My guest today is Josh Mendoza, an award-winning filmmaker known for his post-apocalyptic feature film, What Still Remains. His debut novel, Shadow of the Eternal Watcher, which combines sci-if and film noir, was released in January. Josh joins me to talk about his start in creative writing and his move into film, the similarities and differences in writing fiction and film, the necessity of learning through failure, the democratization of creative pursuits like filmmaking, and more
Episode breakdown:
00:00 Introduction
04:42 Family support fuels persistence in creative pursuits.
08:51 Emphasizing positivity over negativity in sharing creative feedback.
13:40 Unexpected audience reactions highlight creators’ limited control.
16:25 Importance of not focusing on negative reviews or criticism.
20:14 Film structure rules help shape and tighten storytelling in novels.
24:05 Editing and trimming elevate both novels and screenplays significantly.
28:14 Books become lasting physical achievements compared to shelved scripts.
32:07 Movie-making demands flexibility and compromise with real-world constraints.
36:02 Intellectual property’s role in getting projects greenlighted discussed.
39:56 Technology enables democratization, but creates challenges in standing out.
44:02 Bad creative work is necessary learning for improved future art.
48:13 Letting characters shape the story often leads to authenticity.
52:10 Duster Raines, Josh’s protagonist, is both flawed and compelling.
55:38 Genre mashups and series building.
Show Links: Josh Mendoza
Josh’s website
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Transcript: Josh Mendoza
Please note: This is an unedited transcript, provided as a courtesy, and reflects the actual conversation as closely as possible. Please forgive any typographical or grammatical errors.
Nancy Norbeck [00:00:06]:
Welcome to Follow Your Curiosity. Ordinary people, extraordinary creativity. Here’s how to get unstuck. I’m your host, creativity coach, Nancy Norbeck. Let’s go. My guest today is Josh Mendoza, an award winning filmmaker known for his post apocalyptic feature film, what Still Remains. His debut novel, Shadow of the Eternal Watcher, which combines sci fi and film noir, was released in January. Josh joins me to talk about his start in creative writing and his move into film.
Nancy Norbeck [00:00:37]:
The similarities and differences in writing, fiction and film, the necessity of learning through failure, the democratization of creative pursuits like filmmaking, and more. Here’s my conversation with Josh Mendoza. Josh, welcome to Follow Your Curiosity.
Josh Mendoza [00:00:54]:
Well, thanks for having me, Nancy. I’m excited to be here.
Nancy Norbeck [00:00:57]:
Me too. So I start everyone with the same question. Were you a creative kid or did you discover your creative side later on?
Josh Mendoza [00:01:04]:
Yeah, well, I was a creative kid. I mean, if you’d met me when I was little, you probably would have thought I’d be an engineer. I was the LEGO guy. I was really good at science and math and that’s obviously been passed on to my kids, too. But I don’t, you know, it took me a little while to. I was always a big reader. I was a kid who always sat in the science fiction section, hence the book. Right.
Josh Mendoza [00:01:26]:
And my mom would be off talking back when there were indie bookstores. There’s still a few, but not as many as there used to be. But I used to always be buried in the back. And I was just flipping through books and I loved movies. My dad was a big cinephile. I don’t think he knew it, but we rented a ton of movies all the time from the video store. And I just grew up on a steady dose of books and movies. And I remember being in high school and started talking about, I took this great English classroom, I think it was my junior year.
Josh Mendoza [00:01:52]:
And we just got to write a creative essay about like a store. And I just had so much fun doing that. And I remember being like, I want to be a writer. This is awesome. Someone wrote these books. So. And people were like, oh, you got to be already good at being a writer. You can’t just be a writer.
Josh Mendoza [00:02:07]:
Which I was like, well, whatever. I can do whatever. When I went to college, I started taking a lot of screen creative writing classes. And it was there that I then took a film class and sort of realized someone makes movies. I remember watching Susan Kane and there’s just this innocuous scene where Joseph Scott, he walks up to a pole and he spins around the Pole. It’s very silly. And the camera’s behind him, and that’s in front of him. And, like, a light bulb went off in my head that someone had moved this camera.
Josh Mendoza [00:02:40]:
And it’s funny because to look back on it now, I don’t understand, but because I always used to watch the documentaries of how things got made and how you can create these things. But that was, like, the first time in my life I was like, oh, like, I could be the guy who does that. Like, someone told someone to move that camera. That could maybe be me. And so, like, I kind of went off in this screenwriting vein. So it definitely took me a while to get to, like, that creative where I am now. But I.
Josh Mendoza [00:03:06]:
I always had those things in me. I think it was just that awakening took maybe longer than some people, but, you know, my early. My mid to late teens.
Nancy Norbeck [00:03:16]:
Did your family encourage you when it became clear that this was a path that you might take, or were they kind of like, yeah, now you got to do something that earns you some money, like that Lego thing that you were on, too. Maybe you want to do that now.
Josh Mendoza [00:03:29]:
They were always very supportive. I mean, I think there was always. There’s always the. You have to make money. We live in a society where we require funds, and as you get older and maybe you start to have a family, as I do, you have to make money for other people. So I do a lot of things to make money, and I just keep chasing the dream, too. And, you know, the books and the movies, you can’t do them because you want to be rich. You got to do them because you love them.
Josh Mendoza [00:03:55]:
And some people do get rich doing them. You have, if I’ve learned anything, you really have no control over what makes something click. I mean, I had my first feature film come out a few years ago, and people are still watching that movie, and it’s. You know, you just never. You do all these things to try to get it out to people, and then people find it in weird ways that you never even imagined, too. So I think you just have to keep creating, putting stuff out there. And I’d love for it one day to, you know, be the only source of income, but I think you have to find ways to do it.
Josh Mendoza [00:04:27]:
But your question was, was my family supportive? And they’re still very supportive, and my wife now, too, is very supportive, so I’m very lucky in that sense. No one ever said, you have to be a lawyer, though I did think about being. No one was like, you will be a Lawyer.
Nancy Norbeck [00:04:42]:
Yeah. No, and that makes such a difference, too. I think when you’re fighting against what you’re told you have to do versus what you know you’re really being called to do, it makes it much harder.
Josh Mendoza [00:04:52]:
Yeah. And I mean, you run into it not just from your family, too. I mean, people. When you do anything creative, you’ll find people who love your stuff and you will find people who hate it, too. And it’s just you get a lot of no’s, and especially when you’re pitching for movies or, like, with the book trying to get it published. I mean, you just, like, people pass, and it may not even be because they don’t like it, but you as the creator, don’t ever really get to know. And you just gotta take those lumps and grow from them and hopefully channel it into something better too, in the future.
Nancy Norbeck [00:05:24]:
Well, and I think that’s an important point too. Right? Like, nothing that we create is gonna please everybody.
Josh Mendoza [00:05:31]:
Yeah.
Nancy Norbeck [00:05:32]:
You know, like, you have to reach a point where you say, okay, so you’re not my audience for this thing. And that’s cool.
Josh Mendoza [00:05:38]:
Yeah. You know, I mean, I was just doing a book event the other day. It was just a small thing with some local authors, and people came and bought my book, and other people walked by my book and went to other books. And you’re like, why didn’t you even talk to me? You know, people have the. We all have our proclivities and what we like. I love sci fi. I love film noir. That’s what this book is.
Josh Mendoza [00:05:58]:
Not everyone loves that. Right. So I, When I write, always think for myself first. What would I have loved? What would that kid have loved sitting in that science fiction section that he would have bought? And then I expand out from there and I think to myself, okay, well, how can I get these ideas out to people? What will speak to people? And I definitely write for an audience, but you can’t write for everyone. And at a certain point, too, like you said, you have to accept, well, this is the. This is, I think, the best version of this. And I’m going to put it out there and see where it goes. And I think sometimes, maybe people jump the gun on that.
Josh Mendoza [00:06:31]:
And I think sometimes people wait too long. So there’s a. There is a sweet spot like when to let people into your creative process too. And it’s. It’s always a journey. And you learn. I’ve learned a lot from making movies. Things surprise you.
Josh Mendoza [00:06:47]:
Like, things you think are not important, that you’re like, I would just move past this and that’ll be quick. And then people, like, latch onto that and they’re like talking about that and you’re like, that’s like this small little thing. It’s not important. But you can’t control what people think once you put it out there. Right. I mean, it’s out there. It’s theirs, then that people consume and think what they think. So you as the artist have to kind of.
Josh Mendoza [00:07:10]:
I think about that when you’re creating, but also then maybe put the armor on and be ready for it too.
Nancy Norbeck [00:07:16]:
Yeah, definitely with the armor.
Josh Mendoza [00:07:19]:
Yeah, whatever. Like. Like a 13th century knight out here. I can barely walk. I’ve got so much.
Nancy Norbeck [00:07:27]:
Yeah, lots of very, very thick armor. Especially when you’re doing it for the first time. Because I.
Josh Mendoza [00:07:36]:
By nature, I mean, I’m. Obviously, we are all critical beings, right? Like, we like things, we don’t like things. But I’m more of the old school, tell my buddies around the water cooler kind of guy. I don’t feel the need to go shout from the rooftops. My critical. I like to shout when I like things. So I like to tell people what I like and try to encourage other people to be creative in their artistic endeavors. I’m not really a person to go out and be like, I hated this.
Josh Mendoza [00:08:01]:
And this is why some people are like that. And that’s fine. That’s their choice. So for me, too, it’s just separating myself from that because that’s not really the way my brain works either.
Nancy Norbeck [00:08:11]:
I think we would all do so much better if we had more people who were more interested in sharing what they like about things than what they don’t.
Josh Mendoza [00:08:19]:
No. I don’t know if the algorithm likes that though. So then.
Nancy Norbeck [00:08:22]:
No, it doesn’t. And it’s such a shame because, you know, you think of. It’s funny that, that we both immediately went to the algorithm and the social media, right? Because like you, you can’t go on any given social media site really, without being fed all of the stuff that everybody is upset about all the time. And wouldn’t it be great if there was just one where you could go see what everybody loves all the time.
Josh Mendoza [00:08:51]:
I know. And it’s. You know, I think too, you know, I’m not saying anything no one’s ever said, but that echo chamber you get in that spiral too. And I think it just makes people unhappy too, which is a bummer because, I mean, there’s always been terrible things in the world. There’s terrible things now we need to deal with them and help people. But also there’s beautiful things in the world, too, and a lot of love and friendship out there. And I think when you approach people with friendship and despite what they might think on the Internet, you find that people are people still, is what I’ve discovered. So I think we just need to remind ourselves of that sometimes.
Nancy Norbeck [00:09:29]:
We need to remind ourselves of it a lot, I think.
Josh Mendoza [00:09:33]:
Yes, we do.
Nancy Norbeck [00:09:34]:
Definitely a lot more than we do. Yeah.
Josh Mendoza [00:09:38]:
Well, it’s easier to be negative and mean. Right. It takes effort to be kind and positive.
Nancy Norbeck [00:09:44]:
Well, and especially when it’s what you’re being fed when you look at any given social media site.
Josh Mendoza [00:09:51]:
Yeah.
Nancy Norbeck [00:09:51]:
You know, it’s like it pulls it right out of you.
Josh Mendoza [00:09:55]:
And it’s always tough to prove a negative. Right. You can’t prove that, like the positivity and the helping people prevented bad things. All you can really ever see is when bad things happen, it happens, you know, so that’s that. I guess that’s the conundrum for human beings that we can’t always imagine the opposite. Which is I always say why I think people should read more books, because, I mean, there are a lot of great books I love that I could never write. I’ve never experienced those things. But they allow you to get into other people’s mindsets.
Josh Mendoza [00:10:27]:
And maybe even though you don’t necessarily have lived that experience, you can relate to people. You can understand people better, and then that can help your art too. But also, I just think it helps you as a person, like trying to imagine what other people are thinking, why they’re acting that way. I think can really. When you think like that, it can really lead to better outcomes.
Nancy Norbeck [00:10:49]:
Yeah. Especially if, you know, you go and read books about people who aren’t like you, from places that you haven’t been to, from backgrounds that aren’t your own. It’s the best way to put yourself in somebody else’s shoes for a while.
Josh Mendoza [00:11:01]:
Yeah, you have to. I mean, I just read James and I thought it was wonderful. And, you know, I remember reading Huck Finn when I was a kid and I took Huck Finn classes in college, and I thought it was just a great take on that. And, you know, obviously none of us have lived that thankfully, but I think we all need to remember it wasn’t that long ago, too, that things like that.
Nancy Norbeck [00:11:23]:
Yeah. Haven’t read that one yet, but it’s on my list.
Josh Mendoza [00:11:26]:
That’s great. I really enjoyed it. Yeah, I’d check it out.
Nancy Norbeck [00:11:29]:
All right. So you mentioned a minute ago. The things that you think aren’t important, that turn out to be important to other people. And I’m wondering if you can just give us an example of what one of those might have been.
Josh Mendoza [00:11:40]:
Well, like with my movie, right, it’s a post apocalyptic, really, It’s a Post Apocalyptic world 25 years after Something’s happened, right? And it’s about a girl growing up in this world with her family, and she’s ripped from that family and has to find her way in this world. And it’s really a coming of age story rep disguised as a dystopian world, right? But right at the beginning of that movie, her and her brother are searching for food and medical supplies to help their mom who’s sick, and something comes for them. And again, the, the, the backstory is there’s there was like some. We don’t know what it is. I mean, it’s like they don’t know, so we can’t know as the audience. But there was something that happened 25 years ago and people know there were monsters. It was probably some sort of 28 days later kind of vibe, but like, we’re past it. And these people are only 18 years old and they didn’t live through it, right? So that.
Josh Mendoza [00:12:36]:
But they know there’s monsters, so they run from the monster and he chases them. And I don’t want to ruin the movie, but the movie, I mean, he’s carrying weapons. So people like picked up on that. Like, why are they running from this guy? He’s got a, he’s only has a sword and like they have a gun to shoot him. But in my mind, when I wrote it, and I think in the movie too, it’s clear that they think he’s a zombie, he’s a monster, and they’re scared and they run. But a lot of people latched onto this other idea and we’re like, this is dumb. And I was just like, really? You know, then you as the creator have to think, well, what could I have done differently? Maybe that, like, maybe there’s a line I could have said right at the beginning I thought, I think I did it. But like, you can’t.
Josh Mendoza [00:13:15]:
Again, once you put it out there, you can’t like put like a little bar above it that’s like, hey, this is a low budget movie. And this is like, you know, you can’t do your Star wars scroll. Right, right. Let me explain. Like, people have to, like, experience it for themselves. So I think, you know, that was one experience where I was like, oh, wow, that was such a. I mean, that’s like a 10 second thing in this movie. And then we move on and it’s other stuff and you get this backstory later.
Josh Mendoza [00:13:40]:
And you find too that with books and with movies, but I mean, people will put things down. You’re like, well, you didn’t even finish the dirt thing or you didn’t even read it. Like, how can you like have an opinion? So, you know, you just have to take that as it comes and be prepared for those things too.
Nancy Norbeck [00:13:54]:
Yeah, for sure. Yeah, yeah. Now, Now I’m. I’m thinking about like the first time I got a bad review of my book. It’s like such a totally surreal, you know, I don’t even know how to describe it. I was going to say out of body experience, but that’s not even quite the right thing. It was just sort of like, you know, you feel that. I don’t know, like I could feel it on my skin somehow.
Nancy Norbeck [00:14:25]:
Like, like this very strange physical sensation. Like not even like you wanted the earth to swallow you up whole. It was, it was a little different than that. Kind of like, I don’t, I don’t know, like, like melting from the outside or something. But it was, yeah, it was not a lot of fun. And the only good thing about it is that it will never happen for the first time ever again.
Josh Mendoza [00:14:48]:
Well, it’s funny too because like with the book, I mean, books are a little more of a slow roll, right? In theory, they read them, so it takes them a little longer to read them and then they tell you what they think. Whereas a book, movie, I mean movie comes out, it’s two hours, they watch it. So people, it’s much more real time coming out. And I find too, it’s like not latching onto the negative because I mean, a lot of people loved my movie. A lot of people will like, I’m sure a lot of people loved your book and they would like my book too. So I mean, I think it’s important not to latch on to the negative and then ignore the positive.
Nancy Norbeck [00:15:24]:
Right?
Josh Mendoza [00:15:25]:
That’s really simple to do too where you’re like, oh, I got all these five star reviews, four star reviews wherever they are, and people are loving it. But you let you like focus on that two star, you know, like, why did this guy like that? And it’s like, well, it doesn’t matter because they’re allowed not to like it and say la.
Nancy Norbeck [00:15:42]:
But yeah, yeah, when you. It is hard.
Josh Mendoza [00:15:47]:
The challenge of art too is you’re putting yourself out there. Right. And you’re. Yeah, you’re letting yourself be vulnerable too. And you pour yourself into these things and you want people. I mean, I. I mean, I’m sure everyone’s not like this. I’ll speak for myself.
Josh Mendoza [00:16:02]:
I write these things and I make these things because I want people to watch them, I want people to read them, and I want people to be entertained. So that’s my goal, is to get it out to people. Right. It’s not. It wasn’t really for me. I wrote it for me to reach people. Right. So the more people that read it, you’re going to have both versions.
Josh Mendoza [00:16:25]:
So I’m just prepared for that because I think hopefully it can reach a large audience too. And I hope people have fun with it because I tried to write something that would be a fun page turner too.
Nancy Norbeck [00:16:35]:
It is definitely that.
Josh Mendoza [00:16:37]:
No, thank you.
Nancy Norbeck [00:16:40]:
And I will just say that, you know, to anyone who may, you know, have recently or be just about to have the bad review experience for the first time, it is worth going out and finding bad reviews of famous books that are now considered to be classics, you know, well regarded because you will feel so much better to find out that, you know, the Great Gatsby and the Handmaid’s Tale and all of these other books were panned by people like the New York Times. Makes you feel so much better.
Josh Mendoza [00:17:14]:
Yeah. I mean, Melville never knew that he was a famous writer when he was alive.
Nancy Norbeck [00:17:19]:
Right.
Josh Mendoza [00:17:20]:
His most famous book was Typee, which I’m sure most people have never read. I’ve read it. It’s a fun. I think it’s like the subtitle is like A Polynesian Adventure, you know, very 19th century, like Guy goes on an adventure to an island kind of thing. But that was his most famous book. I mean, no one’s even heard of that now.
Nancy Norbeck [00:17:38]:
Right.
Josh Mendoza [00:17:39]:
Unless you’re in college and doing like a Herman Melville PhD, like, yeah. I mean, everyone Moby Dick and everyone knows those things. So, I mean, he died never knowing that he was one of the most famous American authors ever.
Nancy Norbeck [00:17:51]:
So, yeah, just like, you know, Vincent Van Gogh also thought he was an absolute failure and would be astonished to find out that he’s considered to be one of the greatest artists ever today. So, you know, you need that perspective.
Josh Mendoza [00:18:05]:
Let us hope that none of us have to wait till we’re dead. Yes. Some love while we’re alive.
Nancy Norbeck [00:18:12]:
Yes. So I’m curious, since you started out taking creative writing classes and then moved into doing film classes, what, what you discovered that was similar and what was different and what you could carry over. And you know, how, how does that kind of synergy work? Because I know when, when I did my MFA at Goddard, we all, as we were about to graduate, were like, now I want to go back and do the screenwriting program. Now I want to go back and do the poetry program. You know, we all wanted to kind of go and do the other thing that we hadn’t done.
Josh Mendoza [00:18:46]:
Yeah, well, you know, I mean, I always say, you know, screenwriting teaches you very much to be by the book and then you can break the rules. Right? Yeah, I mean there’s, there’s very much, there’s a lot of structure to a screenplay. There’s page 15, this needs to happen. Page 30, this should happen. Page 60, this should happen. And you need to like tie string to these different points and like make your, your rising tension and all these things. So I always say, you, you know, I could see. I know there’s probably some young people out there like, ah, forget it, I’m not going to learn those rules.
Josh Mendoza [00:19:22]:
I’m, I’m a writer, I’ll just create it. But it’s important, I think, to learn those, because I was that guy, I came around. But you have to learn this, the rules, that you can break them. Well, right. And then do cool things. And I think so. Obviously that structure lends itself well to a novel. And then when you have a novel, you’re like, oh man, I got so many words.
Josh Mendoza [00:19:41]:
I mean, because the screenplay, 10 to 15,000 words, book, 80,000 words, you know, so one screenplay is way shorter. And screenplay, you have to be so much pithier. Each page is about a minute, you know, so you’re thinking, okay, well I’ll write 120 page script. But no one wants to read your 120 page script. So you got to really write like a 95 page script. So you gotta be entertaining with your descriptions, but they gotta be quick, they gotta be like a sentence or two and you’re moving on. Dialogue, dialogue, you know, and people want to feel like they can see it, but it needs to move really fast. Like if you write a page of description, you’re in trouble kind of stuff.
Josh Mendoza [00:20:14]:
But there, if you do a page of description, better be multiple scenes. So with the book you’re like, oh, I have so much more leeway, I have so much more room. But I think that’s a trap really, because I personally mean I love a lot, I love a good sci fi, I love a good fantasy novel, but sometimes I’m like, why am I still in this library reading this book with this character? Like, why? I want to move on. And I think that’s the filmmaker in me. I’m like, I’m all about character, and I want there to be cool action set pieces, and I want to move through action. I want to move through the story. So for me, when I read the book, I would come back, I treated each chapter sort of like I treat scenes in. In screenplays where it’s like, what’s my end? What’s my arc for the character? What is he doing? What is he trying to achieve? And then what’s my out? So what? And then when I would go back and reread what I wrote, I’d be like, well, what are.
Josh Mendoza [00:21:04]:
Like, there were chapters where I had some really cool descriptions, and they went on for a long time. And I was like, you know, obviously let other people read it too. And some people were like, I don’t know. I kind of got lost in here. And you’re like, all right, well, I think everything in here is cool, but, like, obviously, like, we’re lost. And that’s where the screenwriting me came back in, where I just started trimming, and all of a sudden, paragraphs that, like, were four, like, a page apart go together, and you’re like, wow, that’s really cool and good. So I think that there can be magic in the editing, too, that you have to open yourself to. It’s okay to be a little, like, stingy at first and be like, ah, it’s so good.
Josh Mendoza [00:21:42]:
Don’t hate me. And then be like, okay, I hear the note. How do I make it better? Because I think, too, what I learned with screenwriting, because you get so many notes, right? So a lot of it, too, is like, they’re telling me to do xyz. They’re so wrong. But what they’re really saying is they don’t like that this character did this thing. So how do I make not do xyz? How do I make that character do something that they’ll like, but in my own way and make it true to my as an artist, too? So that really played well, I think, into the book, too, is because you get more. You get notes from your editors on books, and obviously, a book is such a big, labyrinthine thing, too. So you having that mindset, too, as I went through and trying to connect those dots, was very useful as well.
Nancy Norbeck [00:22:28]:
Yeah. And you’ve touched on something that I’ve always suspected and is part of why, when. When I was saying that, you know, at graduation, it was like, yeah, I want to go do this. The screenwriting part now. Because I’ve always suspected, you know, from things that I. That I learned and kind of overheard from my friends who were doing dramatic writings, like, oh, yeah, I can play around and I can do whatever I want because I’m writing a novel and I don’t have any big structural. You have to do this by this kind of stuff. But I can’t really escape the feeling that that would probably make my story better.
Josh Mendoza [00:23:06]:
Yeah.
Nancy Norbeck [00:23:06]:
And, you know, I think, too, if.
Josh Mendoza [00:23:07]:
You think of yourself as a reader and a consumer, what are the books when you were reading them where maybe you got bored and you were like, what is happening right now? Like, why am I still doing this? And I always think of the old books, like the 19th century novels, where they were getting paid by the word. Right. And some of it’s brilliant. And sometimes you’re just like, all right, I’m over this. And, you know, in the screenplay, I mean it. There’s nowhere to hide in the screenplay. So I think that that thought process did really help me with the book, too, with moving. Moving forward, and then also just wanted.
Josh Mendoza [00:23:42]:
I wanted it to be fun. I wanted there to be set pieces like a movie. And I. So I tried to balance, like. Because there is a literary side to me, too, and I love to read, and I get all that stuff, and I’ve studied those things so I know what they are. And then I tried to, like, hybridize them and have fun with it, too.
Nancy Norbeck [00:23:59]:
Yeah.
Josh Mendoza [00:23:59]:
So I wanted to be a. A literary page turner. Healthy book, you know?
Nancy Norbeck [00:24:05]:
Yeah. Yeah. And it’s. It’s funny because as. As you’re saying that, you know, like, how many. How many reviews do you see on Amazon? Or just general book reviews where somebody’s like, yeah, but there’s too much description, you know, like that. People notice that kind of stuff. And it.
Nancy Norbeck [00:24:21]:
It does feel like, you know, I always kind of get suspicious a little bit with myself when it’s like, ooh, I really like that sentence. That was great. I like the way I wrote that. And then it’s like, yeah, that’s probably the part you need to cut.
Josh Mendoza [00:24:37]:
Yeah. Well, I’ve gone the other way, too, where I’m like, I’m so pithy.
Nancy Norbeck [00:24:41]:
I’m so heavy.
Josh Mendoza [00:24:42]:
And it’s like, people are like, well, what the heck’s happening in this? I can’t imagine this. I remember getting that note when I was a young man in a screenwriting class and being like, oh, well, you know, we’re gonna see it on the screen, but, like, you still have to describe what’s going to be on the screen too. And that’s a learning process as well. And I think that’s true. The book, too, where it’s like, you can be. You can go too far the other way, where you pull too much stuff back, and then people can’t imagine it. So it’s. There’s a balance, too.
Josh Mendoza [00:25:09]:
But definitely when someone’s like, I want more description, my. My inclination is be, like, less.
Nancy Norbeck [00:25:15]:
Less is more. Yeah, like, okay, maybe. Maybe more, but very brief.
Josh Mendoza [00:25:21]:
Yeah, exactly.
Nancy Norbeck [00:25:22]:
You know, like, how. How little can we provide and still make it clear to you what’s going on?
Josh Mendoza [00:25:28]:
Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, it’s easy to say it here, too, and it’s hard to do, right?
Nancy Norbeck [00:25:33]:
Yes, yes. Especially when you love wordplay, which is my thing. So, you know, I will. I’m definitely the kind of person who’s like, well, why use one word when 32 will do so? Because that’s just half the fun of it for me is just playing around with the language. And then it’s like, yeah, but now you’ve got 600 words and you need, like, five.
Josh Mendoza [00:25:56]:
So my novel is 700 pages. It’s a ton.
Nancy Norbeck [00:26:00]:
Yeah. Yeah. And that was a thing with me. You know, my thesis had to go into two binders to go in the library, and that was after me cutting a whole pile of stuff. So, you know, it was like, oh, God, what have I done?
Josh Mendoza [00:26:16]:
Yeah, I mean, I went on a journey with this book, too, where I definitely. It was always, like, in this 300 to 350 range when it’s finished. I mean, it’s hard to tell what that is on your word process, but it was like, 75, 90,000 words. I trimmed it down, and then I went too far. Right. Like, it trimmed too much, and I was like, I’ve lost some things. So fleshed it back out. It is what it is now, so it can always be.
Josh Mendoza [00:26:43]:
I mean, it’s always a process, too. And people always ask me, how long did it take you to write the book? Like, I wrote the book in, like, six months. But, like, how many times did I rewrite the book? And I think it was Lori Moore who said, writing is rewriting, so it might have been someone else, too.
Nancy Norbeck [00:26:58]:
But, yeah, when people ask me that question, it’s like, well, how are you defining write the book? Are you asking, how long did it take to write the first draft of the book exactly. Or are you Talking about all of the stuff that I had to do after that, because they’re very different questions.
Josh Mendoza [00:27:14]:
Well, yeah. And then, I mean, people don’t realize too. It’s like once you get through all that and you’re like, okay, and now it’s getting published, there’s a long process before that too, and more rewriting from that end of it too. So just even to get it to that point took forever. And then to get it out takes a long time too. It’s a journey. I keep saying that, but I think it’s true.
Josh Mendoza [00:27:39]:
A long journey in the night.
Nancy Norbeck [00:27:41]:
Yeah, it’s not really done until it’s actually in your hand in that finished form.
Josh Mendoza [00:27:47]:
One thing that was cool about the book too, now that it’s out, is that it’s a thing. Whereas, you know, with scripts too. I mean, I was writing this thing for this indie production company right before the Pandemic hit. We were going to make this low budget, like, horror thriller thing. And we went round and round about it. And then the Pandemic started. It’s like, okay, well, let’s. Let’s shelve this.
Josh Mendoza [00:28:14]:
We’ll keep working on it and then we’ll be ready to go once we figure out how we’re going to shoot with COVID And long story short, the money eventually went away and that never got made. And I’ve got this noted to death script that I can’t use because it was like, for these people, right? That’s what they wanted. And no one ever even knows I wrote that thing. Right? It’s just like it was. It was like an exercise and fun, I guess.
Nancy Norbeck [00:28:39]:
And you.
Josh Mendoza [00:28:39]:
And you grow and you learn from these things. But like, the cool thing about the book is that the book exists. And I’ve had a movie come out, so that’s a great thing too. But movies, there’s a lot of. I have a lot of great friends who have written things that they’ve made money on and will never see them because they’re just someone, some. Some executive shelf that they’ll never make it, right? So it’s. The book is cool because now it is a commodity and it is a thing and you can hold it. And it’s at libraries.
Josh Mendoza [00:29:08]:
And that’s cool to me. The. The literary guy in me, like someone, some stranger posted on, I think ax, that they had the book from the library. And I was like, that is the coolest thing in the world. They had like a barcode on it. I’m like, yeah, let’s Go.
Nancy Norbeck [00:29:27]:
Yeah, well. And you know, making a movie is so much more of a collaborative thing because there are so many more people involved too. I mean, how, how does that affect that process? Because, I mean, when you’re writing a book, it’s really you and you know, your word processor of choice.
Josh Mendoza [00:29:45]:
Yeah, well, you know, with movies too, I mean, you write these spec scripts and I mean, you can write whatever you want, obviously, when you write a script for a movie, but like, it, it ain’t getting made. It’s like you wrote that 20 page action sequence and if you’re not someone who can get that movie made, I mean, like, where are you getting $200 million to make that movie? I mean, it could be a cool thing to show people if you, you’re going out and they’re like, wow, this is great. Now read as something else. But when I started conceiving of this book, it was when my movie was coming out and I just had this idea. Well, I had the vision of what has become the first chapter of my protagonist, Duster Raines, driving to this case and he’s going to his favorite watering hole, he’s going to this bar. So I had that image and I just, I didn’t know what yet, but I just had this idea that I wanted to be like this big space opera science fiction adventure. And I was like, well, how do I get from that little film noir guy from like the 1950s, even though it’s set now and then, get him to like this Star wars kind of vibe at the end, like a Starship Troopers thing. So that was the beginning thought.
Josh Mendoza [00:30:56]:
And I just knew as having gone round and round on pitching things, I’m like, well, hey, I’m never going to get this made. It cost too much money. And they’re going to ask, they’re going to say they wish they had intellectual property for it. So I was like, well, I just get back to my roots and write the book and, and have intellectual property doesn’t mean it’s going to be a movie. But like, now the movie exists, maybe there’s a fan base and then that justifies the movie too, when it’s higher price. So, you know, with a book like you said, I mean, I got to write all the cool sign. I blew up some bridges and did all sorts of things and collapse tunnels and subways and had space fights. And you, you know, you write down a movie, the first thing the line producer does is like, yeah, I mean, even on my, my movie, what still remains when it came out, we up until we were shooting, there was a.
Josh Mendoza [00:31:45]:
There was a. Guy fell in a pit. There was a trap. It was gonna be super cool. And we were like, a couple days before we were gonna shoot that thing, and my producers and the production crew pulled me aside. We’re like. We started trying to dig this hole, and I don’t know if we can do it, like, with, like, the time we have, the constraints we have, and do it safely. Right.
Josh Mendoza [00:32:07]:
That’s always the thing with movie, too, is, you know, you do these things, and it always has to be about actors and safety and people have not done that, and people have died. So, I mean, that was a big thing from. I got to go to one of the best film schools in the world, usc, and they were very big on safety and how to. How to do these things safely. So, like, you as a director can get consumed by trying to get your shot. But in my mind, too, it’s. There’s still people, there’s still humans, so you have to worry about them. So we went a completely different way, you know, and it.
Josh Mendoza [00:32:36]:
And it works just fine, right? So, like with movies, there’s the limitations of the world. That’s real. So we were shooting up in the Angeles Forest when we made that movie. And just a few years before, there’d been a big forest fire. And there’s some great scenes in my movie where they walk through this wasteland where it’s like, it was just free. Production design is beautiful. But also in my movie, we do some fire stuff. So we have the fire marshal out there and you have fire trucks, and you’re doing this.
Josh Mendoza [00:33:04]:
And we were gonna burn this giant wall. And they on the day were like, we’re not comfortable with you burning the wall. It’s dry. We don’t want you to burn the forest down. So we adapted, and we still burn some stuff. It looks cool, but, like, we were gonna do a lot more, you know, and you can’t. You just have to accept it and move on, too, and figure out how to do it better with your limitations. And sometimes the limitations make the movie better too.
Nancy Norbeck [00:33:30]:
Yeah, that’s always interesting. It’s like a surprising. You know, this isn’t how it was supposed to be, but, hey, look, as it turns out. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Josh Mendoza [00:33:40]:
Well, I mean, I always think of. I’m a big film noir guys we’ve touched on and, you know, when. When they were making Touch of Evil, he was. He was like. Well, he was like a week or two behind schedule, and the studio was freaking out, but he knew as the director, he was going to do this one scene as a oner, and he did it in like a couple. He did like a couple hours. And like it was eight pages of script. All of a sudden they were five days ahead and he was just like, yeah, I always knew I was going to do that.
Josh Mendoza [00:34:10]:
So, like there’s. When you, when you become an expert at it, I think you can adapt and do things. And you know, movies are tough too, because you just have constraints of days. You’re, especially in that low budget world, you’re shooting a lot of pages and you want to have shot variety and you want it to be interesting visually when it ends up on the medium. So you’re trying to figure out how do I get performances, how do I get lots of different angles and how do I make my day? So there’s just a lot of things that go into that. Whereas in the book you get to just kind of do it, say whatever you want and it could happen. Which is a fun. Like we already talked on, it’s a great liberty and it’s freeing, but it also can be a trap too.
Josh Mendoza [00:34:50]:
So you gotta, you gotta learn from it all and keep coming back and hammering. And I think too, when you write your first draft of a screenplay, I mean, you have fun with it. You do the things you put the car chases in and then if it’s actually getting made, then the people who are telling you how much money you have tell you the reality of what you can actually do and you have to accept it. And that can be challenging. When your car chase becomes like, what if he just ran down an alley and tripped over a trash can? You’re like, well, I guess that’s what’s happening.
Nancy Norbeck [00:35:23]:
Yeah, not exactly what I pictured in my head. Oh, wow.
Josh Mendoza [00:35:27]:
But again, you can’t put the scroll up there. This movie only had a million dollars. Please judge it on that basis. Could you imagine if it.
Nancy Norbeck [00:35:36]:
That would be an interesting parody movie, right?
Josh Mendoza [00:35:40]:
Yeah. Please don’t judge this. We ran out of money.
Nancy Norbeck [00:35:45]:
So you mentioned a minute ago about how when you were kind of starting to play with this idea, like if you had made it a movie that they would say, we wish we had intellectual property for this. Could you talk a little bit more about what that means for folks who might not be familiar with that?
Josh Mendoza [00:36:02]:
Yeah. So intellectual property, like Shadow of the Eternal Watch in my book is now intellectual property. It is a thing that exists outside of movie medium that a producer can look at and say, oh, wow. Well, this book sold a million copies. We’ll be rich when we make this. It’s going to be great. We can, Apple can greenlight this and pay money for this book. And it’s.
Josh Mendoza [00:36:25]:
I think so. You know, you can be negative about it, but I think it’s a way for people who maybe don’t know what they’re doing. They’re protecting their jobs, I guess is a good way to say it. Right. So they’re executives and they’re people too. And they don’t know if it’s going to be popular. Everyone’s guessing, right. So having that popular thing that they can point to is a good way for them to wrap their minds around.
Josh Mendoza [00:36:49]:
Okay. Yeah, I think there’s an audience for this because I mean that at the end of the day, it’s a business. So like you got to get people to pay whatever movie ticket prices are and you got to get people to sit down and stream it and they’ve got to make that money back. And if you’re spending $200 million to make a movie, it better be a Marvel movie at this point. But you know, because it’s not just the movie budget either, then they gotta go spend $100 million to advertise it. So I mean, it’s just stupid money, right? So it’s like, you know, and when I was coming up as a kid, I grew up on all these movies from the 90s that were, I didn’t realize at the time, but they used to make mid, tier, kind of what you might describe as a B movie. And they were in the movie theater and you could go see them. And you know, I always think of Rain of Fire, which had famous actors in it, but didn’t have that much.
Josh Mendoza [00:37:41]:
I think they spent 40 or 50 million dollars on that movie. But like, you know, so like that mid tier, still a lot of money, but not like a tentpole movie. Whereas nowadays they’re either making Marvel movies or they’re making. Or it’s like an indie low budget thing like that middle ground where that’s where you get movies like the Graduate, right? Where like they spent a million dollars back in the 70s, that movie, and they don’t really make those movies anymore unless you’re, unless you’re. Alexander Payne, like, and you have a track record. So it becomes difficult too, I think, for young filmmakers to break in where it’s like, well, what have you made before? What have you done? What’s your intellectual property? So there’s all these barriers of like, it just gives them a reason to say no. And you Just have to keep overcoming. And some people do it by raising money and making indie stuff, and some people overcome it by finally getting a yes and making something good.
Josh Mendoza [00:38:33]:
And some people never overcome it at all. So it just becomes a round and about way. So again, we talked about the beginning. You just have to create. I mean, so if it’s getting your iPhone, if you’re a filmmaker and you want to make movies, I mean, that can be lame. But if you can do something good with no money, they were much more likely to give you some money, right? If you have great ideas for books or comics, I mean, those can be great things that springboard you towards a movie one day. But you, you can’t write something and say, well, this is going to be my blockbuster movie thing, because you don’t know. And you can’t chase trends.
Josh Mendoza [00:39:10]:
You have to make. You just have to create things that are good and hopefully speak to people and reach an audience and then that will get you noticed.
Nancy Norbeck [00:39:19]:
It’s interesting that you, you brought up the iPhone thing just as I was thinking kind of the same thing, you know, I mean, because there has been kind of this, for want of a better word, democratization of, you know, anybody can make a movie with the phone in their pocket now. You know, anybody can go out and take decent pictures with their phone and anybody can make a podcast from the closet in their house. So there is this opportunity that didn’t exist before. Do you think that. I mean, I don’t know how many people are actually out there making movies with their phone.
Josh Mendoza [00:39:56]:
There are a lot of people who do it, but I think it’s true in everything that there’s been a democratization, but there’s also been a. Watering down is the wrong phrase. But like, there’s so much stuff that it’s hard to like, get noticed through the noise. So like, like, really talented. It doesn’t necessarily mean anything because, like, does the person who, like, whose job it is is to read a slush pile of books, who reads eight pages? Do they even recognize your talent at eight pages or are they just burning through them? And when they watch reels, it’s like, you know, you apply to these, these film festivals and I mean, they all have different people behind them, they all have different agendas and you have no control over those things. So all you can do is just find ways to make things. I mean, I think they’re just. Because it is democratized, though, there’s still talent and there’s still value in having good crews and good people and Just because you turn a.
Josh Mendoza [00:40:59]:
Turn an iPhone on me and say, act, Josh. I mean, you’re not going to get a good performance because I’m not an actor. So I, I mean, I’ve seen a lot of. I mean, there’s still a lot of bad stuff out there too. So I think a lot of it is just trying to get through the noise, but knowing that you have. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with making bad stuff either though, because the bad stuff leads to better stuff.
Nancy Norbeck [00:41:24]:
That’s right.
Josh Mendoza [00:41:25]:
I’ve made bad stuff. I mean, I had this vision and when I was in film school, I was like, gonna do the sci fi thing. And I was like. They were like, oh, you can only spend. I think it was like a thousand bucks. I was like, yeah, it doesn’t matter. I mean, money. I’m just gonna.
Josh Mendoza [00:41:38]:
I’ve got this cool story and it was a cool story, but I guess what people want when they watch a sci fi movie. And I had the money, so it’s like I learned a valuable lesson. It’s like, well, sometimes going outside and shooting in a forest gives you free production design. And I learned that lesson, you know, and there’s a reason my feature film is outside and it’s beautiful and it looks great. And I learned that lesson in film school is like, what is something I can write to a budget that can exist in a. You know, I say budgets, like so much money, but like it’s very low budget in the movie world. But like that’s, that’s free. You know, you turn your camera on and it.
Josh Mendoza [00:42:19]:
And there’s mountains. And I actually made a, a different movie after that movie in grad school where I did that. I just drove out into the forest and shot it and it’s. And it looks amazing. It starts snowing and it’s like, I didn’t plan for it to snow and it looks awesome, right? And you’re like, you know, 20 year old me is like, yes, we’re getting it. And that was a fun experience. And I think I learned those lessons the hard way though too, by making things that people like, were very critical of in class. They’re like, why is this, why is the.
Josh Mendoza [00:42:51]:
It looks. Doesn’t even look like Star Trek from 1965, right? It’s like it looks like wood. It doesn’t make sense. But it works too in other ways. So like, you figure out what worked, you learn what didn’t work. And there was ways to have done that. I could have gotten someone to help me do that. Who’s good at that for no money, right? So, like, that’s the thing about movies is you already said it’s the collaboration.
Josh Mendoza [00:43:15]:
So I know just enough about everything to be dangerous. But I know when someone’s good at it, and I can be like, I wanted to do this. I want it to look like this. I was thinking it should be framed like this. And then they said, well, what if we put this lens on and put the grass in front of it? And, you know, we do, like, our Days of Thunder thing that actually happened on my feature film, and it’s one of my favorite shots. And that was the dp. That wasn’t me. A lot of.
Josh Mendoza [00:43:40]:
That’s me, but, you know, that was him. So, like, that’s what you want, though. You want to surround yourself with people that make you better.
Nancy Norbeck [00:43:48]:
Yeah, yeah.
Josh Mendoza [00:43:49]:
And I think that’s just the book, too. I mean, my editor was great, and, like, he gave me notes. I was like, that’s not the book I’m trying to make. I want to do this. And he was like, cool, I get it. Let’s do that. And then he, like, jumped in and gave me notes for that.
Josh Mendoza [00:44:02]:
And it made it better. Right? And it’s still me. And I. I still do it. But, like, when people give you good ideas, you can run with them, too. And I think that’s. There’s nothing wrong with that.
Nancy Norbeck [00:44:12]:
No. And I think there’s. There’s lots of important stuff in there, because you’re totally right. You. You gotta. Especially when you’re starting out, you don’t have any idea what you’re doing. Like, you think you do maybe, but you really don’t.
Josh Mendoza [00:44:26]:
Everyone thinks they do.
Nancy Norbeck [00:44:27]:
And the only way to figure it out is to fall flat on your face until you start to figure it out. So you cannot make good art until you make bad art. But also what you just said about your editor, like, you need. You need somebody who knows what they’re doing and is going to give you good information, but you also need somebody who gets you and will not try to turn you into somebody that you’re not. Because your editor could have said, nah, you don’t know what you’re doing. We’re going to do it my way, and steered you into writing something that was not going to be your book and was going to end up making you kind of like, contort yourself to do something that didn’t feel right to you. And that wouldn’t have gone well.
Nancy Norbeck [00:45:12]:
You know, you’ve got to pick your people.
Josh Mendoza [00:45:14]:
Well, Yeah, I agree. And you don’t always have control over that. But I think—I was reading a Stephen King interview when I was younger, and he said one of the things that really dawned on him was when he realized he was allowed to say no, too.
Nancy Norbeck [00:45:29]:
Yeah.
Josh Mendoza [00:45:31]:
Be like, no, that’s not what I’m doing. I remember, you know, because I think especially younger artists will get locked into, like, I’m an artist, and so I’m the visionary. I have to be a—I have to be a jerk. And, like, that’s wrong, too. I mean, it’s like, you gotta. You have to have a vision. You have to, like, push for your vision, but you also have to have open ears, and maybe people can point you in the right direction.
Josh Mendoza [00:46:01]:
Sometimes, like I said earlier, people will say the wrong thing. They’ll say, you should do this. There should be a flying elephant in your book, and that’ll make it all work. And you have to say, that’s terrible. Don’t say that to them. That’s a bad idea. But what they’re really saying is this. And I need to do something about.
Josh Mendoza [00:46:21]:
And that’s a skill that I’ve learned over time, too, and I’m still learning it. But I think it helps make you better when you listen to the people, when they object to things. You know, I always say it’s okay to be angry for, like, a day. They don’t know what they’re talking about. I wrote it right the first time. Then you wake up the next morning, like, yeah, they’re right.
Nancy Norbeck [00:46:44]:
And sometimes it’s worth trying the flying elephant.
Josh Mendoza [00:46:47]:
Yeah. You never know.
Nancy Norbeck [00:46:49]:
Because you never know it might actually work. And if it doesn’t, then you can say, this was a terrible idea. But I tried it. Can we do something else now?
Josh Mendoza [00:46:57]:
Well, you don’t even. I mean, so much of it’s dreaming and thinking and spinning it. And sometimes you think you’re gonna go. You’ll write to a destination, Right. And you’re like, I need to get into this thing. Because that’s. That’s the. That’s the apex, and that’s the midpoint.
Josh Mendoza [00:47:15]:
And as you’re going, the characters start doing different stuff.
Nancy Norbeck [00:47:19]:
Yeah.
Josh Mendoza [00:47:20]:
You know, and sometimes you go with them. And that midpoint that you thought was gonna be so cool, I guess that goes in a different story because it’s not in this story anymore. And I don’t know. That’s just my process is I always tell people, because they’re always, like, where you get your ideas from. Where does it come from? And I always talk about that news because it does just sort of come to me. And sometimes when I’m writing and I have a plan, the characters don’t listen to the plan and different things happen and someone says something cool, and also my brain just, like, goes in a different direction. I’m like, oh, wow, that would be really interesting. And then you start trying to do that, and you just off in a different place.
Josh Mendoza [00:47:59]:
And, you know, there were versions. There’s things in this book that don’t exist anymore, and then there’s parts from. But those parts that don’t exist anymore kind of inform other things in it and no one will see it. But it makes it better, too.
Nancy Norbeck [00:48:13]:
Yeah. Yeah. I always love those moments when the characters start talking to me, because that’s when I sort of feel like it’s all become a real thing.
Josh Mendoza [00:48:20]:
Yeah.
Nancy Norbeck [00:48:21]:
And I always, you know, when I’ve worked with writers, there’s always that moment when that happens to them for the first time and they think they’re crazy. Like, no, no, no, you’re actually not crazy. It means your characters are coming to life, and it’s cool.
Josh Mendoza [00:48:34]:
My wife will say things like, what did you just say? I’m like, oh, nothing. I’m just talking dialogue to myself. I’m just talking to myself. I better go write it down before I forget it, though.
Nancy Norbeck [00:48:47]:
Yeah, yeah, that’s the important thing. How many times has something popped into my head and I have not written it down and then I go and kick myself for it later?
Josh Mendoza [00:48:55]:
Exactly.
Nancy Norbeck [00:48:56]:
Yeah, yeah. But there is something, you know, about when they start talking, and then they tend to talk in moments when you’re like, hi, I’m in a meeting now. Can you save it till later?
Josh Mendoza [00:49:10]:
But that infamous job we all have to have sometimes.
Nancy Norbeck [00:49:14]:
Yeah, yeah. But there have definitely been moments where they’re like, no, I’m going to turn left. And I’m like, no, but you needed to turn right. And like, yeah, sorry, that’s not what I’m doing. Like, okay, well, then that’s going to make my life interesting. But all right, I guess we’re going to see where you go now. So. Yeah, it always is.
Nancy Norbeck [00:49:34]:
It. It’s a little weird. And there’s moments where you kind of go, you just ruined my whole plan. But at the same time, it’s kind of like, well, maybe. Maybe whatever part of me you are knows something I don’t know. So let’s see what happens.
Josh Mendoza [00:49:49]:
I think that can be invaluable, too, because, I mean, There are people who plan to death, right? And they write an outline that’s longer than their screenplay or their book. And then there are people who just wing it. I think there’s a balance in between the two. You can. If I gave you my outlines, they’re just like random notes I write down. But it all makes sense to me. But I think getting too locked into a plan can sometimes be stifling too. And.
Josh Mendoza [00:50:13]:
And you never even start because you’re like, oh, I don’t know how I’m gonna get there. It’s overwhelming. Just write something, you know, and please tell my buddies that, too. When they write screenplays, you know, they keep rewriting the first 10 pages. It’s like, well, how can you fix the first 10 pages? You don’t even know what happens on page 60 yet. Maybe you should get through it and then fix it. And that’s how I try to approach, like, writing the novel, too. Obviously, it’s more of a marathon than a sprint.
Josh Mendoza [00:50:38]:
It takes longer. But just trying to get through to the next point, to the next point. And then when you come back, it can be bad. That’s okay. But, like, it’s so much easier to fix stuff that’s on the page than it is to, like, fix ether that doesn’t exist. I mean, you can think about it all day long. If you don’t write anything, it never exists and it can’t be better.
Nancy Norbeck [00:51:02]:
Yeah, you don’t know what you have until you’ve written it down.
Josh Mendoza [00:51:04]:
Yeah, I think that’s so true.
Nancy Norbeck [00:51:07]:
Yeah.
Josh Mendoza [00:51:07]:
Well.
Nancy Norbeck [00:51:08]:
And it seems to me that you had a heck of a lot of fun writing this book.
Josh Mendoza [00:51:11]:
I did. And I hope people have fun reading it because it is just a blast. And I’m working on the next one. And, you know, you get those insecurities of, like, I’m never going to finish this thing. Like, what is this? It’s like, should have just had to be one. What was I thinking? But it’s gonna. You know, I think he’s a fun, interesting character. He’s flawed, just arraigns.
Josh Mendoza [00:51:33]:
He’s not a good person, and he’s a great person. And I thought that was what was interesting about him, is that he’s both a villain and a hero, and he’s got a lot of warts on him. And there are people around him who love him. And you’re like, why do they love him? And I thought that was an interesting journey to go on with him as a character, and then throwing him into this extreme science fiction. World was just.
Nancy Norbeck [00:51:53]:
Yeah, there are a couple of them who kind of love him and hate him all at the same time. Which is also really interesting.
Josh Mendoza [00:51:59]:
You know, sometimes I say too, it’s like, well, it’s not what I would do, it’s what Duster Raines is going to do. And then the other characters can be like, I’m like the Greek off on the side being like, don’t do that.
Nancy Norbeck [00:52:10]:
Yeah, yeah.
Josh Mendoza [00:52:12]:
Depends on the other guys.
Nancy Norbeck [00:52:15]:
Yeah, no, it’s a fun read to be sure. And I was really glad to see that there’s a sequel though it was fairly obvious at the end that there needed to be one.
Josh Mendoza [00:52:23]:
Yeah, I’m working on it. It’ll might take a year or two.
Nancy Norbeck [00:52:28]:
But you know, that’s all right. You mentioned that you want to write a YA or middle grade book too.
Josh Mendoza [00:52:35]:
Yeah, you know, I mean, I have two kids, 10 and 8, and I read to them all the time and they’re always like, oh, you should write something like this, you should write something like that. And I’m like, I should write something like that. So I mean, I have an idea that sort of it’s sci fi again, but sort of more in like Harry. I don’t want to say Harry Potter in space, but it’s something more along those lines that would be fun for my kids to read too. So, you know, I just want to try to tell stories that lots of different people can enjoy for different reasons. And Duster Raines is more of the PG13 and that would be more the, the PG version of something. Yeah, so just always writing and I’ve got a couple scripts flying around. I mean, I always like to do genre mashups.
Josh Mendoza [00:53:24]:
So you know, this book is obviously the detective noir meets sci fi and I’ve got a script flying around that’s sort of a coming of age vampire hunter slams into like a Taken thriller. And it’s just, that’s a lot of fun. And I just think that, you know, sometimes people are like, oh, that seems like a lot of stuff. And I think. But that’s what’s fun about trying to come up with clever ways to do things that people haven’t seen but they feel like they’ve seen them before too. Because you always get that note too. Oh, what, what is this? I’ve never read this before. But then you write the thing that they’ve read before and they’re like, I don’t know, I’ve read this before, what’s the point of it? So you have to find like that magic sass where they Feel like they recognize it, but it’s unique, too.
Nancy Norbeck [00:54:08]:
Yeah. Yeah. That’s always the weird thing. Like, what’s your book A combination of, but also different.
Josh Mendoza [00:54:15]:
Yeah, well, you always have to pitch things. Like, it’s like, I have a script that’s Jaws with a bear meets Deliverance. You know, you have to pitch it like that. But it’s really sort of different than that. But that’s like, people are like, oh, I get that. So there’s a monster and there’s crazy guys in the woods. I get that movie. And you dial it down for that, and then it’s always more.
Josh Mendoza [00:54:37]:
But that hopefully gets people to read it.
Nancy Norbeck [00:54:40]:
Right, right. So you’re figuring you’re gonna go back and forth between books and scripts?
Josh Mendoza [00:54:47]:
Yeah, you know, I mean, the screenplay thing, I mean, I keep chasing it. I take meetings at managers. So, I mean, I’ve almost made that second movie a few times, so I hope to get to actually do it one day. But the book, now that having done one, it’s reawakened that passion from when I was younger. And like I said earlier, it’s just cool that it exists. And, you know, people are requesting it at their libraries and buying it on Amazon and Barnes and Noble and all the places and Bookman’s, and it’s just a fun experience to be in that author world. And, you know, I was the kid who used to sit in the. I talked about sitting in the bookstore, but I used to look at books.
Josh Mendoza [00:55:28]:
Books. And see where my book would be in between the different authors. So, like, now it’s kind of a cool thing that in some places it is on the shelves. Yeah.
Nancy Norbeck [00:55:38]:
Yeah. That’s cool. Well, I really enjoyed it, and I think anybody who is a science fiction fan who, you know, can go for a mix between that and that noir kind of feeling is going to enjoy it. So I hope that they will go check out Shadow of the Eternal Watcher and then keep an eye out for the next one when it comes out.
Josh Mendoza [00:55:59]:
It’s coming. I’ll come back, Nancy. We’ll talk more.
Nancy Norbeck [00:56:02]:
Do. Do. It’ll be great fun. But in the meantime, I’ve had a great time today, so thanks for joining me.
Josh Mendoza [00:56:09]:
I really enjoyed it. This was fun.
Nancy Norbeck [00:56:12]:
That’s our show for this week. Thanks so much to Josh Mendoza and to you. I hope you’ll leave a review for this episode. There’s a link in your podcast app, and it is super easy and really makes a difference. If you enjoyed our conversation, please do share it with a friend. Thank you. So much. If this episode resonated with you, or if you’re feeling a little bit less than confident in your creative process right now, join me at the Spark on Substack as we form a community that supports and celebrates each other’s creative courage.
Nancy Norbeck [00:56:43]:
It’s free, and it’s also where I’ll be adding programs for subscribers and listeners. The link is in your podcast app, so sign up today. See you there, and see you next week. Follow Your Curiosity is produced by me, Nancy Norbeck, with music by Joseph McDade. If you like Follow Your Curiosity, please subscribe, rate and review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And don’t forget to tell your friends. It really helps me reach new listeners.
