Bruce Borgos, author of Shades of Mercy, on Creating Genuine Characters with Personal Experiences

David Temple (0:1.262)
Dude, one thing I try to pride myself on is knowing how to pronounce names. And I think either you told me this or I came up with it. Gorgeous Georges. Gorgeous Borges.

Bruce Borgos (0:4.746)
Ha ha ha!

Bruce Borgos (0:13.706)
Hey, there you go. Yeah. Exactly.

David Temple (0:19.149)
And dude, if you're that good looking, you just gotta roll with it.

Bruce Borgos (0:22.538)
Hahaha!

Bruce Borgos (0:26.602)
I lost you again.

David Temple (0:29.135)
Damn it!
Hold on, this is really weird. This has never happened.

Bruce Borgos (0:36.586)
Mm -hmm.

David Temple (0:38.703)
I'm gonna really... This is not a day that somebody wants to fuck with me, because I just got out of radiation treatment for the... Fuck, what day is this today? Yeah.

Bruce Borgos (0:49.642)
What is that for?

David Temple (0:50.991)
Oh, I got prostate cancer, dude.

Bruce Borgos (0:53.258)
I am going to the doctor in a couple of weeks and I am fearing that that might be the case with me.

David Temple (1:1.839)
Talk to me. Why do you fear it?

Bruce Borgos (1:3.210)
I mean, well, you know, it's just, I have a lot of symptoms and I'm 60, I'll be 65 next month. I just, and my dad had it. So, you know, we're going to run the tests and see what comes up.

David Temple (1:20.333)
Well, I'm going to spend one minute here on this, folks, because this is important to me. I was one of those guys that said, yeah, I don't want to go to the doctor to get that test that none of us guys like. Right. And I don't have it in my family and I work out and I eat well and I'm in shape and all that stuff. Until one day I go, okay, Tammy says, why don't you go to my specialist, just do a run blood test, just to check things out. And the number had sky PSA had skyrocketed.

Bruce Borgos (1:50.026)
I'm afraid of that too, yeah.

David Temple (1:51.756)
So long story short, if you will, Doc says, dude, you went from a six, no, you went from a three, six to a nine in like a year. That should not, that should take you about 20 years to do. Long story short, I had the surgery, took it out. He's high five and I was, oh, we got everything. Everything looks good. We'll see in three months. It's going to be routine.

Bruce Borgos (2:6.794)
Right. Right.
You did.

David Temple (2:20.651)
Three months later, he goes, uh, it's back. So what it did is either he didn't get it all or a little fella jumped the ropes and headed north. And so, yeah, I am, um, oh, watch this. Uh, this, this tells you my life. I have nine more days after today of radiation. And that's not so bad. Although.

Bruce Borgos (2:41.450)
Oh boy.

Bruce Borgos (2:46.570)
Yeah.
Oh, that's good.

David Temple (2:51.018)
Although it, it F's with your machine downstairs, but it's the hormone therapy that they give you to stop the testosterone. The hot flashes, my wife and I are now having competitions for hot flashes.

Bruce Borgos (2:56.426)
Sure.

Bruce Borgos (3:2.122)
Right.

Bruce Borgos (3:7.754)
Oh my gosh, oh my gosh. Well, I'm sorry to hear that. I hope that works out for you. I mean, I know that's, my best friend just went through the same thing last year, so.

David Temple (3:10.154)
Yeah.

David Temple (3:19.561)
Yeah, it's, hey, Nietzsche said if it doesn't kill you, it makes you stronger. Now, if I break out into a big sweaty mess and you just see dripping, it's just a hot flash. I'm really okay. Bruce, you're not making me nervous.

Bruce Borgos (3:30.954)
Got it. All right.

Bruce Borgos (3:36.650)
Yeah, OK.

David Temple (3:37.289)
Mr. Borges. Anyway.
Yeah, we're actually rolling. I may or may not keep that in. I don't know. I'll figure that out. But if you're cool with it. Let me say this though. I wish you well. I hope it turns out positively, negatively. Yeah. And you know, I guess I'm a little older than you. So I've passed that number. And but I'm here's the good news, Bruce, if I may for one more second.

Bruce Borgos (3:51.114)
Yeah.

Bruce Borgos (3:57.802)
Yeah, I hear you, positively, negatively.

David Temple (4:12.166)
I'm writing a book about it, non -fiction book.

Bruce Borgos (4:12.458)
Oh, good, good.

David Temple (4:16.423)
Because I want to challenge guys just like you just like me just like buddies of mine who are a decade younger I'm gonna go hey. Oh, you don't like that little inconvenience for 15 minutes. Well Let me tell you what the alternative is

Bruce Borgos (4:29.866)
That's right. Yep, exactly.

David Temple (4:32.742)
Alright, now here's the official start to the Thriller Zone. The day before your book drops, Bruce, how excited are you, man?

Bruce Borgos (4:42.730)
pretty excited. Yeah, definitely ready to go with number two in the Porterback Series.

David Temple (4:48.965)
This book, part of the reason that you're back on the show, and I should probably explain this because I never talk about it, people wonder how do certain guys get on two and three times and I've been trying to get on your show forever and I can't get on. Well, there's a couple of things. How the stars are aligning, how I'm feeling that week, the success of your book. If you're a debut author, those are kind of challenging because...
I have to, since I do the show for free, I have to figure out ways to make the show valuable beyond just everyone liking it so that I can get sponsors and sponsors go, well, I don't know who that is. And so it doesn't pull any attraction to the show. So I'm in a tough place, but I really have always liked pulling in new guys like you, which was last year. So you see, you see where I am, right? And it makes sense, right? I happen to like you cause you got great energy.

Bruce Borgos (5:42.634)
Sure. Yeah.

David Temple (5:48.867)
Um, you're smart, dude. You're kind. You're gracious and you're right. Hell of a works I mean, I loved uh, bitter past the bitter past and This one, you know was better Imagine that

Bruce Borgos (6:5.354)
Well, I'm glad to hear you say that. I don't know whether this is common among authors or not. You could probably chime in here as well. So the bitter past was kind of the baby that got everything started here. And I've had a lot of people tell me, I think Shades of Mercy is actually even better. And to me, it's like, that's kind of shocking.

David Temple (6:27.650)
Why is that shocking? Tell me, break that down for me.

Bruce Borgos (6:30.890)
You know, I just, I was afraid, and again, I think this is probably a pretty common feeling that I was not going to be able to recreate, reproduce, or get that same kind of vibe going in any of the following books because they're sequels for the most part. It's not the same story, but it's the same set of characters. And I was worried that, gosh, am I going to be able to recreate that? And I just...
It's been very nice to get that feedback already on Shades of Mercy.

David Temple (7:6.112)
There's a couple of things that spring to mind. You may or may not have heard my episode a couple of weeks back with Jack Carr. We're talking about his new book, The Red Sky Morning, and we were talking about that thing about authenticity and imposter syndrome, which we both kind of called bullshit on. And sometimes I wonder, and I'd like to hear your thoughts about this, sometimes I wonder, do we pull that on?
ourselves as kind of a false bravado or we've heard it so we feel like we should feel it when in reality and this is what I said to jack I said I call bullsh -t on that because there are days that I write something I'm like god damn that is good and I think we should high -five ourselves metaphorically and go that was good and you know what sometimes and I'm gonna stop so you can jump in here I'm sorry sometimes
You just got to give yourself permission and go, dude, that came out of the thin air and it resonates and it's heartfelt and it's good. Technically it's good and it's good storytelling. So I'm going to shut up. I don't want to hear your thoughts.

Bruce Borgos (8:9.002)
Right.

Bruce Borgos (8:19.274)
Yeah, I think you're spot on. The only time that I really feel imposter syndrome or something akin to that is when I'm reading other authors and I stumble across a paragraph or a couple of sentences and I go, oh my God, that's magic. Why can't I do that? And then to your point, I'm writing things oftentimes when I sit back and I look at it.
And you know, you've created this world, this entire fake world, and you've populated it with people and buildings and all of these settings. And sometimes you look back at that and you go, that's really good. And you're right. You have to give yourself permission to acknowledge that and also to be able to tell other people and convey that to other people that, yeah, I've written a good book here. This is worth reading.
And that's not easy to do for a lot of people, but because it does sometimes feel self -aggrandizing. But it's necessary.

David Temple (9:29.484)
Yeah, I had the good fortune of knowing at a very young age what I wanted to do in my life. I was about 13, 14. I said, I'm going to be on the radio. I mean, my voice changed really early, so that kind of helped. And my dad was a preacher, so I learned elocution and storytelling from the pulpit from him.
But at 16, I landed my first gig because I'm like, this is what I want to do. I'm good at this. And I wasn't even good at it yet. I said, but I'm going to be good. And I practice just like we do when we write. We practice by writing. And damned if I didn't just skyrocket one gig after another until I made it to the number one market in the country. And this is my point, not bragging, but saying you have to have a dream, hold onto it, latch onto it, and let the power of that take you.
And you gotta do that with writing, because if you don't give yourself that permission and believe that will happen, now I can get all metaphysical on your ass if you want me to, but you know, the universe source energy, whatever you want to call it, God, gives you the talents. Do you think, here's an interesting thing, I'm gonna go on a tirade. Do you think it's interesting that this all powerful being goes, hey Bruce, you're a good guy.

Bruce Borgos (10:55.786)
I just lost you.

David Temple (10:57.565)
Hang on with me. I don't know what's going on stick with me Don't move because I'm gonna stay I'm Editing this bitch Okay, you should be able to hear me. Okay?

Bruce Borgos (11:8.842)
Oh yeah.

David Temple (11:13.148)
Okay, so you can see me, you can hear me, I will hold that thought.

Bruce Borgos (11:15.402)
Yeah. Yeah.

David Temple (11:25.489)
Okay. You good? You still with me?
All right. All right, there you are. I don't think that looks at you and says, you know, you're you're a good guy, you're talented, I'm going to give you these desires, I'm going to create these desires in you. And then you go, Oh, cool. Thank you, all powerful one. And you start working and he goes, Oh, psych. I was just kidding. Right?

Bruce Borgos (11:50.282)
Yeah.
Yeah, absolutely. It's funny because you know, you talk to other people who are trying to get into the business of writing and maybe get their first book or their first short story out or whatever, and they have those same feelings of, gosh, can I really do this? And like you said, you have to be at the point where you are able to recognize within yourself that, look, I've got some talent here. Maybe it's not...
Maybe I'm not Stephen King, but I've got some abilities here and I'm going to go after this. And once you start believing that and believing you can go some places here, it's a lot easier because self -doubt can wreak havoc on you. And it's a waste of time.

David Temple (12:41.998)
Yeah, absolutely.
It's a total waste of time. And I would say re -channel that energy to, you know that old phrase, Bruce, fake it until you can make it. So, so just fake it until you can make it. Tell, tell yourself you're faking it until you're making it, but use whatever technique you need. Well, I can tell you this. And I read probably way too many books. Sometimes my challenge on this show is I will be

Bruce Borgos (12:54.730)
That's right. Yeah. Yeah.

David Temple (13:16.332)
I know your book. I've read your book. I know the characters, but I may be reading through this week. I was reading three simultaneously because I'm just stacking the deck and sometimes I'm sitting down and I'll go, uh, oh shit, uh, Porter. Oh yeah. Porter back. Okay. Good. Right. So my point is I, you know, I'm a, I'm a fan of all you guys. I'm a fan of me, you, uh, we're all trying to get this thing done. So, all right, let me,

Bruce Borgos (13:34.890)
Yeah, right.

Bruce Borgos (13:44.970)
Yeah.

David Temple (13:45.612)
Let me stop babbling. I want to do this. As we said, it drops tomorrow. Last time I saw you, I like to get caught up. I saw you at Bauschere Con here in San Diego. And I wish I had had the wherewithal. There was a lot of balls in the air at the time. I wish I had the wherewithal just to grab you, come up to my hacienda and bang out a show. And we tried to do that this time, but the medical attention kind of took over.
But what have you been up to, like just outside of writing your book? Because what I wanna know is, I wanna know what you've been up to, how did you like Bauschere Con? What did you take away from Bauschere Con?

Bruce Borgos (14:30.474)
Well, you know, I'm on the kind of write a book a year schedule now with my publisher. And the good news is that the Bitter Pass has done well enough that my original two book deal is now a four book deal. So we're going to have at least four Porter Beck novels. And that's great. And there's been a lot of extra stuff kind of surrounding that contract extension. The other thing that I've been up to, unfortunately,
is that my wonderful literary agent, Janet Reed, passed away. And she was, you know, an icon in this industry. And she was very, very gracious in taking me on back in 2020 and believing in me. And I learned so much from her. So now I'm trying to fill that void of not having an agent presently. Now, quite honestly, I'm in a good place.
where I'm in the middle now of this four book deal and I probably don't need an agent immediately. But I'm already, I'll tell you quite honestly, I'm missing that advice and that counsel and the occasional phone call just shooting the crap with me and talking about the industry as a whole. So that's kind of what I've been up to. But BauschereCon was great. Out of the conferences I've been to.

David Temple (15:35.111)
Right.

Bruce Borgos (15:57.898)
It certainly has been the best. I may go to Thriller Fest next year and try that. But I'm definitely going back to BowserCon and certainly the one in San Diego was great. The thing I got out of it most, Dave, was meeting a lot of the authors I had begun to have relationships with online or social media and whatever. And certainly some authors that I hadn't yet met that way.
but really kind of solidifying some friendships and talking about things and just sharing stories. And that's been great. And because of that, I think, you know, all of the same people that you know in this side of the business, the authors that you've had on your show, so many of them I've gotten to know as well. And we pretty much talk all the time and, you know, ask questions and say, how are you doing this? And what are you working on? And...

David Temple (16:51.716)
Yeah.

Bruce Borgos (16:56.234)
And that's been a wonderful kind of support group.

David Temple (17:0.579)
That is so awesome. I love hearing that and it was so great to see you. Often I hear people say this of me, but I always turn it around and go, man, it's just so cool to put a face and a handshake to someone that you've been either looking through a screen at or reading about and so forth. So I thought it was really cool. My notes about Thriller Fest. Everybody should do it once.
Everybody should do it once. Beyond that, it's up to you. BowserCon, that was my first and I totally enjoyed it. I will not be able to make the one this year in Nashville.
For many reasons. But I do like writer conferences in general. And Chris Hottie, my good buddy Chris Hottie and I were talking one day, and I think it was actually at the last Thriller Fest, and we were talking about the very best part is hanging out in the bar or the coffee shop, canoodling with other people, just shooting the breeze, and there's something about that camaraderie.
and having people in your corner and that you know that they're going through the exact same thing you're going through and there's something really good about that.

Bruce Borgos (18:10.218)
Right. And the other thing that I did, similar to Bauscherkhan, was because I was at Bauscherkhan, I got invited to the Tucson Festival of Books, which if you've never been to is the most marvelous thing on the planet. And it happens every March. And I'm looking to go back. But I got to meet, again, tons more people, including the very great Craig Johnson, the author of the Longminer series. And he...

David Temple (18:20.641)
Mmm!

Bruce Borgos (18:38.122)
I was able to personally thank him for blurbing the bitter past for me. And we talked about the book a little bit and he's the most gracious guy you'll ever meet. Very generous, we got to have dinner with him and just listen to him tell some stories about his process and everything and saw him on a panel discussion. So it's just fabulous. There's like 100 ,000 people that turn out for this thing.

David Temple (19:4.896)
What?

Bruce Borgos (19:5.770)
It's over several days and it's in the quad of the University of Arizona. So they've got this huge setup and they get tons of great authors and great panel discussions. It was an amazing experience.

David Temple (19:20.767)
Make sure you and I connect either offline after this or in between here and there and I will meet you there for that. I would love to be at that gig.

Bruce Borgos (19:28.810)
Well, yeah, it is amazing. Yeah. Oh, yeah, look it up for sure. I'll send you some stuff on it.

David Temple (19:31.230)
I'm not even familiar with it, so that's actual.
All right, well, folks, let's take a short break. Hopefully we'll get these tech issues handled. I wanna say hello to our sponsor this month, a brand new one, so we wanna say hi to there. But when we come back, fun little thing, everything you want to know about Shades of Mercy from our friend Bruce Borges, and he's gonna give us his secret sauce for creating genuine characters. Stay with us. I'm springing that on you, so you'll just have to come up with something.

Bruce Borgos (20:5.322)
Got it.

David Temple (20:6.013)
Heheheheh!
There must be some fucking ghost in the machine today. I don't know what that's about. Could be Wi -Fi. That's right. We're good here. But thank you, dude. You're amazing the way you just stayed right there and you held the thought because a lot of people... Oh, man. Yeah, we're where we are. Shut the fuck up. Three, two, and we're back with Bruce Borges. And of course, we're talking about this delicious book, Shades of Mercy. This is the follow up to The Bitter Past. And...

Bruce Borgos (20:23.850)
I'm sorry.

David Temple (20:38.299)
Thanks for sticking with us, buddy.

Bruce Borgos (20:40.106)
Yep, absolutely. Thanks for having me again.

David Temple (20:42.363)
Alright, now I want us to drill down. Do you want to go A or B first? You want to go, let's drill down on shades of mercy? We're gonna go there anyway. Or, give me that secret sauce for creating genuine characters. And the reason I pick that for you, Bruce, is that this is what I feel about your characters. Much like Craig Johnson, who you referred right before the break with Longmire, which, God, I love that television series. The first series. It...

Bruce Borgos (21:7.882)
Yeah, me too.

David Temple (21:12.122)
Kind of dwindled as it went, but that is not Craig's fault. That is directing. I'd love to... Do you agree with kind of what I said there? Yeah.

Bruce Borgos (21:20.298)
Yeah, I do. I mean, there's no question. And I mean, I love I'm rewatching the series now.

David Temple (21:27.226)
So Longmire, every time I read Porter Beck, I think of Longmire. I hope that's a compliment.

Bruce Borgos (21:34.794)
It definitely is.

David Temple (21:37.017)
So I have that same kind of a feeling, that same kind of a, that voice that he has that just kind of a, you think you're not gonna mess me up, you're not gonna rush me, I'm gonna take care of this my way. And so I wanna, which one do you wanna go with? You wanna talk? All right, do it.

Bruce Borgos (21:51.530)
Let's get the secret sauce stuff going. So, you know, similar to, and again, Craig Johnson has been one of the guys that I read extensively before I started to seriously do some writing. And Longmire was just a favorite character. And I really admired how he created not only Longmire, but the characters around him. And in a lot of ways, sometimes I kind of feel, and I told Craig this, that,
you know, I've kind of copied him in some ways. I mean, I've created different characters in a different place, but I try to emulate his, the way he creates real, relatable characters. And Porter Beck, especially for me, is a character that when I sit down and I do some writing and I'm typing out what Porter Beck is saying or what he's doing, I look back on that and not just with him, but with my other characters and I say, is that really what,
this guy would do in this instance. And I think I would be lying to you, David, if I said that there's not some of me in Porterbeck, especially, you know, kind of sense of humor and things like that. And I think you have to impart part of you into at least your major characters. Otherwise, they're not real. You're just trying to create something that you don't have any background in.

David Temple (22:59.926)
sure.

Bruce Borgos (23:18.570)
you don't have any knowledge of. So I try to do those things where, I mean, my secret sauce, if there is any, is just in putting something down on paper that sounds like, hey, you know, this is how a guy who's had 20 plus years in military intelligence would go about looking at the world. This is how a guy who...

David Temple (23:33.237)
you

Bruce Borgos (23:47.210)
isn't quite sure what his, without giving too much away about the bitter past, about what his real background is, where he actually came from, the secrets in his life. This is how a guy who has those questions views the world. So that's kind of how I try to approach it.

David Temple (24:5.459)
Well, and I love that because there's so many things. There are so many times I'll circle sometimes entire passages. Other times I'll just highlight a sentence that struck me. You made a comment earlier and I've had the same feeling and I'm sure a lot of our listeners have where you're like, oh my, like I think about this with Meg Gardner. I'm like, how did she craft that sentence? She's, I mean, it's structure, it's words. And sometimes it's with such little,
what seems to be such a little effort that makes me go.
All right. I need to just think about something else. I need to pick up another job. But then listen to this, talking about this imposter syndrome, talking to Don Winslow. I'm sure you heard this conversation. And he was saying, is it Richard Rousseau? He goes, yeah, I pick up one of his books and I read it and I go, and this is Don speaking. Yeah, I need to just quit. Yeah.

Bruce Borgos (24:48.266)
Yeah.

Bruce Borgos (25:4.234)
Yeah. I know! Yeah.

David Temple (25:8.625)
Isn't it nice to hear when your heroes say something like that and you go, oh, you feel that way too. In case you're wondering, you think I'm distracted, I'm not. I'm trying to find something that really... Okay, this is a couple of things. All right, here you go.

Bruce Borgos (25:14.378)
Yeah, it is.

David Temple (25:30.448)
Premise of this book and many others being written these days. Okay Beck shook his head That was a problem with drones They were a gateway technology opening the door for any country or any bad actor to weaponize artificial intelligence and Execute lethal force while eating ice cream from the comfort of a recliner
A. Great line. Check. B. Talking about technology that's right here on the tip of everyone's tongue. B. Check. Yeah.

Bruce Borgos (25:59.914)
Yeah. It's funny that you mentioned that or you read that quote because I was just before this, we started the podcast, I'm typing up an article for Criminal Element and I'm trying to relate to the reader there the interesting things I ran across in doing the research for this book and all of the information I found on hacking, the things that scared the absolute shit out of me about what really happens in the world. And I included that quote.
Yeah, I was just looking at it before you and I started talking. And I think literally that when I wrote that, and yeah, I mean, I just kind of came up with that when I was trying to describe what was going on in the book about these unmanned drones, and the fact that people can take them over at any time, and it has happened. But it's terrifying. And you can literally do it.

David Temple (26:54.477)
Yeah.

Bruce Borgos (26:57.418)
from the comfort of a recliner while you're eating ice cream. For some of these people, it's a video game.

David Temple (27:5.580)
Yes, it was, that's exactly it, and it was the juxtaposition of the terror of artificial intelligence inside a drone, intercepting such and such, creating this havoc, while sitting there eating some mint Oreo cookie, if you want to know my little secret passion. All right, and then right here as I flip the page, I'm just having fun with this, so thank you for bearing with me. Back was blah blah blah.

Bruce Borgos (27:26.762)
Yeah.

David Temple (27:34.507)
But something was wrong, as wrong as liver and onions.

Bruce Borgos (27:38.250)
Well, and back to the secret sauce. I think, again, I'm trying to come up with a few good words and string together a few good sentences that are relatable to people. And so I thought, I didn't want to write something cliche about as bad as, you know, whatever that people hear all the time. And I thought, well, what's bad to me? And I just thought, you know, things like liver and onions are so wrong.

David Temple (27:42.635)
Yeah.

Bruce Borgos (28:8.266)
Right?

David Temple (28:9.545)
Yeah, well, the reason I circled that is I write, what, you don't like? I love liver and onion, so... Yeah. There was one other one and I've been flipping through it. Evidently, I must not have had my highlighter in my hand when I said it. Usually, I will bend a corner and then I'll come back and highlight it later. But it was something like this and you'll know what it is. So -and -so was as difficult as picking... Folks, bear with my language.

Bruce Borgos (28:14.730)
Yeah. Oh my God. No, no.

David Temple (28:38.952)
Picking a piece of shit out of a fly's.

Bruce Borgos (28:41.706)
Pick and fly shit out of the pepper.

David Temple (28:43.528)
Thank you. Now that right there, that's creating character. That is brilliant. That's hilarious. All right.

Bruce Borgos (28:49.450)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, there are things like that that I, you know, when you write something like that and you look back on it and you go, that's really good right there, you know, and that's what you feel good about. And that's, it's like the stupid game of golf. You know, you're horrible at it, most of us are horrible at it, but you go out there and you hit that one good shot a day and you go, and that keeps you coming back, right? It's enough to keep you coming back.

David Temple (29:16.998)
Dude, dude, Mr. Dude to you. That is probably one of the best analogies I can think of right there because I love golf. I've loved it since I was a kid. I'm not that great, but I'm okay. I watch it on Sunday with my dad when he was alive. My wife and I watch it today. I get out and play whenever I can. And yes, one day you're out there banging them and you can't hit it to save your life and you want to throw or bend your clubs and go, why am I even doing this?
And then sure enough, somewhere on 13 or 15 or 17 or wherever, you hit that, you connect perfectly. It goes straight down the fairway and you're like, oh yeah, I'll be back for this.

Bruce Borgos (29:59.114)
Yeah, that's right. That's exactly it. And to extend the metaphor a little bit further, you know, the writing is so similar to that because sometimes you're sitting there writing and you're going through like, you know, I try to get through, I try to write like four to five hours a day. And sometimes, yeah, I'm not feeling it, just like you're on the golf course, you're not hitting much of anything, but it's necessary to hit those shitty balls.
Because occasionally you're going to get that swing just right, but if you don't hit the shitty balls or you don't type out the shitty words, you're not going to get the good one.

David Temple (30:40.036)
could not agree more. And as we continue to extend the metaphor, sometimes what I will do, and I think this is a good little trick. It's not a trick. I don't know if there's any real tricks. If I get stuck, I'm in a passage, I'm two and a half hours in and all of a sudden I hit one of those mental walls. I step up, I stand up, I put everything on pause, I go for a little short walk, get a little oxygen, a little sun, clear my head.
take the pressure off of myself to stop doing this, come back, click, it's right back in.

Bruce Borgos (31:16.490)
That's it? Yep, totally. I do the same. Gotta do it.

David Temple (31:21.826)
Well, that's such a good analogy. I am so gonna steal that. You know another thing about, while we're talking about characters and why it's so, one of the things I liked about this book so much, you take your hero, and I always call the protagonist the hero because he's the hero in my world at that moment, right? So Portobeck is got a, he's got a malady. Something is broken in him. I want you to explain what it is and why, but when I read that the first time, I'm like,
Oh shit, that's going to be challenging for him in his line of work. And as then I picked up this book, I'm thinking a bitter pass. Then I picked this book up, Shades of Mercy, and I'm like, oh, it's progressed. How is Mr. Borg just going to handle that? So talk to me about that.

Bruce Borgos (32:10.858)
Yeah, so I wanted to give Porter some obstacles to overcome. And he's got a few things going on in his life. But I wanted to give him a physical malady. And so what I came up with was a thing called retinitis pigmentosa, which is commonly referred to as night blindness. But that's really a bit of a misnomer. It's true that when the sun goes down, Porter Beck
basically cannot see. His vision, and this is a very real malady, his vision narrows to basically this pinprick of light in the center and he really can't see anything else. During daylight hours and under the sun in a well -lit room he's absolutely fine. But he has this malady that he has inherited genetically from his mother.

David Temple (32:45.215)
Mm -hmm.

Bruce Borgos (33:6.954)
He just got the mutated gene that causes retinitis pigmentosa. And as you can imagine, as you've alluded to, being a law enforcement officer, it's not really the best when you can't see at night. So I thought, and I thought about this ahead of time, well, okay, first of all, this is a progressive disease. So over time it gets worse.

David Temple (33:24.029)
Right.

Bruce Borgos (33:34.090)
Porter got it much later in life, or he first started to realize the symptoms much later in life, than most people who have RP actually do. But it's not completely uncommon for somebody in their 40s to start experiencing symptoms. For him, his disease is progressing pretty slowly. He doesn't know when he will eventually be blind all the time.
He doesn't know when that's going to happen. Nobody can tell him that. It could be five years from now. It could be 25 years from now. So a lot of that causes some apprehension for him. Imagine, you know, you're home at night. You're trying to sleep. You can't see at all. It throws off your day.

David Temple (34:9.339)
Mm -hmm.

Bruce Borgos (34:27.050)
You're worried about it. You have nightmares about being blind. These are very real experiences that people who have RP go through. It's just that kind of not knowing what's down the road for me. What am I going to do about it? So Porter, being a lawman, he's a cop, he's a sheriff in a very remote county where he doesn't have a lot of tools.
to use. Now, what he does, and I'll just kind of give a little bit away about Shades of Mercy, is he's acquired a dog, a police dog, who kind of has flunked out at guns and ammo school, where he might have sniffed out some things. Although he's competent in that. But Porter's thinking, and he picks him up for a song, literally a song, while he's at a sheriff's conference.

David Temple (34:57.209)
I love this.

Bruce Borgos (35:22.218)
And he has decided that maybe I can train this guy to be a guide dog. He's got some skills. He's a police dog, you know. Yeah, he's washed out of this, but maybe I can train him to do this. Now, Porter's the kind of guy, he's a do -it -yourself guy. So he's figuring, I can do this on my own. And that has its own foibles and failures included in that. So it's an interesting.
disease for a guy, a character like that to have.

David Temple (35:54.583)
Yeah. Well, thank you for that explanation. I love it. And here's another thing about developing, and this is why I brought this up, the secret sauce about genuine characters, is that being a big dog lover as I am and having lost mine not that long ago, I am attracted to any time a story has a dog in it, of course. And so, then that dog has such character in and of himself, and I love that about that. And so, folks, if you want a great example of just building genuine characters both...
Four -legged and two -legged check out shades of mercy, of course As we start to wrap up I want to drill down a one last thing because it's such a frightening It's such a frightening force in our world today and living here in San Diego Right down the road not very far from us Lies a fair amount of Mexican cartel. So I know that you have that influence in the book. So tell me I
your feelings about this, I know you got plenty of them, and what kind of research that you had to do in order to really, again, make this so genuine.

Bruce Borgos (37:4.106)
Well, part of the book is Porter Beck trying to figure out and solve for the opioid epidemic that is going on in his county. Even though it's a rural county, only has about 6 ,000 people, they're not immune to drugs. And the impact and the effects that drugs have on its citizens there, and people that he knows, and old friends of his, people who are struggling with pain.
things like that. And because now there is such an epidemic of fentanyl in the United States, that's very much what he's really trying to get to the root of. His problem is that a lot of this now, the transactions for these drugs is happening over the dark web. It's not, you know, you go to a seedy corner of town and pay some guy for this. It's you order them online, albeit...
on the dark web and it gets delivered to your house. And there's no good way to trace that stuff. So that's a big part of the book. And because it is, and as we know, we all know, that most of this fentanyl is coming up from the southern border in a variety of ways and that the cartels are very much at the forefront here. So it's a piece that he has to deal with and has to be a part of this book, along with that, as you know.

David Temple (38:2.226)
sure.

Bruce Borgos (38:31.146)
It's not just the Mexican cartels. It is another foreign government who is involved, and specifically not perhaps on the drug side, but on the technology side, on the hacking side of things that comes into play here. And all of those things kind of collide in the middle of this story.

David Temple (38:53.488)
Yeah, dude, it's so powerful and it just shakes me to my core at what goes on around us and Tammy and I talk about this and I'm not beefing on San Diego because I we love it here for crying out loud. It's as you it's paradise. But what we are aware of is that there are so many things we are not aware of. I mean, this stuff is happening right around us, maybe next door, maybe just down the street.

Bruce Borgos (39:7.786)
Oh yeah. Yeah.

David Temple (39:22.832)
maybe across town, but it has a dark hand that is reaching out and touching a lot of people we know. And what I'm afraid of is that there won't be any end to it. And that's the killer. Yeah.

Bruce Borgos (39:22.954)
Yes.

Bruce Borgos (39:36.842)
I know there's no easy answer to it, that's for sure. As long as there's an appetite, it's going to be hard to suppress.

David Temple (39:44.270)
Yeah. Well, as we wrap, you know what I always close with, and it may have changed since last time we spoke, but I'd love to hear Bruce's best writing advice.

Bruce Borgos (39:54.954)
I think, and this is something you hear from so many writers, my advice to writers is always two things. One is, as we talked about, believe in yourself. If you have the desire for this, nobody was born Stephen King, nobody was born John Steinbeck. They worked their asses off to get that recognition and to get that acclaim.
And I'm sure they have all the same self doubts that the rest of us have as writers. So that's my first piece of advice is believe in yourself, do something about it. And then get into the habit of writing. As I said, I try to write four or five hours a day, you know, six to seven days a week, much to the chagrin of my wife. Because technically I'm supposed to be retired now, but now I'm not retired. And that's a good thing. But...
Getting into that habit allows you as a writer to... I tell people this all the time, they say, what do you do about writer's block? I said, I've never ever had writer's block. Because I will sit down and I will just start typing what I, you know, something that is related to the outline that I've created for a story. And it may be absolute crap. It may be junk. But by getting into the...
the rhythm of a few paragraphs, I find that, okay, then things kind of start to click. And I can always throw out the crap later on. And I do, in all of the subsequent drafts that I do. You don't need to be perfect in your first draft. Just get into the habit of writing, whether it's the same time every day or the same amount of time every day, and good things will happen.

David Temple (41:31.083)
Yeah.

David Temple (41:49.417)
So good. Was it Voltaire who said perfection is the enemy of good?

Bruce Borgos (41:56.650)
You would know.

David Temple (41:57.608)
Okay, all right. The other thing is, since we spent so much time talking about golf, and I hope you play golf, because we're going to do that one day. Do you, by the way?

Bruce Borgos (42:5.962)
You know, I tell people I hack around. My back is not what it used to be, so I have a very limited backswing, which probably serves to give me a better score.

David Temple (42:8.968)
Okay. Okay.

David Temple (42:17.160)
Yeah. Well, my point is this, and I was thinking about this when I watched a Tiger Woods documentary since we're hammering on golf. Do you think, do you think Tiger Woods just woke up one day and said, you know, I'm going to, I'm going to try this and see if I'm any good. No, he practiced his work ethic for practice is insane. And I read and I heard on this documentary, I think he will not leave his practice until he
strikes the ball 1000 times every day. That's minimum. And when I heard that, I'm like, wow, that takes that 10 ,000 hour rule to a whole new level. But the key is, folks, in case you haven't heard it and figured it out by now, just sit down, give yourself permission, be kind to yourself, do that which you love, keep going. If it sucks, scratch it. But if you've written nothing, then you have nothing to correct, right? Well,

Bruce Borgos (42:48.394)
Yeah. Yeah.

Bruce Borgos (43:3.754)
Right. Yeah.

Bruce Borgos (43:9.802)
Yeah, absolutely.

David Temple (43:12.838)
Bruce, it is always such a good time. I loved seeing you at Bashar Khan. I'm sorry we didn't get a chance to hook up this particular time in person. I promise you in season seven, which is launching, season seven, can you believe it? Will launch in September. Yeah, because daddy's taken vacation time. This summer will be the first time I've taken vacation.

Bruce Borgos (43:29.802)
Wow, that's great.

Bruce Borgos (43:34.698)
Oh my gosh.
Good deal.

David Temple (43:43.110)
I shit you not since I started working at 16.

Bruce Borgos (43:47.754)
Oh my god, are you kidding?

David Temple (43:50.052)
No, I have worked, I have just hammered my whole professional career, my second career, now in my third career. I've worked every summer and this summer I'm taking July and August, or at least August for sure, off. And yeah. Folks, once again, you want to know more, go to bruceborges .com, pick up Shades of Mercy. You will not be disappointed. I promise you, this is one of those reads and it feels like an old friend.

Bruce Borgos (44:2.570)
Good for you.

David Temple (44:16.004)
Craig Johnson influence. I love the fact that he's right at the top saying a crisp jolt of cask strength 100 proof writing.

Bruce Borgos (44:26.538)
He's a good guy.

David Temple (44:27.843)
Bam. Well, Bruce is always delightful. Always good to see him.

Bruce Borgos (44:32.266)
Thank you my friend, great seeing you all. We'll miss you at BowserCon.

David Temple (44:36.035)
Yes, but I'll tell you what, we'll catch another conference and go get your checkup. And we will talk more about that book that I have in the back burner very soon. But again, folks, it's Bruce Borges. Be well, my friend.

Bruce Borgos (44:41.898)
Yeah, going.

Bruce Borgos (44:52.778)
All right, thanks David.

David Temple (44:54.979)
Please hold. Hitting stop.