546 | Eric Bishop | Indie Author | DOWNFALL

We catch up with indie author Eric Bishop on how he's built a growing thriller catalog — nearly 10 books deep — while working a full-time job and doing everything himself. We talk the real tipping point that got The Body Man written, why he chose the indie route over traditional publishing, the writing routine (or lack of one) that keeps him producing, and his new release, Downfall. Along the way we get into live music, bucket-list concerts, and the advice he'd give anyone thinking about writing their own book.

Link to DOWNFALL https://a.co/d/05zPn7JO

Transcript

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Welcome And Why Eric Stands Out

SPEAKER_01 0:20

Hey, welcome back to Hit Protectors. Today, my good friend for years now. Years.

unknown 0:25

Years.

SPEAKER_01 0:26

Eric Bishop is not back on. Now, Eric is one person, and you know, we were talking about this before we hit the record button. Eric has hustled. And he's been hustling. He's still hustling. He's an indie author, but he's not your traditional route. He's not like, hey, he writes a thriller, but he doesn't have that background of most of these guys that are popping into this genre. They got like the military, law enforcement, something kind of nichey. You know, like, hey, you know, I did this, I did that. And, you know, we know like a lot of them probably do have ghostwriters. They probably have other people helping them out because they're not traditional authors. They kind of know the story, they know where they're coming from. But one thing I like about Eric, and one thing I always promote Eric for, is that he's indie author, but he understands story arcs. His protagonists are just as solid as anyone published out of one of the main publishing houses now. So when you pick up, well, like I'm we're gonna be talking about his books later on, but when you pick up his first book, Body Man, his first real genuine uh quote unquote hit, The Body Man, you're gonna understand, like, wow, where did this author come from? Where did this protagonist come from? Why haven't I been reading this for years? But hey, now's your opportunity to check it out. And I'm gonna say, start with the body man, start from the beginning, and it's gonna be an easy read, because hey, we know if you're a if you're a reader, if you're a listener, you love to just pick something up and read it and then move on to the next. I'm doing that right now. I'm on I'm on like book 45 of the Jack Reacher series because I'm backtracking back to the 2019s now. But hey, check out the body man first, and then when we talk about his other books, by that time you're gonna be like, hey, I'm gonna check these out. Eric, welcome to the show, brother.

SPEAKER_02 2:15

Jason, always a pleasure to talk to you. And yeah, we've known each other now for a hot minute. I know it's been definitely for five years, which time's going by a little quick, my friend.

SPEAKER_01 2:25

Hey, and another thing too is we've actually met in person and we did some shooting. I remember that.

SPEAKER_02 2:30

Absolutely. You and we met in DC and you you you you even met my kids. That was two summers ago. Yeah, so absolutely. We're we're overdue for another uh we're we're we're overdue to get together, but what we're really overdue to do is have an international trip together. So we gotta have a boys boys week somewhere in the next uh uh future at some point.

SPEAKER_01 2:52

Yeah, exactly. At least in 2027, we need to go somewhere good. We can do that. Well, we are on the new concept for books and authors and stuff like that. We're gonna have you back on later on to talk about how you've transitioned from like different points of your life.

The Moment He Finally Started

SPEAKER_01 3:05

But today we're gonna go into like 10 questions. And then we'll cut we'll do a couple questions on the new book, but I really want the listeners who are not familiar with your previous appearances on a show or familiar with you to actually understand who you are and why they should pick up the book. So, question number one on being an author. You spent years in corporate America before The Body Man came out in 2021. What was the actual tipping point, not the polished version, where you decided to write a novel instead of just thinking about it?

SPEAKER_02 3:37

Good question. Um I think really that impetus started in 2013. Um, so that would have put me mid-30s, uh, mortgage, kids, corporate job, all those fun life things that you you you don't realize you don't want when you're a kid, and you get and you're like, oh my God, what's happening to me? Um, but I was just I was kind of in this rut of I had written a lot ever since college, but I never finished anything. So I'm going through this period of life, and I realized I wanted to actually finish a novel. So I spent some time thinking about it, planning it, and then finally in 2014, I actually really about three months, which is a really short period of time, I just started working on a novel. It was like June, if I remember, it was like June 19th, something like that, um, sometime in late June, and I finished it by mid-September. But um, I just wrote every night when my wife and kids that I was married at the time, my wife and kids would be asleep. I would write, and I would write until midnight or three or four in the morning. It just I had to, I couldn't, I didn't train myself at that point to stop. So I would just write until I was done for the night. And I just pushed myself and finally did what I wanted to do, which was to finish a novel.

SPEAKER_01 4:57

Now, I guess it's into the second question. You publish everything, you do it all yourself. You're an indie author. Now, obviously, a lot of people want to run down that traditional publishing house. They want to get that like that letter to mail or email that says, hey, you know what, we got you. But now you have your own creative control. And what have you noticed from your indie perspective compared to the people out there who are doing the traditional route?

SPEAKER_02 5:25

So I had somewhat traditional for the body man initially because I went with a small publisher. So um I kind of got a taste of what traditional gets, where you submit a manuscript, they do the cover, they do the edits, you get a say-so and stuff, but they have final control. So that's exactly what happened with the body man. And I had, we'll just say I had some issues with how it happened with what took place, and did I definitely butted heads with the publisher more than, you know, the relationship ended, put it that way. So it wasn't, it wasn't, wasn't always a pleasant experience, but it kind of gave me a heads up of how things work. Even though it was a small publisher, I've heard enough stories that it wasn't far off from how traditional works. Um, so when that relationship ended and I got all the rights back, I had a choice. Do I try to submit these books to a large to another an agent, get a larger

Indie Control Versus Traditional Publishing

SPEAKER_02 6:15

publisher to try again, or do I take everything I've learned and do I go indie? And I decide to go indie because I had learned enough about the process. And I have to say, for the most part, there's things about traditional I would like to have in my pocket, but there's something about being able to go in and hire people to help, like with cover. I don't touch covers by myself. I hire someone, but I have full say. So when I give this my cover person what I'm thinking, they'll spit out five variations to me, and I get to pick and choose. I like this part of this one, that of that one, and we can compile this cover together, really. Um same thing with editorials. You know, editorial stuff I can bring someone in, do the edits, but I have final say so on, and they're mainly just copy edits. So kind of having that control and having your vision be what comes out to the audience is kind of an invaluable um thing to really have as an author.

SPEAKER_01 7:13

I like that. And that kind of gives a perspective on people who are thinking about going down that indie route. Yeah. Now that brings us into question number three. Is that you have a full-time job? Most people who go to a traditional route, hey, you know what? They're probably full-time authors now. They're getting an upfront, they're getting back-end pay, they're getting all sorts of money coming in. But with you, you have a full-time job and you're writing and writing and writing. How many books do you and of in novellas do you have out now?

SPEAKER_02 7:42

Uh what we'll talk about a little bit after. Um, Downfall is book seven out in two different series. Um, and then I have a couple others finished and I'm working uh that that might not see the light of day the way they're earlier books, but I might repurpose them. And then I have several I'm actually two I'm currently working on. So we'll say close to 10.

SPEAKER_01 8:02

So close to 10 books. Yeah. What does your actual writing routine look like to sustain that?

SPEAKER_02 8:09

That's a ridiculous question because there is no routine now. Um, and I do want to say one thing too, not to correct you, but uh what most people don't realize is people that go the traditional route, majority, vast majority of those people are working full-time as well. Or their spouse is working full-time or a partner or whatever, or they have a bunch of money, or we know a bunch of former veterans that write and they have, you know, they they they retired, so they have basically full pension. If you're that's the majority, like people that think they're gonna get into writing and they're gonna get a fat check and I can quit my day job. Not to be negative, but that's literally probably 2% of writers. It's the then the number out there, and I've talked about it on my podcast as well, and other people have confirmed this number. 1.8% of authors in the United States make $100,000 or more a year. And you know, you live up in DC. Um my cost of living down here where I am in the Carolinas is cheaper, but you you can't live off 50,000 or 40,000 around here. So, you know, 100,000 is a livable wage, maybe in some areas of the country. So it kind of just shows you how hard that is. And then back to what we originally asked for routine, it's changed. So when I was writing that first book in 2014, I just wrote after everyone went to sleep. Uh divor uh years pass, divorce happens. Now that's been years that that's happened. Um, so

Writing Around Work And Parenting

SPEAKER_02 9:35

now I have a little bit more flexibility. So I'm able to write in the nights and the weekends. Uh, when I have my daughter, I don't write as much, but she's also a teenager now. So plenty of times she's at my house, she's in her room on the phone with her friends. So I just sit in the living room and write. Um, or I cook dinner and clean and do everything that uh, you know, I have no cleaning service. So um, or I do that. But I find my times when I can write. And then sometimes I'm editing, or sometimes I'm creating marketing. So I just kind of piecemeal it when I can, but I'm also fortunate that I can do it anywhere. I can ride on planes, trains, automobiles, when I'm not driving, of course. Um, I finished part of my first book at Yosemite, so I can sit out in National Park with a laptop on my lap and write from there. So I'm pretty flexible in that regard.

SPEAKER_01 10:20

Yeah, that shows that you know things do change. Now, when you wrote The Body Man, did you have the ending in mind? Or did you like did you outline the whole book? And has that changed since then?

SPEAKER_02 10:33

Every book I've had an idea how I was gonna start it and how I was gonna end it. I've never figured out the middle. So I end up, and it's changed over the years. I sometimes have more notes than, but I never have a full outline. Um, but I have a concept of what I want to do, and that's changed with a few books. I've ended them different than I thought originally, just as I got into the flow of things. But I have normally have a general blueprint of where I want to go with the characters. So for the body man, yes, I knew we were gonna start with him being kidnapped, and by the end, uh I was gonna resolve that issue. So I kind of had an idea, but there was a lot of parts in the middle that kind of ended up tweaking how I was gonna end it because I took it a different direction.

SPEAKER_01 11:18

You know, that is that's like the big thing I hear about a lot of people is they kind of know where they're starting, they know where they want that character to end up.

SPEAKER_02 11:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:28

So we know you write, we know you love writing, you publish a bunch of books. Writing is great. But as an indie author, what is the hardest part about this whole thing?

SPEAKER_02 11:39

Hey, buy my book. Hey, buy my book, hey, hey, remember me? Buy my book. It's screaming out to that void and trying to handle the marketing side of it, the writing side, and I'm not it's not arrogance or whatever saying the writing's easy. Of course it's not, but it's not work to me. Like it's fun. I enjoy it. Like, like we were talking just a second ago about not outlining it. I like sitting down on the couch and not knowing where I'm going that night and just creating it. And you know, and sometimes I have an idea, but a lot of nights I know where I gotta take my character, but I'm like, maybe the body man's gonna go to Jakarta in this chapter, you know, and then have a reason for it to happen. But I like that flexibility. But then when you get done, get it polished, and then you have to sell it. And then most authors will say it. That's the hardest part, you know, asking people to buy your book and then also trying to stand out from the tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of people that are asking people to buy their book. That's the hard part. And that's the part that's never gotten easier. I'm I think I'm good at it to a degree, but I think the void you're yelling into is keeps the chasms getting bigger, and AI is not helping that either. So that's making it even harder as time goes on.

SPEAKER_01 12:53

Yeah, that elf in a room is AI, but I think more people, as this AI machine goes on, are going to realize that they want a human behind the typewriter. They want a human typing. You know, uh, before we get into the the nuts and bolts of you know, other things outside of writing, you've been grinding for a while. You're a great marketer. I know it's tough. And uh, one thing I do want to caveat before I get onto this next question is is anybody

Marketing Pain Plus Real Author Advice

SPEAKER_01 13:20

out there, when you're if you're interviewing them, you're a friend of them, you have any association with an indie author, do not ask for a free book. That is coming directly from their pocket. Don't be like, hey, I'll interview you, but send me a free book. Don't do it. Just don't do it. I typically, nine times out of ten, if someone comes on my show, I will buy that book as soon as we're done. Because what does it cost me? Ten bucks, nine bucks. But um, it just do that. Um, the other thing, too, is this is one question because you've been grinding for a while. One piece of advice for anybody who wants to be an author, indie author.

SPEAKER_02 13:59

Ooh, one piece of my my my standard advice is always to never quit. Um, but actually the advice I think I give this instance is make sure getting into this, you're doing it for the right reasons. And I say that because often we look at the most success, whether it's Hollywood or music or writing, we look at the most successful people out there, you know, and we go, I want to be the next fill in the blank. You're not gonna be that person. So if you're gonna, especially if you're gonna write a story, write that story because you have a story to tell and write it, and it sounds definitely on the selfish side, but write it for yourself. If you're writing to please Dr. Jason Piccolo, or you're writing to please your spouse or your best friend or your mother, your mother will tell you you're great because she has to, because she bore you. Um, but no one's going to meet your expectations of how they react to it. So don't have them in mind. Write the story you want to write. And then once you do that, maybe great things can happen. But it can't happen until you put in the time and write that story that you are happy with.

SPEAKER_01 15:09

Okay. Perfect advice for those getting ready to hit it and actually start typing. But this is gonna be shifting. I've I have not told you what the questions are gonna be. I have no idea. So you're big into live music: Shine Down, ACD, huge ACDC, huge range. What was the show that hooked you for life? The one where you thought, I need to keep doing this, I need to keep going to live shows.

SPEAKER_02 15:34

Uh

The Concert That Hooked Him

SPEAKER_02 15:35

honestly, first concert. First concert got me in the fields, and that was Candlebox. Uh, I was 18 years old. I was at the New Haven Coliseum, which is no longer even there anymore. And a buddy took mine, I think it was for like a birthday, it was my 18th birthday or whatever. And um, I had probably seen some stuff before then, but I don't have any memories. I don't like nothing that just blew me away. No big concerts for sure. And I saw Candle Box and I think Toadwitz Rocket Open Forum, and there was another band, I can't remember who else, Screaming Trees might have been there. Um, but I just remember Candle Box, and I've been fortunate now that I've seen them twice in the last three years again. So it was a 30-year gap between the first one and the second one. Um, it was 30 years later I saw them in concert, and um, yeah, that kind of got my fire going of like, this is cool. I love listening to stuff on the radio because I'm old enough that you listen to stuff on the radio and even recorded it on a cassette. Um, but to actually go to live shows, it it got me.

SPEAKER_01 16:37

Now, what is a bucket list show that you want to see? Ooh.

SPEAKER_02 16:41

Bucket list that I haven't seen so far. Yeah. Because I've knocked out some big ones in the last few years. My son and I have seen ACDC. We went and saw them. I've seen some Guns and Roses on Metallica, Metallica was great. You too, I've seen a whole lot. Um, probably one that I still haven't made it to see. I don't know if I'd put it on bucket. Well, I guess it'd have to be bucket list. I for some reason we were supposed to go. I want to see Creed, and I can't see Creed. I can't like I had tickets last year, you weren't able to go, I think. And then I ended up literally the one week I could take my kids to Yellowstone was the week I had the Creed tickets. Um, so thank goodness for uh Stub Hub, I made money on them actually. When I sold them, I made a little profit. But uh yeah, probably Creed, because most of the other ones that I would kind of want to say, I can't see anymore. Um, I'd love to see Van Halen, obviously. But I saw Sammy Hager. I took my son to see him when he came through Charlotte. Um I'm trying to think who else is touring. Um, I know like John's doing Rush this year. Um, and a couple people when I was talking to Shine Down, some of the crew backstage, like, oh, have you gone and seen you know John and seen Rush? And no, and I was like, what rush songs do I know? So I looked through one of their set lists, and the only song I recognized was Tom Sawyer. Tom Sawyer is gonna say Tom Sawyer. That's it. I even I even saw some social media posts from some folks that were at the shows and they had little clips, and I'm listening to these clips going, I don't have a clue what that song is. So I probably won't even say, Hey John, let me come see Rush with you when you come through. I'm like, eh, you know, but um yeah, I guess Creed, I guess Creed's the one that I haven't been able to see the last couple of years. And um kind of depends. I've seen Bon Jovi, um Arthur Brooks, Elton John, you know. I mean, kind of gone through the ringer of shows the last five. Really, after my divorce, I stopped going to shows for quite a while while I was married. And not that I couldn't, not that my wife wouldn't wouldn't let me or anything like that. It was just she didn't want to go. She went to a couple U2 shows with me, is all I got her to. Um, it's kind of weird to go to a show without your wife. So once I didn't have that anymore, I'm like, I miss going. That's literally I have a list on my phone of memos, and it says, I missed going to shows. I'm making up for last time. And I there's like 60 things on there in the last six years or five years, whatever, since I've been starting to go again since COVID.

SPEAKER_01 19:00

Yeah, and I have to tell people out there, like, if you get the chance to see someone you want to see, see them. I always wanted to see Phil Collins. Uh-huh. And now he's way too old. And I had a chance to see him. But and the other thing about solo concerts, I go to solo concerts all the time, brother.

SPEAKER_00 19:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:14

And if you're a single, like single ticket, you get and you buy a last minute, you could use I saw Peter Gabriel. I was like second, second row. I was like, super cheap. Yeah, so do that.

SPEAKER_02 19:25

I saw Bush, I saw Bush two years ago, and I got it like two days before, and I think I spent under $100, and I was like four rows back. Like the show, seats next to me were like $300 seats, and I'm like, suckers? Once the show starts, you're not talking to anybody. So you're more just the loser for the first hour before the show or whatever. But well, in the sense of if you go with someone, it it's it's it is a something that you can enjoy. Because I love going with my son, but it's one of the events that you can go to by yourself, and once that show gets going, you're not, you know, you're focusing on the band, not necessarily the person next to you, and unless she's really attractive and you know, and you want to that brings me into your family.

SPEAKER_01 20:03

I mean, your son had got into music, and you think you're you're exposing him to live music has gotten him into becoming a musician?

SPEAKER_02 20:10

Um, I think it's something he had. I'd like to think because when he was little, I played a lot of music for him, a lot of U2, a lot of stuff like that in the back deck while we were eating and stuff. So I I hope that appreciation I gave him when he was younger helped blossom that interest that he he came up with. Because he's he's got a musical talent I don't have. I have a drum set. I'm looking at it across the room from where we're talking. I pick that thing up every like three months, bang on it for about 30 seconds and be like, I gotta go write a book. And I I've almost sold it a couple weeks ago. I thought someone that was one of my son's friends supposedly was interested, and I gave him a price. He goes, eh, I just want to buy it. I'm like, want less? Nah, just not interested. I'm like,

Downfall Plot And Reading Order

SPEAKER_02 20:50

darn it, it's just sitting there. Might as well sell these drums, drum said.

SPEAKER_01 20:54

Now we're gonna jump right back into books, and that's one of the reasons you're on today is to talk about downfall. Downfall. What is the premise of downfall?

SPEAKER_02 21:04

So at the end of book two, Breach of Trust, uh, the body man, Nick Jordan, and Luke Fury find the body of the chief villain that they are going after in that book. And bludgeoned into his chest with a dagger is this silk sheet of paper that has 12 names on it. And those 12 names are kind of referred to in Supreme Justice, the next book in the series, which is really a book about mere sea. But um parts of Downfall are kind of sprinkled in there, what's happening in Downfall. So in Downfall, we really unpack who that list of names are, which spoiler alert, because it said earlier in the book, they are the former body men, and they're all being hunted. So the question in Downfall is why are they being hunted? What information do they have, or why are there entities that want them, and what are they gonna do with them when they find them, if they find them?

SPEAKER_01 22:01

Perfect. Now, do people need to see, or not see, but uh read the previous body man's in order to understand what's going on, or is it I mean, obviously it's gonna help, but they're self-contained, that's how I write them.

SPEAKER_02 22:13

And I also I indicate the biggest question on them I think that people would normally have is the role of the body man, but I end up in every book giving an explanation of what the body man rule is, so that people could pick up Downfall and they wouldn't be completely lost. Uh, is it better to start with the body man and work your way through? 100%, but you can pick up any of them at any time, and you won't you won't be in the dark. You'll you'll know what the inside jokes are basically.

SPEAKER_00 22:40

Nice, man. Now, what is next?

SPEAKER_02 22:44

Next. Next is the trip to New Zealand and Australia, so I can dream up what comes next. But I actually I'm putting both, so I got the the Body Man series, uh, the four books that are now out for that, and then I have three books in the Omega Group series, and I'm putting both of those aside. I am writing a high concept thriller. I'm about 10,000 words into it or so. Um, and it's the first chapter is pretty bonkers if I don't say so myself. And I finally, it's a something I started a couple years ago, and I didn't know where to go with it, so I put it aside. Last year I figured out what I wanted to do with it. This year I even figured out a bigger element that was eluding me. So um I'm I'm writing that for the rest of the year, and then I'll probably transition over to the next Body Man book, which has already been started. But I'll probably, but I gotta get this book out of my system. I I put it aside for two years and I I want it to see the light of day, and and maybe this one will be the one that

Release Date And Where To Buy

SPEAKER_02 23:40

you know blows up, uh blows up everything.

SPEAKER_01 23:42

That's a good thing. Awesome. Well, Eric, I appreciate you coming on. Everyone, make sure you check out the Body Man series, get on it, and then pick up Downfall when it comes out.

SPEAKER_02 23:52

Thank you. Yeah, Downfall is out uh August 18th. Uh, if they have any information or they need any information, I have a really cool new website. Uh, a buddy of mine designed it, and it's got a lot of uh positive feedback. So EricPbishop.com, and they can get links to all the books and they can uh they can get a little adventure on the website. EricPbishop.com. Exactly. Thank you.