Lee Child got fired from his job. His job became, as they say, redundant in his industry,

the television industry. And he said to himself, what am I going to do with my life? And

like many people, he said, well, I'll write a book. Many people do it. I'll do it. Of

course, many people fail at it. Lee Child didn't fail at it. He wrote the first Jack

Reacher novel. Jack Reacher is the hero of Killing Floor, that first novel. And then the

next 28 novels after that, plus a movie starring Tom Cruise, plus a TV series that my entire

family watches all the time. So, and hundreds of millions of copies of the Jack Reacher books

have been sold. Now, there's a new Jack Reacher novel. The secret just came out. And Lee Child

wrote it with his younger brother, Andrew Child, who henceforth is going to be the writer of

the Jack Reacher series. It was, it's a great honor to have them on the podcast. And these

podcasts are always self help for me. I want to learn how to write a thriller novel. Now I get

the best thriller writers on the planet to come on. And here's Lee Child and Andrew Child.

This isn't your average business podcast. And he's not your average host. This is the James

Altiger show.

Thank you guys for coming on the podcast. And I'm a huge fan of Jack Reacher and, and the work

both of you do. And I guess I would love an origin story. And I know that's like the cliche

question. I almost hate asking that because I'm sure you've answered that a gazillion times.

But, you know, everybody out there would love to know how Jack Reacher started, how you got into

writing Lee. And then of course, Andrew as well, you've been a thriller writer. And now you're,

you're on the Jack Reacher series. So what's, how'd you guys start writing?

I mean, for me personally, it was, you get asked the question, how long have you known you wanted

to be a writer? When did you first want to be a writer? And some writers answered, you know,

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