The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Hang On St. Christopher (The Sean Duffy Series) by Adrian McKinty

Episode Date: March 14, 2025

Hang On St. Christopher (The Sean Duffy Series) by Adrian McKinty Amazon.com New York Times bestselling author Adrian McKinty continues the Edgar Award-winning Sean Duffy series with Hang on St. Christopher. Rain slicked streets, riots, murder, chaos. It's July 1992 and the Troubles in Northern Ireland are still grinding on after twenty-five apocalyptic years. Detective Inspector Sean Duffy got his family safely over the water to Scotland, to "Shortbread Land". Duffy's a part-timer now, only returning to Belfast six days a month to get his pension. It's an easy gig, if he can keep his head down. But then a murder case falls into his lap while his protege is on holiday in Spain. A carjacking gone wrong and the death of a solitary, middle-aged painter. But something's not right, and as Duffy probes he discovers the painter was an IRA assassin. So, the question becomes: Who hit the hitman and why? This is Duffy's most violent and dangerous case yet and the whole future of the burgeoning "peace process" may depend upon it. Based on true events, Duffy must unentangle parallel operations by the CIA, MI5 and Special Branch. Duffy attempts to bring a killer to justice while trying to keep himself and his team alive as everything unravels around them. They might not all make it out of this one. About the author Adrian McKinty was born and grew up in Belfast, Northern Ireland. He studied philosophy at Oxford University before moving to Australia and then New York City. In 2019 Adrian had a global hit with his standalone novel The Chain. Adrian's novels have won the Edgar Award, the Ned Kelly Award (3 times), The Anthony Award, Barry Award, Macavity Award and the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award. His books have been translated into over 40 languages.

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Now, here's your host, Chris Voss. Hi folks, it's Voss here from thechrisvossshow.com. Hooray! Hooray! Hooray! Now, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the big show. As always, the Chris Voss Show is a family that loves you but doesn't judge you, at least not as harshly as the rest of your family there. Today we have an amazing author on the show. We'll be talking to him about his

latest hot book that's coming up the presses just March 4th, 2025. It's called Hang On St. Christopher, part of the Sean Duffy series by Adrian McKinty. We're going to get into some of the deets and some exciting new things that he has coming up with his books and all that good stuff. Adrian was born and grew up in Belfast Northern Ireland. He studied philosophy at Oxford University before moving to Australia and then New York City. In 2019 he had a global hit with a standalone novel, The Chain. Adrian's novels have won the Edgar award, the Ned Kelly award three times. In fact, the Anthony award, the Barry award, McAvity award, and the

Theakston award and the old peculiar crime novel of the year world. Did I get the Theakston right? Is that- It's basically all you have to say is it's a clean sweep. Oh, it's a clean sweep. Five points in our award there, I've won it. That's all you need to know. We just need to get him a Nobel Peace Prize.

Please find one that I haven't won and then give me something to root for. You know, get to this plateau, you're just looking down on the universe. And his book's been translated into 40 languages. So welcome to the show, Adrian. Give us any dot coms. Where do you want people to find you on the interwebs? Adrian Hildesheim You can find me on Twitter and Instagram, and you can get the books at all the usual places.

Pete Slauson So give us a 30,000 overview. What's in your new book? Adrian Hildesheim It's book eight in a series of the tech novel set in Belfast, Northern Ireland in the 1980s. So just to set the background scene, it's the apocalypse. Northern Ireland is true story. Northern Ireland has been in the throes of this low level civil war known as the Troubles for the previous 20 years and Belfast is just the apocalypse. Bombs going off, riots every night, killings, the highest murder rate of police forces in the Western world.

Just to be a copper there is a very precarious job. And my copper has been in the job for seven books and this is his eighth and he's trying to head into retirement. But just like Al Pacino in the God Feather part three, just when he thought he was out, they drag him back in to one more case. It's always one more case. Pete Slauson You got a great blurb there from Don Winslow. We've had him on the show. He's always one more case. Pete You know, you got a great blurb there from Don Winslow. We've had him on the show. He's a great author. John Yeah, Don's a good friend.

Pete Oh, yeah. And so, this is book eight in your series, the Sean Duffy series. Tell us a little bit about the Sean Duffy series and who is this Sean Duffy? John So, Sean Duffy's my detective. He's interesting in the context of Northern Ireland because Northern Ireland, if you know much about the troubles or the Civil War that happened, but the police force was mostly a Protestant police force and it was seen by the Catholic community as kind of an alien, untrustworthy police force to be a part of. Just like, you know, LAPD would have been in South Central in 1966 or, you know, any of those situations. And he's actually a Catholic cop. So he's seen by a traitor by his own people, and he's seen as untrustworthy by the other cops. So

that's what makes it an interesting dynamic to write about and think about and hopefully read about. Pete You can't win either way sometimes. David No, exactly. Pete You can't please everybody, that's for sure. What prompted you to start this series? How did it all begin with this character? I was born and grew up in Belfast and I'd never written about it before. And I'd written about just about everywhere I'd ever lived because people said that to

write about Northern Ireland was box office poison because it was a complicated situation there. But eventually if you're a writer, you do the challenge of bringing the complicated to your readers. And so I decided that I was going to write about it. And then much to my shock and amazement, the books actually did very well in terms of critically and commercially. So that's all you need. All you need is that little bit of encouragement and then you write another one and another one and if they keep encouraging you, you can't stop.

That's true. That's true. And if the publisher says, hey, we need more books, you got to go. You got to listen to your editor. Exactly. Now you have a lot of books under your belt. How many books do you have so far? I think I've written all together, including short story collections and books I've edited, I think

21 altogether, which is a lot of heavy lifting. Pete Slauson Yeah. Yeah. And do you have other series that are still ongoing? David I do. I have this series, which I haven't done a book in about 10 years called the Michael Forsythe series about a young illegal immigrant from who goes to New York City in the 90s. It just sort of echoes my story because I was a young illegal immigrant from Northern

Ireland who lived in New York City in the 90s. And I also have a couple of standalongs that may become series in the future, but I'm not allowed to talk about those. Ah, so the stuff's coming in the future there. What does the future look like for this series, the Sean Duffy series? Do you have a- Yeah, after the third book, I said, that's it. It's a trilogy, we're done. And then I wrote a fourth and then I wrote a fifth. And then I said, okay, that's it. I only have a certain number of ideas. You know, the genius only goes so far. The sixth book is the second trilogy, we're done.

I made this big announcement, you know, people wrote to me and said, please, please, please don't end it. And I said, no, you're done. I'm not a one trick pony. There will never be another one. And then I had an idea for seventh one and much to my shame and chagrin and embarrassment, I wrote the seventh one and sort of shame facetly brought it to the universe. And I said, but enjoy this folks, because this is the last one. And now yesterday, I brought it on eighth. So I made it full of myself. And now, yesterday, I bought it at an eight. So I made it full of myself. This was the end and I'm not doing that anymore. I mean, you know, I mean, I've been to so many Kiss, the last tour of Kiss, Kiss concerts.

Someone says to Sean in the book, you know, you're about as unretired as Frank Sinatra. I think that's true. You should never say, this is my farewell tour, because two years from now, the tax man will be coming and just go, you know what? That wasn't my idea. One more tour. Yeah, we got bills to pay. One more tour. Even the Eagles got back together. I mean, what are we talking about? And they called them to- They got a lot of divorces they got to pay for.

They called that tour because they said, we will get together when hell freezes over. Yeah. So they called that tour the Hell Freezes Over Tour. That was like 1985. Yeah. And they did like three more after that. 1988, 1987, I think was that album, but what a great album. But yeah, I mean, they were just the sphere in Las Vegas. And I do remember my mother saying, oh, I have to go all the way to, I'll do it

in her accent, I have to go all the way to Dublin because it's Frank Sinatra's last concert. Oh. And even then we were going, are you sure it's Frank Sinatra's last concert? I mean... Old blue eyes. Yeah. And it certainly was not.

Yeah. Even the, oh, what's his face, Tony Bennett, you know, he had all songs. Oh yeah. He was like out of it. He's still, it's still propping them up on stage, put a mic in his hand, play music and he'd go. The one I do not regret, I remember about, about five years ago, Leonard Cohen was in New York City and the tickets were quite expensive.

And then someone said to me, you know, it could be his last and it was. I was glad. I was glad I went. He was on fantastic form. Yeah. I skipped the last Rush concert thinking they'll do a big farewell tour. It'll be one big thing. And it wasn't. I regret it all my life. Some people resist. Look at Led Zeppelin. They've been bagging them for 25 years. They give you so much money. They said, we'll give you 200 million.

Last one I heard was $200 million. $200 million, wow. To do it. And they said, Robert Plant said no. Yeah. This is crazy, man. I wish they get back together, but you know, hey, what are you going to do? It's their thing.

You know, they got to, I'm sure they, they were in the old days where you actually made money as a musician. So they probably got a couple bucks for a hold away somewhere. Yeah. It wasn't all going to Spotify and everything else that you actually made the bread. Yeah. I think I saw a picture of their jet, Led Zeppelin's jet. Oh yeah. And they had a fireplace in it. Yeah. I remember that famous jet. It was like fake, but it was like And they had a fireplace in it. Yeah, I remember that. It was like

fake, but it was like, they had a fireplace in it. From 75. Yeah. Like somebody, somebody like, we need a fireplace and a mantle in this plane. They, they got it. And they got it. Yeah. You know, rock and roll has changed a lot. So, so what do you, what do you, what do you hear from your readers? What do you to your books, your writing and the character? Adrian Smedley Just brilliance at every level of stories. Pete Slauson Modesty, maybe a little modesty. Adrian Smedley Yeah, yeah. Humility, obviously.

Pete Slauson They say humility is my greatest. Adrian Smedley Humility at the top of the list there. But just, you know, they say, Adrian, you know, stories are so funny. The writing is so perfect. The dialogue is perfect. I just get, don't even look at my ratings. There's a bit of some fake one-star reviews out there. Don't listen to those guys. That's obviously jealous fellow authors. Yeah. But the real genuine readers, all five-star reviews across the board. Yeah, I mean the chain's got 17,819 ratings on Amazon and then 141,258 readings on Goodreads.

Yeah, that was the one that really had a big impact. I knew that one was crazy when I remember I broke, first time ever I broke the New York Times bestseller list. And that was the, I think the one and only time where people would recognize you in airports. Ah. And that's, this never happened to me before or since. That was, I think, the one and only time where people would recognize you in airports. This never happened to me before or since. They say, are you the guy that's on the page four of the New York Times book review? And I go, yes, yes, I am.

And I thought, I don't know how I feel about this, being recognized in airports. Because that must happen to, I don't know, let's say you're Mick Jagger. I mean, that's his daily existence, right? 25 times a day. Aren't you Mick Jagger? I get recognized at airports all the time. It's the TSA finding out I'm on the no-fly list. Yeah.

It's just go, sorry, you're going to take the bus. We're not letting you in a plane. Wouldn't that suck? That would be awful. You're going to take us. We're not letting you in a plane. Wouldn't that suck? That would be awful. Not being able to fly somewhere.

Although, I mean, from my perspective, every time there's a weird situation like that, you think there might be a book in this or there might be some story or something. That's true. Planes landing upside down nowadays. Well, you get bumped from a flight and then have to take the Greyhound across the country or something. I once did the flight. I once did the train.

Wait, isn't this the plane? This is the, this is the plot of plane trains and automobiles. Yeah, it is. John Candy and Steve Martin, the only good Thanksgiving movie. Yeah, really. And he says, but anyway, I once took the train once from Chicago and New Orleans. And that was the scene because it's people, people with DUIs, people who are afraid to fly, people, you know, so that you really got to meet a

vast cross section of America on that train that you wouldn't have gone if you'd flown. Pete Slauson Yeah. David So, it's extremely interesting. Pete It's interesting, people are interesting. Do you find that you're a people watcher? Is that maybe one of the things that you integrate that into your books, characters and people? I'm never bored, for example, at the DMV. There's all this free dialogue. My DMV is the DMV in Harlem.

So it's a fantastic DMV if you want free dialogue and amazing situations and drama. It's a great place to go. Maybe this should be the new gripping crime novel or something, the DMV. I mean, the great thing about someone like, I don't know if you know the works of Samuel Backett, but what he did was say put a microcosm in ordinary life and make it interesting. I think that's an excellent challenge for a writer. How do you make something just really banal and ordinary and make that interesting?

Anybody can make a gunfight interesting or a bomb going off or whatever, but making a cup of coffee interesting, that's the charm. Get a whole book on just making a coffee. I don't know, I bought it, I just recently got into an espresso and bought an expensive espresso machine, all the toys that are like a money pit. And you could probably write a book about making a coffee with one of these damn things. There's a very famous spy novel called The Ipcris File. They made a great movie out of it with Michael Caine. And there's an incredibly sexy scene in the movie where he picks

up a woman and she comes, she gets out of the bed and she walks into his kitchen. And all he does is make her breakfast for the next three minutes. And it's very great. It's the Auntie James Bond. It's from a 1966 movie, but it's a fantastic scene because he makes her breakfast in a very, very sexy way and she's completely won over by it. And Bond never makes anybody breakfast. Yeah. I don't think he knows how to cook. No, I don't think he does. I don't think he does. He just knows how to fire weapons and bash headboards in. But it shows you that that's an interesting tack to take if you're a writer to go into

this other pathway. I'm going to have to go watch that movie so that I can be sexy for the chicks in the morning. Yeah, the IPCRIS file. It holds up. It's an amazing phone. Wow. The CRIS file? The IPCres file.

IPCres. I-P-C-R-E-S-S. Michael Caine movie. Just Google Michael Caine's spy movie, 60s. I mean like, what is it, like 500 movies or something? He's got a lot. He's got a big filmography. Yeah, he's got a lot. That's true. Yeah. He's still alive, I think too, isn't he? He is.

He's still doing film? I think he is. Every couple of film. I think he is every couple of years. I think he invented film. Yeah. I mean, he's got some great films. Ip Chris Fa, one of the best, Zulu, one of the best. And then of course there's Joel's Four, which is absolutely worth watching because it's the dumbest movie that any studio has ever made.

A hundred percent worth watching Joel's Four. The shark, to escape the shark in Massachusetts, they go to the Bahamas, but the shark knows and follows them to the Bahamas. I mean, what a movie. Pete Slauson It's a intuitive shark. Yeah. Joel Slauson Yeah, what a movie. Pete Slauson Yeah, a shark's got an axe to grind, man.

He's not letting shit go. Joel Slauson Absolutely does, that shark. Pete Slauson A shark's going to have a chip on their shoulder. That's why they're always biting people every now and then. That one does. They're just testing for, I don't know, see if it tastes good. Adrian, as we go out and pitch people on how to pick up your book and how to maybe websites.com, anything to stay in touch with, updates on what you're doing.

Yeah. You can get the book at all evil and most good bookstores and you can get it on Amazon and only get it if you want to be entertained and have fun. If you want to be bored and not find anything about the meaning of life, definitely don't get it. Yeah, just get second gray. I can't pull the reference now off the joke top of my head. It's Friday folks.

Seven levels of gray, what is that? Oh yeah, 50 shades of gray. 50 shades of Friday, folks. Seven Levels of Grey. What is that? What was that? Oh yeah, 50 Shades of Grey. 50 Shades of Grey. Thank you for the reference. Yeah, if you want to be bored, listen to that. Until then, pick up Hang On St. Christopher there. Thank you very much, Adrian, for coming on. We really appreciate it, man. Anytime, buddy. Thank you. And thanks so much for tuning in. Order up where refined books are sold. Hang On St. Christopher, the sean duffy series book

eight go buy all of them so you can get caught up on the whole series it will yeah just just binge it like you do the chris fosho anyway thanks for tuning in thanks for being here go to goodreads.com for chest chris fos linkedin.com for chest chris fos chris fos one of the tick tockity and all those crazy places on the internet be good to each other stay safe we'll see you next time and that