The Grey NATO – 205 – Bond Author Kim Sherwood On ‘Double Or Nothing’
Published on Thu, 01 Sep 2022 05:30:33 -0400
Synopsis
The episode features an interview with Kim Sherwood, a British author and lecturer who has been chosen to write a trilogy of continuation novels set in the James Bond universe. Sherwood discusses her lifelong love of the Bond novels and films, her writing process for the first book "Double or Nothing" which sees 007 missing and follows a team of other Double O agents, and her approach to updating certain elements while staying true to the spirit of Ian Fleming's work. Jason and Jason also share their thoughts on Sherwood's book and provide recommendations for other recent novels they enjoyed reading.
Links
Transcript
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| Unknown | Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Graynado. |
| Jason Heaton | It's a loose discussion of travel, adventure, diving, driving gear, and most certainly watches. This is episode 205. And it's proudly brought to you by the ever growing TGN supporter crew. We thank you all so much for your continued support of the show. And if you'd like to support the show, please visit thegraynado.com for more details. Hey, Jason, we're back. |
| Jason | Yeah, welcome back. Yeah, we're We're back after a couple of weeks off. You had some big adventures. I had some smaller adventures. But yeah, it was it was a good, good little break. You feeling pretty good? |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, yeah, it was nice. It was nice to have a break and, and kind of step back from a few things. I took August off of Instagram, like deleted it from my phone. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | And then when I went, when I went offline for this, like kind of more full vacation, I disabled my Gmail and the rest of it. So it was really nice. I think my phone, my phone usage went from a, you know, three and a half to four hours a day to like 25 minutes a day. Oh, nice. And I read some books and all that kind of stuff. So it was good. I, I, I enjoyed the break. It was really nice. You know, we're recording this Monday, you know, three, four hours after I turned my email back on. Yeah. And so right now I feel pretty stressed. Yeah. Yeah. It had been kind of a while since I took like a legit vacation that didn't also coordinate with like a holiday. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. Like, you know, you take some time over Christmas, but of course you're running around every day trying to see friends and family and make sure the gifts and everything are all sorted out. So this is like a real, a real vacation. Yeah. |
| Jason | It was, it was good. You blipped on for a brief while and you sent me a couple of photos that looked pretty spectacular. And then you kind of went dark again and I was like, wow, that looks amazing. Tell, tell, tell us where you went. You went out East to the Maritimes? |
| Jason Heaton | I did. Yeah. Yeah. My wife and I wanted to go somewhere where we had never been before. Yeah. Um, both of us have traveled quite a bit and often we end up going to places where one of us have already been. Yeah. Uh, but we wanted something that was both a little bit more adventurous and also way more low key than going to a big city. Right. Um, we wanted like more time to just kind of lay around and read books and, and not feel a lot of pressure to see certain sites or that sort of thing. So we went to, um, Newfoundland, And I loved it. We went to the, uh, the West side of the Island. So it's a huge Island for those that don't know. It's, um, one of Canada's provinces, uh, on the East coast. So, uh, I was able to fly into a little airport called deer Lake. I like little airports. It's very simple and straightforward. We did a few days in a spot called corner Brook and did some hiking in gross Morin, which is a big national park, uh, on the, uh, on the West side of the Island with some incredible, um, geological features. including like exposed earth's crust and an inland fjord. I actually don't know that you're allowed to call it a fjord. Out east they call them ponds. So yeah, we did some hiking. We did Tablelands, which is a hiking route where they've got, I'll put all this in the show notes, but we did some hiking out there. So Tablelands is where you can kind of hike on and around this weird sort of desert-y Martian environment that's sort of based on the earth's crust, exposed element of the earth's crust. which was incredible. It was a super easy hike, really close to the parking lot and all that kind of stuff. We did one called Green Meadows. It was a little bit longer and had some actual climb and ascent and descent sort of element and also beautiful, really beautiful scenery. And the trail itself was lovely and the weather was perfect. So there's a few options to see the Western Brook Pond, but if you wanted to hike it, it was like a 10 or 12 hour hike and you had to do it with a guide. It's in like a controlled area. Yeah. And it seemed like the goal was to get basically the same Instagram photo that everyone else had, which I don't really care one way or another about. Yeah. Um, so we found a boat tour, uh, which was really cool. It's, it's quite a drive. Cause you come around through the park and through to the other side kind of of the, of the fjord itself. And then there's a walk. It was maybe 30 minutes, like two, three kilometers, uh, through essentially like a low tundra. And then out of nowhere comes this rise and the body of waters, 10 miles, 16 kilometers long. Wow. Um, kind of, uh, uh, a channel like you would expect in, um, in New Zealand or maybe West coast of Canada, but it's landlocked. It has a very small supply from the ocean, um, like a river, I guess. Uh, but the water is actually so fresh that it doesn't, it can't conduct electricity. They had a certain term for it. I've already forgotten that term, but like when they put the things in to measure the water, to learn more about it, that none of them registered anything. Cause they're all based on, uh, mineral conductivity, I guess. Sure. And so it's crazy clear, um, super clean water. And then basically you just have two huge walls of cliffs on either side, some of them several thousand feet high. Uh, but you get out there and there's, you have no reference. You can't tell how big anything is. Yeah. Um, so I'm looking at it, I'm like, Oh, this feels like, you know, it's kind of like, um, the how sound in, in, It kind of between Vancouver and Squamish is the how sound, but imagine if instead of being several kilometers across, it was, you know, at times significantly less than one kilometer across, like not that it was quite narrow. Yeah. And it was absolutely gorgeous. The, uh, the boat ride was awesome. It wasn't the cost of a helicopter ride or a huge guided hike. I think it was 65 bucks a person. And then, yeah, after that we went to, uh, we switched locations and drove, you know, maybe an hour and a half, two hours and into a little area, uh, called like Southbrook and around Southbrook Springdale and Kings point. And we drove around, we did a few little hikes, like fairly short hikes, uh, kind of tourist hikes around that area, ate some food when we kind of found like a cabin retreat on a river. So sad and read books and watched beavers do their thing. And it was, it was awesome. It was a great trip and an absolutely beautiful part of the country that I hadn't seen before. And I didn't know what to expect. And it really does kind of mix like where the area kind of North of where I grew up. Once you get onto the Canadian shield. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | So the big rocky elements and then some of the sort of vertical elements of the West Coast all into one thing. You get a ton of ocean, lots of mountains, more rolling mountains than what you're used to in the Cascades or North of there, but really beautiful. Had an amazing trip and I can't wait to go back. You know, didn't get down to St. John's, which is kind of the main metropolitan area. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Um, but it's a huge thing. Like if you fly into deer Lake, I think, and then wanted to drive to St. John's, it'd be like eight hours. Oh, Oh yeah. But yeah, we had a blast, uh, Newfoundland and Labrador. Uh, we saw a little, little tiny slice of it along the Gulf of the St. Lawrence and can't wait to go back and see more, uh, sometime soon. Wow. If anyone listening is from out there, you live in a beautiful, really chill part of Canada. |
| Jason | I like it. How, so, you know, speaking of kind of local Intel, I mean, that sounds like a lot of logistics to plan. How did you, if you had never been there, how did you, How do you cook all this up and plan all the outings and where to stay and all of that? Just a lot of research and Googling and stuff? |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, just a lot of Googling. You know, the big thing was to get to Gros Morne and see that. And then once we got to Gros Morne, we realized like there's a few things you learn fairly quickly. One, it's like massive, even on the scale of any normal provincial or national park. And you could, you could basically spend years in there discovering everything. And it's just a very, very large piece of property that runs, runs that. But, uh, you know, there's a few things we wanted to see and we wanted to kind of make it. So maybe you had four or five hours of hiking a day, give or take, and then the rest could be kind of relaxing, making food, that sort of thing. I mean, it's not a, it's not a part of the world where the, uh, the, the culinary options are really wide. You can get some seafood. We were there too late for lobster season, so I didn't get any lobster. You kind of just find out what was there and we, you know, kind of operated based on what was near deer Lake. Yeah. Uh, so that we found Cornerbrook and it seemed to have a nice vibe and it had a couple of breweries and that sort of thing. So that was easy. |
| Jason | And then we kind of did the same thing, but said like, well, how far could, you know, if we had three hours driving, did you move around and stay at different places or did you kind of base yourself in one cabin or Airbnb or something? |
| Jason Heaton | I had two, two spots. So it was at a, at a little resort in, um, in Cornerbrook. And then the second one was an Airbnb for that cabin against the river. Oh, nice, nice. Wow. Yeah, it was, it was awesome. |
| Jason | Yeah, it's funny you mentioned going someplace where you've never been and doing something completely different. And, and I think that reminds me of when we did our North Carolina trip back in June is it was a place we'd never been. And, and it's so refreshing to, to take a trip like that. Cause we do often just go to, you know, a place we've been together, you know, the same kind of region up North or wherever it is, or Colorado or whatever. And, and to just go someplace that it's brand new, it just lends such a, a different viewpoint and just new adventures. I don't know. It really rejuvenated us. I know. And it sounds like it did you as well. That's, that's really cool. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, no, we had a good time. It wasn't crazy expensive. Um, you know, and the flight wasn't too bad. It's a three hour flight, uh, from, from home base here. So yeah, Newfoundland rocked and, uh, there's so much more to see. I just, it would take so it's such a big piece of land out there, especially when you start to include a Labrador, And then you're like, well, I got out there. Do I go to new Brunswick PI, Nova Scotia? Like there's a lot going on. And I could see this being kind of a fascination for the next little while. Cause the accessibility is high. And especially if you're talking about new Brunswick PI, Nova Scotia, like you can, you could drive, right? |
| Unknown | Sure. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. I'd love to get back and see St. John's and maybe make it up into Labrador. Uh, just cause my guess is that's like, that's gotta be, you know, east coast, Alaska, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's just way out there. |
| Jason | Oh, that's amazing. I'm so, I'm so glad for you. That sounds like a great getaway and well-deserved. You were, uh, I think you were in need of a getaway like that for a long time. I needed a break for sure. Yeah. I had a bit of a getaway as well. It was a bit more of a familiar surroundings. In fact, it was back to my old hometown down in Milwaukee. I went down there, I guess it was. Well, two weeks ago now, um, my, my old buddy, Chris, who, uh, I grew up with and went to high school with, we go diving occasionally and I drove down there. I took the defender down and. And we did a day of diving. We were doing kind of a couple of photography projects for some upcoming work. And we did a dive that is kind of one of our favorites that I had done once before. And he's done many times over the years. And it's this car ferry called the SS Milwaukee that sank in 1929. And it's a pretty spectacular shipwreck in Lake Michigan. It's about 120 feet deep. And it was actually featured on, I don't know if you remember that show, What was it called? Shipwreck hunters or shipwreck detectives. I think it was with Richie Kohler and Chatterton. And, uh, they dove this wreck as well because they were doing some research into, uh, um, how it sank, uh, which is a bit of a mystery, but, um, this is a, it was a railroad car ferry that sank, uh, and during a storm in 1929 and the, one of the railroad cars had broken loose and then shattered the back, um, gate of the, of the ferry causing water to flood in. And then it sunk, uh, sunk this ferry. And what's interesting about it is that when you get down to the bottom, there's a, there are actually railroad, um, wheels, like they call it the trucks, you know, the, the, the wheel sets that are underneath the boxcar underneath the propeller of the ship that's kind of buried in the mud. And it's like, how did that get there? You know, like it, it had to be a very violent sinking event. I think what happened was the railroad car rolled off the back, sunk to the bottom and then the, the ship sank on top of it. So it's, uh, It's one of these really fascinating shipwrecks. It's, it's deep and it's, it's quite cold. It was 41 Fahrenheit at the bottom. So it was, um, it was, uh, it was a fairly short dive cause we got into a little decompression, but it was, uh, it was great. It was a good day out. I, it was just a fun kind of diving adventure. I like, I like meeting up with Chris. We hadn't met in a few years because of COVID and whatever. And, uh, and so it was, uh, it was good fun. It was a beautiful day and, uh, and we got some, some good photos out of it, but, uh, I will say I have to offer a strong endorsement. I, I. Before I went ice diving back in the winter, I was looking for a good pair of dry gloves. Now, those not familiar with the concept, um, I was wearing a dry suit, which, you know, seals the water out completely when you're diving in cold water and then you wear insulation underneath it. And you can either opt to wear neoprene gloves, which get wet, but still insulate your hands to a certain degree or dry gloves, which seal out the water entirely. And, um, I've always worn wet gloves, dry gloves. You usually have to. clip into some kind of a ring on your suit sleeve, um, to, to keep the water out. But I had discovered these gloves called, um, easy Don dry gloves made by scuba pro. And I'm, I'm a convert. I highly recommend them if anybody's doing any cold water diving, because they don't require that ring system to, to attach to your suit. They, they just pull on over your hands and then you actually tuck the, the, uh, I guess the gauntlet under the, the edge of your dry suit sleeve. So, um, I know this is a bit insider kind of deep nerd stuff. But if you're in the market for dry gloves or want to try dry gloves, I highly recommend these scuba pros. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. I remember my first dive with dry gloves and I was like, Oh yeah, now, you know, I was really, I was really stupid before this. |
| Jason | Yeah. I mean, it makes such a difference if you're, you can still feel your hands after the end of a dive. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. I haven't used a system quite like this. Um, I had, I had a set that, um, Well, I mean the gloves oftentimes I would just use like I would wear a liner like you might under ski gloves. Right. Right. And then just use like a big heavy restaurant glove. Yeah. Like a dishwasher's glove. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Pretty easy to use and not that expensive if you cut it on a rack or something like that. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | And the system I had for my dry suit, which is a bare next gen, was actually like a ring that went inside the seal. |
| Unknown | Yep. |
| Jason Heaton | Yep. And one that went on the outside and formed like a lip and you just drag the glove over that lip. Yeah. It seemed to work. Yeah. Those were, I definitely got one cut up on a rusty, right? Like on the Granthal, like one of those ones we dove on at Porto Cove. Yeah. And it, you know, it blooms gets really big and you get out in your hands kind of weird and veiny for a little bit for the pressure difference and yeah. And that sort of thing. But, uh, yeah, huge, huge fan of dry gloves. Yeah. Yeah. It makes a big difference. What else you got going on? |
| Jason | Yeah. I mean, so I had posted a photo of this on, on Instagram. I, when we were at wind up in Chicago, uh, I was chatting with, uh our buddy Ben Lowry who runs Submersible Wrist on Instagram and uh went diving with him down when we were in Chicago and uh and Ben was wearing I can't remember which watch he had it on but he was wearing one of these um they're called Olongapo um they're kind of a cuff style steel bracelet for a watch and um these were very popular with um soldiers and divers during the Vietnam War who were on R&R in the Philippines there's a town there called Olongapo steel cuff bands made for their watches. I think Moki Martin probably had one on when you met with him. |
| Jason Heaton | He definitely did. Yeah, that was my, it was kind of my introduction to it. |
| Jason | And so I saw a Ben's and I was like, where did you get that? And he hooked me up with this guy who's fairly well known in the watch community. I just wasn't aware of him named Jaffe Jurado, who's based in the Philippines and I think has been making these bands since the, at least the eighties. Wow. Uh, it makes them by hand. Um, and he does custom engraving and he can make custom versions for you. And, uh, and so I ordered one from him. It's about 175 bucks. Uh, he just orders, you just do it right through Instagram. He said a long a po bands and, uh, you just send him a DM and give him your measurements and details and he'll make it for you. And it came in about a month. And, uh, you know, I didn't want to opt for any kind of a Navy insignia or anything on mine cause I didn't serve in the Navy. So, um, I went with just double scuba tanks and then I had him do a custom engraving on the inside and I threw it on my, my vintage benthos, my Aqua star. And, uh, And I love it. It has, it has a certain retro appeal. It feels a bit like kind of to a certain degree, it feels a bit like kind of Southwestern jewelry, you know, like kind of cuff. Good with a tan. Bracelets. Good with a tan. Yeah. Kind of leathery skin, which I'm starting to develop here. Um, and, uh, yeah, I think it looks really cool. I mean, I think it would work well on certain watches, especially kind of vintage dive watches, but I'm really pleased with that. So for those that were curious about that, that's a, that's a good route to go. And I thank Ben for, for that referral. |
| Jason Heaton | Oh, speaking of some cool new handmade stuff, I do need to give a big shout out to Tom, Expedition 16610. Yeah. Tom, you know, we got to meet up in Chicago. He's a lovely guy. If you're not following him, you definitely should. He's running this project to find a Rolex that was lost in a lake. And he's, you know, basically surveying the lake to find the Rolex. And then on top of that, he's also a very successful stuntman. He's also a really lovely guy. And it was a treat to finally meet. I returned from my trip out East to a package from Tom and having not requested or, or, or any of that sort of thing, he made me a wallet, uh, to replace my last one, the one I lost on the West coast about a month or so ago. And I really love it. It's this kind of beautiful two fold. Um, well like a, sorry, single fold, like a book with two card channels on each with a, on each side and then kind of an open flap behind that for setting whatever you want in their cash or otherwise. Yeah. And it's this really beautiful leather and it's hand-stitched and has my initials. And Tom, you're just the sweetest guy. And I really, really appreciate it. Totally unnecessary, but absolutely something I've, I've had in my pocket since, uh, since I got home and I'm going to put a lot of miles on it. So I wanted a nice public. Thank you. I'm sure I'll send you an email. Uh, now that my emails turned back on, but, uh, thank you so much for the, for the wallet. |
| Jason | Man of many talents as well. I mean, there's nothing that you can't do. That's really cool. Yeah. I had a little project of my own here, um, that I did. I forgot to mention this. I, a few days ago, I decided, you know, the, the, the rims that are on, on my Land Rover defender, we're getting pretty ratty and chewed up and a little bit rusty. And, and I, for a long time, I've been wanting to, to either swap them out for something nicer or just paint them. And so I, I tried this product called plasti dip, which a lot of people probably familiar with. I think it comes in a actual dip thing where you can like dip stuff in it and it kind of coats it with this. whatever color you choose, but like a rubberized kind of coating. Um, but it also comes in spray cans. And so I had, um, bought a few spray spray cans of like a matte black, uh, plastic dip. And I took the wheels off the defender, uh, last week and just one by one, I just, uh, I cleaned them up, scraped off the rust and did the best I could. And then, and then sprayed each wheel. I did a couple of coats and used a hairdryer to kind of dry in between coats and Um, so far so good. I think it looks good. I think it looks good with, with black rims and the beauty of it is if I don't like it, this stuff, uh, you can kind of get a fingernail under it or whatever, and kind of start to peel it off if, if I'm not happy with it. But, uh, a friend of mine has did it on, on his, uh, he's got a newer Land Rover and, uh, he'd done it on his rims a few years ago and his have held up really well. So I'm optimistic. I think it improved the look and I, and, you know, hopefully it adds some durability to the. to the wheels. So we'll see. I posted a few pictures on Instagram and I think it looks good, but it was, it was a lot cheaper and kind of more fun to do it myself than, than to go and buy, you know, buy five new rims for, for the truck. |
| Jason Heaton | Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Plastidip is a, is kind of a funny thing, you know, in my, in my younger days, it was a great option for changing the color of something on your car in a non-destructive sort of way. And, and of course, you know, there was a phase where, people I knew, you know, use it to tint headlights and tail lights and that kind of stuff for that sort of blacked out version. Yeah. It's all comes down to the treatment, especially with the spray. Amazing. Um, it can kind of be done like a tint. Uh, I, you know, I've, I've definitely watched like, um, donut media did a whole thing when they were doing the high low series with the, the Nissan Zs where they, one car, one car got the expensive real paint job and the other one, they plastic dipped the entire car. Wow. And, uh, and like, it seemed like the prep. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | For the PlastiDip was way more important than the PlastiDip part. Yeah, right. So yeah, you got to make sure there's not any little bits of grime or rust or other stuff. So yeah, I'm looking forward to seeing a picture. You should send me one when you get a chance. I think it's a great product and I love that it's non-destructive. You can peel it off if you like. And yeah, for sure. |
| Unknown | Very cool. |
| Jason | Yeah, we'll see. Other than that, I mean, speaking of the Defender, even though our TGN summer break is over, Uh, Ghoshani and I are taking much of next week off. We're actually going to go camping and hiking up on the North shore of Lake Superior. We're going to actually going to sleep in the Defender and we've got a couple of sites booked at a couple of different state parks up there. So we're, we're going to be gone for a few days, but, uh, so we're, we're going to pre-record a couple of episodes this week for that. But, uh, yeah, it's kind of the last hurrah for, for summer, you know, get a, get away before, uh, before the cooler weather sets in, which, uh, it's definitely hinting at that now. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, it absolutely is. It's getting cool at night again. And I was at the cottage this weekend and it was, it was chilly overnight and it doesn't bother me. I think that, you know, we're basically halfway through the cottage season when summer starts to fade. So that's great. But, um, you know, the other thing is that you were talking about recording our extra episodes. If you're wondering, this comes out on Thursday, obviously September 1st, which will be the last day of Geneva watch days. Uh, our plan is to see what's released by Thursday and have that form next week's episode. So if you're keen on, let's say the new Doxa Army, the new Diver 65 from AORUS, those will be on the list. Give us a week to kind of contextualize everything and make sure we don't miss anything that was cool and kind of in our vibe. But we're thinking that's what the next episode will be. So yeah, should be pretty cool. That Doxa looks great in steel. |
| Jason | It sure does. Yeah. I like the bronze version. It's steel with the bronze bezel with like a kind of a drab olive insert. I think that looks really good. I mean, I have this, I have the stainless steel Synchron Military and admittedly, I don't wear it very often, but I think that that bronze bezel version looks particularly appealing. It's really cool. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. And I like the price point, especially if you, if you remember the number that they had for the ceramic, uh, limited edition and these ones aren't, so it's a little over two grand, which is nice. We've already said too much. We'll, uh, we'll, we'll, we'll have more in the next episode for you for sure. |
| Jason | I should, I should mention though, um, since this episode does come out on September 1st, that, um, that date, uh, the, the TGN shop will be open again. Um, you know, we had sold out of the, our kit bundles, uh, thanks to everybody who, who, you know, bought those. It was an amazing campaign. And, you know, after windup, we were left with a fair amount of t-shirts and pins and kerchiefs and stickers. And we sold those out, um, of the entire kit. Um, just a couple of weeks ago, it was right after our last episode. And, um, as of this morning, uh, September 1st, when you're listening, uh, the shop is open again. So the great NATO.com slash shop. Um, because we're, we're going to sell off the, or try to sell off the remaining extra large t-shirts that we have, and there are about 50 left. So if you're, if you're an extra large, you're in luck. And then the few cantonment, uh, TGN kerchief sets that are left, we only have about 15 of those. So hop on those if you want to get kind of a cool TGN adventure flag. I mean, I'm, I'm so Christmas gift too. Oh, totally. Yeah. I'm, I'm so excited by the response that those kerchiefs have gotten on Instagram. I mean, people have been. posting them in all sorts of amazing places, you know, mountaintops and, you know, run up on, on sailboat masts and, and backpacking and their kids using them and fishing and hiking and diving. And it's, it's been amazing. So like I said, there's about 15 of those left and about 50 of the extra large t-shirts and, uh, uh, well supplies last as they say. So hit up, uh, the great nato.com slash shop and, um, You know, we, we might do some, some merchandise, something different, uh, this fall and winter. So stay tuned. We're, we haven't decided yet, but, uh, but as always just kind of keep listening. |
| Jason Heaton | All right. Well, that all sounds great. Nice to finally catch up and to be back in front of the microphone, you know, those, those, uh, Kirchhoff, you know, TGN adventure flag posts were the only thing that I kind of missed out on. I came back today and went through Instagram on, on the computer. Yeah. Um, and looked through my and saw a bunch that, you know, this post has expired this. So I assume that was all people sharing, uh, and tagging and that sort of thing. So I think it's super fun. I love to see all that kind of stuff. So, um, it'll be great to see more and hopefully we can go through the last few sets. I probably need to buy at least one or two of those from our stock for a Christmas present. Yeah, true. Right. But, uh, yeah. So what do you say we get into some risk check? |
| Jason | Yeah, let's do it. What did you wear on your, on your long getaway? And then, uh, what are you wearing today? |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. So I kind of did something stupid for the getaway. Um, I, I wanted, I wanted to kind of, again, kind of like leaving my laptop at home and removing a lot of the notifications from my phone. I wanted a bit of a palate cleanser for watches and I only brought my Garmin, uh, the descent mark two. Wow. And then you could tell that I must've just been so stressed out from how work has been the last little while. And, and you know, I made a few mistakes in my planning for packing for the trip, but I got the charger. That was okay. The camera was all, it was all good. That stuff was all, but, but especially when it came to the watch, the Garmin is perfect for this sort of vacation. Absolutely ideal. It changes the time zone. Obviously, uh, Newfoundland is on a 30 minute offset. So it's an hour and a half ahead of where I am. So none of my other GMTs would have been especially helpful. But I looked at the, uh, you know, you know, when you, you can tap that top left button and brings up that additional menu and you can see how long the battery will last. And I was like, Oh, 30 days. That's fine. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | And I get out, I get out there and we start hiking and I put it into the hiking mode and it's like, I can do this for seven hours. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. Uh, you know, to do the, the, the really advanced, all the tracking and, and everything like the full, the full suite with the track back feature and the rest of it. Right. And I was like, Oh, I didn't bring the charger. Yeah. Yeah. I left the little clamp charger on my desk. Cause I looked at it and I thought, Oh, it's full. It'll be fine. Like six days or seven days or whatever. And so I was constantly kind of like massaging the power, settings. Sometimes like I disconnected it from my phone. I have a no more heart rate stuff like all this. And in the end I kind of thought like, man, I should just brought like the SPV 143 and had that as a backup. And then I could have used this just as I was going on a hike, like a tool watch for the hike and then switched over to a standard watch otherwise. But the Garmin is a fantastic watch. I really, really love it. It works so well for a lot of different things. But if you're going on a vacation, even a short one, and you intend to do some hiking and you wanna track all that, I end up using that max track setting, which is like a little bit less accurate, but does basically the same thing once you get back. Just don't be like me and don't think that you're really saving a lot of stress by leaving the cable at home, just bring the charging. |
| Jason | Wait, you did the whole trip on one charge? |
| Jason Heaton | Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. That's amazing. I think I came back with like 14 or 15% and that was with maybe 10, 12 hours of max track hiking. |
| Jason | Wow, that's impressive. |
| Jason Heaton | And then it was just a question of like, when I wasn't using it, I would like at night, cause I didn't need an alarm or whatever. I would just fully shut it off. |
| Unknown | Yeah. Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | So it really does last a long time. Um, it, it, the only thing where you don't is, is, you know, that gives you all these projections when you're looking at the different profiles for the GPS tracking and the difference between the max track, which I think only pings the GPS occasionally. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | But I mean, even then it gives you, in my mind, it gives you one of the most important readouts, which is, it tells you your average moving speed. So if I stopped to take a picture, Yeah. That number doesn't change. It's only kind of calculating it based on your steps. Yeah. It's really clever. Yeah. And, and, and that setting, it can go for a long time. Like, like I said, like the 30 days or whatever, right. Not of measuring, but, but in mixed use. Um, but if you wanted the glown ass and the heart rate monitor and the track back ability, and maybe the connection to your phone and the rest of it, that's like I said, that's one long hike. Um, and you can, you can run the battery down. Um, but that, that, that super low power mode is cool. Cause it shuts the screen off. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. Um, and you just have to touch a button to wake it up and you get a quick view and it tells you obviously how long you've been hiking your distance, um, the compass, the rest of it, but then it also gives you this moving speed and it performed great. And it was nice. We could, we could go on a hike or two and then go to a brewery and sit down and I'd, I'd turn the phone sync back on, sync up the hike, disable the phone sync, and then look at it on our phone and be able to share like the different metrics and the rest of it. Um, so yeah, no, a great platform. One, I continue to really love and appreciate. But once I got home, I grabbed the SPB 143. I wanted something simple to go jump off a dock at the cottage. And I still just adore that watch. I love its loom. I love its size. It's amazing on a NATO. All the stuff I've talked about way too much over the last couple of years, none of it has changed. That watch isn't going anywhere for me. I could see owning a different version maybe someday, that sort of thing. But right now, I still love that original. uh, that I've got and, uh, have been wearing it a ton. It's so comfortable. I fall asleep with it on and the loom lasts all through the night. It's all the stuff you want from a Seiko in my opinion. It's just great. Um, so have a pretty busy month ahead when it comes to watches, uh, between figuring out how I want to do the final kind of big story for the new SSC 003, the GMT. Oh, sure. And the Aqua land and some stuff I can't talk about. And maybe a cool gold tone watch that I've been waiting for a little while should be in the mail by now. So there's, there's some pretty fun stuff coming. Uh, some of it will be stories for with, with Hodinke and then some of it will be stuff for the pod. And I I'm, I'm pumped for how September, October is looking for hands on. I've got stuff that I still haven't gotten to from the summer. Uh, so it's, it's nice and busy. So once a Geneva watch days is kind of wrapped up, I think that'll be the next focus. |
| Jason | Yeah. Nice. What do you been wearing? Gosh, you know, I, I had on the, my, my Blancpain, uh, Hodinkee bathyscaphe for a while there. And I posted a few photos on Instagram and people got very excited that, uh, that I was wearing that again. Cause I, I admittedly, I don't wear that watch as often. And when, boy, when I put it on, it was, uh, it just felt so good. I mean, you know, Ghoshani wears it a lot. It fits her well. And, uh, you know, I enjoyed wearing it, but I came back now today, I'm wearing the Benris type two, which I've been wearing a lot. Um, I got this watch, uh, from Ben Russ, um, for a photo project and then they've let me keep it. So, you know, super thrilled about it. I thank them and, you know, full disclosure, it was, uh, you know, they, they needed some photos of the watch and I was going diving and, and so it kind of worked out for a nice deal for me. And it's been, it's been great. It performed really well in the dive as, as you might expect. Um, but it keeps amazing time. Um, I, I don't think they make any claims about chronometer rating or, you know, or accuracy or whatever, but it's, it's been spot on. Um, I love the way it wears. I love that it's the sterile dial. It's just sort of this, uh, it's just such a basic watch. It's like a field watch dial. And, and admittedly, I'm not a, a field watch guy typically because I like a bezel. I like something to do, you know, when I'm just playing with the watch. And, and of course this has the 12 hour, uh, markings on the bezel, which, um, which conveniently work out for, for the offset for Sri Lanka time, I can actually set the hour between know kind of on the half hour and it kind of tracks pretty well for for my in-laws over in Sri Lanka which is on a like Newfoundland on a half hour offset so that's pretty cool um and it just wears well it's got this you know really sloped kind of profile to it traditionally or originally this watch would have had fixed spring bars this one comes with removable so you could put two-piece straps on but I'm almost tempted to put on like shoulderless spring bars and just lock it in for good and almost make it like a faux fixed bars, because I think it looks good on a NATO strap. |
| Jason Heaton | Absolutely. Yeah, those are beautiful watches. Great design. |
| Jason | Yeah. Yeah. So that's a lot of fun. Yeah. We should probably jump into our main topic, which is a really exciting one, and one that we recorded a long time ago. Gosh, it's been June or July, I think. |
| Jason Heaton | It's good. It gave me time to read it. Yeah, true. I'm such a slow reader. I finally went on vacation and read the book that we'll be talking about. Uh, I'm getting ahead of ourselves. Why don't you, uh, intro, uh, Kim and, and, and what this chat is all about. |
| Jason | Yeah, sure. So as the, as the title of the episode suggests, um, I sat down with, uh, at least virtually with Kim Sherwood and, and Kim is a British author, um, in her early thirties. She, um, she's a lecturer in creative writing at the university of Edinburgh in Scotland. And, um, she's, uh, also a huge James Bond fan and has been for her whole life. In fact, I believe her grandfather was in one of the Bond films in a fairly small role, um, which, which tied her to the franchise in a very odd way historically. But the reason that, that I spoke with her and we're so excited about this episode is that she has recently written, completed the first of what will be three kind of continuation double O novels, uh, with the full blessing of the Ian Fleming, um, foundation, which is the kind of the, the descendants of Ian Fleming, um, that kind of control, you know, who gets to write James Bond novels kind of under the double O banner, right? She was chosen to write a three book series and, and the first one to come out, which actually publishes today, September 1st in the UK is called double or nothing. And, um, it's, it's a fantastic book and, and you and I have both had a chance to read it. Uh, she sent advanced copies. uh, in preparation for this episode. And, uh, and like I said, I, I talked to her back in, gosh, I believe it was even in June. And I thought at the time, Hey, we're going to be able to like run this next week. And then while I was talking to her, she said, uh, no, uh, this is all embargoed. All my interviews are embargoed until September 1st. So we kind of sat on it and here we are. So it was a great chat. She's really friendly. Um, really just a kind of a fun person to talk to and just so enthusiastic about the Fleming books and about the James Bond universe. And, um, And the book's great. What did you think of it? You liked it too, right? |
| Jason Heaton | I absolutely loved it. Yeah. I, I've never read a bond novel, uh, to completion. I've read elements of casino Royale, I think was the only one I've ever dipped into. Clearly I've missed out on something because if it's anything like what, um, what, uh, Kim put together for double or nothing, I loved it. I, you know, I thought it was, the pace was incredible. The storytelling was great. Her writing style is super accessible, but very detailed and, and feels it has that like edge that you want in a bond. If that makes sense. Yeah. You know, take, take it from a guy who's long been a nonfiction snob. Uh, I shouldn't have been, you know, over the past year or two, I've dipped into a bunch of books that were recommended by people to me over time. And we've talked about a handful of on this. I actually have another one in, um, in final notes, but a double or nothing is absolutely worth whatever few bucks they're charging for it on, on your favorite version of how to read a book. I thought it was great. And I think we should jump right into the interview. |
| Jason | All right, Kim Sherwood, welcome to the Granado. Thanks for joining me today. This is really a thrill. |
| Kim Sherwood | Oh, thank you for having me. It's really lovely to be here. |
| Jason | We had chatted a bit before we started recording here. And I also am subscribing to your Substack newsletter and your latest one. We're recording this actually in mid to late June. This show will run quite a bit later. But in your latest installment, you had just returned or you were just writing from Agatha Christie's home. in, is it the South of England? Am I getting that right? |
| Kim Sherwood | That's right. Yeah. Yeah. And the Southwest down in Devon, which is the sunny part of the UK. So I was there for 10 days. I just left yesterday and it's really magical. It's an old Georgian sort of manor house set in Parkland over the River Dart. And they very generously, it's owned by the National Trust now, and they very generously let writers go and stay in, in what was the servant's quarters of the house. And so I was there for 10 days writing a big chunk of what will be the second book in the 00 trilogy. It's just amazing because you have that long time to write and there's no distractions as this. I ironically, for someone writing Bond, can't drive. So you can't leave. You're just there in the estate. And it's it gives you a chance to really to kind of speak with your characters and get immersed into the world. So I was really grateful for the opportunity. |
| Jason | Wow. That's amazing. Have you had a chance to visit GoldenEye by chance, given the Bond connection? |
| Kim Sherwood | No, not yet. Oh God, that's like the top of my list of things I would like to do and I keep wondering if I tell people that Jamaica is going to appear in the books, whether it does or it doesn't, will I then be given access to GoldenEye? Like can someone arrange that? I need to work on it. |
| Jason | My wife and I were there to October of 2019 and we weren't staying in the Fleming Villa, which is hugely expensive, um, but they, it wasn't occupied at the time. So they gave us a little walkthrough tour of it. And it was, I mean, it's, it is inspiring. It's, it's a really amazing place. You can see why. And, and I'm sure as you experienced at Agatha Christie's old house that, um, I don't know, just being in that environment is, is inspiring, right? It sort of seeps into you. |
| Kim Sherwood | Absolutely. I always find visiting writers homes and seeing that space that for them, was there was their working space it was every day but there's also something quite sacred about it because it's a space of creativity you know it's almost like a workshop you know it's like here things are being built imaginary worlds are being built and that's amazing to step into that here in the UK you can visit Virginia Woolf's house and they have her writing desk and everything out in the she worked in this shed in the garden and just standing there and sort of soaking it in you feel inspired yeah that's amazing so I mean are you |
| Jason | Are you a fan of Agatha Christie? Were you a big reader of Agatha Christie novels? |
| Kim Sherwood | So yeah, definitely a fan and then became more of a fan staying there. So I first stayed there in 2019 when I was writing my next novel that's not a Bond novel will be A Wild and True Relation, which will be out next year and is set in 18th century Devon. So Agatha Christie's house, which is Regency and in Devon is the perfect place for it. So I finished that novel, Staying There, in 2019, and I read a lot of Christie when I was staying there, including Dead Man's Folly, which is set at the house. Oh, wow. You know, they're finding bodies in the garden. So staying in the house, and there was actually a storm when I was staying there, so the public couldn't come in. So I had the whole place to myself for three days, the whole estate. And I was walking where all these bodies are found in the book while reading it, and I was thinking, God, any minute now, any minute now, there's going to be a corpse. Yeah, right, right. So yeah, I love her writing. And she was another writer, you know, much like Fleming actually, who was very well traveled, like surprisingly well traveled for her time. And that really informed her books. And I love how she writes about place. |
| Jason | I'm ashamed to admit, I've never read any Agatha Christie, but you know, it's just part of our collective unconscious, so to speak. I mean, just from the shows and the movies and the, you know, and I feel like I know her so well, but this is probably a bit like similar with Fleming, right? I mean, people, so many people know the Bond movies, But I'm always such a proponent of like, read the books, the books are, you know, spectacularly good. |
| Kim Sherwood | Yeah, I think you put it so well there because there are very few fictional characters who get a life beyond the page to the extent that Bond has, you know, maybe a few Shakespearean characters, maybe Sherlock Holmes, maybe Poirot, speaking of Agatha Christie, maybe today Harry Potter. You know, those are characters where even if people couldn't tell you when they came out or who wrote them or any of those things, they sort of, they know them and they can picture them and they feel like they're real. You know, they're characters who've taken on this life force. And certainly with Bond, you know, that's happened in relationship with the films. And I say in relationship because I think that really the Fleming books, in some ways they're quite different from the films and I would really recommend that people read them. One because I think, I think Fleming's style isn't talked about enough. I think he's a beautiful prose stylist and I just would recommend the books for the style alone. Bond's character is on a journey, he's on an arc in the books in a way that perhaps the films lack or maybe lacked until Daniel Craig's films which have a definite arc to them. But the Bond character in the books he ages and his adventures take a toll on him and he becomes tired and he becomes self-doubting and cynical and angry and has existential crises and you know as these things go on and he's very self-aware, he's aware of his own image. There's a fantastic moment in From Russia With Love where the Russians are kind of plotting how to bring down the secret service and they think about the symbol of the secret service and maybe they can attack the symbol And they say that the strength of the UK resides in myth, the myth of Scotland Yard, of Sherlock Holmes, of the Secret Service. How can we attack the myth? Is there not a man who lives up to these heroic deeds? And another character replies, well, there is a man called Bond. So Fleming is pointing to, look, here's this myth I've created, this heroic character. And now the villains are going to spend the book dismantling that myth. So if you have a self-aware character like that, then it's a character that's capable of change. He's a character where he ages. He's aware of his own follies. He's aware of the workings of his own mind and the point of view gives us that gift. And if a character is capable of change, then they're sort of evergreen. And I think that's how the films have managed to carry on for so long, because they inherited a character or took on a character who kind of had a life of his own, you know, and was able to be larger than life, able to adapt. And I think that's what we've seen through the series. So I would always say to people, go back to the books because, you know, that's where it all begins. And I think so, so much of the films, whether it's the visual language or the humor or the, or the sort of sheer style of it comes, I would say from the books. |
| Jason | Yeah. I studied English literature for my major in, in university. And I, I always, I don't want to say look down on, but ignored the kind of the thriller genre. whether it's a spy thriller or, or, you know, murder mystery and things like that. It wasn't any sort of snobbery. It just, I was so used to kind of reading books for this sort of heavy, like you're always looking for the meaning and the literary devices and things like that. Now I can't get enough of the thrillers. I've, I've, you know, I've, I've discovered Alistair McLean, Forsythe. I just finished Eye of the Needle. Have you read that? Ken Follett? No, I've not read that one. It's incredibly good. It is so good. I listened to an audio book. It was read by Samuel West, the actor. And it was just, but I feel like I'm, I'm like, like being reborn in literature by reading this, this genre. And I think what, what always struck me about the Fleming books is his writing is amazing in his character development, but also that I think what appeals to people and what really stands out and what has influenced my own work is that attention to detail, I think is like no other. And I think he was a pioneer of that, right? |
| Kim Sherwood | Yeah, absolutely. He has that kind of journalist's eye, and you can see it in his travel writing as well. I'd really recommend if people are sort of new to Fleming, as well as reading Bond, I'd suggest reading Thrilling Cities, which is his travel writing, because he has that very keen observational eye, which I'm sure stemmed also from working in intelligence during the war, sort of that eye for detail. that makes things feel real. So it's those small moments, you know, there's a moment in the books where Bond, he lands in an airport, and I think it's in just outside Vegas, I think it's in Nevada, it's incredibly hot. And there's a little machine in the airport that's like a kind of test your oxygen kind of machine, you know, it's like a little gimmick. And because he's hot, and he's frustrated, and he's tired, and he thinks, okay, I'll give that a go. So he goes and he tries that. And while he's distracted, something really key happens out of his eye. And it's that kind of thing where you think, Fleming must have walked through that airport, seen that, and thought, yes, that would, in the mood he's in right now, that would draw him, and that's going to be a great distraction for this other thing to happen. So he was always sort of picking up details about place, about gadgets, about clothing, about cars, about weaponry, that drive the story forward, and they're significant for character, and they lend that plausibility. So then when his plots are, you know, become quite fantastical, you really believe it because you're grounded in these details that create a sense of the real world. |
| Jason | Yeah, true. I've just realized that we've, um, I have buried the lead here because we didn't really even talk about kind of what prompted you coming on The Grey Nado and to backtrack a bit, you have this, this incredible gig, if I can, you know, dumb it down to that term. Um, of, of writing, I guess what we'd call a continuation double O novel, but it's with a twist, right? Because here we are talking about Fleming's writing style and things, and there have been other authors that have, that have been, I guess you'd say given permission to write bond continuation novels where double O seven is actually in the book. And a lot of these have been. very close to the style of Ian Fleming's writing. And you're almost reading it as if you're reading Fleming. I think Horowitz talks about that. He's even used passages or hit, you know, um, unused Fleming content in his books and things like this. I had a chance to read an advanced copy of double or nothing, your new book. Um, and it's so different, but it's, it's set in that world. I guess, first of all, how did this come about and, and how did you decide how to approach this? Because it must've been a very daunting. kind of intimidating assignment. |
| Kim Sherwood | And then I became a Bond fan seeing the Pierce Brosnan films on TV. And I was completely entranced. And then I started reading Fleming. I was probably around 12. And I told my mom I wanted to write a spy story, but I didn't know how. And I grew up in in London in Camden, and there's a fantastic secondhand bookshop in Camden. My mom took me there and said, well, if you want to write a spy story, you should read some. So I bought From Russia With Love, the pan paperback, that quite pulpy cover, which I love. And I read it and I was just immediately entranced. It's got that amazing opening line that's something like, um, the man lying naked beside the swimming pool might've been dead. Immediately you're like, well, is he or isn't he? And who is he? And why might he be dead? |
| Jason | It just pulls you in. And as a 12 year old, like a naked man lying by the pool. |
| Kim Sherwood | And his body's described as inanimate meat and, you know, so scary. And he has next to him, it's something like, you know, all of the things that a rich man carries. And then it describes his money roll and his watch and all of these things. And I loved that detail and the sense of being invited into the secret world. So I was immediately pulled in. And so all of my life, I've been saying to people sort of half-jokingly, one day I want to write James Bond. But of course, that's the kind of thing you say, but you never think anyone will take you seriously. And I was very lucky that somebody did. So my agent remembered that the first time we'd ever had lunch together, I said, I'd love to write Bond. And she heard that the Fleming estate were looking for a new writer. So it's all still run by the Fleming family, and they were looking for a new writer. And my agent remembered that I had tweeted when my first novel came out, Testament, I had tweeted a picture of it in a bookshop on a shelf next to Anthony Horowitz's Bond book. And I tweeted something like, oh, one step closer to my dream of writing Bond. So she scrolled through my Twitter, it's 2018, found that, screenshot it, sent it to the Flemings and said, this might be the right for you. So they then read Testament, my first novel, which they really liked. And they invited me to send them some ideas. And they said, do you have anything that sort of shows you're a fan? Because, you know, this is their family legacy. It's really important to them that anybody who writes Bond really, really cares. So they wanted a way to sort of demonstrate that. And very luckily, my mum had kept a school report that I wrote when I was about 13. And the task was to write about an author you admire. And I'd written about Ian Fleming. And I still have the report. So I sent them a copy of that. And I just said, you know, this is quite literally a lifelong dream. And, you know, I'd be honored to send some ideas, which I did, and which they liked, and it all kind of took off from there. So what they were after was a sort of expansion of the James Bond universe. So books that are about Bond, but also about other double agents and kind of can bring in almost an ensemble cast of new heroes. So that was really exciting for me to have this chance to both honor Fleming's writing and to create something set in the modern world, something fresh, and something that hopefully kind of speaks to Fleming's world. |
| Jason | I would say that having read it, you really, it has all of the elements that I've enjoyed about Fleming's books without aping the style specifically. And I think that that goes well with the content because Bond isn't in this book. I mean, there's no double 07 in the book. He's, he's missing, right? He's, he's, he's lost. And so we have this young crack team of very interesting and diverse other double O agents. And was that a conscious decision on your part to kind of veer from the style a little bit because of that? |
| Kim Sherwood | Well, I kind of thought, you know, I can't, I can't write like Fleming. I can only write like me. So I looked for places where our writing might share a DNA in a sense, because I've been so influenced by him, you know, he has influenced my style. So For example, he uses a kind of third person omniscient point of view, this roving point of view that can get into different characters heads. And I thought, well, that's sort of perfect if I'm writing an ensemble story with multiple characters, you know, to be able to have that roving eye. So I sort of took that. He has these very vivid similes, these sort of very uncanny imagery, as I was talking about in From Russia with Love, Red Grant's body as inanimate meat, you know, sort of images like that I love. In Casino Royale, there's that image of the Shifu's hands as pink crabs scuttling across the green table. So I thought, OK, I'll try and, you know, that sort of suits. I love imagery as a writer and that kind of suits me. So bring that in. So that was partly the approach to kind of think where do we have things in common. And then the other challenge was, as you say, James Bond is missing. So I thought if we're going to bring in these other 00 characters, in a way, James Bond becomes a problem because he's such a star that if he's there, if he's in the scene, he's who you pay attention to. You don't really care about anybody else in the room. It's about him. It's his story. Yeah. So I thought, well, you know, I thought about it like sort of in the metaphor of stars, stars have gravity. If James Bond were to have gravity, if he is at the centre of this universe, how would I arrange the other 00s in relation to him? So one of the characters, 003, Johanna Harwood, had a romantic relationship with him. Another one, 009, Sid Vashir, Bond was kind of his mentor. And after Harwood's relationship with Bond, she and Sid then get together, so there's also sort of something of a love triangle. So they, in that kind of metaphor of the universe of Bond's gravity, they're very close to his star. And then there's another character, 004, Joseph Dryden, who, you know, has his own story going on, his own journey. He, you know, he knows Bond as a, you know, somewhat gruff, surly, arrogant, you know, kind of good looking guy who's around the office, and that's his view of Bond. What worries him is if Bond is missing, then there's a problem. There's a security breach somewhere and that comes in. So once I've got my universe like that, then you think, okay, then take the star away, make him missing, build it into the plot. And then the question is, how are they going to find him? And that way you can bring him in through flashbacks with the characters who who really miss him and really care about him, like 003 or like Moneypenny. And you can you can set him aside a little bit when you're with 004, who isn't really thinking about him. You know, he's on his own mission. Yeah. But it helped me in a way to build the concept into the story, you know, sort of a metafictional element. If James Bond is missing conceptually, then let's make him missing literally. |
| Jason | Yeah. And I want to, I want to revisit the, your writing process and kind of how you put all that together, but I'm going to set that aside just for a second because you mentioned these characters and I, that's what I found incredibly striking about this book is that you've taken some familiar names, um, money, penny M and you've promoted some people, you've moved people around, you've, um, it's, and then the cast of characters, the main cast of characters that the double O agents, are a very, it's a very 21st century, modern, dynamic group of people. We have different, again, I don't want to be giving things away, but maybe this is okay. Sexual orientations, ethnic backgrounds, you know, all sorts of things that, and capabilities. And, and I found that so refreshing and it makes me think that some of the criticisms leveled at Fleming's work, looking back retrospectively are, Um, you know, the way women are handled in the books, um, some undertones of racism, colonial sort of mindset, things like this. And I found, you know, your book to be obviously a nice, um, update to that while keeping the same thing that, uh, you know, that so many of us love about the Fleming books and the bond universe in general. Was that difficult for you to kind of navigate that? Or were you intimidated or, or, or, or. hesitant to kind of make those updates? |
| Kim Sherwood | It was sort of exciting in a way because you're given a lot of leeway really as a writer by the films because each new actor has kind of brought a new iteration of the Bond universe. Even when there were constants, you know, even when you had Lois Maxwell as Moneypenny across Connery and Moore or you have the same M across different actors, you know, both with Bernard Leigh and with Judi Dench. So there are some constants that remain, and then there are differences, you know, and the films are always a reflection of the times. And that gives me as a writer, the room to manoeuvre to make this book, Double or Nothing, hopefully a reflection of its times as well. And also, because of that, as we were talking earlier about that sort of cultural unconsciousness, I think or I hope, people kind of go with you a little bit. So For example, with M and Moneypenny, I thought, well, in the books M is the head of, described on point as the head of the double O section. But then in the films, really, M is positioned as the head of MI6 as a whole. And then I thought, well, what if I say that M is the head of MI6 as a whole, which means that we have space for a head of the 00 section. And then I thought, well, again, in that sort of cultural unconsciousness, Moneypenny has been a secretary since the 1950s. So it's really due for a promotion. |
| Unknown | Right, right. |
| Kim Sherwood | You know, I say that jokingly, but also the serious part of that is that readers and audiences imbue money penny with authority because we know her so well now we're so used to her and because she has that very important relationship with bond so i thought let's let's make money penny head of the double a section let's give her the you know the promotion i think she's she's overdue um and and put her in charge of things yeah There was just some, you know, it's a little bit like moving chess pieces. Let's just move this one here, move this one here. It's just slight adjustments. It's all the people that you, that you know and love, but just in slightly different roles. |
| Jason | Felix Leiter. |
| Kim Sherwood | Yeah, Felix Leiter. |
| Jason | He's in Berlin, right? Yeah. |
| Kim Sherwood | Yeah. Yeah. I was really, I really wanted to bring Felix in, partly because he's my husband's favorite character in Bond. And he kept saying, you've got to bring in Felix, you've got to bring in Felix. But also because of the way that Felix has been handled in the films, because we had different actors playing him for so long, and we didn't really have any continuity with him until the Craig era. Because of that, his arc in the books isn't really replicated in the films. So in the books, we have the shark and he loses limbs and he almost dies. And then you see him afterwards and you see the consequences of that, you see him with prosthetics, he has to leave the CIA and he joins Pinkerton's detective agency, although over and out again he's sort of seconded back into the CIA. But the films didn't really deal with that. And I was also interested in, there was something that I felt Fleming hadn't delved into, he touches on it but he doesn't delve into it, the trauma of being eaten alive by Great White Sharks, you know, what is that like for Felix to have been this man of action and then to go through this horrendous trauma and to have his body changed and to have the shape of his career change, especially when his best friend is James Bond of Daring Do, who's out there doing it, you know, out there being a man of action still. So what's that relationship like? So I thought I'll keep Felix in the CIA, as Pinkertons isn't, you know, such a thing now. But I'll say that he's kind of taken a desk job. So he's the head of the CIA in Berlin, our man in Berlin. And it was so fun to write him because he has such a fun voice in Fleming. So it was really fun to take him and kind of bring him into the modern day and to take a look at the, you know, the sort of trauma that he'd gone through. |
| Jason | Yeah. I'm curious with these characters that we all know from the books and the films, when you're writing those characters, do you have a specific face in mind from the films or don't you do that? You know, like, do you see Jeffrey Wright as Felix or do you see Jack Lord as Felix? |
| Kim Sherwood | That's a good question. I think I just see Fleming's descriptions because that's kind of Because I was, you know, all the time while writing this, I was rereading and rereading and rereading. So I was getting those descriptions really firmly in my mind. But there are there are things from the films that certainly do cross over. So I love Lois Maxwell as Moneypenny. I love her style in the Connery films. They put her in beautiful silk shirts and very bright brooches. She has a sunfish brooch that I love. and really, you know, quite subtle, but beautiful jewelry. So I was looking at all of that and thinking, how can I sort of borrow from that visual language? And then of course, with Bond, you know, everybody has their favorite Bond and you'll have films that stand out and that kind of thing. So in a sense, it blurs together the face that you picture, and you might just picture one actor, you might have multiple favorites. So different things would come in at different points in the writing process, but I was always returning to to Fleming's description of Bond and Fleming's sort of voice for Bond. |
| Jason | Yeah. What was your, or what is your favorite Fleming Bond novel? Do you have one? |
| Kim Sherwood | My favorite is from Russia with Love, which was the first one I read. So I think in part that's why, because that was so influential on me. But I also really love I mean, I love the early ones too, but I, I love them as they get deeper in and he becomes a little older, a little tired, a little more beaten around the edges and a little less pleased with himself. And then he begins to sort of doubt, um, and he'd see that quite a bit and from Russia with love. Um, and then you do in Goldfinger as well, actually, and onwards. Um, but that's the one that I, that I would, um, press into people's hands if I could just get them to read one. |
| Jason | Yeah. I think my propensity for scuba diving, makes Thunderball very appealing to me and elements of live and let die. But, um, I love Moonraker the book. And I'm always telling people forget about the movie because it was my least favorite film. The book is so good. I love, I love the driving scenes. And I think that plot to me felt the most, I don't know if realistic is ever a word you can use, but you know, it felt like plausible. And I think nowadays we see, kind of these megalomaniacs launching rockets, right? And I mean, you know, with good villain names. I mean, Elon Musk, you know, I mean, come on. |
| Kim Sherwood | Moonraker also has one of the best female characters in Bond who doesn't translate to the film. She's not in the film, Gala Brand. She's sort of a Scotland Yard policewoman, but kind of in an investigative arm. And really it's her case. She's undercover. with the villain. And it's her case that Bond joins. And I love that, that she's sort of in the lead. And then she's thinking, oh, God, here comes this 00, you know, with this flashy style that might be useful. It's all set in the UK. And she thinks, you know, that might be useful abroad. But, you know, what good is it here in Kent? You know, it's like, just doesn't want him to mess it up. And their relationship, their sort of professional respect for each other as the book goes on. I really love that. I think she's she's certainly one of the best characters in Bond. It's a shame she hasn't made it into a film. |
| Jason | Yeah. Obviously this is a very literary discussion, but when we move over to the films, you kind of came of age, so to speak, with Pierce Brosnan, would you say? Yeah. Was he your, is he kind of a sentimental favorite bond or do you have a different one? |
| Kim Sherwood | Pierce Brosnan is definitely my favorite. I mean, the bond you grew up with is really influential because it's the one that you first get to know. You know, when I played imaginary games, it was him pretending to be when I was a little kid, he was the first one I saw in the cinema. And I think that makes a really big difference. And I love his, I love the way he plays Bond, he's so suave. He's so cool under pressure. He has the right level for me of humor with it. And then he has a kind of darkness that sits just underneath that veneer. And I really love how he, you know, it's almost like every now and again, he'll let it rise to the surface. So something like the scene in Tomorrow Never Dies where he's waiting for Terry Hatch's character to come to the hotel and he's drinking alone with that gun next to him. And there's that really dark look of sort of anger and disdain and discomfort and pain on his face. Um, and then, and then he sort of, um, almost closes the door on that again. And he was also, you know, the nineties were a great time, I think for, for spy films and for action, they had a really good balance of tone. So I enjoyed the silly end of things and I enjoyed the serious end of things. And I think the action, the stunts were amazing, you know, that, that jump off the dam, what a way to introduce it. And it was also, they began to, deal with his character really thoughtfully, and that's not to say, I hesitate there, because that's not to say that he wasn't dealt with thoughtfully before, but I think when you get to the 90s, they're kind of asking themselves, I think the filmmakers are asking themselves, what does Bond mean in the 90s? How do we update this character? without losing who he is, because we still want him to be Bond. We don't want suddenly this new character who's kind of up to date with the politics of then the 90s. But we want a film that's more palatable, perhaps to sort of modern concerns and ideas. So they kind of bake that in, you know, with with Judi Dench's M saying to him, you're a, you know, misogynistic dinosaur, a relic of the Cold War. They're kind of talking to themselves about about their own franchise. And then and then they're saying, no, now watch us reinvent it. But with the character remaining who you always loved. And I just love that balance. So I'm, yeah, I'm a big fan of the Brosnan films. But I do think, you know, of course, it's hard to say, because Sean Connery, the original, the icon, you know, that stalking panther-like walk alone, you know, watch him all day. And Daniel Craig's done an amazing job rejuvenating the character. You know, I really think what he's done is a revolution in the Bond world. And I think, you know, that what they've achieved with that arc is incredibly moving and new. You know, they've done something new. |
| Jason | Yeah. Yeah. I personally feel that Connery kind of, when I close my eyes or I'm reading Fleming, I picture Connery as kind of the physical embodiment of Bond. But the Brosnan films have held up so well that when you go back and rewatch them, I think people, when Daniel Craig came along, they thought, oh, this is such an improvement, but go back and rewatch Goldeneye. And it's a really strong film. |
| Kim Sherwood | Goldeneye is a classic and I think, you know, that's the thing about any new Bond will take attention away from the last one. And that's, you know, that's only right because that's that character's and that actor's time. So when you look at, for instance, the difference between Die Another Day and Casino Royale, you know, you could think of these even the same franchises. It seems so different. And that was Daniel Craig's time, you know, he was reinventing it. But because of that, perhaps the Brosnan films have been a bit neglected recently. So yeah, I would really recommend, you know, to people if you're still sort of feeling in mourning from No Time to Die, go back to the Brosnan films. |
| Jason | Yeah, yeah. And I think the thing that I like about some of the pre-Daniel Craig films, even Casino Royale to a certain degree, is I always think of the Bond films. The books felt like very self-contained full stories, but with the films, it's the kind of thing on a Saturday afternoon on a hot summer day, you click on the TV and oh, you're halfway through. Right. Oh, I don't know. On Her Majesty's Secret Service or something. You can just pick up and watch an hour and a half or 45 minutes and turn it off and you're satisfied. It's all about scenes for me. It's all about iconic scenes. A lot of the movies were deeply flawed as an overall film or plot, but, um, The movies, to me, are all about the scenes, and I think the Brosnan ones particularly were good at that. |
| Kim Sherwood | Absolutely. And going back to the Connery films as well, and beginning with Ken Adams' set designs in Goldfinger, I think they were in a way built to be watched like that, you know, built to be viewed as these, these set pieces, these kind of, these iconic images or scenes that, that you'll remember. And you might not even necessarily remember what film it's from or, you know, love the whole plot or anything, or remember what the villain wanted, you know, that doesn't matter. What matters is, you know, the design of Fort Knox, you know, you remember what that looked like. Yeah. Or, you know, in The Spy Who Loved Me, the way that the pyramids are lit up, you know, you remember that kind of thing. And that's what Bond is in a way. It's a sort of series of lasting images. |
| Jason | Yeah. Okay. We've talked, we've talked about the films for a bit here, but I want to get back to the writing because not only are you a successful and talented novelist, but you're also a lecturer in creative writing. And you, earlier you talked about setting 007 and how you kind of framed it in a novel that you wrote that doesn't have 007 in it as an active character, at least. I'm curious about your writing process. I mean, as someone who kind of is trying to be more of a fiction writer, I'm just curious, like, did the kernel come to you that, okay, in this book, 007 is missing Where do I go from there? Do you use whiteboards and big sheets of paper? How does it all start? |
| Kim Sherwood | I had the initial idea for, okay, Bond is missing. And that was the, the kernel is a good way to put it, because that was the sort of seed from which everything else grew. And I was on a train actually, fitting for Bond, when I found out the night before, kind of excitingly, I was shortlisted for this prize, the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award, which is a big deal here, and I was up for that. and which I didn't get an amazing poet one but Raymond Antropos but um that night at the at the sort of prize giving I found out I'd got Bond so I was walking around with the biggest grin on my face I couldn't tell anyone why you know they were probably thinking why is she looking so happy she didn't win yeah but uh I know I was so thrilled and then the next day getting the train home I began to make notes on my phone and I knew it was a trilogy and this idea of him missing began to grow And I had the idea for the arc from beginning to end, you know, not in tiny detail or anything like that, but just a shape, a shape in my mind. And I knew what I wanted to drive towards. So the first thing I wrote actually was the last scene in the trilogy. I mean, you know, I'm sure it'll change over time and things, but that was like, that was there as a kind of destination point. And then it was sort of, how do we get there? And I think a lot in terms of dialogue, when I'm coming up with characters, a character's voice is really important to me. So then it was a matter of working out who my other double O's are, as I was talking about earlier, and then finding their voices. So I would write down conversations that take place between Harwood and Bond or between Moneypenny and Bond and Moneypenny's memories or I'd write down kind of Felix talking about the shark attack and I'd look for where's the voice, where's the hook into that character. I do a lot of writing by hand in my notebooks, you know, both for drafts but also just character note, diagrams for the plot, you know, that kind of thing. So I always have a notebook next to me, even if I'm writing on my laptop. And then when it comes down to, you know, the actual plotting, the kind of intricacies of the plot, I like to get a big roll of wallpaper and roll that out and then draw on it a kind of timeline of events. And that's not to say I'll stick with that because I think the more you get to know a novel, the more it tells you what it wants to be. And so things change and characters take off in directions you weren't expecting. Um, but I still, I still have that sort of timeline for me to refer to and say, okay, you know, where are we heading on this line? Are we still heading in the right direction? |
| Jason | Huh? Interesting. Would you say that as you're developing these characters, do you, ever loosely sort of base them do you visualize or picture a certain person that you've met, or do you pull names from people I, I'm curious because, you know, in my own writing I'm always like, I'm, I'm picturing this guy who I met at a you know, at a cocktail party one time or this old high school buddy of mine or something. Do you do that? Or are these people complete figments of your imagination? |
| Kim Sherwood | I call it magpying. I'm always like a magpie, like stealing details from other people's lives. Um, so, you know, the lesson is, uh, watch out what you tell me. You might appear in a book, but it's all kind of going through a blender and becoming a new character. And for this, You know, inspiration came in different places. So for Bashir's character, for instance, I was walking down the tube and I saw a poster for something with a model and just something about the model's face. I just thought, oh, that's what he looks like. And I was just waiting, waiting for the tube, just kind of staring at his face and thinking, yeah, that's the that's that's the eyes of that man. So I'm always sort of looking for little details and little places and things that will kind of bring the character alive. Virginia Woolf talks about the facts that engender, so the details that kind of give rise to or generate or give birth to the story or the character, you know, the place, whatever it is you're trying to write about. So I'm always looking for what is the hook into this character. So for 003, Johanna Harwood, I was thinking about this notion of a license to kill and what it would mean to have a license to kill. And then I was thinking, well, what's the opposite of a license to kill? It's the Hippocratic Oath. It's a doctor's oath to heal people and to heal anybody. And then I thought, well, what if there'd been a character who trained as a surgeon and then something happened in their life that meant they became a 00? And so they embodied these dual, in some ways, opposite what would that be like for a person and how would that sort of be emblematic of their personality? So Harwood is somebody who's perhaps her main skills are kind of adaptability or flexibility and persuasion. So she's very good at reading people and working out what, what is needed to get what she wants from that person. But being adaptable like that, being able to have a multiplicity about yourself where you can hold those, those opposing oaths, for example, um that comes at a cost because who are you really you know who's your true self so it's it's finding things like that that that helped me go okay here's the the window into this character or with Dryden uh 004 Joseph Dryden he he was a special forces operator in the army and he sustained an injury in the field that means he's medically downgraded and he can't kind of serve on the front line anymore which is a route that people often take into being a spy You know, that injury for me and the experience of the recovery process, I talked to some medical doctors, military doctors, sorry, about, you know, what happens to men when they sustain an injury like this? What's the recovery like? I talked to some soldiers and it was that process, it was writing those chapters that made me think, oh yes, here's this man, here's this person who would who would sustain in some ways this life altering injury, um, but they would find a way to keep fighting because really they're not alive unless they're fighting. That's their, that's their whole life. So I'm looking for those kinds of ways into character. |
| Jason | You mentioned Dryden and it reminded me, um, of this fascinating solution to one of his ailments or his, um, I guess disabilities or, or, um, sustained, uh, injuries. And it was, it was, it was such a unique twist. Um, this, again, giving something away, but this implant that allowed him to not only hear, but, um, for Q to communicate and, and your, your notion of Q is very different. Describe that a bit. Cause I, it took me a while to kind of catch on what was happening there. |
| Kim Sherwood | Yeah. So Q in my world is a quantum computer, partly just cause it's a fun pun. I was thinking about the way that Fleming and then the films take technology that's really cutting edge, you know, that's sort of about to happen or is beginning to happen and they kind of take it to the next level. And quantum computing is being used in the fight against terror. It's being used by intelligence organizations to, for example, crunch kind of massive data sets about the currencies and money exchanges between terror groups. So I thought that's really interesting that computing is being used in that way. sort of like the computer becomes a spy itself. So how could I bring that in? And I also was aware, you know, Desmond Llewellyn as Q is so iconic. And then Ben Whishaw has done such a fantastic job. And I sort of didn't want to overwrite those characters. So I thought, yeah, I'll make you a quantum computer. And then he has a whole team of characters around him. I don't know why I'm gendering Q around it. So then i thought if you have this if you have this quantum computer you would want ways for it to be able to get information very quickly to your agents so the idea is rather than like a hearing aid you can see is a hearing aid implanted within the ear canal and within the skull that can in a sense read your mind so so these are being developed now and and people who use them you know they can It can help things like if they're in a crowded room, you know, if you if somebody with typical hearing is in a crowded room, they can sort of choose who to focus on and try and really hone in on that voice. But a hearing aid can't do that, the traditional one, because it's not intuitive. These sensory neural links, they can do that, they can choose somebody's voice, they can amplify it. And obviously a very useful skill for a spy to be able to eavesdrop on somebody across the room and to, in essence, stream that sound, that conversation back to Q. So Dryden was a character where I really wanted to kind of explore what's happening in technology at the moment, which is a kind of hybridity between human and technology. And for Dryden, this is a way for him to keep fighting. You know, that's what means he can keep serving and that's what he needs to still be him. So he said yes to it. But of course it comes with all sorts of implications. You know, who am I now that my mind in a way is shared with a quantum computer? |
| Jason | Yeah. I found Dryden the most, I don't want to say compelling, that diminishes the other characters, but the most interesting character to me because of this mix of real toughness with vulnerability. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| Jason | And I don't want to say insecurity, but he has, he has some things that make him second guess himself some. And then of course his physical challenges and then the punishment he takes in the book. I mean, it's like, it's just brutal. Yeah, no, I really liked the Dryden character. Yeah. |
| Kim Sherwood | It's tough. You know, you've got to put your characters through it because conflict drives story. Um, And then you've got to put them in the absolute worst place they can be and see if they can get out of it. But it's hard, you know, because by the time you get to the end of the book, you love your characters so much. You don't want anything to happen to them. |
| Jason | Yeah. Yeah. This revolutionary kind of quantum computing and medical technology with the lack of a better term hearing aid makes me think that that you obviously put a lot of research into a lot of different elements of the book. And you mentioned that you don't drive and yet a real central non-human character in the book is this Alpine A110 that I think Harwood drives. And it's, um, you know, it's a car that I've never driven, never actually seen in person, but I, I love that car. I've watched plenty of kind of videos of it and it's just such a beautiful car. And it's such a, you know, I love that Money Petty has, has the, the E-type Jag, which is, you know, kind of expected. You kind of have to have something like that in the book, but I love this twist of having, have an Alpine, uh, |
| Kim Sherwood | That kind of came through because the head of the Fleming estate collects Alpine cars. He's an amazingly cool woman. And so she said to me, you know, if one of the 00s is going to have a new car, can it be an Alpine? But I said, you know, I've never, I've never been in one. I've never even been in a sports car. And she said, well, that's got to be fixed. So yeah, Helping, we're doing a tour of the new car across the UK and they brought it up to Edinburgh where I live. But this was when it was still a secret, I was writing the book and I wasn't allowed to tell anybody and nobody knew and it wasn't public at all. So the Flemings arranged for me to go and be driven in the car, but the people who were kind of doing the tour were just told I was a VIP, hilariously, but not kind of like why I was there. Yeah. My husband Nick and I went along and I was taken out by a race car driver. And at first we're going around Edinburgh. I don't know if you've been to Edinburgh, but it's like lots of cobbled streets and narrow towns and everything. So we're going quite slowly and chatting away. And I was asking him questions and I was saying, so if you were driving this car really fast down a mountain and some other cars were in pursuit and it was nighttime, what would you be doing, do you think, to get away? And then he was saying, what is it you do? sort of writing about cars. And then he said, but you can't drive. No, that's true. Trying to interrogate him. And then while we were chatting away, we got a bit out of the city centre, which I haven't really noticed. And we were on a straight empty road. And then without warning me, he just floored it. Yeah. And I felt like my like, I'd left my skeleton somewhere back here. And the rest of my spirit was miles ahead on the road. And it was just an amazing feeling. And I've always thought that sports cars were beautiful aesthetically. But I didn't understand the price tag, you know, from a sort of practical standpoint, how is it different from a regular car? But God, driving at that speed, you know, when it finally stopped, I just said, can we do that again? It's like, this is amazing. And then they let Nick take it out. They let him drive it. And, uh, he, you know, he, he went off and he was gone for quite a while. So I was just chatting with the other staff there about the car and everything. And then eventually he came back and got out of the car and walked towards me looking so happy. So then I said, Oh, was that fun? And, you know, he nodded and I said, Oh, well, should we buy one? Like as a joke. And all of the people there didn't know that I, you know, I'm not necessarily in a position to buy a sports car. So they're all rushing over with brochures. Oh, well, we'd love to find you if you'd be interested. Yeah. Well, maybe maybe give me a bit of time. But they've offered to teach me to drive in one of the sports cars at a racetrack. And I don't know if this is a really good idea or a terrible idea. |
| Unknown | Oh, my gosh. |
| Kim Sherwood | If I flip a 70,000 pound car with me in it, my mom's not going to be happy. Oh, my gosh. |
| Jason | Don't pass that up. I mean, if, I mean, this, this could be the next iconic, uh, double O car, you know, we had the five that everybody remembers, but yeah. |
| Unknown | Wow. |
| Jason | I guess. Yeah. I mean, we're, we're getting close to the end of our time here, but I mean, do you, speaking of cars, I mean, do you have a favorite bond car from over the years? Did you like the BMWs of Brosnan or do you like the DB five or. |
| Kim Sherwood | I always felt as though nothing at all against BMW, but when he turned up in a BMW, I did feel a bit like, what is that doing here? Yeah, I'm very attached to the DB5. And I like how they've reused it over the years, you know, they know it's their touchstone car. And I think it's those sorts of talismans of Bond, you know, it's the it's the Aston Martin, it's the it's the Rolex or then the Omega. It's it's those things that are if you say to somebody who's even somebody who's not a massive Bond fan, what do you think of when you think of Bond? They're going to say, you know, martinis, Aston Martins, nice watches, nice suits. You know, those are the sort of the luxury that Bond wraps himself in. And in the books, he talks about using luxury to efface the memory of death. It's a sort of coping mechanism. And they put that in the films, too. You know, there's that great moment in The World Is Not Enough when Brosnan says he survives by taking pleasure in great beauty. And I think that that's sort of what we want from Bond, you know, we want that glamour and we want that beauty. So it was really exciting for me to, you know, to be able to bring in some of the traditional elements like that and, and then to, you know, get to put a new car in it and some new watches in it and, you know, that kind of thing. |
| Jason | Yeah. Yeah. There has been talk of, or maybe hopes from people that there will be spinoffs from the Bond universe. is filmically a word and, you know, in film, um, and I think your book is kind of headed in that direction, uh, in a literary sense. Um, but, but some people have thought, Oh, the, uh, Paloma character from no time to die, or I can't remember who else has been considered, but you know, what if you have a Felix lighter spinoff series or something? I mean, In your wildest dreams, would you love to see Double or Nothing in your trilogy become kind of a spinoff of the 00 universe? I mean, I think it almost feels like it would be a natural. Would you like that? Is that an ambition of yours or do you not care at all? |
| Kim Sherwood | I sort of, I mean, obviously it would be amazing. It'd be so exciting, you know, and I think it would be really fun to kind of see something that's just in my mind, to see it on the screen, you know, to externalize it would be really amazing. But in a way, it's quite nice to, you know, the sort of Fleming family still look after the books and the Broccoli family look after the films. And that's an amazing legacy that both of those families have held on to those properties, and that they have the relationship that they do. You know, I think that's really special. But they're separate, you know, they haven't sort of adapted the Horowitz novels or anything like that. They kind of run on their different train tracks. And in a way that's quite nice for me because it means I don't have to take anything else into consideration. It's just my train track that I'm on. And then where they do sort of intersect, to torture a metaphor, those train tracks, it's just really lovely. So, for example, when No Time to Die came out, they put on a premiere just for the Fleming family. and they invite along their writers and things. So we went along and saw it with the Fleming family, which was really amazing because you're there, you know, with, with people for whom it's their, it's their legacy, it's their history, uh, it's their uncle or great uncle, you know? And so to sit there and watch it with them felt so special. I mean, to get to be part of that world is such a privilege. It was, it was quite an out of body experience really. |
| Jason | That's great. You know, look, we're coming up on an hour here and it's just been, An incredible pleasure. I could talk for hours about writing and Bond and films and books. I mean, it's one of those things that I'm sure as you're going through these interviews with us and others, you know, there's such a bubbling enthusiasm among Bond nerds, as I'd like to call myself, that, you know, It would just be fun to get in a room with all of these people and just chat and discuss this stuff. |
| Kim Sherwood | Oh, wouldn't it? Absolutely. Well, you know, as a Bond nerd myself, this for me is amazing. I was so excited when it was actually made public and I could finally talk to people about it, you know, cause I've been burning to talk about it. And it's just been so amazing how welcoming everybody in the fan community has been, um, how excited people seem to be for the book. So I felt really grateful. |
| Jason | Yeah. And before we close out here, can you give some detail about, um, So double or nothing comes out in the UK on September 1st and in the US |
| Kim Sherwood | This isn't public right now, but it will be by September, so I think I can say this. In the US, it's going to come out a little bit later, so it'll be early the following year. So US folks have to wait a few months. And then the books will be roughly a year apart. Um, I'm trying to, um, write like Fleming and, um, yeah, I need to go to a villa and get it all down. |
| Jason | Yeah. His discipline was amazing, right? I mean, he would, he would write, I think he had a word count that he aimed for every day and he would sit and write every day for two or three months, then go back to London, edit for the rest of the year. And then, yeah. |
| Kim Sherwood | Yeah, exactly. And whatever he had in those three months was the book. So I'm trying to learn that discipline. Yeah. |
| Jason | Yeah. All right. Well, Kim Sherwood, it's been an incredible pleasure and a long time coming, and we really appreciate you being on The Grey Nato and all the best. I'm looking forward to the next book and what comes of your successful burgeoning career here. Thank you. Thanks so much for chatting with me. Okay, so long. |
| Jason Heaton | Okay, and that was Kim Sherwood. Kim, an absolute huge thank you from Jason and I for coming on the show and talking about Double or Nothing. And kind of your history and appreciation of the Bond world. I love to see these things, these franchises that are often rooted in a single person kind of expand. And, you know, I feel like this is something we talked about on our Bond episode, how cool would it be to kind of slow down the pace of the traditional James Bond movie and supplement that world with other double Os, which you know, are there. And it feels like not only obviously is Kim operating on a similar idea, but she She had it certainly beforehand and really executed at such a high level. This would, I think just this one story could make an incredible Netflix series, um, anything like that. But I think the starting point has to be to read the book. I thought it was so good. |
| Jason | I agree. I mean, you know, it had, it had so many elements. I mean, obviously well written. Um, she's a great writer, but I think what was interesting about this book is it's, it's part of this double Oh book, uh, continuation kind of trilogy that she's working on. James Bond is not in this book. And I think that's the interesting premise of it or what kind of draws you in. It's, you know, you come into this, this world populated by characters that will be familiar to you, um, from, from movies or, or the Fleming novels. Um, but Bond is not in this book and that that's part of the, the main plot element is, is kind of finding what has happened to him, but then it's populated by all of these familiar characters, but then these new double O agents, uh, young, diverse, varying talents and backgrounds and the stuff they get up to. The cars they drive, you know, interesting choice of vehicle. For sure. For one of the agents and just kind of the descriptions. I love what she did with Q Branch. I thought that was really clever. Yeah, it was just, it was really an entertaining read and I'm so excited that there's another one coming. She said in the interview that she's doing it about Um, they're going to be spaced out by about a year. So, so she's hard at work on, on number two right now. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, no, I thought it was fantastic. I highly recommend it. We'll have links to all this in, uh, in the show notes, but it's, uh, it's, it's not like a short book, um, by, by any stretch. It's a nice full story. Right. And it was, uh, the first of two books that I read over the, uh, over the, the holiday time that I took, uh, previously. |
| Jason | Nice. Yeah. So, um, yeah, thanks again to Kim Sherwood for joining us. I hope everybody enjoyed that. And, uh, We look forward to, uh, to kind of seeing how the book rolls out as well as, uh, as the second book. And it would be fun to chat with her, uh, at some point in the future and, and kind of as this trilogy gets moving. Absolutely. So, uh, you mentioned a second book that you read on vacation. Why don't we jump into final notes? Because I think that is your final note today. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. So I was lucky enough to have the time to read two books, double or nothing was incredible. Loved every minute of it, but I did have a little bit of pressure to get it done. Not only to have this recording makes sense, but also I wanted to read heat too. Yeah. Um, so a ton of you wrote me about heat too. Obviously I'm a massive Michael Mann fan. I've talked about it on probably just about every, uh, film club. I believe heat was in the first film club. It's one of my favorite movies. And I guess Michael Mann, uh, you know, it doesn't feel like he has enough on his plate making the new Ferrari movie. And he went ahead and wrote an extensive novel that kind of traces a run of time that is both before heat when the movie Heat is set and after. |
| Unknown | Huh. |
| Jason Heaton | Wow. Um, that mostly hinges on Chris Scherlis, uh, that was Val Kilmer's character in the movie. And it kind of gives you, um, a background because Robert De Niro's character, Neil was based on a real person, um, from Chicago, a real robber from Chicago, as was Vincent Hanna, who's played in the movie by Al Pacino, also based on a real cop from Chicago. And so it goes into their history and some bad people that they were both loosely involved with and how that person kind of affected their lives through the heat storyline and then beyond and afterwards. Yeah. And I love it. It's Michael Mann who wrote it, uh, supported by another author, Meg Gardner. And I, I, I can't say enough nice things. Two great books is what I'm happy to say. Very, very different books. I would say that, um, The writing from Heat 2 is much more rudimentary than what you get from Double or Nothing. Yeah, yeah. It's a little bit more straightforward. I think in some ways it kind of reads with the crispness of a screenplay. Okay, yeah. So I don't know if that means they're planning to make this book or who would play these guys at this point. Of course, Heat was made in 1994, came out in 95, so it's been a while. But I absolutely loved this. If you like Heat even a little bit, I think it's absolutely worth your time. cover to cover. I enjoyed almost every part of it. And it, and it has all the stuff that you like from heat, including very similar lines, a recap of the film itself, but in text and, and that sort of thing. So super fun. |
| Jason | Yeah. I was just going to ask if, if someone needs to watch the movie heat before they read the book in order to understand it, but it sounds like you just said there's a recap. Um, I haven't seen it for many years. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. Yeah. It'll make more sense if you watch the movie, but you definitely don't need it. Um, and, and, and maybe if you go in just on the book, you'll be able to see these people, how they're described versus De Niro, Kilmer, Pacino, et cetera. Yeah. So, uh, it's a, it's a two, two, a two book recommendation episode. Uh, certainly double or nothing is the number one poll, but if you're in the world of heat, if you enjoy a Michael Mann, that sort of thing, then Pete two is absolutely worth your time. |
| Jason | Good one. Yeah. I might pick that one. |
| Jason Heaton | What have you got for us? |
| Jason | Yeah, mine, mine came, uh, from a guy, uh, the follower on Instagram, uh, who goes by MJL944. And, uh, he sent me a direct message a few weeks ago asking if I had listened to Patagonia's Dirtbag Diaries podcast recently, because they did an episode on, uh, a place that actually worked in college. It was actually, it was called, uh, Midwest Mountaineering. It still is called Midwest Mountaineering. And this episode is, is called Ask Us, We've Been There. And it's about the owner. It was this, this guy that, um, you know, I met when I was working there, his name is Rod Johnson. And, you know, it always struck me as kind of funny that, that, you know, we don't really have mountains in Minnesota, but he established this place called Midwest Mountaineering and it, it's kind of the de facto outdoor shop in town. I mean, we have REI and a few other kind of big outdoor shops, but this was kind of the original, he established it back in the, in the early seventies. And, um, you know, Rod's quite a character. He was kind of, kind of an original dirtbag and living out of a car, rock climbing out West, traveling the world. And he decided to open this, this business called Midwest Mountaineering to sell outdoor products and backpacks, climbing gear. Um, he got into canoes and skis and everything else, footwear. And when I was in college, I worked here, I kind of worked in the boot department. I was selling footwear and a few other things. And, um, you know, it was just for about a year. Um, but it's kind of an institution here in town and Patagonia has this podcast called the dirtbag diaries and they, visited Midwest Mountaineering and interviewed Rod because he's in his 70s now and he's getting close to retirement and he's trying to figure out how to kind of pass on the store and kind of move it to the next generation. And, and so he, he was looking for someone to take over for him, uh, and kind of continue the legacy. Uh, I don't believe he has children or maybe if he does that they aren't interested in running the store or whatever, but he was kind of talking about the beginnings of the, of the store and how he's planning on, on finding the next person to run it. And since this podcast originally ran, which I believe was like early in the summer, he has, uh, he actually did select someone to take over for him and has been kind of grooming this person. I believe it's someone on the management staff there, um, to kind of continue the running of the shop. And, you know, I mean, you know, stories about kind of small local businesses or, you know, dime a dozen these days, but I, I just found this particular episode and maybe it's because I worked there and know some of the people involved. Um, I found this one particularly interesting. I think Rod's got an interesting backstory. It's one of those kind of classic, you know, seventies dirtbag climber guys, kind of a Yvon Chouinard sort of character. Um, but, but right, right in my hometown. So, uh, yeah, if you're interested in that, or if you're familiar with Midwest mountaineering, uh, certainly check it out. It's called ask us we've been there. It's a, it's an episode of the dirtbag diaries, which I recommend anyway, because I think it's a cool podcast put on by Patagonia. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, I've listened to a few episodes and have really enjoyed them. And I can see now, I guess this is like they're pushing their way up to 200. Yeah. Maybe they're beyond that by now. So that's great. And very cool to have that personal connection with the story. I'm glad someone sent it in and you enjoyed it. That's great. |
| Jason | Yeah. So it was a good one. Wow. This is a long episode. We've got the Sherwood interview and boy, close to an hour of us chatting. I guess we needed to catch up after being away for a couple of weeks. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, Q&A coming out soon, and certainly we'll catch you next week, probably with an episode about the stuff we liked from Geneva Watch Days. Definitely. |
| Jason | As always, thanks so much for listening. If you want to subscribe to The Show Notes, get into the comments for each episode, or consider supporting the show directly, and maybe then you can even grab a new TGN signed NATO, please visit TheGreyNATO.com. Music throughout is Siesta by Jazzar via the Free Music Archive. |
| Jason Heaton | And we leave you with this quote from Albert Hubbard, who said, No man needs a vacation so much as the man who has just had one. |