A discussion on crime writing with authors scott, Richard North Patterson and greg ills is next from the 2018 Rancho Mirage writers festival in california. Good afternoon. Welcome back. I think its you would all agree im sure what a wonderful, wonderful couple of days this has been a great festival. [applause] to our founder jamie, Just Brilliant job. Brilliant job. [laughter] shy as he is brilliant job. This is a panel called crime does pay. We could spend a few hours amongst ourself it is talking about whether thats true or not. But its catchy. I feel somewhat like i was trying to find the right analogy my husband who really does love me and is a pretty modern guy said well think of it like youre a rookie player with three hall of fame percent that youre interviewing, and i i was up half of the night trying to think of something with a feminist twist. So for those of you who know your literary history, there was a young woman very young woman named mary godwin and she married a very famous, british poet named percy shelly. On their honeymoon when she was 18, they went to italy where they spent time with lord byron and another physical la named william and one night around fire with a lot of define being consumed, the four of them decided and three men were very famous, very with known writers, poets, and the creator of the vampire story mary the bride was 18 and the four of them made a bet one of the most famous bets in literary history. They bet amongst themselves who could write the best horror story. And until the coming of steve king most people regard Mary Shellys Frankenstein as the best horror story ever written so im not there yet. But i hope someday [laughter] someday could be in the league with these guys. [laughter] im here with three of the best. Yesterday some of you were fortunate enough at the crack of dawn to hear scott and greg and a conversation on this stage with each other. A lot of nodding heads you heard great things which i will try not to cheat and steal from. But one of them all writers. [laughter] we do that. And greg said of scott something that i think is true of all three of these men which is that they walk the line between literary fiction and genre fiction some look down on genera fiction better than any writers on planet since john who is another one of my favorites so were going to talk wide ranging about a lot of a lot of things these men have written about and think about. But im going to start with the issue of genera because were not exactly all crime pays at the same time and then the same ways same category. So im going to start with my dear friend Rick Patterson known as richard north to many of you. I would like you to talk about your ark about what you started to write actually rick scott and i are all lawyers first, and then became writers. So rick is not writing crime fiction. I love to be called a crime writer. He would shoot me if i said heres a crime novelist. So why dont you open district by telling us what you do now and that your book swamp fever is in the bookstore down the road. Well, im now concluded after the election 2016 that fiction is redundant so [laughter] so im writing a weakly political column for the boston globe and a by monthly column longer for Huffington Post trying to explain inexplicable to an audience which is bewildered as i am. But my career started with being a lawyer pep and i will say as i resist notion that i or any of us are writing for crime fiction, i do believe in the power of story. I think its very important to that people want to turn pages that they care what happens. And you know, with a good plot, good narrative can carry a great deal ive written about Israeli Palestinian problem, ive written about abortion, but in order to make people sit still for the area of position i needed to have a narrative that people cared about. I needed to have characters that people cared about. I think we all really up here try to do that. I know both, you know, scott and greg and linda are complengt at that. So for me whatever you call a novel a story is important. I dont think it is embarrassing to to partake a judicial craft of fiction where you want people to turn page where is you want people to care about the ending but i think people who care about ending not only because the story is pretty good. But because the story sb people who were changed by events and who act upon each other. On a way that is dramatic and interesting. I in a subject matter which is important. So when i wrote exile for example which is my novel of the Israeli Palestinian problem, it proceeded from the premise to a trial but most of it was spent exploring tragic history of the two people soon to be trapped like scorpion in a puddle and we saw it again on television today in a tragedy for which one hopes theres a resolution but i tried both to dramatize to explain whats going on so whereas i resist a notion that im writing crime fiction i dont resist notion at all that elements of crime and fiction are story and character. And those who have been very important to me i think important to most people is readers. Greg. Would you talk a bit about your i dont i dont care what thl me as long as they buy the book. [laughter] ive been called everything from the poster boy for southern gothic fiction to breaking bad generation. I rather be called the latter but i dont really care. [laughter] mostly, though, the crime label doesnt bother me because i think ive written across many genera and writtenning everything from holocaust to childhood sex abuse to civil rights murders, and im writing about nature of evil and high School Response to it and why good people do bad things about and sin for lack of a better world and crime novels tend to i think, touch on that and express it best. Rather than hugely ambitious novels frequently do, you know, i would rather read a john d. Mcdonald than jonathon fran anyway thats all i have to say. I know you have more to say well get back to that. Scott good to talk about for me as i said this morning when i interviewed scott for the first time, presumed innocent is second book was just a break away legal thriller that for many of us focused attention on that sub jean is are a in genera, and really brought so many people to write almost imitation of what scott had done, and like rick and like greg he takes on moral o issues and legal issues and writes about people effective events on them. But the art has been since 97 when presumed innocence was im sorry 87 when it was publishedded time fly so this years testimony which is a brilliant book would you talk about your how you see your place in literature. Well i alluded yesterday to sort of my late adolescent ambition to be the next. And i went off to the writing program at stanford after college. And i was i was really tormented in lot of different ways and some of them were theoretical in the sense that i if i admired joyce, for example. And yet i worked in the post office in glencoe, illinois this in the summers. And i came back to the basement and he campaigned he was going to kick because nobody. Thed the postmaster to know that the job was being done that easily. So [laughter] i the only airconditioned building in glencoe, illinois, in those days was the Public Library and so i finished my freshman year in college and ive been thought that greatest novel written and by joyce. So i decided i would read paid 2. 27 by the taxpayers of the united states. And what i did it. [laughter] i wasnt unhappy that face being paid to read the book. And the other thing that struck me is that glencoe is a very well educated literate affluent community, and heres the greatest novel ever written in the libraries loan copy wases on the shelf every day. When i went to read it and from that experience, i begun to reflect on the same kinds of issues that greg and rick have talked about which is you know tree falls in forest is there sound and if a writer writes wot an audience is it a book . For me the next big revelation came years later in the course of my journey when i was sitting in a criminal courtroom in chicago. Having become a young prosecutor and, i looked around, and i realized not only was i sitting there slack jaw listening to the account of the star witness in that case about how did something evil happen . But the courtroom was full of people. All of them every bit as intent and at that point. I realized not only did crime fascinate me but it fascinated many other people. And for me at least, it was the sort of kings highway to the issues that i wanted to write about. So you know, i understand the genera fiction, and i dont regard it as completely irrational if you talk about the mystery, the mystery is erected on the premise that there will be an answer to the question of who done it and why. To some extent all fiction, all fiction has to answer the question of why people behave the way they do. But theres an artificial constraint that exist in the mystery to explain and also to usually not just explain but to surprise. And theres an academic argument but theres a lack of in that and therefore, the mystery for example, is a luster form. And you know, its like i do what i do. And i look at people like Graham Greene and writers of suspense who i think of as icon, and theyre it not the only writers i admire. But i think that you know to prejudge is unfortunate. But as i made the point this morning, there are plenty of readers who will only gravitate to that shelf in the bookstore to the extent people still go to bookstores thats marked crime. So there are advantages to it as well. Great, yes great. Scott brought up something porkt if you look at the traditional constrained forms, where like, agnes kristy with a disturbance to the press teen order and resolved and somehow it is comforting the whole experience is comforting for readers. Thats not what i think were tag about genera fiction. Look at scott in presumed innocent. When you get to the end of the book he says there is justice and there is punishment its not a comforting thing you finish it and you feel like everything is is restored wonderfully. You are looking at the actual cost of human life and that is great that as long as you stretch the genera you can deal request serious things. Well said. Well first of all im relieved it that scott did not write [inaudible conversations] i really like it a lot and never would have finished two books theyre not hearing you. I think it is really important to be accessible. I guess the difficulty i always had class vacation is you could classify hamlet as family drama if you wanted to so you know, the question is what, what are the elements youre trying to bring . One of my unfortunate experiences after the meeting in particular with women saying basically gee i was compelled to read one of your books because i met you i never would have otherwise youre not nearly as dumb as i would have taken you for, and you write about actual relationships and that was sort of thats the am on one hand you have a audience for what you are categorized as by publishers as much asking in but you also exclude people and my targeted audience it was anyone who ever read a book and so anything that impeded me from reaching those folks, i kind of resented but that said, i think it is very important to say again, that theres certain elements of what you would call suspense fiction which are useful carrying all sorts of element and values in a book i never, ever, ever wanted somebody to be bored or indifferent to what happened next. Greg, i would love you to talk about i would like us all to talk about process and so if you would talk a little bit about the guys in the basement okay. Okay. Most charming thing. I get in trouble with my publisher i go to the year lying to the publish ire i always do that. I dont write i play music whatever im doing and story is working itself out inside in a younging way. Really without ever writing a word. But steven king band mate put it best when he said all writers mind are like a house and sub conscience is the basement of the house, and down in the basement are a bunch of the crates that are unlabeled and the stupiddist thing you can do as a writer is to go down in the basement to sort out the crates because theres already a crew down there working on the crates. [laughter] and your job is to stay the the hell out of the way i was so relieved when i read it on writing because that it always been my system stay out of the way. The stories happening. And then for me it is like i say this my wife is a week with from delivery right now but i use a pregnancy mote motif like the story is reaches point and i have like four months left as i do now in the deadline like a pregnant woman who water is break that is coming i run for laz boy with gray granola bar pane im staying up 24, and even 36 hours at a time. And its like im taking dictation. I i swear thats my system. I dont recommend it you wont live long. Youll have car wrecks and lose your leg. You its like a rock n roll version of writing so thats me and thats the process. Much like my process and i didnt have the wisdom of it. But i bet to the end to spend ten days just many hours a day without leave ing the machine. Rick has a different process when youre writing fiction. It is most intense jot liner rntion soulful approach of it. A kremlin bureaucrat i basically plan it very carefully. No i will say what had in line request greg i used to not work every summer on a ground your sub conscience should be unmolested for at least for a while but i never trusted those guys in the basement i wasnt sure if they were there. So i would start up by knowing how the story ended. I would think to the general story and the reason was, not simply so the narrative would make sense. But also it makes psychological sense to people behaved in a way that was consistent with our character even surprising you could see how that happened so i always thought ending resonate to the ending to narrative and the behavior of the character and other thing i did was i got driven to research and i never believe this stuff which you know because i would write about a white guy forever. I when i wrote my novel about the palestinian dplem dilemma i interviewed a lot of people and a lot of that was not native and not a way to retain wot taking a lot of notes trying to figure out how to have that in your story. Novels have been heavily researched. Yeah. Yeah. So i had , i had maybe 100 file frustration scene to scene from union organized into sections. You know i had notes from that scene and Research Notes keyed to what i was going to write about so i showed up every day like the kremlin bureaucrat and i knew what i had to do. Now some days were better than other days. While i never didnt show up for work. I never didnt write something. And some days when i thought i was wonderful i would look at the end of the day like it was translated from the bulgarians it was awful other days i thought i was being a pro and it was pretty good so important thing to me was to show up and do the work. Or there would be just a blank page so unlike greg i didnt have a staff. I was thrown back in my poor humble resources so i did with that the best i could. And scott. Well somewhere between the two one of the remarks i made yesterday was probably greatest joy of my professional life has been being able to hang around with other writers, and because i still think of writers as the real rock stars to me. And what ive learned over the years to the extent especially with the band to the extent they can be alluded and we can talk a little shop. Something that dave discourages, ive learned everybody has a different process. So my process is somewhere as i said between rick and greg and i really agree with steves observation about the guys in the basement. But you know every now and then they wonder up to the first floor, and theyre like, you know does anybody know where poughkeepsie is, and i i like in the early stages to sort of take those gleanings and write them down. And you know, i didnt get into this yesterday when greg and i were talking. But you know i had had a thought in the morning about what does it mean to be a criminal defense lawyer who spent your whole life as a boy watching bad things happen had. And then dealing with the realities of what occurred and what didnt occur. And you know, i dashed down a paragraph about what its like to live in that kind of warrioristic will it find its way into the next novel . I would say theres a 70 chance. That it will. But i like the collect those kinds of impressions as i go along and i find thats the way the story builds, and then i can kind of streamline and put thing miss sequence and ask myself a question which i dont put too much qailgt on is how does this story end and i figure sooner or later that will suggest i. T. To me but i regard my process because advantage of what greg does. Is that he puts himself under so much pressure that he gets the book done. [laughter] whereas the way i do it, i, you know, im wandering around and writing stuff, and probably you know, overall 30 of what i write in that first year finds its way in every rough form into the book i finally write. So its not terribly efficient to do it the way i realized problem ienl haunted by i would feel liking i failed morally if i threw away 300 pages. [laughter] do you always find scott, the impressions that you have written. I do that a lot, and then i write them on scraps of paper when i meet interesting people and then i find them after the book is finished sometimes. [laughter] i rarely go back and read what was committed to paper. And i have to say that people say what is the interaction between being a novelist and a lawyer . That was one of the things that i learned when i started practicing law. Because when a judge tells you that its youre allowed 15 pages for your memorandum he or she does not mean 17. 5, and you have got to cut and tear and doesnt matter how deafless you think your words are. And youve got to impose that kind of discipline on yourself, and you know my agent is always, shes she has constantly comforted e me with the fairytale oh, youll put it in the next book. [laughter] which is not u true. Not true i dont even go back to read it. So i dont answer to that. I would think wow that would be really fun to sort of write a kind of common place book which is made up excerpts that i never published. I keep that journal and common place journal and i have a lot of what if mommies what if i had found that in time to put it in the fourth book. But i didnt. Can we talk about editors for a minute. Rick i know from our many discussions what one editor in particular meant to you in your novelistic years. Personal editors are almost always a help and sometimes terrific help. Thousand, i think the difference between somebody making it in our business somebody not making it is wellness to recognize good advice, and lots of people who were writers of not good drafts instead of the rest of the way they pitch it right now theyre 8 good enough first draft. So i mean, the concept i think is surely important. Now my best editor ever had this process and i would write you know, 700 pretty complicated pages with a pretty complicated architecture and he would look at the whole first of all and i go back and sit in his office and we would leave through page by page talking not about words but about structure. How this thing worked as a narrative. Because he said he couldnt do one thing and then you know, like obsess over words. And once we got the structure right, then he dot line and it wasnt you know severe i tried to save him some trouble by writing are well in the first place. But he was not you know, it was not insignificant and it was a wonderful process because you know, im very particular in all writers should be about language but theres also the business of architecture and structure and what scene needs more, and less and what doesnt need to be there . What had needs to be explained better . And no matter how goods you think you are and no matter how much second sight you think you have a really good editor is valuable to fin valuable. And in this day and age, with publishing having changed so much which you may talk about many young writers dont have editors. There are, theyre just not being paid for by publishers or their spread too thin so for me it is great having grown up reading the perkins correspondents and wanting longing for that kind of relationship when i grew up and wrote books. It really doesnt exist anymore. So scott i think you talked yesterday about sometimes having a six to eight month process after you turned in a manuscript with editor which i dont not something i do. But would you please. Yeah are. I have to say that, you know, youre looking at three really four people who have the advantage of honestly referring to themselves as best selling novelists. And people think, i mean, you get an answer. You get a bigger paycheck. But todays publishing world, one of the things you also got that many writers no longer do is an actual editor. Somebody who sits down and tries to help you write to make better the book thats there and to help you write the book that she or he thinks you intended to write. And in terms of my novels i have worked with two editor first john who is u now the publisher and a dear, dear friend to this day. And early on jonathon and i almost had a mystical relationship, and we would sit usually in a hotel room in new york. And turn john would turn every page of the man u pan ewe script with his own notes and own reassociation and impression sometimes he was questioning a word. Sometimes he question the who will paragraph sometimes that led us into a discussion of an ark in the book. Sometimes we both sitting there and go well you know, i like that. Do you like that . Yeah i like that a lot. So [laughter] it was wonderful. And of course its problem is people recognize the talent and put him in charge of the publishing house, and [laughter] you know it was much, much harder for him to do that. And them work but that at Grand Central and that was a much different kind of editor and she was sort of terrier like in the sense that she figured out what the problem was like in the bock and then told me to solve it and when and if i solved it, that was okay. But if i didnt solve it, it wasnt okay. And you know, she would toss it back as it were and say heres what had im thinking and heres why what youve done basically and she was, of course, kind and sympathetic but she was really saying it is not good enough. And and she would keep she would just keep doing that until we were both satisfied with the book. They were i think both of the them as really great editor. Lucky to have them. Yes. Absolutely. And greg do you have a different this is going to sound air gangt but if i wanted another opinion i would be writing for hollywood. [laughter] in all serious editing a function the reason i havent had real Close Relationships with my editor because i was a musician not a lawyer before i did this and to melange wage is musical and i realized early on that editors could look at two sentence and i could make a sentence more economical and efficient. But it wasnt nearly as good a sentence. As the thing i had done and i realized editor did not even hear had the rhythm of the sentence didnt read it alads and did not understand. And somebody keapght see that. I cant work with them. Now ive had three agents in had my life two served that sort of function when i wantedded it and thats the kind of nice relationship to have. My more typical relations with the publisher would be like when i was at putnam i was at a lunch with phillips grand and i turn in the book and say it was great it is fantastic greg just needs a little work so what does it need . You need to cut 50,000 words, and i typically write really long books and i said which 50,000 . Oh it doesnt matter. [laughter] to finish im a writerrings house thousand run by simon when i turned in trilogy three and in totals 2300 pages took eight years of my life and simon read the last book and he called and he said, listen, man, ive never given you an editorial suggestion in my life but i dont think you got where you wanted to go right at the end this have thing. I dont have any suggestions i dont know exactly where it fell short but why dont you think about and i was so pissed off when i hung up the the phone. And but within 12 hours, by the tile i was awake the next morning it was like by god hes right and i completely at peered the outcome of the trial, resolution of the novel, all of it. Because simon was a genius to take one look and go something is wrong. You know so im not saying i dont take afghanistan but you better know that book damn well as good as media and why it came from. [laughter] i cant even imagine not having the Editorial Exchange and trust starting some of it but signing some of it valuable. So kudos to you for going that way. Now you said the magic words an a lot of people in the last day have asked me if were going to talk about which had is you said it, hollywood. So i know there was some kind of program about good tbhoox made good movies or nots. I happen to think loving the novel presumed innocent as they do what an luflly good movie but would you talk about your hollywood experience . My hollywood experiences are many, and you know, linda, of course, some of you know has a little bit of a stake in presumed innocent because she was also a technical consultant on the movie. For free. [laughter] and a friend of the wonderful alan who directed and really wrote, wrote the movie. And i was very pleased with the movie. You know, the reality, of course, is that first thing i saw in presumed innocent was a trailer. And it was one of those scenes where ellen have been particularly careful and system director dearn asked me how i saw this, and the sets were just perfect. And it was one of those moments in the, in the movie where the dialogue wases taken straight from the novel, and joe gratasi and Harrison Ford looked very much like the characters that i had imagined and they were speaking the lines exactly as i had heard them in my own head, and still a voice said the camera is on the wrong side of the room and its never going to be exactly what the novelist envisioned and you must let go of it. And you know, its really about are really is the pathway to madness to try to expect another artist and another team of artists to coordinate what theyre doing to your own vision. And you know, many some ways the best piece of advice ever given to novelist earnest hemingway says take your bock to the california, nevada border. Toss it over, tbrab the check and run like hell in the the other direction. [laughter] then you went in a second feature film. I have had lots of adventure in hollywood and ive had books sold to become movies that the movies have never been made. That far more often. Ive had tv mini series tv movies, you know, a pilot was filmed bissed on one much my novels. I ended up in last few year doing a little bit of screen writing myself. And i have respect for what goes on there. But as i often tell people theres a reason i have stayed in chicago and havent moved to hollywood. Its enticing, overwhelming we seductive environment, and i like being a novel e key. Rick too. Pnches scott and i once did an event somewhat like this and i was asked about movie deals and i said movie deals are like sperm. Many are called but few are chosen. [laughter] line by the way that i repeat with but i was very pleased to relatively recently, you know, nine, ten months ago one of my books to a very eminent producer. Harvey weinstein [laughter] all i can say is me too. [laughter] im the with scott, ive had a couple of films made one better than the other. I had, ive had other films, not made and when i read the screen is treatment i was actually quite relieved. But i think the thing to remember is its art form your art form is the bock and it cant do a damn thing to that. Thats the thing youve done. Other o thing is what they do and pay to do with your idea. For better or worse. And if you dont have the detachment to realize that your book is not holy written hollywood then you have no business deal requesting folks and theyll make you actually crazy. So bottom line i was always happy to be engageeded in a process at a distance. When i saw something made in line i thought was successful i was very pleased to take a different form. But i didnt have any big emotional stake in it. I think that way life sanity. I cant top the one line terse there. [laughter] i dont write the kind of book that lends itself well to hollywood or write long internalized bocks they made a movie out of o my short pest book ever if that gives you an idea of how hollywood work and it was how to screw up a novel is what it ended up being i saw most of it firsthand and a lifetime of stories in adult company. [laughter] after that they offered me a bunch of book script doctor work where they pay to fix to movies that are in trouble because essence of being a script doctor a lot of well known novelists do is pay a lot of money you dont get any credit, and you get accident ifs every day from ten people giving you suggestionings. And thats you know, for me that i cant handle that. Now with my trilogy, ill end on this. I had the dream situation when the thing finally came out, i started getting called oned road on book tour it was a bidding war an all of the big cable i wont say any names but cable were bidding on it i wound up with a deal that floored me. It was like game of thrones kind of deal. You know, budget that level of budget. And big hollywood actor and stuff. And in the end it dieded because the big actor in it finally got cold feet and wasnt ready to make his transition to tv. But heres what worried me about hollywood. In the process a whole lot of stuff got done before that happened. And it died and that was these are about civil rights murdered it is fictionalized but its about the truth. But first thing they did is asked to change one of the main characters middle aged White Reporter from louisiana based on a friend of mine who is a hero who he had almost he lost the pulitzer to the spotlight people from boston this is a tiny little guy who makes no money and it is just a martyr they said can we change that guy to make hill black . And i said, well you know, let me call him but this bothers me and heres why it bothered me. In i live in mississippi in real life these crimes are not being exposedded by young idealistic black guys theyre exposed by middle aged white guy for whatever reason. Okay, and the killer in edgar or o cases any books are about. Those are middle aged white guys busting their tail to break these stories. Because they feel it is the right thing to do but that doesnt fit the preexisting narrative they want in l. A. So well lets make hail black guy so it shall that really bugs me. I agree with scott is youve to let go of things but on the other hand look. Im writing about the truth here. So lets dont twist the truth to fit some preexisting narrative about the way you wish things were. Politically, okay. Anyway. [applause] in our remaining Time Starting with rick would you tell what you say youre working on now and in your writing and what you like about the writers life . Well, first of all i like what both greg and scott have alluded to were not employees. Were selfemployed and it is nicest kind of selfemployment there can be because first person you have to answer to is you. And nobody tells you what to write. They may tell you theyre not happy with what youve written but youre not youre not working from a cookie cooker unlike screen writing where you have some guy calling you before hes fired in the next guy calls you. [laughter] yeah. And [laughter] so the book right now i wrote my last line of fiction in i think halloween 2012. In since then after a couple of years painting badly. I i have been dedicated myself to what for me is a whole other career which is writing seriously about american politics and geopolitics and international airefares as well that is absorbing to me a real moral urgency to the country right now. And it needs writing about, and such is the turn of events that one has to try to find an eye for what is really important. And supposed to daily and quotidian but it is a great new challenge i have in addition to lovely folks like these guys i have a great new peer group of people who are it in the business of writing columns. Im engaged in activities around it so wonderful to get back to what i think i do the best. But in a very different form. So thats been a privilege. And greg. What . What youre working on what you god i dont to give any spoilers im working on things multiple things right now. I dont to talk about any of the hollywood things. Some im actually working with a guy from mississippist mississippi delta heres the three word pitch i sound so arrogant heres the pitch jal with hog os. [laughter] right now theres almost more hogs in texas than people thats ill leave you with. Wild hogs if you sign up for the Rancho Mirage mississippi trip youre going to meet greg and hell tell you more about it. [laughter] and scott. My dream was to be a novelist and all i can say is i dreamt well. It is just an incredibly great life especially, of course, when the work is going well. And you know as i often say to adrian okay ill see you around lunchtime im going to play with my imaginary friend, and its it really is rewarding in all senses including most important one of feeling that you are using everything youve got as a human being. To bring something to the page, and i regard myself as a blessed human being, and ill Say Something about these two guys quick. Scott, everywhere i go i say whats scott like you play in a band with him hes a jees man and scholar what you think he would be. But going back to agnatny of a martyr and what scott moved the earth and created a genera with presumed innocent which had is still the best of the lot despite an army of lawyers coming in his wake. And we know the genera is flooded but then i remember the day i openedded degree of guilt and i read and i thought okay heres another one who can write right here for real. You know, because most couldnt. Who did it, and these guys creme de la creme so im happy to be here with these guys. Honored. Become at you. Back at you. [applause] i was going to say that too. But thank you thank you for saying that and to all three of you it really is it was really the hall of famers and youre great. Thank you for being here. [applause] and now from the 2018 Rancho Mirage writers festival in california authors and historians john and margaret mcmellon and douglas discuss is their favorite historical figures. Ladies and gentlemen, please give a warm welcome to the stage Douglas Brinkley morgan and john with your