The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – The Lost Ticket by Freya Sampson

Episode Date: August 27, 2022

The Lost Ticket by Freya Sampson Strangers on a London bus unite to help an elderly man find his missed love connection in the heartwarming new novel from the acclaimed author of The Last Chance Library. When Libby Nicholls arrives in London, brokenhearted and with her life in tatters, the first person she meets on the bus is elderly Frank. He tells her about the time in 1962 that he met a girl on the number 88 bus with beautiful red hair just like hers. They made plans for a date at the National Gallery art museum, but Frank lost the bus ticket with her number on it. For the past sixty years, he’s ridden the same bus trying to find her, but with no luck. Libby is inspired to action and, with the help of an unlikely companion, she papers the bus route with posters advertising their search. Libby begins to open her guarded heart to new friendships and a budding romance, as her tightly controlled world expands. But with Frank’s dementia progressing quickly, their chance of finding the girl on the 88 bus is slipping away. More than anything, Libby wants Frank to see his lost love one more time. But their quest also shows Libby just how important it is to embrace her own chances for happiness—before it’s too late—in a beautifully uplifting novel about how a shared common experience among strangers can transform lives in the most marvelous ways.

You wanted the best. You've got the best podcast, the hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show, the preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. Get ready, get ready, strap yourself in. Keep your hands, arms and legs inside the vehicle at all times. Because you're about to go on a monster education roller coaster with your brain now here's your host chris voss hi folks this is voss here from the chris voss show.com the chris voss show.com i'm just here for the brain bleed folks welcome to the chris voss show guys we certainly appreciate you guys tuning in we have an amazing author we're talking today all the way from london and england all at the same time london england oh there's not a london anywhere else in the world is there i mean there's certainly

not the beautiful city but i don't think there is a london city anywhere in the world uh so you know there you go so london england you'll be finding out more about geography on the show uh things that you skip when you were asleep or drooling on your desk in elementary school uh today we'll have her on the show also to learn more about it refer to show your family friends and relatives go to goodreads.com for just chris voss go to youtube.com for just chris voss see all the places we are on the interwebs, the big LinkedIn group, the big LinkedIn newsletter. And for more of me saying the word the, you can tune in for that.

Further, share your family and friends. Give us a five-star rating over there on the iTunes. Today, she is launching her new book. It comes out August 30, 2022. The Lost Ticket. You know, in four months, I'm going to be saying 2023. Oh my gosh. The Lost Ticket by Freya Sampson, an amazing author. She's written a couple of books here. And she'll be talking about her latest book that's coming out. You want to order it up and get it? Well, it's hot off the bookshelves. She works in television as a creator and executive producer. Her credits include two documentary series for the BBC about the

British royal family, as well as a number of factual and entertainment series. Wait, was the British family not the factual part or was it the factual part? We'll find out later. She studied history at Cambridge University and in 2018 was shortlisted for the Exeter Nobel Prize. So you didn't get the Nobel Prize, you got the Novell Prize. Yeah, I mean, I really like the way you said that. Let's just go with the Exeter Nobel Prize. I'll take that one. We'll do that, yeah.

She lives in London with her husband, two children, and an anti-social cat, which we'll definitely have to ask her about on the show. Welcome to the show, Freya. How are you? I'm very well, Chris. Thank you very much for having me on. Thanks for coming on. We certainly appreciate it. Give us your dot coms or wherever you want people to find you on those interwebs tubes that run in the sky. So I have a website, which is freya hyphen samson.com and then on most of the social medias i am uh freya samson author so pretty easy to find there you go so tell us more about the uh british royal family bbc documentary you did no just we'll get we'll

get to talk about that you're like i didn't come on here to talk about that come here to talk my book damn it no we'll get the dirt later uh so uh do you have a name for that so people can look that up my mom's one of those bbc watching fans over here yes so um i think i'm trying to remember that it had a slightly different name in america i think it was called like a year with the royals or something was one of them then castle we'll have to. We'll have to check that out. We got the plug in there anyway. I got the plug in there for you. So let's talk about your newest book. Now, this is your second book.

Is that my understanding correct? It is. That's correct. Yes. There we go. And so what motivated you on to write this book? And is it a novel? Do I have that correct?

Yeah, it's a novel. So it was inspired by a story. So my first book was set in a library and I heard this amazing story when I was researching this book, The Lost Ticket, about it was about a woman who was one hundred and two years old. And she had spent years trying to find this book that her father had read her as a child. She couldn't remember the title, but she really wanted to find this book again and she'd never been able to find it and she mentioned it to a librarian and this librarian because librarians are superheroes went on a mission and not only did she trace the book but then she and her colleagues recorded themselves reading it so this 102 year old lady could listen to the story one last time and I was like blown away by this lovely act of kindness but also this idea that

actually the librarian it wasn't just the old the lady who'd got pleasure all the librarians had really enjoyed it as well and I was like I think there's a book in that on like a sort of a long search someone who spent decades looking for something um and this sort of group of strangers who come together to try and help them find it but I realized a book perhaps wasn't the most dramatic uh for in my novel so it's a woman so it's a man who has spent 60 years riding this london bus trying to find a woman he met as a 22 year old and the strangers who come to try and help him and and so and so this is kind of one of those lost connections sort of thing like uh i don don't know if they have them in London, but over here we have a thing called Craigslist.

And it's used for all sorts of things, selling things and selling goods. If you want to hire like a lawnmower person, you can. It's kind of like a bulletin board, an old-style internet bulletin board. Still is. And they have like a lost connection section on there. And it's, it's kind of interesting to go on there. You go on there and, you know, you see some romantic stuff, people like I saw you from across the Starbucks and you were drinking a latte and you spilled it on yourself. And suddenly I was in love with you. I don't know,

making funny scenarios. Uh, I, I, or, you know, I, and if only I could, I fell in love with you and if only I could find you. So is it, is it kind of that sort of thing? It is. Yeah. Less spilling. In fact,

we have a, in a, there's a newspaper in this country, a free newspaper. They give out on buses and trains called Metro. And it has something called rush hour crush, which is exactly that. It's like,

Oh, seriously. In the Chris Voss show hat. called Metro and it has something called Rush Hour Crush which is exactly that it's like the guy in the Chris Voss show hat I was the lady who spilled the cappuccino down my front on the northern line let's meet for dinner I feature it in the book because I'm obsessed with those columns I'm always like

A. who actually does them and B. do they ever connect do they ever find their person see you've touched on what I always thought when I looked at him and the, in the curio, the curious, the curiosity of those columns. When I,

you know, like I'll go on there, like usually I would hire movers off the Craigslist and they're usually cheaper than, you know, hiring off of, you know, the expensive guys are like,

yeah, charge a million bucks. Uh, so I just hire some guys. They usually have a truck and they're usually cheaper. And, uh, so anytime I would ever go on there, I be like hey i wonder what's in the lost cup and you go read it and like you say you you wonder like you're like i wonder if anybody ever like like the the two people meet and they you know they get married or something and have kids and you know they're the old people that you see holding hands. You're like, how did you meet? There's this time

at Starbucks. We're on the bus. And somebody should do the movie about that. Maybe your book should be turned into a movie so we can... I mean, from your mouth to Hollywood's ear, please, Chris. Is anyone listening? I want a cut

of that. So Spielberg, call me. I wish I had that cut of that. So Spielberg, call me. And I wish I had that kind of power. There's so many great stories that come on the show like yours. So, yeah, I always wonder, like, what happens? So you have the story here. Give us the name of some of the characters that are in the story. So Libby is the main character,

and she is a young woman who has just had her heart horribly broken by her boyfriend and she's she arrives in london literally with her life packed into two bags and on the bus she meets frank who is our elderly gentleman who has spent 60 years trying to find this woman and i should say so the reason he spent 60 years trying to find her because he met her on the bus in 1962 fell in love with her she wrote her number on a bus ticket and he lost it oh i mean honestly frank what a move he lost the ticket that's awful i know so lippy decides to help frank in his search um with the help of frank'ser, who is a punk rocker by the name of Dylan. So he joined the search too. Hi, Voxers. Voss here with a little station break. Hope you're

enjoying the show so far. We'll resume here in a second. I'd like to invite you to come to my coaching, speaking, and training courses website. You can also see our new podcast over there at chrisvossleadershipinstitute.com. Over there, you can find all the different stuff that we do for speaking engagements, if you'd like to hire me, training courses that we offer, and coaching for leadership, management, entrepreneurism, podcasting, corporate stuff. With over 35 years of experience in business and running companies as a CEO, I think I can offer a wonderful breadth of information and knowledge to you or anyone that you want to invite me to for your company. Thanks for tuning in.

We certainly appreciate you listening to the show. And be sure to check out ChrisVossLeadershipInstitute.com. Now back to the show. So this becomes quite the bus adventure of everyone trying to help him find him and so he just keeps riding the bus yeah hoping one day she'll step onto the bus exactly never been able to get over it the one that got away you know i've had that happen to me i think at least once i had uh you know i was at the club getting phone numbers, and I think there was one time I got a number that was either written on my hand, a phone number, or it was put on a napkin. And there was a little bit too much drinking that took place that night.

And the next morning when I woke up, the stuff was smeared. And I think there was another time where I I lost the napkin or the napkin had gotten wet because you know, you're just sitting in a cocktail, um, and, uh, and lost the number.

And I think it's happening twice in my lifetime. And do you want that? One of them? Yeah. I don't talk to ugly girls. I mean, they were a nice girl. So,

uh, yeah, you wonder, you're just like, well, if that was the one or whatever. So, yeah, you wonder. You're just like, what if that was the one or whatever? So do they all – how does it play out? Do they – or you can't, of course, tell us a lot of stuff with an all at the end or in the middle. But do they all search beyond the bus system or do they stay within the bus system?

So the bus is how it starts. But obviously, it expands out and it kind of gains its own momentum. It becomes a bit of a social media thing. Lots of other people become involved in the search. So, yes, it does. And it's set in London and it's all around London. So American readers, I'm sure, will recognize lots of the sort of famous tourist sites that are featured in the book as they search. Wow. Now, I guess he has dementia or progressing dementia. And so they're trying to, they're wasting its time to unite. Exactly. He wants to find her before he can't remember her anymore.

Wow. That's wild. You know, my favorite movies, and I forget the name of it, but it's a movie that's done in South Korea or Japan. And a guy's family is killed. He comes from Italy and he has onset dementia and he's working with some guys to get revenge. In fact, I think it's called revenge. Um, and, but he, he's, he's fighting to get the, you know, the, the killers killed and revenge for his family, um, before the dementia kicks in. And that's part of the thrill of the film. So I think this is quite the element you put into your book, uh, where, you know, it's a race against time, you know, they don't have much time left and so uh so i guess we have to buy the book and read the book to find out if they ever achieve their

goal no i'm gonna tell you that i'm afraid buy the book i gotta figure i gotta figure darn it um so in and uh so the see her uh on in 1962 does the rest of the story play out in modern day times yeah so we open in 1962 the first time he sees her but then everything happens in 2022 oh there you go and so they're they're constantly uh uh you've got it mentions there's a lot of quirky characters in the book tell us what it means some of those choices so my background is in tv as you said i've spent many years making tv programs and lots one of the things that they all have in common from programs about the royal family to programs about like bed and breakfast owners is i'm just i'm really interested in quirky characters

and like the royal family where they're definitely quirky characters, right? So I'm just always really drawn to sort of slightly eccentric, unusual, slightly different people. And so I like to populate my novel with kind of memorable characters, you know, characters that you like spending time with that are hopefully at the end of the book,

you're like, oh, that was super fun to hang out with them that's the aim there you go well that's that's good to have i mean the characters can make up all of the all of the uh all of the different facets of a book and it sounds like you know you've got the compressed pressure of the of the uh dementia that's there and so you know everyone's going let's let's get this done. And I think it's an interesting thing. People love love, I guess, when it comes down to it. It drives people to do funny things, I suppose.

I think that's very true. I think we've all done strange things for love, haven't we? And I think we also, all of us love the idea, or lots of us love the idea of that sort of one big love. And the book kind of explores whether that can come true. If that is, you know,

if it is just a fantasy or if actually that does exist. So again, I'm not going to give any spoilers, but I think we're all attracted to all. Many of us are attracted to that. Yes. Every morning I wake up and, and the first thought of my, of my day is my love.

And I wake to them and I'm just like, I go searching for them in the house and open up the coffee maker, put the coffee in, and true love comes pouring out every morning. Every morning. Just my best companion is a cup of Joe. But I try not to spill the frappuccino down the front. So tell us more about this cat. What's going on with your cat? Well, I realize I say antisocial in my bio, but actually most cats are antisocial, aren't they? That's true.

Sort of like just saying I've got a cat who's a cat. She's lovely she's very cute but she hates humans all human you know it's an interesting thing i mean a cat's an interesting thing it likes you half the time and hates you the other half of the time and uh i always tell people the joke you know, cats are a lot like women. And I have often said, if I ever settle down and quit being single, I'll get a wife. People say, well, Chris, you should get a wife. And I'm like, if I want something that hates me half the time and loves me half the time, I'll get a cat.

Or maybe the joke goes the other way. I forget. It's an old joke of mine but uh of the so the anti-social cat is there is there any other anti-social things that we need to i just feel like we need since we put that in the bio it has to we have to square that peg about the cat yeah being anti-social yeah i mean she bites she scratches she's like unbelievably aggressive towards my children who are still young yeah no she's a real she's a real character wow yeah that is an anti-social cat yeah she really is uh yeah and she refuses to be around us except when i so i've shut my office door so of course she's meowing outside the door now pretending that she wants to come in but if i let her come in

she would like stick her bum in my face and then leave again because you know that's what cats do right that's uh yeah that's definitely anti-social you should uh they should see a shrink see if they yeah we considered it like finding a cat shrink we just keep having to mellow with age but so far she's not mellowed yeah how long have you felt this way about your mother well she abandoned me and my eight other siblings when we were children so but uh there you go uh so this is pretty interesting on the british royal family bbc thing does that have any is there any juicy bits on it so many but none that i can tell you because i had to sign very strict non-disclosure agreements. It was very interesting. So I spent, I think, four years, three or four years in total,

filming with the royal family. And we had access, you know, really good access. Oh, you had access. So this isn't like a fountain. No, I had an office in Buckingham Palace. So we've traveled the world with the royals. I came to the White house with the queen uh when she was visiting george bush when he was president the second bush so it was really amazing like we

went from kind of afghanistan to washington to estonia with them and we traveled all sorts of places filming kind of the working life of the royals um so yeah it was it was really interesting i mean you know i got to meet them all and interview some of them and yeah it was good yeah i i i when she got to covid recently i would last year i think and the whole thing seems like a recent event the last years but when she got covid i was like so worried i was like oh man i hope you know the last you live for you live through all everything she lived through world war ii uh you know everything in the craziest uh in the craziest life and uh what a journey and you're i'm like i that would like suck if you get knocked off by the virus but you know i you you you look at her and i i you know in England have probably a real affection for her, at least a lot of people maybe.

But I look at her, and I'm a big Churchill fan, and you look at her life, everything she's seen. When we sent our idiot boy, orange-haired Muppet over you guys and you know he was doing stupid stuff that was embarrassing like i think you walked in front of her at one point and uh uh and she would she had that look on her face like you know a grandmother who wants to kick your ass and uh uh and and you just you know one of our presidents goes over and she's like, I've, I've seen, I've known people back to 16 of you guys, 16 of you guys, you guys are just like a rotating thing. And I've been here the whole time.

And you just think of what she's seen in her life. Yeah. And what secrets she must know. And yeah, the secrets and the, and the, uh, you know i i have a lot you know i've seen a lot of stuff 54 years but certainly nothing from her vantage point and and her uh thing but he's just like her her her take on it like does she have an autobiography that she's ever written no and she never will she never will wow yeah like maybe i don't know i don't know how long there might well be some point in 100 years time where her diaries get released like

queen victoria's diary you can read so maybe one day but no like i mean and actually aside from our documentary which was a while ago like she said nothing and we and we we couldn't even interview her like she won't wouldn't be interviewed she is she is a lady who is not sharing her secrets she's a lady yeah yeah the um yeah but just one extraordinary vantage point inside of on history like just just everything she's lived through um the extraordinary characters that she's had to put up with yeah um you know she probably just sits around and goes you're freaking idiot compared to churchill or i don't even know she liked churchill um but you know it's just her attitudes she must have it like like i say i've

lived 54 years and i have some different attitudes based upon what i've seen you know she's what like in her 90s she's what what, like 97? 97? Like late 90s now, I think. Might have made that up, but late 90s, yeah. I'm surprised she tolerates anybody at this point. Yeah. She's like, her autobiography would just be like,

the hell with all of you. The thing that's extraordinary, I mean, so I think, you know, whether you love or hate the royal family and, you know, people have really mixed feelings about them you have to kind of respect the fact that like she is in her late 90s and she's still working like she's still doing all these events as you say meeting all these people when she's like i just want to put my feet up and watch a movie but she can't she's like still got i mean it's really exhausting i would not that life on anyone and then i think she's got to to kick Charles in the ass every day for, I don't know, whatever he says or does.

Yeah, exactly. And then she's got to deal with the whole family. Disastrous sons. A little too weird with all the sons and the kids. And, you know, you got this one over here and that one over here. And you're just trying to manage them all and be like can you not embarrass me like i've been doing this for 90 years i'm a pro at it i i don't embarrass myself i'm not out there dancing on stages or you know doing stupid stuff you know and marrying horses and things like that

and uh so you know there's a charles joke in there somewhere anyway so uh your book sounds delightful and it sounds like a lot of fun i've always wondered about those misconnections so i think tapping into that is is something that people really love well i hope so i hope so i mean it is i think it's something as we've said that lots of people wonder about you know even however happily in a relationship you are there's always the one that you still think about, the one that got away. And I just wanted to explore the idea of a 60-year search for that one. Or in Chris's case, the 50 that got away. The 50 that got away, pretty much, yeah.

And they have restraining orders against me, so I can't contact them even if I got a bus full of people to help me. So there's that. I do not have any restraining orders, by the way. That is a joke, people. I just want to make that clear. me so there's that i do not have any restraining orders by the way that is a joke people i just want to make that clear i'm very proud of that fact that you know i i had years ago i had a girl uh that i didn't call back after a second time uh because i was like okay she's clearly interested

in the old voicemail days and then a year later she showed up at a party and her friend came to me and said you know um she really wanted you to chase her. And I go, look, I'm not going to get a restraining order. I'm not going to sit there and call her like a stalker. But evidently that was her mix of bag. I'm just like, whatever. So anyway, that's a joke, people. You can check court records if you don't believe me.

Anyway, thanks for tuning in, guys. We certainly appreciate it uh and hopefully you've loved our uh loved our uh vault no no we you've loved our jog across the pond to our wonderful folks at linda england thank you very much for being the show for you we certainly appreciate it thanks for having me chris i'm just searching for jokes now at the end uh be sure to check out the book uh what's your.com freya so people can find you on the interwebs it's freya hyphen samson there you go there you go uh be sure to check out the book uh you can go to anywhere fine books are sold but stay out of those alleyway bookstores they're're dark. They're damp. You might catch influenza or you might get

step on a nail. I did one yesterday and now I've got to go get a tetanus shot. By the way, the movie that I was referring to earlier in the show, beautiful movie called Vengeance. It's a South Korean, I believe, film. South Japan, South Korea, one of those two.

It's an amazing film. The guy has dementia. I'll leave that in there so people aren't writing me later going, what the hell movie are you referencing and you don't tell us? You just leave us on a cliffhanger, Chris, which is how we end the show. Thanks for tuning in. Be good to each other. Stay safe, and we'll see you guys next time.