hi, everybody.

welcome. the barnes and noble and aliso viejo. today, we're joined by author martin. he's the author of great many books on a great many topics, including to be a runner in africa further than any man with bill o'reilly. he's the coauthor of the bestselling series of killing history books, most recently killing the witches about the salem witch trials. his book, his series on world war two, taking paris, taking berlin now continues with taking winston churchill and the fight. save civilization. please welcome. hello. afternoon. already i've been told i need to make sure i speak into the. can you hear me? okay. i don't think it's no, george

can hear me. okay, so let's start with the little taking london. here's what it looks like. i want to make sure the camera gets this very. that's the most important thing ever. it's called london winston churchill in the battle for civilization. some earlier reviewers found that a little bit misleading because really what it's about is a lot of winston churchill, but it's really on the battle of britain itself. the period from may 1940 through september 1940, where literally a civilization hung in the balance. you know, if if they lost the battle of britain, hitler and then nazi germany have been able to invade england, and then everything would have changed churchill probably would have either fled to or been imprisoned in the king would have been taken off his throne. so everything that we think of when we think of england was changed and solidified that month. so as kevin was saying, so

politely, most of you probably know from the killing series, i've been a writer for ever since i caught my quit my corporate job in 95. well, i didn't quit. they fired me, but i left my i left my it was i mean. nobody wants to get fired. but i we literally when my boss told me i should find something to do with my livelihood, i was probably the happiest guy in town. and so i'm going to a stage management anyway. i've been doing this a long time, so the first 15 years of my writing career, my first books, which were more sports at the start than kind of transition in the history. the first 15 years i was a solo act, i was working on my own and then i got connected with with bill o'reilly. we worked together, we did 15 books. we just finished the 15th, 14 number one bestseller. so it kind, kind of boost my name a little bit, but it's kind of it's time to get bill and i kind of we broke up the band a

little bit ago and i think it's for the better i mean we're both getting to a point where they need to reestablish myself as a solo act and i think the taking books are a great way to do it. and of all the books written and i've probably written, i think somewhere between 25 and 30 since 1994, i think taking is easily the best thing i've ever written. so if you if you read, you know killing lincoln or killing kennedy or any of those books or even into africa, my book about stanley lyrics. and i think this is the summation of everything been doing and i'm really, really proud of it. so for those of you who don't know, my story as i look around, i see a lot familiar faces. and most of you probably know i'm the son of a pilot. you, this guy sitting right here, 92 and going strong. what when you grow up on air force bases, you develop a certain fascination with with flight and. you know what? if some of the bases lived on we

live in when we did live on base the flight line you know wake up at two in the morning you can hear them running engines in middle of the night is the maintenance crews do, their work and so you know flight became a part of a kind i wouldn't say my identity, but very the background noise in in my life literally and but kind and i don't know where this came from. right. i like to pinpoint it as the movie battle of britain, which came out in 1969. but i developed a fondness for spitfires and i'm really not sure why, but you know, because my dad's plane, jet did aircraft. they're going twice speed of sound and i'm hooked on british aircraft from world war two. and i kind of let it go a while. so you know, when i left the corporate world and, you know, was i was mostly the time writing magazine stories, running and triathlon i looked out to sea runs out there. i wrote about race one time 30 years ago and but at some point

it because i was i was freelance in the whole time and you know i was traveling almost three months of the year some point i realized i needed to stay home. and to do that i began writing books. and, you know, that led me into history. and i didn't. and i'd always loved history when i was in college and i loved history even as kid i've got like this children's with my six year old name written in them, you know, books about captain cook and all these people and as i began writing history, i realized that the one thing wrong about history is, it's written improperly. it's written in a very boring academic manner. and from my very first book that was written history, which was about which was about captain cook kind of a relapse of that six rule book that had i went on this mission and i'm on that mission to this day is to make history readable because i'm really, really i don't history

books that grind you and i think the most of them do i think history is the is the equivalent of a thriller and i think it reads better than any modern thriller. and i try to write books in a way that when you read, you're not you know, you don't feel like you're reading about history, about some distant or a distant time. i want to put you in the action. it should feel you're you're watching a movie or you're reading a great spy book or, like a bourne identity. and that's what i try to do with this and there's a lot of pushback, you know, the more i the more i do this, the better things go. some of the techniques i use, i write a lot of stuff in the present tense. the research i'll put research against anybody. and i just but i just want you, the reader, to be there with me as i take through that kind of that mystery ride in the we do that we're taking london we open with with churchill before long before the war where he predicts that what nazi is going to do, what they're going to become and we tell the story through the eyes of four pilots, a brand new

pilot, a veteran pilot, an american pilot who joins the brits. and then an oxford student who becomes a good pilot, but he's he's got so many issues that he doesn't know if he wants to be a pilot or if he wants to be a poet in a test and you bring all these people and that is the story of taking london. so and again a bit since i you know left the corporate world and decided that i wanted to do history and in focus on history i don't do fiction even though i'd like to one day i don't write about sports anymore. although i obviously follow them, but the thing i want to do is i literally want to change the way that we read history in the first person that challenge me after i'd kind of written a book about captain cook, which my first was my first ever though when i worked the james on a book and he he came up with some really, really cogent things to think about, you know, write chapters that are shorter

because people feel successful when they finish a chapter, become a scientist, kind of like psychologically uplifting to finish a chapter. so if the chapters thousand words instead of 10,000 words and you kind of feel like you got stuck you feel better when you finish chapter, you know, have a have a strong, you know, have an opening where you put the reader in the moment you and then finish the chapter with a cliffhanger so that the reader doesn't want to close the book and go to sleep and instead they say, one more chapter, you know. that's what we're going to do. and then of course, the research, the research to be it has to be so deep, you know, which in patterson told me it was like, you can't fake anything, don't even paint a beating. you should feel like the reader wants to feel like if there was a bee sting, what does it feel like? i was researching this new book about the battle of midway right now, which is going to be the fourth book in the taking series and. i literally spent an hour this morning the guy who discovered island in 1859 and what happened to him.

and i found out his wife, she drowned at sea. his daughter down with the ship. but i can't find this guy. and instead of writing, you know, three or 400 words in that hour, i just was chasing this guy's life. and i guarantee you, when i write the book, it'll be a sentence. but it has to be that level of commitment to the detail. so anyway, thanks for. coming out, i i'll tell you, i just i love taking london, as you know, when you this is this is the publication where it came out tuesday, june 11th. so whenever it goes on c-span, i don't know, but, you know, tomorrow's father's day, i think it's the is the perfect father's to give. i called you know, top gun meets the nazis. you know, that's that's kind of that's my my my elevator pitch. but implied that is it. you know, you have these these forums pilots and then you have the nazi pilots who are equally good, the luftwaffe. but it's just one of these things that this book is, you know, when you when you write a book, it's it's just this thing

that's and dear to your heart. you you hold it close. you're you're proud of it. it's not quite like child, but it's something very very close, you know? and then like when your child graduate from high school, from college, and they go out into the world when a book is released, it's like tuesday, you know, it finally came out. i turned this into the publisher a year ago. it finally came and i spent the this whole week kind of wallowing in my sadness. and i realized what it was. i was running the other day and i was also i to stop. and i thought, you know what, i'm sad about it because. i've got to say goodbye now. it's out into the world and people can say wonderful things about it. they can say horrible things about it. and there's nothing i can do. i mean, for for the rest of eternity, the book's out there, and i have to say goodbye to it. break up with it, as it were, and then move on, you know, finish the new book. but, you know, i look out and i see i see friends, i see family, i see my runners. thanks for coming out, guys. sad margaret catholic high school in the house. thanks, everyone for coming.

i really appreciate it. so before we sign books and stuff, let's up the floor for just a few questions for anybody who might miss mccullough. so yeah, we had a we got to make sure we get the mic to you in doing all this research, did you come across or do something that was really fun or exciting in your research and was there anything that you found shocking that you discovered and you were to bring anybody back to talk to? oh, that's really good. would it be actually? gutzler would it be churchill or whoever? oh, that's a good question. you know, that that the thing that was true. i know, i know are many questions there. so i'm going to i'm going to go we're going to start with the churchill thing, you know, that that little parlor game people say like if you could dinner with three people, which one of it would be like churchill would be you'd have jesus churchill and i'm not sure who else, but i mean, it would be i would love to sit with churchill because it would be a long there would be

you know, he'd have his cigar, he'd have his brandy and his stilton cheese. he would talk down over everybody. but he always said something very interesting to. two really interesting things happened when i wrote this book is i was with cross-country team. we were in hawaii at a meet and i was supposed to fly from honolulu to london to some research. and my wife céline was going just fly home and we were going to go. then the queen died and so also we changed plans and céline flew with me along way honolulu to l.a. to london and we got there. we're jetlagged and. that was when the queen was laying in state by then. and so earlier that day we went to see the ted lasso, set it just outside town, which was super cool. i got to fly in a spitfire, have a two seater model. so i was in the back. you wear a parachute and you have to learn to egress. so in other words, if it were to go down, i knew how to pull

canopy off, jump out of the plane and pull my parachute, which is like it's not flying the dreamliner. it's just little bit different. but it was super cool. and then and then we went, we stood in line to see the queen lying in state and we were tired. it was late and telling us like, let's just see how long the line is in. the line was super. it was if you know, london, it was way past the tower bridge, you know, way, way, way down. we got in line in about 1:00 in the morning. we finally, after eight or 9 hours, we finally got to file past. it was the queen was there and it was just what a moving moment. that was that was just made really special. so got two out of the three. what was three. what did i miss. and then shopping anything shocking me. no, you know, here's the thing. when you write a history, i like to go into a book knowing just an overall sketch of what it's going to be like. you know, like i about the battle of britain. because when i was eight years old, i watched that movie at the

base theater, you know, and and i still remember that movie. and actually to start this book, i went back, rewatched it, and there were still it was made so soon after world war two. they're flying a real spitfire as a messerschmitt, which was amazing. but the thing that shocked me was that how how this this battle was, you know, it's kind of lost a little bit now. we you know, we just had the 80th anniversary of d-day, which, of course, you know, that the course of western civilization, you know, we just had 82nd anniversary of midway changed the course of the war in the pacific the battle of britain is that battle in europe if the stakes were so high, the stakes were enormous. if if the british had lost it, america have been next. you know, it seems far fetched to think that hitler could have america. it's not that farfetched at. all you know, it's the battles in pacific were fought over much broader distances than what

fought, you know, the distance between, let's say, london in new york city. so everything the stakes were extremely high and it it is i kind of wrote it in the gravity it kind came around to me it was i don't know it just the process of writing this look just a bit more validation like i was doing something that was not just popular history. it was important people need to know about it. they can't forget about it because it's it's it's as as d-day and it's as big as is midway. so, yes, man, we need something like from you have to. it's the rules. it's the rules. there's an inordinate amount of time that goes into research. and i wondering, are you the sole researcher? do you have any assistance? oh, it's just me. it's a i mean, i'm kind of a a history nerd. so i love doing that deep dive,

like when i worked with bill, you the process was that i would research those books completely, would write the book, then we would send it to book to bill and bill would put it in his words. so that's what we brought them together with this, you know, and you know, when you have a coauthor like that, they can kind of direct you a little bit like hey, a little bit more of this a little bit more of that when i'm doing a book by myself, i have to completely focus on making i cover all the bases and that that means is like what i did with captain kirk brooks this morning focusing, you know, he was on the bart gambia and he owned the the ship i think it was columbia, but what happens is and then what's the ship made of? how many masts does it have? how many people were on the crew? what did they eat? you know? well, weather we're conditions like. and then you just go deeper and deeper and deeper and it's fascinating and it was my wife will tell you it makes for a lot of knowledge that nobody wants to hear but me. i mean, there are so many times

at the dinner table, i'll say to my wife, hey, let me tell you about what happened in the battle of britain. and she'll say, nope, no, don't want to hear about it. so then i talk about cross country. i run that into the ground too. so but yeah, the research is fun. it really is and it's like if i start a book, just the vague outlines of what the book is going to be about. then i some point it's very intimidating. it's, it's so big. how am i going to learn about battle of britain? there's so many how are we going to tell this story? and then you you get to know it and then you know it better. and then you get to know like really silly little facts. but there they're important. they add a little bit of detail to the book and they and they just kind of then you feel like you own it, you know, then when you're writing, it's out with a little bit more confidence, which is why when it finally comes out and i have to throw it off the world, it's like it's not just a book. it is the summation of two and a half years of my life, of full

immersion into a time in history that i knew nothing about. i became passionate about enough to fly to england several times, do all the turtle nerd stuff, and it's just yeah, i love the research. it's great. thanks for asking. yes, sir. oh, yes, sir. with your recent foray into the european theater of war, what made you decide to switch to pacific theater? it's very good question. so the series taking series obviously, i was trying to kind of, you know, can i say cash in cash and on the killing series, you know, i'm going to go off in my own direction. like, let's use that knowledge. but the first book was supposed to be taking rome, which i was fascinated with the anzio landings. i went and we we researched nco fantastic moment there. we were at the the american cemetery just off the italian beaches. and we were there just at reveille, you know, in or taps

at the end of the day. and there were they were taking on the flags and this guy said to my wife, i are you americans? and we yeah, sure. and he goes, hey, do an elvis take down the flag. so we got to take down the flag and fold the flag is that you know, they played taps it was wonderful so but at some point the battle for rome gets overshadowed. you know, we took rome on june 5th, 1944. what happened on? june 6th. so like we even when churchill went to tell pala about rome, nobody to hear about rome, they wanted to hear about what happened on d-day. he didn't tell them till two or three in the afternoon. so? so i switched from rome. i went into paris because i didn't know much about the occupation of paris. other than the movie casablanca. so that, you know, that's the gateway drug. that's that's how you into something it's like the battle of britain got me into the battle of britain. casablanca got me into taking paris. taking berlin came next because. it was right after, you know,

they were we liberated paris, then went straight on towards berlin. and it wasn't it didn't happen that fast. but that was the easy one. and i wanted to go back to london because i feel like i felt like there was unfinished business with the battle britain. again, my fascination with the battle from a young age. and then it just nice to shift gears and when i was working with jim one time, he told me, always play on the big stage. and so instead of looking for a very, very small story, i keep looking these big stories and you got to you got to learn a lot. you got to find a way to take all these details, this this mountain of knowledge and funnel it into simple, concise writing that makes one people keep turning the pages and. and that's where the research comes in. i don't but here's the thing. midway is almost done and i don't know what's next. i don't i don't know if i want to do taking book or i just want to do something that the stand alone not taking work. but i do like world war two. it feels like a good place to

park a while. so. hey, marty, if. when you put together probably like the taking london obviously a lot of stories have been written in history has been recorded on the on the battle of britain in the in the blitz. oops how did you go a different direction to take it make it more something different to india. fine fine that had not not showed before. there are some topics know like let's say abraham lincoln or christopher columbus the battle britain falls into that category that there have been so many books about them that the chances of finding some little bit of data that it has never been published is tough. so the other option is take the data until a really riveting

story, but do it in a unique fashion, you know, so there are there are several books and cite them in the back of the book, several battle of britain books. again, as i started the process was so intimidating because how am i going to tell this story any better than they did? but i'd already been paid advance. i had a book to write i a deadline. you got to find a way you know, i got a mortgage, man. so so you find a way. but with this book, you know what i did? was it there were so many pilots that wrote books about their experiences in the battle of britain. so instead of focusing on trying to outdo them. i just i found four pilots and i later a fifth and i just found their memoirs i researched their lives in kind of you know made an action instead of this this british history book where everybody is sitting in in parliament and arguing of i put

you in the cockpit. that's the whole idea. and you should you should feel you're in the cockpit with the pilots. and that was that was the big, big payoff for me. yes, sir. yeah. so just a quick question to i'm wondering why you have yet approach pearl harbor and then maybe just sort of a different have you ever thought about doing like a taking stalingrad or. okay, you've read my mind. so couple things. okay. harbor is in the midway book. pearl harbor is so it's again, it's something that's overdone. and you could you could tell what it was. but i can't tell midway without telling pearl harbor. so that's in this book, i like stalingrad a lot. and but the hang up i have the stalingrad is getting there. yeah, i got to i look at i need i need write off i need an excuse to fly places and i'm like, i'm not going to russia

anytime soon or the soviet unit or whatever they call it now. you i'm not going anywhere. so yes, sir. yeah. i was wondering what percentage your time is in research versus getting organized to write versus writing finishing and how do you organize all that information you get so that you have it at your hands when you're trying to write the book, it's pretty, you know, again, you know, is over the course of all the killing books and the history stuff i did before that the process, you would think it would be just fine tuned but it's it's more like get up in the morning, have some coffee read over what i wrote the day before. and if it's horrible, you try to forget that it's horrible and you fix it a little bit, but you've got to keep moving. you can't just stay stuck and you can come back to that stuff later. but you got to keep moving forward. but once i start knowing a story, i literally research line by line. so if i'm going to, let's say

put you in in, you know, on september first 1939 is the war is about to begin. you know, i, i okay. i describe parliament and, you know, but that's a thing know in and of itself, you know the furniture, all the everything is upholstered in green. you know what year was it built, all that stuff. and that's a little bit of time and then the people in parliament that day who they and then you can't just these five people because you could do that but that's boring you know if you were watching a movie, you'd want to know what they're about. i mean, what are they cheating on their wives? are they people who are not to be trusted or are they people who are extremely trustworthy? you know, and you then you're going to tell those little snapshots of a story and really, just like in five words, you know, you just got to it out there. but line by line, line and then but the fun part goes when you got a whole book written and you

know the topic then you go back and you all that stuff and then you make it pretty. you use fancy words and you you start messing with the timing and just the little, little tricks. and that's when it gets really funny. like when i turn my manuscript in for taking london they don't they the sunday was called first pass which is the first real look at the manuscript you know before it starts moving into being an actual book publishers don't like you to make changes at that point. if so, they should be minimal. i mean, 205 changes to taking london. and then then i had to call them and say, look, i'm super sorry about this, but i'll fight for this because does make the book better. listen, no problem. you know, just don't you get second pass. just don't make any more changes. i made 210 changes, second passes and then i literally flew to new york to meet with my editor and say, i'm sorry about this, but what do you think? you know, so that it just the whole idea that you make book as

good as it can possibly be but it's just a it's a brick by brick process. and then you you get to the end and you get to sign books on. a beautiful day like this and it feels magical like it like it was easy. so, so, young lady in the back, if you could tell yourself anything before writing, taking london, would you tell yourself, don't afraid sometimes when you write a really, really big story you like stalingrad when you write a big story that there was a world of history. experts out that will that that's the only thing they know about that's the only thing they care about and they can't wait to write amazon review or a facebook message saying you got this and so then and the easy thing to do is just be perilous just to say, you know, maybe i'm just going to write fiction, you know fiction, you can get you can get away with a of sense, you know, but then you have to go. no, you know what? i can do this. i'm talented, but it's a day by day process like this.

midway. i'm trying some new stuff. and so an often told story so i'm trying to tell it in a unique that purists might at first go i know about this but then i need to i need to bring them in. and there are days i start to write where i don't believe i'm going to pull it, you know, and i there with taking london, there are so many where i said, i don't know, you know that i can't i can't do this pilot justice. i can't can't talked about you know, air marshal doubting, you know, and then, you know you got to push through that fear and then again, then it happens and it easy, right? so. yes, sir, but we need the microphone again. yeah. just curious in selecting your four pilots, are those based on real life characters? and so how did you do the research into them? they're all real life. okay. so it's history. yeah. so every bit of yours is all true story. yeah, yeah.

that's so the trick is to take a true story and it sound like it was made up. so other words, take these people who did such things, amazing things that you and i could not comprehend doing and then telling the story in such a way that people go that never happened, you know, that guy never flew head on into a messerschmitt, you know, playing chicken at 5000 feet, 300 miles an hour. that would never happen all those things. if you can do that. and at the same time being to their own written word how their own descriptions about what they there and their own squadron logs about the events that took place. if you can take that fantastic experience and make it something that the reader goes know it's it's all made up that's that's magic. that's what i'm doing, my job and then my last question, i'm sure perhaps a suggestion. have you ever thought about doing a children's series something that makes it more

powerful and only because what got you into history was when you were a kid. and i think that when you discuss how boring history can be and how they just it's a grind. i think that is true for many children. and so i've i thought maybe you'd and that's a no here's i think i i yeah when i was a kid my dad will tell you i think he feared that i was just going to become one of those kids who never left the house and just read books all the time because i was one of those kids, you know, i little league and all that kind of stuff. but that was a book. but i don't have it really a special skill to write children's books. and i'm not that to be pandering. it really is. you you have to know how to tell very, very broad story in a very limited of words. but i go back to this this quest i'm on. history is not boring, but most history books are boring. history, the way history is taught in the school, its history should be taught as if

it was you know it was a big story. yeah, great. you know, like something that people should go to history class saying what's going to happen today you know and they should leave like. i never believe that. that's what real history is like. and so i'm trying write my books. i love when people say, oh, your book read like a movie and and i say, i still steal some elements of a screenplay. it with just with a with a kind of the opening of each chapter and stuff like that. but i want people to feel like they're watching a visual experience even as they're reading about an actual, you know, physical experience. we feel like fun, young man. falling asleep. yeah. so you spent two and a half years writing about pilots in world war two, did freak out when the show masters of the air came on, and you're like, they stole my idea. yes. and and and i mean, the thing. okay.

you always want to feel like you're like. i don't i don't write books to be movies. but this is the first book i ever wrote where i said, this is a movie. i mean it's so visual. it's so it's everything. you know, you have all these emotions and these feelings and you're in the air. and again, it's british pilots. i get it. so masters of the air is about american. again, growing up in air force bases, amazing loyalty to the united states air force. but when you see a book like that, a show like that come out, you go, all right. so they're probably not to do another mini series about pilots anytime soon, but but who knows? i but but i watched it and i loved it. so i like it. i really can't complain. so one more. russ martin do you ever reach out to the relatives and actually go to their house, their grandkids whoa and say this is a resemblance to churchill? patton you know, yeah, we get that off. you know, they're all here's the

thing. it's because it's because the world war two people are aging out. you know there's one living battle of britain pilot still alive. his name is john hemingway. his he lives in dublin. he's irish, 104 years old. and i as an homage to him i put one of his descriptions about his time spent in france in the early days of the war into book just because he deserves it. but you if you go on the facebook pages, you can you might see somebody say, oh my grandfather flew there, but they can't me you know, they can't give me if you know my budget is not endless. so if i'm to go to london, if i want to talk somebody, they have to be able to provide me information that is going to make its way into the book or it's to add to the book, even if it's just subtext. but but on the other hand, if they got in touch with me and said, you mentioned so-and-so in the book, that person would

definitely correspond with him, i that's important. so so. all right. well, everybody, thanks so much for coming out. the great, great afternoon. thanks. it there. one last question. well done. i think we're done. so we're going to pull this table and i'm going to sign books. yeah, they've oh, one more. one more. i read somewhere that you are we're very interested in the, in the spitfires and everything but. did, did you have a i'm not sure how much air is actually available. yeah. we're looking at the beef 100 times or anything. oh. and the aircraft if you go to some of the the raaf museums london they have them there, one of them i think it's the raaf museum has like the stuka tell 87 and it's in, it's completely refurbished and and they're are messerschmitt and you see these things. i mean one of those i didn't see in any one tends but at the same time when you it's great because

you're, you're going through this museum and i go if it hurt i feel like i got all the research i need. i think it's time to go get a cup of coffee. you turn a and boom there's anyone on and you go. oh, okay. wait. right, we're we're here for a little bit longer know. so it's just amazing to see stuff like that and a little little bit of trivia. so again, growing up in air force bases when we lived off an air force base in nebraska, they had a great air museum of all these old planes. and one of the things my brother and i and our friends would do on a saturday, i mean, my dad was. right, our bikes down, we would crawl under the we break into the air museum and then we would inside the planes. we found out it again and, two b-17s and b-29. it was super cool. and then we were inside one day, and this guy came, found us, and they pulled us out of there. they closed off all the openings so you couldn't go in anymore. but i think that that feeling of being inside an aircraft that, you know, i wanted to bring that

into the book, i mean, i'm a pilot. yeah. know it's cool stuff. everybody. thank you very much. like i said i'm going to sign the record. they're going to pull a table up over here. love to read to sign a book to you if you're not buying a book today, buy one later. but like i said, it's a great book. remember top, gun meets the nazis. yeah, it's a great father's day gift. thank you all for coming out. appreciate very much.