, on, on Peacock, yeah.
Definitely made me reminisce in some old SNL stuff,
when I used to, you know, watch it back in the ’90s,
but, but yeah, those were, those were right.
And if you’re talking about patriotism,
the revolution by Ken Burns is insanely good.
That was, – Okay.
Whole, Yeah, Kenny Burns is So good.
All right, so Keith, what do you give it to his in four?
This is out of five, right?
Yeah, Well, let me put This way.
When I first started it, I was like, this is a four.
According to the way through the book, I was like,
I’m, I’m, I’m scrapped in.
Let’s go, let’s see what happens here.
And then the second part started and I was like,
okay, we’re kind of wavering.
I don’t know what’s going on here.
It went down like a 3.5, then went to three,
then went to 2.5.
So it kept going down as I kept reading those earpoint.
It was too long.
And then by reviewing this, I was like, you know what,
there’s a 1.5, but I’m hating this book now.
So that’s what I’m adding to it.
Wow. – What about you?
I’m gonna give it a, I’m between 2.25 and 2.5.
you know, the work he,
I honestly think that the couple other books that he had done
would have been better reads for us, unfortunately,
’cause he does, he has one on the Sackler family,
who’s the, you know, ox, oxy cotton, yeah,
the oxy cotton family.
So. – Yeah.
I just don’t like, not, I mean, the other,
it’s like three non-fiction, we’ve read,
I’ve given like a three, like high subgenres of three.
So, I just think, no. – There’s nothing.
I need to be outside this world.
The book definitely doesn’t make you feel good.
And it’s, I feel like it’s written from a cynical perspective
or maybe a nihilist perspective,
I’m not that familiar with either of those things,
but of society and like this is society
that we’ve created in honestly just the huge wealth gap
and what that’s allowed for and what that’s made people
and also just institutions do, like government institutions.
So, but yeah, if you are into those things,
then this book is for you.
That’s for sure.
Or if you’re my mom, then the book’s for you.
I Do feel bad, I hope none of the people
that recommended it to you listen to those,
’cause I feel like they’re gonna be like,
this is an asshole, huh?
’cause you know, I talked to her today about it.
And she already thinks I’m an asshole,
so my mom says things like,
It’s to be such a nice boy, what happened?
Yeah, my mom’s gonna be like,
your friend Keith never invited out to the lake.
No way, he’s a terrible person.
Hey, listen, you gotta get It out here.
This is like a…
is That group therapy?
they get it out there, and they’re, you know?
This is what this is.
I’m not taking my violence and hatred out there
because I get it out here.
Hey, good For you.
I appreciate that.
Take it out on me, all you want.
What do we got coming to next?
depending on how you read that.
Reader or listener recommendation,
so we already did one of our books,
which I think we both liked.
Sharp objects.
Sharp objects, yep.
So we’ll get into this one and see you for the next one.
All right, cool.
Well, we’ll catch you for Gone Girl next time.
That was London is following a long subtext.
All right. – Bye now.
Bye now.

The Buddies close the book on Joe Abercrombie’s First Law trilogy with “The Last Argument of Kings,” the grim dark finale that answers the age-old question: what if the Manhattan Project was run by a thousand-year-old wizard who doesn’t care if you live or die? The Buddies debate whether Jezal is just Vichy France with better PR, how to weaponize ‘biological control theory’ against your enemies, and if king sized beds are a misnomer. So sharpen your swords and Logan-isms, get ready to stand your ground one last time as the Buddies finish up the trilogy and say goodbye to the Bloody-Nine, Glokta, Ferro, Jezal, West, and Bayaz.

Intro (0:00-1:11)

Stock Up/Down (1:12-36:40)

Favorite Scene/Character (36:41-46:11)

Love/Hate (46:12-58:07)

Casting the Movie (58:08-1:02:16)

Conclusion (1:02:16-1:04:58) 

NEXT BOOK: London Falling by Patrick Radden Keefe

All right, welcome to “Buddy Buckeball.”
I’m Dylan here with the guy who smokes 10 packs of Chaga a day. Keith, what’s up buddy?
Chaga, another name for Marvel Reds?
That’s pretty much what they called it, I think.
It was like Tabacco as Chaga, I guess.
So here’s the “Buddy Buckeball” where we’re going to have some bestseller’s
and this week we’ll be discussing the third and final book in the first lot trilogy.
The last argument of “Kings” by Joe Avercrawby.
If you’d like to recommend a book for us to read, reach out to us at the past episodes
if you’re interested in our website, put it in a calm, slide into our DMs on X or Instagram.
That’s “Buddy Buckeball” podcast, that’s the handle, you can list to us.
I choose “Buddy Buckeball” if I’m ever you a podcast.
Download, subscribe, find our review, it would be great, please, and thanks. Keith, we did it.
We probably started 10 trilogies and finished four, so I’m glad we’re here.
This book was published in 2008, 4.37 on Goodreads, which is 100th of a point above the last one,
which was before they’re hanged.
So people I guess think it’s 100th of a point better.
I’m not sure, we’ll find out today, let’s get into some stock-up, stock-down.
Keith, what do you have for stock-up for “Last Dog of the Minkings”?
Stock-up, the Manhattan Project?
Oh, Oppenheimer, great film.
That’s a little crazy, but I think this whole book was an allegory for World War II,
and ultimately dropping the new pair of bomb on AK The Seed on Japan a couple of times.
So the Gerkish were the Japanese?
Well, let me get to it, sir.
You don’t want to lead the cart before the horse or whatever the fucking say.
You got it, you got it, you jump.
Okay, so by is, he’s the US.
He’s leading the expedition in the Manhattan Project, he’s looking for the Seed, he’s in Iraq, I mean Iraq, or Plina Rock,
I don’t know, whatever, to find the new pair of bomb.
He doesn’t find it there, he comes back, he finally does find the Seed, which we can all agree is just new pair of bomb,
right? It destroys the city and it causes radiation poisoning to everyone, right?
Yeah, it does have some radiation poisoning aspects to it.
He’s the US because he ends up using the nuclear bomb, the Seed, causes massive destruction,
he’s very unapologized about it, he’s like, whatever, and just about the memes, I don’t give a shit.
Tons of people are dying, those are the breaks.
I don’t know. I’m not sure that was Truman’s sentiment, but continue.
They all knew what they’re doing. Logan is the UK, he’s an ally, but he can be brutal, he’s taking his fair share of fire bombings,
but you know, he’s right there with us.
Jazal is obviously France, and Pharaoh is Russia, and then the other two, I couldn’t really use the analogy for Germany and Japan, I couldn’t really figure out how…
The problem is there’s not like a… World War II was… people love it because it was a clear definition of good versus evil,
whereas this world that we’re in here with the last argument of kings, there really is no good or evil.
It’s just everyone has a little bit of both in them, so it’s hard to say, you know,
Mammun, whatever, was definitely bad as was…
Caluul. So, Mammun was like Caluul’s henchman in whatever the case is, but…
Yeah.
So, they’re definitely bad, but at the same time, and I’m sure we’ll talk about a lot,
Bias was clearly a bad person, you know, or a bad major, in whatever the case is, he wasn’t interested in like doing this altruistically.
He didn’t say, “Oh, the seed is gonna have some collateral damage, but, you know, we need it to save the union, and that’s who I’m for.”
Bias is only for himself, so it’s hard to kind of draw a parallel there, necessarily, but I like…
I like that. I like where you’re saying.
You just said it in the nicest way possible. That was a dumbest thing ever.
I award you no points, and may God have mercy on yourself.
It made more sense when he was searching for the seed book too, and I was like, “Oh, so he’s just going…
He’s like trying to do the research for the project, and he struck out, but then he finds it and uses it, and it’s a nuclear bomb.”
Yeah. Just how being the Vichy French government makes a lot of sense, though.
And even Vichy?
They’re just puppets to the Nazis, pretty much, you know?
Oh, wow. You went deep in the history books. I’m not aware of that Vichy government, but okay.
Basically, when the Nazis came in, they put up… France was allowed to continue, or whatever as it was, but they put up a…
Basically, a puppet government, which was the Vichy French, and they did the bidding of the Nazis.
So when the Nazis were like, “Send us your Jews.” They were like, “Yup, no problem. They’re on a train. They’re coming right to you.”
And they were like, “Oh, if anyone’s doing this, arrest them.” It’s like, “Yup, sure. We’ll do it for you.”
So, yeah, there were pieces of shit, too.
Yikes.
That’s a tough one.
My first stock-up is a good PR campaign. Stock-up. I feel like I’ve done this before, maybe even in this series, but I am, of course, referring to Bias’ masterful stroke to get Juzal the throne.
He’s a masterstroke, what?
Master debater.
So, the last minute when they’re at this meeting, or in the case of “To elect the new king,”
Bias saves Juzal’s being the illegitimate son of King Guslov till the last minute. Very smart. Throw that out there. People gasp. Oh my gosh.
And then he uses Juzal’s supposed exploits in quelling the commoner uprising that happened, and his heroics in the journey to the old empire to emphasize Juzal’s like fitting this for that role.
But it turns out Bias had used one of his guys to manufacture that uprising. Basically, great, the whole thing said, “Oh yeah, Juzal can take care of it.”
Bias pretty much handled the whole thing and then gave all the glory to Juzal, just so he could put him up as his puppet.
This is his Vichy France right here. You know, this he put him up as his puppet government.
That’s your boy, by the way, remember that?
Juzal?
Yeah.
I mean, I feel bad for Juzal’s whole time. Also, Juzal had a nice little charge. He had a bayonet charge into the Gurbish when he’s the king.
You know, it’s like he sat there. He could have sat there, rested on his fake laurel, said, “Oh yeah, I am the best.”
And, you know, being a terrible person or at least lazy rid of the case was, he was the king and his wife was kicking him out of bed.
He was pulling a Michael Scott and sleeping on the little bed at the, like the thing you sit on at the end of a bed, whatever that thing is called.
He was pulling a Michael Scott and doing that in his own throne room, so our own king’s quarters, whatever the case is.
So, I mean, it could also be a stock up of, you know, of embellishing embellishments on your resume kind of thing because, you know, what Juzal do in the old empire?
Like we talked about in the last step. He just got hit in the face with a mace.
Yeah, he fought a couple of guys, did well, but then he just got hit in the face with a mace and like cried the whole time.
So, yeah, I mean, stock up to a good PR campaign. Bias did a wonderful job with that. And as it turns out, Bias had Prince Reino killed by his guy, his apprentice, your ruf’s sulfur, to basically open up the spot on the throne for Juzal to fill.
Yeah, Bias not a great guy, but he’s playing chess against everyone else playing checkers for sure because the whole time before that, it’s glaucta trying to get salt or whoever elected and then this other guy is coming in.
And he’s going to get elected and there’s almost this fight for votes. But then once the whole thing commences, they realize they were all getting played by Bias the whole entire time.
Got to show respect, respects do props up to buy us there. I will say though, you give a promise, but it’s when you control the media, the banks, you control magic.
What are we doing? Is it really that hard? I could do that.
And he’s like a thousand years old, so he’s seen it all. He’s like, yeah, I just did a million dollar alone. It wasn’t really that talented. He’s bought everything.
Yeah, but we’ve seen Rory McElroy go into the masters with a foreshot lead and blow up. So, you know, just because you have all the tools doesn’t mean you’re going to win every single time. He’s no bill.
That’s true. I mean, it be more like comparable to like some politician that spent a hundred times X their opponent loses. That would be more if he put it, but you know, he’s got all the spending. He’s got all the people in the right place.
He’s got the best TV spots.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, what else do you have for stock up? Go to saying stock up. Oh, you’re talking about Logan. Yeah, last time I touched on this, but I mean, I’m a king of this. I do this all the time. It’s all mental. Any Kramer line, any Austro power is line. I have about 10 I use all the time, which I probably none of them are original.
I’m taken from other people. What’s your number one besides kitty up? Is that same? Yeah, that’s right. Yeah, that’s right.
That’s not that’s putty, but either way. Yeah, that checks. I don’t know. There’s a few out there anyways. I wanted to see what your favorite as I don’t know if we got to a last time, but he’s all Logan.
And I added a couple though. I just found online that might have been him. I’m not sure. Okay, but you have to be realistic. I think it’s you have to be realistic about things, right?
Yeah, we have to be less about things stay still alive, still alive, say one thing for a Logan, say he’s a cunt. Which is the best route.
Yeah, it’s about it to do something then live with a fear of it. I love that one. Yeah, you could never have too many knives.
I have you have to be realistic again. I think I already said that one. History is littered with good dead men. I found that one. I’m not sure that thing was his.
Yeah, it’s also like a good sounds like a good civil war quote like a grant quote hard words are for fools and cowards, which I liked.
Treat a man like a dog and sooner or later he’ll bite you. Not even dog man. I don’t know. But anyways, those are the ones I found. There’s a few other quotes. I don’t know if I could contribute it to him. So just stuck with those. What was your favorite of those?
You say one thing about Logan and figures. He can call me. Say one thing for Logan line figures say he’s whatever. So that’s one of those say he’s a cunt because when he realizes he’s being a cunt.
You could use that well in conversation. If you had done something that someone thought was potentially rude or immoral or whatever the case is, you can say say one thing about Keith MacGonegal say he’s a cunt.
It’s fine. Totally good. And I like that one. Allow myself to introduce myself. We have a friend of a friend whose name is Richie and he was like, oh, hi, I’m Richie. And I was like, Richie Cunningham. This is my wife Oprah. He’s like, what is wrong with you? Who are you? And what is wrong with you?
I think I never met the guy. I just said, hi, I’m Richie Cunningham. And this is my wife Oprah. He’s got to know that. That’s a pulse check on my other person’s a good dude.
Yeah. So I remember going with that one. Say anything about Logan. Say he’s a cunt.
Okay. I mean, that’s a classic. I think I’ll go with it’s better to do something than the number of the fear of it.
Yeah. That’s a good one. That’s something you’ll like tell you that you tell your kids. You know, say hey, if you’re scared, you know, oh, you’re scared to play baseball. The ball’s coming in pretty fast.
I get it, but it’s better to do it than to live in fear of it, whatever the case is. Also, if you had a chef friend, you could get them the too many knives thing, put it on like a home goods piece and have it hung up in their kitchen.
Yeah. Stock up for me, petty gods. So it’s a big part of Greek mythology. It’s pretty much the backbone of it. You know, gods fighting each other over petty grievances.
And we mere mortals getting caught in the crossfire. Turns out that’s pretty much what’s happening in Agua this whole time. The war, this entire war, the whole, this old trilogy, everything that’s happened is just a feud between bias and the fight.
Between bias and colloal and neither side cares much who gets killed in the process. There’s the Girkish. There’s the union. There’s the Northman.
You know, bias turns out to be just as bad as the supposed bad guys when he, like you said, he releases the city basically chemical warfare is the entire city does not care about all the dead people.
He’s murdering princes and not caring. He’s using people as pawns, whatever. It just seems like bias has a very interesting arc. He’s lying though time for sure.
But at the beginning, we see him as somewhat of this Merlin-esque character where he’s a little out there. He’s funny. And then all of a sudden he blows someone’s head off. But they’re always the bad guys.
And you think he’s just a little eccentric. He’s just like an eccentric wizard. But it turns out he’s cold, cunning, calculating. He’s all the sea words. He’s a, called, bias, one thing. Call him a cunt because he sure is.
So at the end of it, the book and the whole trilogy, it makes you think, like, what was the point of all of it, right?
Not in a, why did I read this? But for the people involved, it’s just like, holy smokes. We did all of this. We created all of this at the bidding of these people that they don’t even care about us. And granted so few people even know that.
It’s only really, yeah.
Jazal and Galacta, who, who really know what’s going on. So, like, dystopian.
Midway through the second one, I was like, oh, he’s a bad guy. I just, I couldn’t bring it up in the last book because I’d already read too far into the third one.
But I just knew at some point I was just like, oh, he’s not a good dude. But yeah, you’re just assume most wizards are good unless there’s some clear, you know, dark wizard, you know?
Yeah, do you think wizard? Do you think, oh, okay, that’s Berlin or Gandalf?
Like, imagine if he told the crew when they were going to the old empire to find the seed, he’s like, oh, it’s going to be a weapon we can use against the gircus.
He’s like, oh, I’m just like planning to annihilate everybody. Like, I don’t care who gets caught in the cross bars. None of this, none of you matter to me.
I don’t, you’re all just pieces on my chess board. I don’t care about you.
Yeah, well, the worst part of it is like at the end of the book, too, just I was like, oh, I really want to like set up free health care and housing and stuff like that.
And just like any politician is like, that’s not important to me. I don’t give a fuck. You’re not going to do that right now. We’re going to focus on what I want.
Yeah, let’s fund the military. Let’s put all our money overseas. Let’s not put it here at home where we’re spending.
Look at the common citizen. Let’s help everything else. I want to help. So yeah.
My last one was, and I think I’ve done this before, but repeats. Okay. It’s a third-run trilogy. I’m going to repeat torture stock up. Just got to throw it out there because yeah.
Supposedly, the liberals just getting that.
Possibly torture is not a reliable way to get information.
You read a Mitch rap book. A boo. Grave. Yeah. So here’s like, that’s probably where I’ve, you know, stocked up it.
Yeah, but gloct is system of nailing your hands down, chopping off sections of your fingers and then threatening your taint, which is what he.
There was like several pages of taint talk.
That’s like Ted talk, right? Yeah. Taint talk. It’s sequel to Ted talks. Yeah. So after that gets threatened, people open their mouths.
I did feel a little bad for Glocter that his practicals both turned on him or I guess all three really. They all they all turned on him. We did get to see gloct to do some sword fighting, I guess, yet like a little knife in his cane or whatever that he used.
And already came to his rescue. But you know, he was able to torture out of I can’t remember what his kind of number one practical guy’s name was.
But he got out of him this whole thing that was happening with like the librarian guy, the case in charge of the library and arch selector salt who were trying to breeze demons or some show like that.
So yeah, I guess torture the day torture works and it, you know, whatever gloct is form is is probably the one that we should be using. No, no more waterboarding just threatened taints.
Yeah, I think the moral of the story is you’re going to break eventually my blood is not suffer. So just say just spill right away, you know, it seems to be the best play that I kill yourself for the two. That’s you know, I mean like those are the two options. I feel like my biggest fear and you know, we read 1984 a lot of torture in there too.
My biggest fear about being tortured is I would give everything up immediately. They wouldn’t even do anything. Like before anything was on me. I’d be like here every name. It’s all given up everything I know here.
And they’d be like, no, we need more. It’s like that’s legitimately everything. I have absolutely nothing else. There’s like, well, let’s torture you anyways. That would that’s that’s a fear for me.
Have you seen hearts war? Is that the Bruce Willis movie? Yeah, no, I haven’t seen it, but I see the cover before I see the cover in my head.
The Germans capture you and then they, you know, true like the first guys really nice to you. He interrogates you then they take your like shoes off and you’re like freezing your feet and then you spit water on you. They get all these stages of torture.
And if you get to like the fourth dude, that means you’re you actually held out and the main guy Colin Farrell, you know, tells him you got to the first dude and he’s like, I didn’t get anyone up. And then he knows he did because he didn’t get to like the down the stages.
Whatever you need to get to he’s like, did they threaten your tank? He’s like, what are you talking about? You definitely gave everyone up because that’s the last step. Yeah, but I went to a when bought a car for Ellie this weekend. Oh, you like bought a car for her. You went with her to buy a car with her. She bought the car. I was there.
Congratulations. Did you get a Nissan Maxima or whatever your car choices?
Oh, American muscle car. No, she bought it American, though, Teta Krola. So I was her to camera. But yeah, American. But I was thinking that because we like started signing the papers and the people next to us had the salesperson talk salesperson talking.
Then they brought out the manager and then they brought the neck and they kept on bringing up more people and I was like, shit, we didn’t get to we didn’t get to the torture bar.
So they got us nice. Nice. Yeah, that’s what car buying is just torture. I mean, how many guys can you withstand before you actually get the best deal?
Oh, it’s I was like, I’ve been my car was last year. I was some of it was fun. And then other parts I was like, just shut up. The way that car said, come on, don’t.
It’s deals right here is a great deal for you. Like don’t tell me what’s good for me and what’s not good. You don’t know me. I think I was key, too, which was funny.
Because I was like, you don’t know me. You know, that’s the worst name. Have you received family guy? Yeah. If someone said that to me, I’ve had that someone said that to me.
He’s like, why? Why don’t you just buy it? You like can’t afford it? And I was like, all right, I’m out to you. Yeah, that was really.
I’m trying to afford this card so too much for you. I’m like, I’m not nickel in diamond. I’m trying to get a freaking. I did. I’m trying to get you to give me a D’s deal.
No, we could never do that deal. And then like two days later, it’s like, Oh, sure. Like, what do you do? Yeah, I wouldn’t I’d rather pay more money than have to talk to me like that. So that’s my philosophy.
I’m like, I’m out of here. See you later. I’ll never talk to this fucking dude again. Yeah. My dad used to do that and they’d call you. They’d call like, what can we do? You’d be like fire that guy. I’m not a car.
Respect that. Yeah. What is going to take for us to get you in this car? Oh my God. Really? Like, yeah, those people terrible. Yeah. The best move anyone buy a car is just go to all different dealerships and tell them get all, you know, what are they going to give you for your trade in?
What are they going to charge you for the car and then just send that directly to the other dealership because they’re just finding each other. And then it’s just a torture system. You just need to.
If you’re okay with torture for a full day, we spend five hours there and we bought the car in an hour. I mean, like, you end up just sitting there forever. Yeah. Yeah.
It’s forcing getting your taint cut right. It is torture. Modern torture. What about stock down? What do you first talk down?
Stock down, king size beds. So, Giselle marries the queen or Mary, king size bed. Yeah. Queen, Torez in a sort of arranged marriage turns out she’s kind of a classic eugenicist awful person.
I know they’re like, well, she’s a lesbian, but like, she’s still a terrible, terrible person. She’s like, I won’t touch you because you’re a bastard and you’re not a certain race and clad. I’m like, this is just a Nazi, right? Like, what are we doing here?
I don’t I don’t understand that all part. And we’re supposed to feel sympathetic for her because she doesn’t prefer. I don’t think we were.
Okay. I was making sure. No. If Giselle had like forced himself on her or something, then I would feel bad for her.
As like locks are just eventually like, kind of makes her, but they’re all shitty people. So. But I mean, it’s a king size bed. I mean, you know how to sleep with a person.
It can still be in the bed with you. That’s what my whole problem was. And don’t get this wrong. The first night of someone’s like, you’re not sleeping in here or kicking out your bastard. You’re not good enough. I’d be like, yeah, I deserve that. I would sleep on the floor because I probably deserve that night too. Let me tell you what they are kicked out of the room immediately. They are not in my bed. That is him sleeping in the floor multiple nights. What are we doing?
Yeah. That’s why we feel bad for Giselle. He’s the king and he’s not even. What is he doing?
You’re the king. It’s a king size bed, not queen size. Yeah, it’s like these people have never gone on a body trip and had a queen size bed or even maybe a full bed and been like, all right, how are we doing this? Are we doing, you know, head to toe? Are we putting the pillow fort in between us? Or are we just going for it?
We don’t wake up face to face, you know, with my lips on your lips. I mean, yeah, that nez never happened to me, but you know, I could. I’m just saying in theory.
So yeah, I think especially kings, I bet those things are massive. Grab, get the body pillow and just throw it in between and you have two beds.
My first lockdown is classical biological control. Are you from other of that?
Oh, CBC. Yeah, exactly. That’s when you introduce one non-native species to control another. Give me an example, please.
An example? Can I have it in a sentence?
An example would be so in Hawaii, then like the 18 late 1800s, there was rats. There was a rats all over the sugar cane fields.
So they said, you know what we should do? We should bring in some mongooses because mongooses will eat the rats.
A mongoose, you mean, but go on.
But unfortunately rats are nocturnal and mongoose are active during the day. So they never saw each other and instead the mongooses ate all of the native ground nesting birds in their eggs.
But I was at a good example. It was a disaster.
The opposite of what you want, is it?
Yeah, so it’s why it’s a stocked out, but there’s also the toes of Australia.
I’ll give you a better example. It’s one same Patrick who was completely real, came to Ireland and drove all the snakes out. That’s a better use of that.
Didn’t you play a flute in all the snakes came?
I have no idea how the metal mythology worked. That’s all real.
I think they did it in the Simpsons, but in Australia they introduced… there was like a beetle, same kind of deal.
So they introduced cane toes, no toes. And the toes are like highly toxic and they have no natural predators in Australia.
So they just had like uncontrolled population explosion. That was it. So those things that I’m pretty sure that was in the Simpsons episode.
My whole point is…
Is this a negative? It’s not a positive?
Yeah, it’s a stocked out. The stock is down.
I’m saying this is the use case. The CDC is when someone introduces something and it can be a problem, but it doesn’t sell the problem.
It can be good. But all your examples are baddies.
Yeah, that’s why I’m using the bad ones.
So, you know, there’s other times that in another time in Australia they had the prickly prayer cactus was just taking over farmland.
And so they brought in a moth and the moths larvae eats the cactus and it reclaimed the land.
So, stuff like that.
Fine. I mean, they’re doing the introduced gray wools back into Yosemite or whatever.
I don’t know if that’s working or not, but either way, this is pretty much what the Northmen did to defeat Bethod by unleashing the bloody nine.
At the end of the day, no one else could have bested Fenwick the feared in hand-to-hand combat.
But also, no one else would have gone berserk or moed and murdered his good buddy Talduro and a child just because.
You know, he was in the bloodlust.
And now he’s King Logan, so they’re kind of stuck with him.
My point being, if you sometimes introduce a species into a population to try to control something, it can backfire on you pretty quickly.
So, don’t do it, people.
Yeah, I guess I mean, well, he’s no longer King because he had to jump out of a window.
Well, dude, don’t get ahead of us, okay.
But yeah.
The book’s over.
You say he pulled a Zach Bredler.
What now?
A Zach Bredler from the next book we’re reading.
Oh, wow.
I guess, okay.
He jumped out of a balcony.
Same thing.
Are you laughing?
He’s the real person.
He’s dead.
You’re fucked today.
I mean, spoilers.
We don’t know that he dies.
I don’t have to be on the book yet.
He’s definitely.
I don’t know.
I mean, this whole book is tipsy-turvy.
He could be so alive.
Oh, you haven’t finished yet?
No.
Spoiler alert.
He’s not alive.
How did you have other stocked out?
Dual stocked out?
Oh, wow.
I love the dualness, but I didn’t love the dual rules.
Say that 10 times fast.
But so that my old promo that is you can bring whatever weapon you want in or whatever
thing you want in.
But then you could choose the other person’s weapon.
I just didn’t.
I feel like you should have one weapon and you don’t let the other person doesn’t know what
it’s going to be and you come in and say that’s it.
It shouldn’t be you.
It doesn’t make sense because like let’s say you challenge something to a duel.
One of their arms doesn’t work well or they’re arms cut off or hands cut off, right?
Like, I mean, that’s normal in a dual society that people have been to multiple battles.
Their hands or and or arm have been potentially cut off or leg or you know, there’s other things.
But then you just bring in, let’s say I just bring a bow arrow in, right?
Against that person that has one arm.
You can’t only use that.
He can’t use the bone arrow and then I pick his weapon and I just kill him immediately because he doesn’t have a weapon.
Why is this the point of this that someone doesn’t have an arm or a leg?
I’m just saying, but that if there’s a weakness, the person and so this happens here.
They’re picking their champion.
You think a champion is going to have not have an arm or a leg in a duel?
You know, you can do whatever you want.
Yeah, you just challenge the person.
So I mean, the blood that gets assumed that everyone is fully able to.
And this is the perfect example of this is he brings armor that is too heavy for the other guy to use.
So then the other guy gets a pick.
So he could just picked his weapon and killed him immediately.
He could have he was too arrogant for no reason.
But I’m just saying like, you can’t just pick.
You can’t just add a weapon in that only you can use and the other person can’t use because then you automatically beat them.
If they, if they, if you get to pick first, like that’s my whole point.
It’s like, doesn’t make any sense.
Yeah, I get where you’re saying there.
It should be here are the three standardized weapons.
We made duplicates of all of them.
You pick which one you want.
We’re not telling you what the other person picked.
You both pick you come into the circle.
You have that weapon.
Yeah, it’s like, it’s like glad to hear you.
It’s like one thing.
So everyone has their own thing that they’re bringing in.
Like the, yeah, or yeah, or you bring one thing in and that’s what you do with the net and tried it.
I always like the net and tried it in guy.
Yeah, how is that?
I mean, I just, I didn’t, didn’t like the rules.
So and I mean, I was trying to give you a good analogy, but you fucking squashed that.
Well, you had to, you could have just said the analogy that was in the book instead.
So he got his one arm and half a leg.
I’m saying he’s a weakness.
If anybody says a weakness, it’s fair.
That’s my whole point.
Well, this weakness is that he wasn’t strong enough to pick up the other guy’s armor.
So it’s also like the armor doesn’t fit him.
It should be a weapon.
Like you should have to be a weapon.
So yeah, you shouldn’t be able to wear armor at all.
Yeah, it’s just weird that you can be like, all right.
So I’m going to get in this giant rock and I’m going to live in this rock.
I’m pretty fat.
That’s my, that’s my, that’s my weapon.
My last talk down was happy endings, not the kind you’re thinking of.
So the series doesn’t really end well for any of our characters except Bias.
Adjua’s destroyed.
An unknown number of people are dead.
Jazal is the puppet king, the French Fisi government.
Glacta is now Bias is lackey.
Logan’s own men turned on him.
And like you just said, he pulled the Zack Brettler to escape being murdered.
Literally straight for our next book.
Dogman’s friends and fellow North men, they dead around him.
Their sacrifice is seemingly for not.
West, column West finally got his wish of rising through the ranks of the military only to be riddled with the wasting disease, aka radiation poisoning.
I can’t think of anyone else.
I guess like already Mary’s Glacta, which I could be worse, you know, that’s she’s probably got the better one.
I guess Farrow probably has the best one because the demons try to get into Farrow’s head.
Now she’s like, you know, got the demon in her and they’re trying to mess with her.
Like, I’ll go to this good and she’s like, nah, I don’t think I will.
Space just says like, nah, I’m too stubborn.
So demons don’t have an effect on me.
I was going to sleep anyway.
So I was going to say I’m just trying to sleep, but she doesn’t sleep anyway.
And she’s just going to go off and try to kill the Girkish empire or Emperor.
So she probably has the least worse besides Bias.
But yeah, it’s just like, you know, usually when you read a fantasy trilogy,
even something like red rising, which has a lot of death and a lot of the characters we love end up dying,
they’re still light at the end of the rainbow.
They’re still happiness going on and granted the red rising could trilogy continued into another trilogy
where there was more death and whatnot.
But and this has more books.
I don’t know exactly what they go down, but I can’t imagine that there’s many positives throughout.
So I guess what I’m trying to say is you can still enjoy a book even if it doesn’t have happy ending.
Or usually movies that kind of bothers me a little bit.
I don’t know why, but for the book, that’s fine.
I was okay with it.
I didn’t grow and changed, but they definitely weren’t left.
They kind of ended in the same place they started.
Yeah, different, but in the same place.
Some of my favorite endings are like that where it becomes, comes full circle.
Yeah, I mean, we were introduced to Logan as he’s jumping off of him.
Yeah, exactly.
To get away from the flatheads.
And now he’s jumping out of a window to get away from the Northman.
Yeah.
Yeah.
The first people were actually terrible orcs.
And now it’s his own people who he’s jumping away from.
So yeah, he’s in the same place, but definitely a worse place because at least he had his boys.
And now he doesn’t.
Now he’s really all alone.
Do you have any other stockouts?
Last one.
Grass is always greener, stocked down.
That is the same.
The grass isn’t always greener because I need to get one more shot at your boy, Jazel.
Yeah, I can’t help myself.
I mean, I thought he was turning a corner in the last book, but he just continues to be a huge bitch.
They give him king and he’s like, all he does is complain.
Do you know how many people would kill and they have killed to be get where you sitting?
Oh, you have to, you know, I can’t do everything.
Every single thing I want, who cares?
Like the worst thing he has going from, he gets a king’s eyes bad.
He gets a hot lesbian wife.
Yeah, he gets a boy.
Yeah, whatever.
He gets a, but anyone he wants, literally anyone he wants.
So who cares?
I’m the Crimea river.
But the only one he wants is already West and she married.
Mary Gloucda.
Then Gold Mary.
He can’t.
She married Gloucda.
Oh, he got a hit his chance.
And he can’t marry her because bias won’t let him.
He’s got the handcuffs.
He’s got the golden handcuffs.
Oh, my God.
I mean, he sleeps in silk sheets, pajamas, he wakes up, gets food served to him.
He doesn’t want that.
He wants to actually change.
He wants to change.
He wants to do good things.
Then go do good things for him.
He can’t bias will not let him.
Oh, my God.
I can’t believe you’re defending him.
He’s literally the only person impeding his progress is himself.
Oh, there we go.
Are you a life coach now?
He says it in a meeting.
And when he’s bored, he just chugs alcohol.
I’m like, this sounds awesome.
And then he just interrupts and just decides what he wants done.
Like that is literally that’s what I’m going to say.
He wants to say, no, you can’t do that.
Bias says no.
And he goes, oh, fucking, daddy.
He’s like, no, Wes is going to be the head of the commandment.
And they’re like, well, you should probably like quiet down.
He says, shut the fuck up.
I’ll do whatever I want.
And they all listen to him.
And he’s like, all right.
See?
See?
I was one time.
He could do that whenever he wants.
We’ll see.
We’ll see you in the next one.
Okay.
He’s being a puppet.
He literally have everything handed to you.
I mean, and also, if you really wanted to go against bias,
all you have to do is one, get your whole army of whole army.
Just go be like, tell one dude, go kill Galocta.
Get rid of this dude.
He’s done.
Now we get a whole army.
We get, we mounted a fence.
We start doing whatever you want.
Where is this area you die?
How do you pay your people?
How do you pay your people?
I mean, he’s a whole kingdom.
I don’t know.
There’s like, I assume there’s an economy behind the whole.
The guy has runs at all.
Oh, my God.
So again, so what’s, what’s the rest of the bias then?
If he has his Tony soprano.
Oh, my God.
I don’t know.
He eats a lot of food and fucking chooses mouthful.
Is that what it is?
So we had a, we had a, like, a getting to know you thing at work.
I don’t know.
They just bring people over.
They talk to them.
Yeah.
I spray your kind of thing and the guy, who they were talking to,
it was, if you could have dinner with any person living your dead,
real or not, real, who would you have dinner with?
He said Tony soprano.
I was like, Keith would be rolling in his grave.
This guy just talking at you and over you and furiously twiddling stuff with his fork
and eating with his mouth open and breathing heavy.
I’m going to dive into that.
Give me one positive quality, but the whole show is just him whining.
He’s like a therapist and then whining about his wife and then whining about his kids.
And then whining about is like, the people underneath, what is he, what’s he good for?
He’s biased.
That’s why he’s just out, rather.
That’s why you like him.
No wonder.
I just wanted to, but I wanted to be like, stop this whole thing.
I need to have a one on one with this guy as to why he actually wants to sit down with him.
I love me, so Tony soprano, more endoses when he’s talking about Christopher Columbus
or, you know, who’s buying the GABA GOOL.
But I couldn’t imagine wanting to sit down and add dinner with him.
It would make you so uncomfortable all the time.
How did terrible, what a terrible response.
All right, but good stocked out, Keith.
That was just a non-sequent, or so you would stop talking about it.
What the hell?
What about favorite scene? Do you have one from this book?
Yeah, I mean, the fight where they’re holding the ground for seven days.
The high places, yeah.
Yeah, I was trying to find the guy’s name. Who’s the guy that they’re fighting with?
Like the weird dude. That’s my favorite character.
Yeah, the guy talks with the moon.
Yeah, that guy’s fucking man.
Who’s Logan killed his son?
Yeah, even then, he’s like, “Cranic?”
He’s like, “That’s on me.”
I let a fox out in the hen, you know, thing, and you killed my son.
I used to piss it out of it, but he’s also like, “Fox in the hen thing.”
He’s pissed, but at least he’s taking some sort of responsibility, not being a huge fucking bitch like Jacelle.
Yeah.
But anyways, that was my favorite scene, that right into the duel, like that whole scene there was by far the best.
Great duel, great everything, even though I didn’t like the weapon thing, but everything else was about that was great.
Yeah, I agree. No, 100% St.Page, the Alamo-esque battle at the high places.
Yeah.
I like it because it has all the elements of a good war battle or something along those lines, because it’s them prepping the walls.
They come into this place and it’s, you know, not nearly ready for them to actually make a last stand.
Yeah, so they got a, they’re doing everything they can to kind of prepare.
They know that it’s a potential last stand because if the union, the union’s supposed to come and they have a certain amount of days,
but at the same time, they don’t even know if the union’s definitely coming or not.
Yeah.
So, their thing, okay, we just got to hold out as long as possible.
And it starts with, you know, some skirmishes where they’re just, you know, they’re just testing the defenses.
And then it’s all the flatheads that they got to fight and then the next day, it’s like actual Northmen and then they’re getting behind the walls.
Logan goes berserk is great.
It’s all great.
And then obviously West comes up and saves the day.
But, yeah, it was definitely cinematic and then like you said, to put a cherry on top with the duel afterwards.
The duel also is cool because at the same time, dogman and whoever else was with him, blacked out, or in the cases are going into kill the witch who they need to kill, or the sorcerer, or whatever, to kill her.
So that Logan can win.
And so that was fun too, seeing them infiltrate the castle or whatever the place is that Beth Aud was that.
So, yeah, yeah, big, big fan of big fan of that.
What about, this could be for this book or maybe the series as a whole, but for best character.
At least in this book, we get main point of views from Logan, Giselle, your favorite character.
And we get some secondary point of views from Pharaoh, Column West, Dogman.
And, I don’t know, there’s obviously a bit of other characters that you could pick from if you wanted to.
But, who is your favorite, maybe for this book or for the whole series?
I think it’s an alternative just for this one, which was the witch.
He’s really the main bad guy.
She gets one and a half minutes of screen time, but he’s kind of the one that’s seeing people coming from like, you know, she’s able to do that.
I think she was the one that raised the duel guy.
Fenric, I heard the fear.
She’s like protecting him.
She’s like doing everything.
And she’s kind of like the main bad guy, but somehow she’s not really talked about.
We say for two minutes and then she dies, but hey, great, great, great overall books for her.
For you saying screen time too.
Yeah, it’s a impact.
Yeah, she is.
Well, it is funny too, because we don’t, do we ever see Bethod at all except for when the first time we meet him is this book, right?
No, we met him before because he in the first book.
Oh, do we?
Okay.
He comes in and talks, that’s when Bias blows up a couple guys heads. He comes in with his witch and Fenric.
Oh, I remember that.
Yeah, it’s like, but yeah, we see him briefly in the first one.
Oh, okay.
Because he talks to Logan and he’s like, oh, Logan, you were my champion.
Now here you are.
I guess we can give an honorable mention then to my moon as well because my moon is like, oh, he’s pretty bad ass too.
It’s gonna be him first bias and then bias just like takes the seed and just blows them all away.
It’s like, oh, all right.
I guess my moon’s gone.
But Logan’s your number one.
He’s the one I’ll remember the most is the whole like, looking a switch and becoming the crazy person that’s going to kill anything.
And then it is, I think I said the last one, but it is.
I do feel the most sympathetic for him because he can’t become a better person because he literally has like a disease.
Love it or hate it.
It’s good for when you’re in war, but it’s probably, I think didn’t he say he killed his daddy didn’t know he killed him?
He’s not a pretty tough, tough life.
Yeah, he can’t control it.
I feel when he’s being normal Logan, he’s such a grounded, what he did with Juzao and Pharaoh, like we talked about in the last book,
where he really managed those different emotions so well that you know he has good people skills and can understand people and work with them.
The fact that the Northman voted him king granted I know it was most of his battle prowess, but at the same time he’s a good guy around the fire.
So it’s tough with Logan because he does have this disease or whatever that case is, but he doesn’t seem to show a ton of remorse for it.
He’s just like, oh, that’s what happens when the bloody nine comes out.
It’s like your buddy who every time he drinks becomes a different person and they’re terrible and you know terrorized the group and make the night not fun for everybody.
But he said, well, that’s what happens when I drink. What do you mean?
It’s just the way it is.
Yeah, that’s a tough one.
You don’t have one of those?
I don’t know about me.
It’s like, if you don’t know who it is, it’s you.
No, you don’t have one of those, I guess in your group you don’t have one of those?
I got a couple.
So, well, I don’t think there’s a lot of people in my group that are fighters, which I think those are the worst people.
Yeah, I’ve got maybe one or two potentials, but that’s not necessarily what I’m talking.
Well, I guess, yeah, they’re that too.
They are that all those stories you’ve told of your buddies are just, yeah, so you’ve never had that buddy to spit some people randomly.
I was like, what?
What are you talking about?
Yeah, everyone has one of those guys.
So, good, good girl, look at it.
You don’t just spit on people.
I don’t care who it is.
So, what are you talking about?
I was kind of joking.
That’s a real story, okay?
That is a real story, yeah.
I remember you saying that people used to clique people and I was like, I’ve never heard of that term.
And you’re like, yeah, you never had people just spit on people.
That was a lot of fun.
That was more fun.
You’re the guys spitting on girls too.
That happens in high school.
We had like an open quad.
And there was a, every, for like a senior day, all the seniors would pull in their cars and have fun.
They’d have them loaded with water balloons and the seniors would just go around the quad after school,
like just pagan people with water balloons.
It was great.
It was like, great fun.
You know, if you’re a senior, it’s fun.
If you’re not, it’s like, oh, this is cool.
Whatever is happening.
And my buddy, we were juniors and the seniors came in.
They had like a laundry basket full of water balloons and he went over and just grabbed them from this girl.
And she was like, hey, what are you doing?
Those are water balloons.
And he was like, they’re mine now.
And she’s like, no, and he just spits on her face.
It’s like, oh, my God, you are like sad person.
Zero percent chance that they do water balloons now.
That’d be like, in the end, like, bullying and, yeah.
No, 100%.
All that fun stuff’s gone.
They used to do like assassins too.
Whatever that is with like, square guns.
Someone get like, shot from that.
So they’re like, we can’t do this anymore.
Yeah.
There’s definitely a sadness going on around all that stuff, unfortunately.
Yeah.
Well, it’s even like pranks used to be good.
And then some guy, he put, he went fishing and then basically took a five gallon bucket of like fish chum and let it sit in his shed for a year.
And then basically filled all of these like fermented fish guts with in water bottles.
And then went around the school and was basically like throwing them everywhere like up in the panels and the ceilings.
No, that’s not it.
It was like a biological war.
Yeah, it arrested.
It was like, it was a whole fucked up situation, but it was in theory.
He’s like, oh, this is going to be funny, but then in practice it was, it was just like he ruined the school.
It was biological warfare.
Yeah, that is.
That’s absolutely wild.
Yeah.
Funny times.
Yeah, for me, it’s going to be Glokta.
He’s my number one throughout the series.
I do like Logan for sure.
I just think Glokta is such a unique character that was written by Joa Bacrombe.
Like you don’t, I’ve never seen another Glokta, you know?
Yeah, he would be my number two, one A, one B maybe.
He has his positives, he has his negatives, he, you know, he says a lot of the times that you know, even sometimes he’s like,
he talks about his torches, he’s like, that could make someone go crazy and he’s like, maybe it made me go crazy.
I don’t know, it’s possible.
Like I’m pretty nuts.
And he has no qualms about what he’s doing, you know, he put it at the same time.
He doesn’t have, there’s not like a moral compass thing.
He’s just like, living his life, do his job, waiting to die.
He’s great.
Love Glokta.
Happy that he got, and that moment with him and Ardy when he proposed us to her,
I thought was, was quite sweet.
It’s like, oh, there is a soul in there.
He’s a character that you’re rooting for, even though he’s not a good guy.
What about Love Hades?
Against the Love Hades?
What’d you love about the last argument of Kings?
I felt like this is what it was all for, you know?
We read those first two books, it really culminated.
There was kind of like a, the book that had everything you wanted that had kind of answers to a lot of questions.
It had big war pieces, it had kind of a story coming full circle.
So I do think this was, this was what was needed.
This would have been a tough series.
We read this third book, you know, 60 hours in total, and then all of a sudden,
we found out that it wasn’t really that good of a series,
and the book didn’t really end very well, or we needed to read another three books.
So I think this did, did it justice, and I’m super happy we ended up doing this series after this book.
Yeah, I agree.
I’m definitely glad we did it, and I grew with you for everything you said.
You know, you have to be realistic about these things.
And I think that, that Logan quote kind of sums up Joe Abercrombie’s approach to the story.
Nothing is going to be tied up neatly with a bow and make you feel great after reading it.
You know, life’s chaotic and messy, so why should it have a happy ending for all?
Which I didn’t even know is a thing, but this is Grim Dark Fantasy.
And that is a thing, I guess, which is just morally ambiguous characters,
and not always happy, and usually it’s pretty bleak.
So, yeah, he did it really well, and by, I think it’s hard to write a series where you’re rooting for,
but also against all these characters, and ultimately not a ton changes.
But you’re asking people to commit, like you said, 60 hours to listening to it,
and also feel like they enjoyed that experience.
So, I think that’s a, that’s a tough, you know, line to, to tow, and,
and he did a really good job, so props to you, Joe.
What else you got?
Um, I really liked how Wes handled the two generals.
Yes, that was on my list too.
Yeah, yeah, that was great.
Yeah, just kind of getting them both in line, getting them both kind of fighting for the same thing.
It was just a really, uh, well done.
Yeah, because initially we’re thinking, “Okay, we need Juzal to promote Wes
so that he can go and save the Northman, otherwise the Northmen are fucked.”
We’re not necessarily thinking that Wes is the best man for the job,
but he’s going to definitely go and save the Northmen because he’s, you know, kind of tied to them now.
And his first act as Lord Marshall is kind of playing these two generals,
making, you know, it does a ruse with this letter that he’s going to send or whatever the case is,
but knows exactly how to play to each one of their egos so that they do what he needs them to do without, you know,
basically trying to turn on him or anything.
And he played that so well.
That was like, “Oh shit, I see, I see you, I see you, I see you.”
Well, if they didn’t name Wes too, the, the head, then like the army would have split in half
because the two generals, one of the generals wouldn’t have any other wooden than, you know,
basically would have screwed the whole army so the naming Wes was actually made a lot of sense.
Yeah, for sure. Logan returning from the dead, that was a stock-up fire, she’s made a love for me.
He basically just walks into camp with all of his Northmen baddies.
And I don’t know how Jarr right, but it’s basically the feeling that we all have
when, you know, you and I don’t see each other that often or some of our other friends from work from years ago
or even your buddies from home, you might not see them in a super long time, but they show up and you’re just like,
Hey, fuck you buddy.
You know?
Like half of them are happy to see him, half of them act like he never left.
It’s, it’s great. It’s just such a, such a guy thing was going on there.
I really enjoyed it.
Yeah, I did love the chapter about, I think it was like answers or something,
which was basically, “Bias, laying out the whole situation for Galocta.”
It’s our, it’s the exposition chapter, but I felt like for this book, we did,
well, we obviously needed Bias to tell the whole story anyways.
It coming from him to Galocta after Galocta figures out a bunch of this stuff was great
because those are the two people that should be involved in it.
Galocta’s been, you know, he’s kind of like the Batman doing all the sleuthing.
So it makes sense and I just thought it was a good way to get that piece of the story dealt with.
So I like that.
It would have been cooler too, I think that if we didn’t know he was a wizard the whole time,
right? Like we just like, “Oh, I’ve been playing everyone this whole time and I’m actually this power.”
You know, that would have been kind of a cooler reveal, but like I said, last book I kind of,
I was like, “I think he’s going to be a bad guy at the end of this.”
So it wasn’t as good of a reveal, but it was still, still interesting there.
For Hades, the whole Seed House part, I had no idea what was going on, honestly.
You mean when it’s him, it’s Bias Farrow and they’re, it’s the old woman…
The shape shifter, which I didn’t understand.
Yeah.
It was like a bigger reveal and I was like, “What?”
I didn’t know which person she was either, so remember how they like stopped off at a house
of his like, “love her?”
Whatever, I was like, “Is that who it was?”
I don’t think it was, right?
No, that, you’re talking about, this was like, “Tolome,” who they, it was like the daughter of Canadian, I think.
Yeah, a lot of them were, a little bit over my head.
I was like, “I don’t know what’s going on here.”
It just, it also was a really hard to picture what was going on in that house.
So, “Tolome” was like, still alive, she was like, living as quiet or something?
Like, she was the shape shifter and she was being quiet.
I, I 100% agree with you with that and that kind of spilled over into the next few parts of this story for me
where I didn’t know what was going on when they got the seat.
I was like, “Wait, who?”
I was like, “Ha, ha, I’ve been quiet this whole time.”
I was like, “Oh, how did I not see you?”
And she’s like, “Yes.”
I died and then I came back because the demons brought me back and now I’m here to, it’s like, “Okay, what’s going on?”
And from that, basically through him and Farrow fighting in the streets with the seat and also glocked figuring out the university had minister, like Silber whatever’s name is,
and Archlector Salt were conspiring to release demons onto the right.
It was like that whole section.
I was like, “Wait, what’s happening?”
And it kept jumping back and forth between them.
I just felt like it didn’t have enough area to breathe.
It seemed somewhat rushed because there was just a lot of storylines at this book and it seemed like they were getting wrapped up in quick succession and then lighting fast and they just had to end all these storylines at the same time
but they were also very confusing because there was a lot of moving parts that I didn’t understand.
So yeah, I’m with you there.
Yeah, for sure.
That was pretty much really it for me was that area I just, like, tolemay in the seat, I couldn’t even envision where this seat was.
It was like hanging from the ceiling or something.
So yeah, I was kind of lost as I was reading and I kept rewinding because I was also like reading it before bed and was like, “Wait, what the freak is happening here?”
Like, it seems like it’s cool stuff.
Cool stuff is going on, but what?
It went from like the most cinematic world experience to this and I was like, “I can’t picture this in any way.
They’re in a glass house? That’s what’s happening?
I don’t know.”
I don’t know.
Go throw stuff.
Any other hates for you?
I just thought there was a lot of quick economic and racial and religious things sprinkled in there that they never really backed or just,
it was like a, like, quickly touched on it and being like, “Oh, it’s because they’re black.”
I was like, “Oh, I didn’t realize there was racial components of this.” And then they never came back to any of it.
So I was like, “It’s a weird thing to just throw in there and not really resolve or tell you why.”
Did you feel that or are I just crazy?
I didn’t feel it necessarily with racial aspects, but I think you’re talking about between the Gerkish and then also the Queen, Terez, or the religious elements.
There’s a lot of, yeah, and then there was also religious elements.
The religious stuff for sure.
I didn’t get any of that.
Yeah, so I just seemed like there was a lot of, like, other things which I think they were trying to tie him to our society, you know?
So they didn’t really resolve any of that.
So I don’t know. I just seemed like it was a throwaway thing to put in there.
Yeah, I think my biggest complaint on the series as a whole was just the understanding or the way it was communicated about the relationships.
We talked about this in the last one of all of Bayaz’s people.
You know, Tala Me, Canadius, Yuvans, all of those people, it was like, “Okay, who’s what? But if you look it up, it’s like, “Okay, this person, A, you started it, and he touched the other side.”
And because of that, you know, he had these kids who had then had demonic blood in them like Pharaoh.
I need to be hit over the head with that so that I can actually understand what’s the bigger picture.
And like, who are the people that started this whole thing?
Because even, we’ve talked about before, we’re like even Missborn, which has a ton of magic elements that they all can be used interchangeably in do different things.
Sanders just like throws, like, throws them at you often enough that you kind of understand, “Oh, bronze does this.”
Like, I kind of get what bronze does. Whereas this, it’s like, it was mentioned once, and then it’s just like, he uses his bronze power.
And he’s like, “Wait, what does that even mean?” So, yeah, I was a little confused about the people when I’m tempted.
Yeah, you take all the magic out of this, I think the book’s just as good if not better.
You take everything, like, it was just a mid-evil society that are fighting with politics and different things.
Or if you like, replace that whole backstory with a dragon, the seed is a dragon, it makes more sense to me.
Yeah, more could literally be gunpowder.
It could be, yeah, they went through different plays and they found this, you know, explosive material.
Yeah, it seems like it could have, it just, like, it wasn’t really a magic book for seven/eighths of it, and then all of a sudden it was really quick,
and you’re like, “Wait, what?” And then there was all of a sudden they’re adding in lore, all of a sudden really quick.
It was kind of like Harry Potter when the master wand, but they did a really good job like spelling that out there.
Like, here’s a kid’s book on how this happened.
Yeah, well, get it now.
Talk about the best way that that’s been translated and filmed, the way they did it in the movie was amazing, but the animation, we talked about that.
Go check out our episode on the Harry Potter subject, if you want to hear that.
Lingering questions, I only have one, but if Bias had this whole plan to get Jizal in the throne so he could control him,
how did he fit into West killing Ladislaw?
Or was it once West killed Ladislaw? Bias then saw, “Oh, if I can kill Reynold, then I’ll have the ability to get whoever I want on the throne.”
Or would Ladislaw already have been a patsy for Bias because he was an idiot, too?
Yeah, I wonder if West and the Prince that he was with, they weren’t supposed to see any action.
So I wonder if someone slipped him a little note on that, on a word of attack, in “Find a Week Bar.”
So Bias told Bias, “Oh, go.”
They were supposed to be in an area that wasn’t fighting it.
But even then, that’s no guarantee that Ladislaw is going to die.
I think Bias sees the whole chess board, he’s in plays percentages.
He’s like, “Well, if I don’t kill him there, if he doesn’t die there, I will get rid of him another way.”
Yeah, he’s an idiot, I’ll take care of him, and I have a better person.
He might not even notice that Jazal would have been a good fit. Well, no, because he did, because the whole Jazal…
He said he had like 10 backup plans, so like, Jazal was just in one option.
But in the first book, when he wins the duel or whatever, the tournament, you know, Bias makes it, so he wins the tournament.
So Bias, he was his number one plan for sure. I don’t know who else is backup plan would have been.
Granted, he could have got to Ladislaw, like that wouldn’t have been hard to do.
Since we were on the whole series, I think we should cast it, so did you have some people you’d like to cast for some of our main characters?
Yeah, I think for Galacto, William DeFoe.
Oh, okay, way too old, but sure.
I mean, I don’t think the age matter. I also didn’t really know what Galacto’s age was. I thought he was like 40, but I don’t know if it’s…
I think he’s pretty much a contemporary with Logan and Jazal a little younger, but he’s like Dogman Logan, he’s like a contemporary with him.
I don’t think it matters what age he is. He’s not a physical character, it doesn’t really matter.
I like the idea also, he can be older because he’s so beat up from the world.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I mean, he would be great, for sure. I like the casting.
I had Paul Bettany for Galacto, who is… he’s like vision from the Marvel movies. He was the… the… herald in the night’s tale.
Oh, yeah, he’s used to playing… he’s… he’s not…
Oh, yeah, Silas, in… what’s that book?
I like how you do by being… he’s saying… I was just like, “All white, but I couldn’t think of that…
Yeah, I bought him.
Oh, but I know. He’s 55, kids. So we’re up there in age also.
He looks very good for 55, oh, is it?
Doesn’t he? Good for him.
He’s also… I didn’t realize, but he’s married to Jennifer… what’s her name?
Jesus Christ.
I know that he’s a villain, huh?
Yeah, he’s married to Jennifer Connell.
Yeah, good for him.
And she’s like… they’ve been married… I don’t even realize… they’ve been married for like 25 years.
Jennifer Connelly is a fox. She’s 55, too. That’s incredible. Both these people…
They must be drinking children’s clothes. That’s the only answer to that.
Who else you got?
Logan, I did Tom Hardy.
Same.
Oh, all right. We’re locked in.
Yeah, locked in.
I actually watched the show. He just got fired from…
Oh, I had a line about that, the Pierce Bros. thing.
Yeah, I’m not gonna watch that after he leaves.
So, that big mistake from them.
He can be late if he’s the whole show.
Yeah, you like him, piggy blinders?
Yeah, yeah. I just rewatch piggy blinders.
Although the last two seasons and the movie were terrible.
I was actually about to start it because we are on a TV shows.
And Caroline’s never seen it.
And I was like, “Oh, we should watch piggy blinders.”
Yeah, it’s good. First four seasons, I liked.
And then, fifth and sixth season were kind of bad.
And then the movie was terrible. So…
Yeah, that’s too bad.
Who else you got?
Farrow, Zoe Kravitz.
Dude! What? That’s what I’m talking about.
Not you.
Oh, we’re pretty good.
I had Zoe Kravitz or the other one was the girl from Guardians of the Galaxy.
What’s her name?
Zoe Salandon, Saladana.
Yeah, I wouldn’t believe her as an actual person that hates everyone.
And when she plays that in the Marvel movie, she’s not believable.
Yeah, she’s nice.
I agree. But Kravitz, yeah.
That’s so funny. I was like, in the car. I was like, “Oh, Zoe Kravitz, I’m a griffin’.
All right, let’s keep going. What else do you got?
I didn’t do Jazeal because he’s a huge bitch.
Okay.
I guess anyone for that?
I had Jacob Allordy for Jazeal.
Oh, okay.
He’s like so hip right now and he’s also just beautiful.
So…
He could play…
Oh, yeah.
Okay.
He could play that care. He looks kingly, but also he could play the meek side.
But he also has to be able to swing a sword.
Yeah, that’s kind of an insult to him, but all right, totally.
Dogman, I had Charlie Hunman?
Okay, I had Adam Driver.
Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah. I like that.
Oh, yeah.
I think they do have to be gritty, though.
And I think they both have that ability to like, you know, be that gritty.
Like, they’re both attractive, but they can also be just…
Yeah.
Well, we know he had to hook up with that one girl.
That’s the most important thing.
Yeah, yeah.
Do you have anything else?
I didn’t have anyone else.
I’m trying to think about that.
Bias?
Oh, shit. I didn’t cast Bias.
Damn it.
I had a John Malkovich for Bias.
Oh, I like that.
I was thinking of someone for Bias, too, and I can’t remember.
John Malkovich is good, though.
I like that.
Yeah.
A John Malkovich for him and then an honorable mention was Paul Walther, House, or Forquai.
Keith.
Yeah.
Last argument of Kings.
What do you give it in “Who’s It For?”
I guess the whole series, the first lot trilogy.
What do you give it in “Who’s It For?”
You can say the first lot, this book, too.
Okay.
Yeah, I think this book is a 4.5, I’ll say.
Oh, wow.
Yeah, I know this is a…
I mean, I don’t know.
The only complaint I had was the, really, that one scene, but I liked how it wrapped up,
but I liked what happened.
I liked the whole series.
I think it’s a top tenor.
I gotta look at my list, but it’s probably in the top ten for me for that.
Holy smoke.
This book or the series?
This book, I put the series, I guess.
And it’d be the back half of the top ten, but it’s not as good as “Misborn,” obviously.
The fact that we read the whole, all three books, I think, speaks to the fact that we like
the characters.
I think it’s just really, really well written and it is an interesting story.
It was fun and I think the next book I’m on, I’m like, kind of slowed down because I’m
like, yeah, I’m used to a certain pace.
So yeah, I would give it a 4.25, probably overall.
And I think it’s the same as we’ve said for other series where it’s kind of like an
intro to fantasy.
I feel like Sword and Sandals kind of stuff, but maybe you’re bored of the typical thing
you get, hero doing his hero journey thing, then this one’s for you.
I give it a 4, which is, you know, I like the series, I’m glad we read it.
I would suggest it to someone who is into fantasy.
That maybe, I think John and Robert Wright’s these characters so well.
I liked it very much.
I think the way all those pieces that we talked about didn’t necessarily flow for me, takes
it down from being much better because it did affect it for me.
It was like, oh, okay.
Well, like this is all of the story lines are just ending and it’s like, boom, boom, boom,
boom.
Like, wait, just, you know, clocked is looking for this guy and he’s bringing up demons like,
what, where did this come from?
And then all of a sudden it’s over.
Like, oh, he’s dead.
That’s fair, it’s fair, Chris is my thing.
All right.
What are you coming to next?
All right.
Next, and I think you’re done with it.
I’m about to finish.
We got “London Falling” by Patrick Raiden, Radon Keath.
It’s a non-fiction.
So we’ll be doing something a little bit outside of a comfort zone.
Yeah.
It’s like a four, five on good reads.
I got two people calling me about it.
Phone’s blowing off the hook.
So we’re doing that and then what are we doing after that?
There’s a case people want to read it.
And then “Gong Girl”, listener suggestion by Gillian or Gillian Flynn.
We’ve read one of hers before.
We both liked it, so.
What do we read before?
Broken pieces or something?
Something like that?
Oh, sharp objects.
Yeah, there you go.
Yeah, cool.
All right.
Well, that was last argument of “Kings” and that was the first lot trilogy and I’ll catch
you for “London” as falling.
Indeed.
All right.
Bye.

The Buddies return to Joe Abercrombie’s grim dark world for “Before They Are Hanged,” the second book in the First Law trilogy. The Buddies debate whether getting your face smashed in with a mace is the ultimate character development, how useless corporate leadership seminars actually are beneficial, and if chivalry is indeed not dead. So, bring your north man mentality, practice your nose-biting techniques, and join us and all our Buddies from last time: The Bloody-Nine, Bayaz, Jezal, Ferro, Glokta and many more!

Intro (0:00-1:54)

Stock Up/Down (1:55-31:06)

Favorite Scene/Character (31:07-41:18)

Love/Hate (41:19-48:49)

Conclusion (48:50-52:22) 

NEXT BOOK: Last Argument of Kings by Joe Abercrombie

Transcript for SEO purposes 🙂

All right, welcome to Book Club.
I’m Dylan here with the Freckled 10.
Keith, what’s up buddy?
I’m here with Dylan.
I don’t have anything.
Uh, we’re here with the Buddy Book Club, we’re breaking down some best-dolars this week.
We’ll be discussing the second book in the first law trilogy before they are hanged by Joe Abercrombie.
If you’d like to recommend a book for us to read, reach out to us in the past episodes, you can visit our website, but at bookclub.com.
Signed to our DMs on X, Instagram, that’s Buddy Book Club Podcast.
You can list us iTunes, Spotify, please download those, subscribe, faster reviews.
It would be great.
Please, and thanks, Keith.
Before they are hanged, publish in 2007, 4.36 on Good Reads.
I was pleasantly surprised about that.
We had previously read The Blade itself, which is the first book of the first law trilogy.
First of the series.
Two years ago.
Yeah, it was, I looked it up.
It was just over two years ago.
So Keith, my question to you is, what made you want to return for the second installment?
We really liked the writer, we liked the story and characters, but it just didn’t really have any ending.
And then it was, it kind of just didn’t go anywhere.
So I think we were like, well, let’s give it another shot.
But it wasn’t one of those things where we got it done.
It was like, what we have to get a book to.
It’s always been sitting there in the back of my mind being like, I’ve really enjoyed that first one.
Why haven’t we gone back?
And I broke my cardinal rule.
I went back and I listened to our episode on it because I remembered nothing from it.
Any good?
Episode was enjoyable.
I was like, oh, these guys can have a conversation.
And it reminded me of like what was actually happening in the story, which more importantly, I was proud of.
Because nine times out of ten, I’m thinking when we do our pods, like, we give no, we don’t talk at all about the book.
Let’s jump right into before they are hanged with some stock up, stock down.
Keith, what do you have for stock up?
Yeah, stock up, getting your face smashed in.
Okay.
Stock up.
And another way to say this is getting a slice of humble pie.
But but, Jacelle is kind of that one dude you don’t want on a road trip.
You know, it’s just complaining about everything.
The food’s bad.
Oh, there’s no showers out here.
I guess I don’t have showers in my brain.
But you know what I’m saying?
They’re just complaining about everything.
And it’s like, bro, everyone’s in the same situation.
Just buck up.
You’re gonna have, if you’re not sleeping well, if you’re not eating a lot of food, you’re gonna have one of those days where you’re like,
Yeah, I’m fucking pissed at everything.
That happens. I get it.
You can’t be that guy, the whole trip.
And then the dude gets smashed in the face.
With a mace too, which sounds honestly like one of the worst ways to get smashed in the face.
Not great. They don’t have like dentistry, anything other, either.
So it’s not gonna be a good time.
But all of a sudden food tastes better.
The sun shines brighter.
He’s just a good dude all of a sudden.
And so I think there’s somebody to be said about just getting absolutely dominated in the face.
You know, makes you appreciate life.
And I will say one thing.
I mean, I think growing up in New England, you kind of, which is nice.
I think I’ve mentioned this before, is like, you kind of get humbled all the time because
all your friends and family are always making fun of you as like a way to keep you in check, you know what I mean?
You know, we invented the, you think you’re better than me.
So, you know, slogan.
And that’s because you want to keep people in your place.
You know, they try to get where some fancy you, you shit on the fancy thing.
They try to show off a car, you shit on the car.
You know what I mean?
Like it’s, you got to keep people in their place.
And this guy just hadn’t been kept in his place.
So you need a physical violence, unfortunately, to do that.
I do appreciate that.
But I was gonna tell you a story there is we were playing flag football.
I played flag football on the side here.
And there’s one dude on the other side is just trash talking the whole fucking game.
The whole game.
And I just kept on thinking like no one’s ever punched this guy in the face.
Like he called one of the guys on our team fat.
Oh.
And he was like you’re gonna lose 10 pounds.
You want to stay with me?
I’m like bro, this is a 30 year old plus flag football league.
What are you doing?
This just, oh motherfucker needs to go in the face.
Did you bring your face?
I wasn’t gonna do it.
Did you bring your face out of your football bag?
Anyways, that was just like just a little moment I was experiencing.
I was like, this guy needs to smash the face.
So, do you think he had that new, the new lease on life where he fell he was so close to death in that moment?
That he then felt like he could hang or was it the way that he was brought into the group?
Because my first stock up was those useless leadership slash managing people seminars.
Some of us are forced to do in the corporate world.
There’s a lot of like, you know, managing up like you have to you’ve required to attend the series.
And you know, or how to give bad news to you or how to talk to your subordinates and stuff like that.
It’s, it’s honestly.
I had a friend recently, he’s a professional poker player.
We were, we had a, we had a golf weekend, we’re, we’re hanging out.
And this other person had just got a job after being off for a while.
And he said, I forgot how soul sucking being a cubicle monkey is.
It’s just absolutely soul sucking.
And my friend that’s a poker player, honestly, was like, what do you mean by that?
He has no, he’s never worked a corporate job.
He’s never really worked any job except for working for himself.
I mean, obviously what he does is difficult, but he has, he has no understanding of that.
And so I’m trying to explain these types of things to him that you’re forced into doing like working for the man.
And he was just had no, could not fathom that idea.
So it was funny.
Be like sitting at the table for two hours and having to fold your hand all over for two hours straight.
But then having someone behind you telling you you should fold that, you should fold that every time.
That’s a good analogy.
That’s the analogy.
Imagine I would make you.
But those useless seminars and whatnot, I think Logan sat on a few because they sure worked for him.
So one of our groups is the Pharaoh, Bias, Logan, Jizouk, we got Quai in long foot.
They’re headed to the edge of the world to find the seed.
But it’s a bit of a rag tag group.
None of these people obviously have much relationship together.
Most of them don’t even like each other.
They don’t think anyone really likes anyone else, like maybe Quai and Bias.
But other than that, they don’t want to be there.
Logan is the glue though, or at least he identifies himself as being the glue.
And he takes very different approaches with Jizouk and Pharaoh.
Pharaoh doesn’t even want to be around Jizouk.
She thinks he’s soft and pompous and whatnot, which is true.
But Logan knows at some point we’re going to all have to rely on each other.
So I better bring this group together.
He’s like Denzel in “Reverved the Titans.”
He’s like, “All right, I got to figure out all these different personalities
and how they’re going to mesh.”
And with Jizouk, he doesn’t talk down to him.
And that, “Oh, you’ve never fought anyone you’ve never killed anyone like you suck.”
He’s just like, “Hey, it’s going to be all right, you know what I mean?”
Whenever Jizoum messes up, he doesn’t scold him for it or make fun of him.
He builds up his confidence, which is great.
And with Pharaoh, he just straight up ignores her.
And so when she’s mean to him or whatnot, because he knows that she just kind of wants to get into it.
And so instead, he just doesn’t get it.
He refuses to get into it with her, well, you know, until he does, if you know what I’m saying.
But, you know, he refuses.
And because of that, they kind of bond because they have like a mutual respect for one another.
Because she’s a super badass.
And so they respect each other that way, even though they might not see it eye on a lot of stuff.
And then it totally works out.
I mean, Jizouk ends up doing well in that fight.
He just unfortunately gets maced in the face at the end by the last person who he didn’t know.
And Pharaoh and Logan create this kind of like,
Rambo, home alone type situation for those 12 guys that are coming at them up the hill.
And they survive when they’re all thinking, you know, it’s pretty much three of us, two of us really.
Because Jizouk hasn’t even swung his sword in anger.
So it’s really two of us against these 12 guys.
And they end up all surviving, even though Jizouk takes a hit.
But yes, so stock up to Logan really taking it in for those leadership meetings.
Most of the time I’ve got drool hanging out of my mouth when I was sitting in one of those.
So the leadership things there would be like, hey, you got to make an acronym.
The defines unity and teamwork.
You know, it’s like all that type of shit.
Instead of it’s just supposed to be you should probably treat each individual based on their individual needs.
That’s it. That’s all you need to do.
And that’s what he’s doing.
So it’s the opposite of these like one size fits all put everything in a fucking acronym.
Have a flywheel, have a whatever, the other five other things they do, not every corporate thing.
Is it flywheel like a spin spin place? You go to that’s like half of the companies do now.
They’re like, see, we first we bring this in and we create, you know, demand.
And then we do this and it turns to this and then it starts all over again.
Gosh, shut up. That stuff.
So yeah, I think he does the opposite of the corporate jargon.
Well, the one I was in, we talked about, you know, focusing on people’s individuality and like what works for them might not work for someone else.
Unfortunately, then when you do that, they have everyone take like Myers-Briggs stuff.
And it’s like, who cares about any of this stuff?
Yeah, yeah, you know what I mean? It’s like let’s put everyone in a box in a different way.
Yeah, but my second stock up, which was related was that a tiger can indeed change his right stock up.
And once again, which is out, I think we had talked in the first book about how I pretty sure you hated just out, which is understandable.
And thought he was going to amount to nothing.
And I said, I think something’s going to come of this guy and lo and behold, he takes a maze of the face.
But he changes his whole behavior and he’s not the, you know, the douchebag that he was in the first book.
Is he an asset though? He’s just now a normal person?
Well, he is extremely skilled at sword fighting.
So he just had never done it in anger.
Just not dodging maces?
Yeah, that was, that wasn’t included in the training.
Okay, fair enough.
But now at least if you get into a fight, if you get into a scrap, you feel like, alright, he can contribute as opposed to before.
It was, alright, you go guard the wagons.
Yeah, that’s my point.
What else did you have for stock up?
Well, mine also, I guess, we’re staying in the same realm here, but mining the pot?
Stock up? I don’t know if he caught that term, but I fucking loved it.
No.
It’s basically the cook of the night.
So everyone takes turns mining the pot.
Oh, okay.
And that’s like the, you know, you’re starting in your own ingredients.
I think you’d love this.
I want to camping on a journey and everyone has a job.
And so one person is mining the pot that night.
The other people are gathering firewood.
The other people are getting herbs, things like that, right?
So I was making fan.
I thought that that’s, he was like, that’s how you bring the chemistry together is like you, you mined pot together.
You know, I was like, alright.
Yeah, I like that. I’m sure Carol, I’m like that whenever we go on family trips, I’m always the one minding the pot, which I don’t necessarily do different turns as well.
Yeah, but she’s like let someone else take a turn.
Like someone else has to cook.
This is ridiculous.
Yeah.
You know, we can’t hang out.
You can’t parent.
You’re just cooking all time.
But I’m like, I’m the only one that can cook, you know?
So if no one else can mine the pot, then what are we doing here?
Well, I feel like everyone should bring their own, their own family.
Yeah.
I’m a burger guy.
I cook burgers all day, every day, and then, you know, the next person’s, you know, maybe you’re more of a fancy guy.
Maybe, you know, more of a, you know, fancy, or maybe a bit of a bratwurst.
Yeah.
Chris gets a peanut butter.
No, my step-toe makes a good steak.
So he usually, he usually cooks up a nice sous vide’s in a steak.
Yeah, that’s his thing.
Oh, okay.
I love that.
My next knockup was the butterfly effect.
And I’m not talking about, no, I’m not talking about the hit.
2004 movie starring Ashton Kutcher.
That is a candidate for the Rotten Tomato Variance, by the way.
It’s a 3481.
I looked it up.
I remember being good.
Yeah, I was one I didn’t want to rewatch it.
Kind of had the similar effect as, as that drug movie that we talked about.
Record for a dream.
Yeah, it has like a little nightmarish, like it’s definitely not a scary movie, but it’s very scary.
I remember being kind of like Tony Scottish, where, if you see a man on fire,
lately, or.
Man on fire.
Yeah, but it’s a lot of like quick cuts and there’s like weird colors going on in the screen.
And it’s just like, whoa, it’s kind of dizzy.
Yeah, yeah.
Tony’s got trying to be artsy.
But like the way that I make an artsy is like by blurring the screen.
And I don’t get that or like being out of focus.
It’s like, why is that artsy?
I don’t get it.
Yeah, I’m just like harder to see.
Tony’s got some legend.
Your favorite movie.
That’s right.
Yeah, got it.
The train’s blurred.
Man, it’s the enemy.
But I’m talking about the butterfly.
Yeah.
But I’m talking about the butterfly effect, the chaos theory that a minor thing like a,
you know, butterfly fapping is wings can cause massive unpredictable changes elsewhere, you
know, tornado and chile or whatever the case is.
I just made that up.
But, you know, in the example here is column west tossing Prince Latislaw off a cliff after
he finds him trying to rape a catail or whatever, whatever her name is.
But obviously west was into catl and catl, catl and he, when he, I mean, I get it.
You see someone trying to rape someone.
Fuck yeah, toss them off a cliff.
I get it.
But he acted in haste and obviously that’s the, that’s the guy who’s going to be king once
the king dies.
So it creates an interesting string of events, which are that eventually by the end of
the book, Prince Raynald, who’s his brother, he gets murdered.
So now it’s like the, the, the king has no heirs and you know, something’s going to happen
in the next book.
So, so yeah, it’s just, you know, one little situation by Latislaw and column west gizm
the old heath hoe.
I kind of love the Northman’s mentality and this is a, I think goes back to the corporate
world a lot actually.
The Northman’s like mentality is like, they want like money, I guess, but that’s not really
the end of the all for them.
It’s more about like someone that they can lead and follow in like trust as the leader.
So the idea of a prince that just inherits this, it doesn’t make any sense.
They’re like, why is this fucking dumbass?
Why do I listen to him?
It doesn’t matter.
It’s like, well, he’s like lineage.
It’s like, so who cares?
Like, was he done for me lately?
You know, so the Southern people are the union people, I guess it’s because they have
their hands and everything and the money is kind of what they fall.
So it’s almost like a middle manager or someone that’s like higher up, you have to listen
to him with their an idiot because they’re paying you, right?
So like, that’s kind of where I saw that.
The best part was when the North, there’s my favorite scene, spoiled that.
But when West does that finally, I’m like, thank God, get rid of this fucking shitty person.
The Northman ever just response was just like, well, I guess that’s the end of that.
No, like they didn’t even care.
Like, wasn’t like being like, oh my, there was no reaction.
I think they said, well, that’s the end of that I reckon that’s there.
That’s what they said about it.
I fucking love that.
Yeah, I love all the Northmen in this book are amazing.
Who’s the guy that they meet in the woods?
Scissors or whatever?
He basically wants to leave Bethod and grab his calls and I think it’s calls, whatever they
are and bring them with dogman’s crew and three trees.
But that in exchange is so good when dogman is like hunting him down and then he’s like,
you know, do you have a knife?
It’s funny, but it’s also tense because you’re like, what is this guy being for real or
not?
And then he goes back to camp and it’s a lot of like, can I sit down or what’s the deal
here?
The Northmen are just, they’re good hangs.
They’re awesome.
Yeah.
Where Ladislah is clearly not a good hang.
But I did enjoy Ladislah’s scenes.
He was his ineptitude and the way he approached things, I thought was hilarious.
I was an LOLing per se, but he was the brave heart, the son in brave heart.
That’s who he was.
The son in brave heart.
You know the King’s, the Kings, who was like, I hired my guy.
He’s really good at strategy and the guy just throws about the wind out.
Yeah.
That’s the kind of Northmen.
And he gets tossed out the wind too.
Yeah, so there he is.
Well his son doesn’t.
Oh, his son is a good friend.
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
So Ladislah had more bravado where he was like, you know, wanted to go into battle.
I was like, I could do this.
Like, oh, chase them down.
They’re retreating and West is just like, you’re an absolute moron.
This is a faint.
Like what are you talking about?
So yeah, but I really did enjoy Ladislah while he’s around and is bitching and moaning.
And it’s funny because you know, he might be the King or the heir to be the King, but once
you’re in a survival situation, everyone is equal.
There is no hierarchy.
Yeah, that’s why Gim is jacket.
I was like, pro.
That’s it.
Yeah, when West did that is like, come on.
Yeah, just keep that for yourself.
But West is also trying to, he’s trying to work his way up the corporate ladder.
He was hoping for something afterwards, but then he ended up tossing his boss off with
a lift.
So there you go.
Did you have any other stockups?
Last one, quick one, dirty work stuff.
Oh, movie?
Yeah.
Super-oderated movie, amazing movie.
But West gets into a fight and is like kind of first time in front of the Northman and
earns the name.
Was his name angry or something?
But they give him procious.
Furious, right?
Furious.
There we go.
Yeah.
He’s a named man.
Yeah.
Because he goes in the middle of fighting, like in the middle of a fight, he bites like a
good old nose off.
Every time, any time, any time there’s a nose bite or anything like that, I immediately think
that’s the Saigon Horde that bit my nose off.
Yeah.
Stockup.
So when we used to work together and when we did work together, you know, this was when
you were on that other team, but it was my first week and our boss took us out to lunch,
like the whole team took us out to lunch.
There’s, I know, 10 people there.
And someone said dirty work and I was like, oh, the movie, I love that movie.
And then at pretty much the top of my lungs, I said, that’s the Saigon Horde that bit my
nose off.
And immediately, as it left my mouth, was like, that was not the right thing.
No one knew what I was talking about.
They were not talking about the movie dirty work.
They were just talking about something that was dirty work.
They’re like, construction is dirty work.
You’re like, wait.
Yeah.
No one had seen dirty work.
So they couldn’t even reference the quote.
It was so bad.
It was so embarrassing.
I said Saigon Horde, like in front of all these people, I just met.
It was, I can’t believe I ever recovered from that, but yeah, dirty work, 2166 on the run
tomato meter.
Honestly, terrible.
I got to do that.
Yeah, that’s, I’m not the right, though.
Yeah, you don’t have to put crazy under there.
I didn’t know Saigon, I thought Saigon was a typo horror forever.
I didn’t know it was a place.
I remember begging to the Vietnam.
And I just remember like Saigon, the capital is kind of crazy.
And it’s like, that’s kind of like the, how they call that, it’s dirty work.
And so I was like, 30.
And I was like, oh, it’s because she’s from Saigon.
Yeah, good stuff indeed.
My last stock up, a little on the nose, but, but creatures stock up.
So this book and kind of the first one too, we don’t get a lot of the fantasy elements.
It’s really just kind of a medieval thing that’s going on.
We know that there’s Bias and we’ve seen him like blow people’s heads up with magic.
But outside of that happening like once or twice, there’s really nothing magical about
these books.
There’s nothing, there’s no real fantasy elements.
We know, or we kind of know, which we’ll probably get into later, that, you know, there’s
this whole thing from the original world or whatever, where Bias, there’s Juvin’s, there’s
the maker, the master maker, you know, Canadian.
Whatever those things are, we know that it exists, but we really don’t see it.
So I do like that in this book.
We get a lot more of the shankah, the flat heads, who are kind of like ork-like people.
And supposedly it was Canadian who birthed them.
He like made them out of mud and clay or, he was like mud and iron and stuff.
I don’t know.
Yeah, kind of like putties from Power Rangers.
Power Rangers?
Yeah, there we go, one thing.
But also like the scene in Lord of the Rings when they show Sauramon birthing, some Urokai,
just like kind of popping the mud of sacks and the mud under the underground.
So yeah, and they are kind of orkish, these, the flat heads.
So I like those.
I’m glad they were in it.
It was, it was kind of like the non-sentient, even though they are sentient beings that
you can fight against, like the big hordes, which we see Logan and Farrow do when they go
to the, the old empire.
And then also we see them, you know, with the Northmen too, because Bethod has employed
some, some shankah, some shankah.
But then we also get a little taste, but unintended, of eaters with glaucta.
We haven’t talked about it at all, but I’m hoping we talk more about glaucta, my guy.
He’s got a lot of glaucta from Boston.
And yeah, so he finally gets, you know, he traps a needer basically and we learn a little
bit more about them.
So I’m glad we had some creatures here to increase the fantasy element, because otherwise
it was just this, you know, medieval book, which I’m, which, okay, with two.
I can enjoy that as well, but just like to expand upon it.
Stocks down, what do you got?
Stock down, bias?
Yeah, I think he was, but you might recall, but I think it was one of my favorite characters
from the first one.
You didn’t say that in that, in that episode.
I feel like I remember saying like, you know, all bizzards are all the same.
They’re all just like rambling, you know, kind of going off the cusp, you know, you kind
of can drone them out, but they’re like, actually saying insightful stuff.
They’re smoking pipes all the time.
And then like they’ll get angry and you’re like, holy shit, I didn’t realize how powerful
this person was.
But I also forgot that a lot of the wizards also will use their powers and then just all
of a sudden be like dead to the world.
You got Yoda, you got Dumbledore, you got Gandalf kind of just, I don’t know what I have
like, Gandalf, he just jumped down a hole.
Yeah, what?
He just fell down a hole and then there’s like, oh yeah, this is his brother.
He fell to the other side of the world and he fought a ball.
Yeah, he never stood there.
He battled a ball, dog beer fest where was the guy that drank a lot and then dies and
then his brother shot.
Oh, this is either fire house or something.
Oh, fuck, yeah.
Anyways, he’s like, this is my brother.
I just call me the same name.
I’ll be exacting all the jokes I know.
That was so cool.
Yeah, that was good.
Anyways, but that was Gandalf and the white wizard or whatever came back and just him,
it’s like, what?
Anyway, get some lore, bro.
Okay, holy smokes.
Landfill, his name is Landfill.
Landfill, oh, okay.
Yeah, that’s the real lore right there.
Anyways, by his uses his power is blows like a fucking hole in the ground.
Then the next half of the journey is just a corpse.
Can’t do anything.
Bro, you’re supposed to be the first to match.
I grow up.
He’s all your man.
I burned all your man on one spell.
Yeah, I’ve played match.
I didn’t have to take an army out.
He basically did the, put a light on his wizard staff like Gandalf and then he was like,
and I’m done for the rest of this time.
It’s like, you didn’t even do anything.
It’s honestly like any RPG game where you’re playing or Dungeons and Dragons or whatever
the case is when you’re playing as a sorcerer, they have like a mana pool or whatever they
are like a magic reader.
I think that much mana would be burned doing that little with that.
Any, any game you use your super power, he has to regenerate.
It’s exhausting, all right?
I saw him saying, I thought he was the magic.
I thought he’d be either replenishing quicker or have a much bigger mana pool or anything.
He popped a bunch of heads.
How dare you?
I will say that Bina’s in general was less funny in this book.
He had less quips.
Maybe it was because I was getting a little more serious for him where he really wanted to
get this seed.
And oh yeah, not to mention the seed, they bring up on a fucking whole journey and nothing’s
there.
I was like, how bad is he?
Terrible, terrible book for him.
Yeah, it was weird because he used Logan to talk to the spirits and the spirit had to
give it to Pharaoh and then I was like, oh, it’s a rock.
But what?
Like, it’s just a rock.
Yeah.
Who?
I had no, my guy long foot throughout that whole thing.
Maybe, maybe the best.
He’s just like, oh, it was good journey.
We’re here.
That was nice.
We saw this beautiful places.
Oh, so good.
But no, I just thought we lost him a little bit and I’m going to save the other stuff that
I have for later.
My first talk down is the idea that chivalry is dead, a stock down to that because our guy
nine fingers, he breaks his dry spell by offering his coat to Pharaoh.
It was legitimately, he says, hey, you’re cold.
Do you want my coat?
She says, yeah, do you want to have sex with me?
And he says pardon me?
How does it should work?
Yeah.
And I appreciate that Joe Evercrombie got into the real, the real details of the
refractory period.
You know, he was like, oh, I’m glad we’ve read 50 shades of gray and a few other smut books
because I was kind of on zero to 100 real quick, but I’m so used to it from other books
that it wasn’t as.
She was like spit on your hand and I was like, what?
Oh my God.
50 shades, right?
I think this is the fourth time we’ve read Throbbing Co.
So yeah.
Yeah, people got to figure out a different word to use.
Yeah.
One Throps?
But, but yeah, he was the refractory period.
He was like, yeah, yeah, it’s been a while.
So I’m sorry.
You know, that was faster than fast forwarding through a commercial break.
But luckily, I’ve got a banana clip in there.
So round two is coming up.
You know what I keep that thing on me?
What?
What else have you ever stuck out?
Last one, ending on a low note stock down.
Look about every trilogy, or the second movie of any trilogy.
They always end on a low note.
The Empire Strikes Back, Red Rising, Golden Sun.
Feel like the Missborn.
And I just remember Booktubing Bats.
I don’t know if I don’t know.
No, Booktubed kind of had its own.
That was like when they met the Emperor, whoever the guy was.
And he pretty much said, like, I was doing this to hold the world together and now you’ve
unleashed hell kind of thing.
Oh, so it is.
Yeah.
And the Dark Knight, the Dark Knight, kind of, not really.
But I know we’re trying to set the final chapter, but…
Now, I think I mentioned this before, but we end the book and I’m like, what happened?
Nothing happened.
All the relationships that were built up seem to be kind of crumbling.
They lose all the fronts.
Like, nothing’s happening in the north.
They’re losing that war pretty much.
They got decimated.
They lose, Glockdown loses his battle.
What’s the third storyline?
The seed.
The seed?
I don’t find the seed.
Like, so what did we just do?
I mean, I know all books are supposed to end in a low note for a second one.
But could it kill us to have one storyline that was good?
Come on, but I was thinking about this.
Why don’t they do a good book to the N’s and is solved?
I was trying to think of any series like that.
The only one I could think of was the worst movie of all time.
What’s that?
The last Jedi.
Star Wars book or episode.
Oh, is that when they killed?
Did they kill the…
That’s where they killed the main guy.
It’s a “mogor” what’s his name?
That’s “mogor.”
It all solves everything and it was literally the worst movie of all time.
Nevermind, it’s a stock up.
I should have had that correct.
So, in the middle of writing this, I said, maybe it’s a stock up because I don’t want that.
Whatever that is, don’t do that.
Yeah, so…
Nevermind.
It’s just so bad because the Force Awakens, that’s the first one.
It was great.
It was so good.
It was like…
I’m so excited for this next trilogy.
It was a great movie.
The nominal soundtrack, soundtrack completely slaps and it opened up a whole new thing of
questions about, “Oh, who is she?
Who’s Ray?
What’s her deal?”
This other thing.
Yeah, and then it just unfortunately went so far downhill.
So once they went to the casino and I was like, “Oh, we’re at a casino.
Why?”
I don’t want to be here.
Yeah.
Sorry.
What’s that guy’s name?
Who directed it?
The third one or the second one?
That’s the second one, I think, when they go to the casino.
Oh, I mean, they’re all…
Yeah.
Second and third words.
So bad.
Yeah, I honestly don’t remember them.
I would rewatch…
It was May 4th, not that long ago.
May the 4th be with you.
Yeah.
And I thought about rewatching the Force Awakens.
I was like, “Ooh, I would…
I would like that.
I would like to watch that.”
No, but that’s a disappointment.
And then yeah, I would just say, “Oh, it’s…
I was going to do Andor for the third time.
I would do that way before.
Andor is so good.
And I started watching the Obi-Wan series.
So bad.”
It’s more like…
It’s nice to see Obi-Wan again.
That’s all really it is, but it’s…
Yeah, the story like that.
It’s nice to see Obi-Wan, but it was like Kevin Sorbo’s Hercules show, or like Xenor,
or Princess.
The episode where the lion’s running away.
Yeah, when she’s running away, like, shipping up those guys in one of the cases.
I just got to be like, “Is that…
Is that the basis to run out, Joy Pepper?
Is that the tracker down?”
And I was like, “That checks out.”
Yeah, this all actually doesn’t make sense.
Oh, god.
All right, my last talk down was…
Nepotism.
Stocked down.
And it just goes back to Prince Latislaw, who we’ve talked about probably more than any
other character, but yeah, he shouldn’t be in charge.
Big mistake by the king.
Don’t let him get out there.
And then also, what do they think was going to happen?
You give him a rat, like, this like terrible untrained, like, military presence, whatever
those people were.
And he has no leadership himself or around him, and they’re fighting its Bethod, who’s
a good battle commander and overall good strategist.
Well, I think they thought they weren’t going to see any action.
They’re like, “Yeah, we’ll put them in the place that, you know, it’s basically all the
politician’s sons that’s like, “Oh, yeah, you’ll be at the…
You’re in Vietnam, but they’re really, like, actually in some other country and you
know what I’m doing.”
You know, they’re actually…
Yeah.
Did you have a favorite scene in this book?
Yeah, I already mentioned it, the West thing and just the reaction from the Northmen.
I think that was just the funniest part.
The whole Northern attitude, I appreciate it.
Yeah, it’s funny, because I had my first one was just…
It wasn’t even necessarily seen, but it was the Northmen surviving in the woods with West
in his gang, just, you know, that interaction, because they’re so…
The people are so different in that being the Northmen are one way and everyone else
seemed to be in other way, but they have to rely on the Northmen because they know
what they’re doing and all the interactions I found to be quite enjoyable.
But then I was like, “Oh, maybe I don’t know.
The Battle of Dunn Breck at the end, which is the final and really the only Battle of
the Book because the first one that we’re talking about with Ladislah, it was just a
route.”
So, I like Dunn Breck.
We get some great stuff by Dogman here when he’s talking to the random guy who’s next
to him with the guys that wait, you know.
Do we go on three or do we go on go?
And Dogman’s just like, “It doesn’t really matter as long as you go.”
Let’s go.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
You just gotta go, doesn’t matter.
And Dogman’s got a great mentality.
We see, also, see Fenris the Fierd, you know, not from the first time, because I think we
saw him in the last book, but we never saw him running through people like a cave troll
in Moria.
He’s absolutely crushing skulls left and right who eventually takes down three trees
before they’re able to beat him back and they retreat.
But I was wondering throughout the book why we have a first person perspective from Dogman,
and it becomes clear once three trees goes down and the Northmen decide to crown Dogman
as a chief, which is, it’s his two other, it’s his two black dow and I can’t remember the
other one, but Dogman’s pretty much like, “I don’t know because, you know, neither one will
follow the other.
How do we go about that?”
But the rest of the calls will follow either of them.
And so he’s like, this is gonna be a tough situation.
He talks to both of them.
They say, “Oh no, you’re the leader.
What are you talking about?”
And he’s like, “No way.
No one’s gonna agree to that.”
And then the rest of the Northmen are like, “Oh, of course, Dogman’s a leader.
What do you mean?”
So it’s once again, we’ve talked about this before, but the people who should lead are the
people that don’t want to lead.
Unfortunately, they have all the skills to do it, but they don’t want to be there.
And those usually are the best, the best people for the job.
And in general, I feel like the Dogman was a great character to be following throughout
this book, except for maybe his, his thrusting.
There was some thrusting there too.
That’s why you want to follow that guy, you know?
Yeah.
Man, that’s…
They do have a great thing when they’re wondering who should go out and all the other guys in
the group are like, “Well, the only person that should go out to basically potentially get
shot is the guy who got laid last night.”
And he’s like, “Oh, God, dammit, you’re right, you know?”
Yeah, it’s like in the whole one, you have to play for anything at the end of the bar.
I feel like we have a paid enough attention or given enough to Glockda in Degasca.
Because I really did like that storyline.
There wasn’t necessarily a scene or whatnot, but I thought it was the best for politicking
or whatever the case is where he’s kind of thrust into this untenable situation of defending
a city from the Gerkish who are going to take it while also trying to solve why the guy he’s
replacing got killed so that he doesn’t get killed.
And also that there’s potentially a mole in the organization here, or at least one mole.
And so he’s meeting all these people for the first time but then having, and he’s in charge
of them, which they don’t want him to be in charge of them, and he’s having to tiptoe
around but then also use his abilities to not die, find this mole, and hold off the city’s
defenses for as long as possible, basically by borrowing from Paul to pay Peter or whatever
the phrase is.
So he gets in with the bank, that big bank, Verstem Blank or whatever it’s called, I don’t
remember.
But that obviously is going to be a through line through the next book.
And he has the mercenary guy who he basically uses to save his butt.
That was good.
And I liked his 300 moment where they send the emissary over.
And not only does he not capitulate or agree to terms but he tortures him.
So yeah, I thought it was a great book for Glockdown but how did you feel about that whole thing?
Yeah, I think Glockdown was a fan favorite.
I just liked his character in general because he’s kind of a bad guy but he’s also kind of
someone you root for but he’s also kind of shitty but I mean I liked him a lot.
I didn’t think the he’s definitely shitty but he admits to being shitty, you know, which
a lot of shitty people don’t do.
Yeah, that’s true.
If you don’t put him there, if you put any other character there, that storyline I think
is not great.
Yeah, it’s boring.
So like I think the storyline in general wasn’t that great for him to be there but like luckily
he could carry it because he’s such a good character essentially.
And it’s fascinating how Joe Recrombe approached it or just approaches that character in general
where so much of what happens with Glockdown throughout both books is internal.
Yeah.
He says little but he thinks so much and so all like the vast majority of it is internal.
We talked about it in the last book, put the way that the narrator is going to say suddenly
narrator is unreal.
I didn’t think about it until like book three and I was like this guy is incredible.
It was it’s in my it’s in my love and I think it was in my love for the for the last one
but I’m going to reiterate it and I’m going to say it again for the third one because he
might be the best.
He honestly might be the best.
Oh, Harry Potter but you know, Jim Dale.
Jim Dale is usually at the top.
This is this is close.
But if you hear like Jim Dale doesn’t miss necessarily Harry Potter except for when he
does Hermione and it’s kind of a miss there but and I’m really I’m just you know I know
that I’m talking to the margins here.
Jim Dale is the goat but this guy is so good.
I don’t even know I don’t even know where the narrator is but he is so good.
Harry character has a very distinct voice.
You know, he’s like a list of characters and what.
Yeah, Gloucester has this list because he’s missing teeth so he’s able to do that and he
does different dialects.
I don’t know it was I like I’m blown away every time this I really I listened to this guy.
It seems like it’s being acted out you know like it’s a real performance.
So yeah proud of him.
I’m sure I look him up so I can actually Stephen Pacey.
Stephen Pacey.
Yeah.
Yeah.
What about a best character for you?
Not a lot of new ones but there are some.
I mean, you already mentioned Logan 9 fingers.
I think team chemistry guy that I always I always appreciate the team chemistry guy you
know the guy that wants to bring everyone together knowing it’s going to help everyone
down the road.
The other thing that I’m going to try to put together for for the third podcast here because
I’ve got to do for this one is just his sayings.
You have to be realistic.
Say one thing for Logan 9 fingers say that he’s whatever.
Yeah.
Yeah.
He’s like five or six.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I just I just love the the the sayings and also just anytime is a dude that is a full psychopath
that you never know when that’s going to happen.
Great character.
Yeah.
Yeah.
When you get control which is he’s probably the one character that is actually all the other
characters are doing bad things but they’re kind of in there want to be better but they
don’t really change.
He’s like I want to change and then he’s like but unfortunately I have multi personality
disorder.
I want to get too much into that because I think we’re leaking into book three which we both
started.
No it does.
I mean he happens in this book.
He’s in like memories in the cave with yeah with Pharaoh.
Yeah and he definitely goes full bloody.
He didn’t last book too which I love but I didn’t realize he could kill Pharaoh.
I didn’t realize.
Remember he was like I’m going to kill this fair like Pharaoh and then eventually snaps
out of it.
Yeah exactly.
He’s he’s weapon X.
There’s a reason why his name is Logan and so as is Wolverine because they both go
into berserker mode and you know they see red and there’s no it doesn’t matter what’s
more like this one.
Yeah but it’s more brutal you know it’s more like popping people’s heads with their bare
hands and laughing.
The Hulk is necessarily like thinking as he do it the bloody nine is like I want blood
give me blood you know.
So yeah I do I do love me some Logan 9 figures still alive.
That’s his other one still alive.
Yeah.
I loved the dog man in this one because we really didn’t get a lot of him in the last one
he was just part of the gang and then we you know we did in this obviously but I think
it’s got to be Longfoot the the guy he’s he’s the one he was so absurd that he was he brought
the the calm.
He like a zalyn long foot.
I’m like who are these people you like?
I like Longfoot he was in the the the voice that our guy Steve decided to do for him was
was so good he was like this happy go lucky guy who’s just happy to be there he didn’t matter
for him what was going on.
He just he just wanted to have a good time so my least favorite.
I am the best and I I surely gave us the right route obviously because I’m the greatest
all right voting.
Awesome.
My least favorite was is in will continue to be R.D. West.
She’s a she’s a tough hang.
She’s a good drinker.
Yeah.
But she’s not like a polish is not like a good good time drinker.
No she’s a bad drinker and she’s a sad drinker.
She’s good at drinking she’s not a good drinker.
Yeah she just drinks and gets sad.
What about love?
What about love?
Was you love about before they were hanged?
I think I already mentioned took me a little while but the characters are just so good.
Well I already mentioned to them.
They all have like flaws but they’re all trying to work on them.
They all have like inner dialogues that even when they do something bad they know they’re
doing something bad.
They’re kind of like them more because they’re like yeah at least they recognize it or they’re
doing it for a reason there’s a purpose.
I just you know I just really enjoyed that.
I mean this is kind of like a love slash hate but nothing happens I already mentioned but
I still was like great book fun time reading you know like literally nothing happens.
But you know and I mean you’re gonna I preface this last book but you’re not going to like
this but it does have the tone of a of a Lord of the Rear.
It’s just an adventure with people.
There’s really no goal even at the end.
Lord of the Rings is like the other ring and the fire.
They’re on an adventure and you’re kind of like alright I guess we’ll see where we go
here but nothing’s really really happened.
Yeah this is just not sure whatsoever and the reason why is what you said is the number
one and that’s what’s kind of missing from this book but I don’t I’m not upset about it
necessarily like maybe it’s a hate but we we’re waiting for the payout.
We don’t know we don’t even know what the ultimate goal of the story is.
We don’t know what the purpose of what is happening.
We don’t understand much of a bigger picture at all.
We’re just kind of with these people whereas Lord of the Rings you know who the ultimate
bad guy is Sauron you know who the ultimate good guys are basically ever but but Sauron
and Sauron and Frodo has his ring that he’s got.
No when would you love in a fire.
There’s a road like I have the Lord of the Rings risk game.
That risk game is different because the ring moved throughout the map until you get to
Mordor and then you cast it into the fire’s amount do.
So there’s we know what we’re doing the entire series and yes along the way we go through
Moria and we then have to defend Helms deep and you know Erragorn goes to Ministerath
and does his thing there but we know what we’re doing.
We know who the bad guys and the good guys are.
Stop just nerd showing off here.
Those are naming out places of general.
Those are general.
I didn’t even get into Tom Bompadill.
No one needs to say anything that stuff.
Come on.
That’s one of my issues with this is it’s okay.
We have Bias.
We know there’s this whole thing with the 12.
He does in this book talk briefly about some lore so I’m just getting to my hate because
my hate is the lore because Bias does talk briefly about it.
It is an interesting moment where he’s talking about Canadius and Juvenz and how he fell in
love with someone’s daughter and the you know Canadius’s daughter or whatever and then
killed him and now there’s who’s the guy that’s running Gercal?
Caloo.
So Caloo is the one that Bias is up against.
He’s the one that broke the second law and basically became an eater.
So him and Mamoon and then he found Gercash or whatever the place is and that’s why they’re
not.
So we know Bias is at odds with Caloo and that’s part of what’s going on or maybe even
all of what’s going on.
So we hear it for such a brief moment and then Bias tells these kind of like anecdotes
about the old times.
So we don’t really care.
We don’t know much about it because it’s not like we’ve seen these people interact really
or know what’s going on.
So that whole overarching plot line is what’s potentially missing.
I think what’s clear though is that everything that’s happening is Bias and Caloo fighting
but through other people.
You know what I mean?
The whole thing with the Northmen is like with Bethod is Caloo kind of doing something
up north to mess with the Empire.
The whole thing in DeGasca is Caloo doing stuff there and then Bias is doing what he’s
doing to kind of be on the side of the Empire so they can fight Girk that Girkish people
and take down Caloo.
But we don’t know that.
We just assume that’s what’s going on.
So that’s why this book is kind of hard for me because the lore itself, I’m not heavily
invested in which would normally be a bad thing.
But like you said, the characters are so good and the stories are so good.
It makes it fun to read.
It’s like an episode of Seinfeld or something.
Yeah, sure.
It doesn’t matter at the end that nothing really happened.
They didn’t get the chocolate bobcat and go to the woman’s house or whatever getting
for the party because George wanted to bring Pepsi and not wine.
That’s the funny stuff.
It doesn’t matter about them getting to the party.
So yeah, the characters in the storylines are totally fine for me.
It’s the lore that I have issues with.
Yeah, I hear you.
Do you hear any other hates or loves?
My only other hate was why is it called before they are hanged?
Was anyone get hanged?
Is there potential being hanging?
I don’t remember.
Is there?
I missed that.
There was a phrase.
So the title, I guess, references a quote by some German guy, Heinrich Heine.
He said we should forgive our enemies but not before they are hanged was the quote.
So that’s the vibe, I guess.
Yeah, so it’s just nothing to do with the German quote.
It’s kind of 1984.
We’re going to teach you how, we’re going to make you believe in our cause before we kill
you.
We’re not until–
Well, it’s definitely Logan’s mindset towards Bethod.
He’s like, all right, because Logan’s always talking about having scores that he’s got to
settle.
With him and Pharaoh, he wanted to stick it with Pharaoh.
But when she was like, nah, I don’t think so.
He was like, that’s fine.
I got scores.
I’m going to go take care of my scores in the north.
So all of that stuff is like, I’ll forgive you, but not after hanging in.
Maybe that even applies to Baez and Caloul.
It’s like, all right, we are brothers, quote unquote, but I ain’t going to forgive you and
tell you that.
It should be before they’re in the mud.
Doesn’t have the same ring to it.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Before they’re motted, seventh floor crew?
His mother wasn’t mother.
But one thing I forgot to say about hates is I hate the map because it doesn’t exist.
And they keep talking about all these places.
And I’m like, I have no idea how far one place is for another or where they are on a map.
And then when I looked it up, I was like, this map kind of sucks.
Honestly, it doesn’t really make a lot of sense.
When you think of middle earth, I can see that map in my head, I go lower the rings.
I can see that map.
I get it.
I get kind of in a general idea where they’re traveling to and from.
And I can always reference it.
This is like their island topping.
You know, it looks more like a video game.
Yeah, how are you not having boats?
Yeah, it looks like Donkey Kong Country, too, or something.
So yeah, not a huge fan of the map.
It kind of looks like Canada, like the topic Canada, where all the islands are.
Yeah, absolutely.
Maybe it is Canadian.
Hmm.
What do you give it and who’s it for?
I think it’s for people that have a little patience with the fantasy realm and know that
there’s a good series.
I give it a 4.0.
I still think there’s a really fun read as a good book.
It’s just, I think I mentioned this on the first book.
I was like, you know, I usually criticize books that don’t have any sort of definitive.
Oh, that’s what happened.
This is the ending of this book one and they could live on their own.
These two first two books really couldn’t live on their own.
You need a third book, otherwise there’s nothing that happens in a series, really.
So that’s my only negative again.
I don’t want to be, I think it’s a really good book, really good writer, really good
writers book three is where it all comes together.
Yeah, I give, I’m the same.
It’s a, it’s a 4.0 for me.
It’s, this is kind of like an intro to fantasy series because if you don’t like the idea
of like, I don’t do sorcerers and dragons and stuff like that, this is great, but you like
almost period pieces or whatever the case is.
This is, this is for you because it’s enjoy, it’s, the characters are amazing.
Like, Joybrook probably absolutely crushes it with the characters.
The story’s fun and it just doesn’t have a ton of the big fantasy elements are those confusing
fantasy elements.
Like even misborn when it’s all the different elements that they can use.
It’s like, oh, that gets really confusing really fast.
So yeah, it’s, it’s pretty straightforward, but it’s really enjoyable and it was fun
to read.
I’m, I’m really glad we jumped right into the next one because I didn’t want to forget
it.
And to finish it and see what actually happens with all these characters that we’ve remat
and refalling in love with.
So yeah, I’m excited to tell you what.
I got the third one.
I was like, are there more of these or what?
I looked, I think there is another trilogy, but it’s after it’s like 50 years in the future
or 20, 20 years in the future.
I think, yeah, yeah, I think it’s like the kids of these guys.
Oh, interesting.
Yeah.
Oh, Pharaoh and Logan from the cave, round two, banana clipping.
I mean, I don’t know which kids, no spoilers.
All right.
Well, what do we get coming to next?
Next, we’re, well, you already mentioned it.
What’s the third one called here?
Argument of Kings or something like that?
Yeah, the last argument, last arguments of Kings, which is not another, not great title,
but that’s all right.
Yeah, the first one was great.
The blade itself, like that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And then after Azure is not so much.
And then we’re going to go right into London is following.
Yeah, I already liked it at only 10 minutes in and I was like, I like this vibe.
Yeah, I was one of those ones where my mom was like, call me right now.
And I was like, holy shit, what happened?
I’m, what do moms do this?
You know, it’s, so I call her and like, hey, is everything okay?
She was like, yeah, I just want to tell you about this book I’m reading.
And I was like, oh my god, you’re insane.
That’s a good reason.
Yeah, but she’s so sweet because she’s like, will you do it on your podcast?
I was like, that’s so nice that you even know what the hell, which he doesn’t.
But you know what I mean?
Yeah, that’s nice that she said that.
And then Carol, I was listening to Dak Shepherd’s podcast, which she loves.
We for him to have us on.
And she had, he had the author of that book on and she texted to me like, hey, you should
read this book.
I was like, that’s so weird.
My mom talked to me all this the other day.
So by, there was no rule of three, but a rule of two, I feel like was hit.
So we have to, we have to do it.
And did, did.
All right, well, that was before they are hanged.
And we’ll catch you for the third and final installment of the first law trilogy.
All right.
All righty.
Yeah, I know.
Bye now.