From Laughs to Literature: Dick Wybrow's Journey Through Comedy and Authorship

Rich Bennett 0:00
Thanks for joining the conversation, where we explore the stories and experiences that shape our world. I'm your host, Rich Bennett. And today, I'm thrilled to welcome Dick Weibel, an acclaimed author known for his humorous supernatural thrillers. Dick's journey from a standup comedian and major market radio host to a bestselling author is as captivating as his novels. His celebrated King series, a favorite on Amazon, masterfully blends paranormal adventures with a unique comedic twist. With a life spent screen. I got I can't wait to read this series now. With a life spent skirting traditional career paths, Dick brings a wealth of creativity, humor, and fascinating insights into the world of writing, humor and the supernatural. So join us as we explore the depths of this imaginative storytelling and his experiences as an author. How's it going, Dick? 

Dick Wybrow 0:54
Good man. And in Greetings from Auckland, New Zealand, I am talking to you from the future. It's just I am a day and. 

Rich Bennett 1:05
A day ahead of me. 

Dick Wybrow 1:06
Wherever you are. I. Am in tomorrow. The trick is, though. Here in New Zealand, we're not. All everybody's going to sign something when I out to tell people what happens in their future. But what I can say. 

Rich Bennett 1:20
You're giving me the winning lotto numbers for tomorrow. 

Dick Wybrow 1:22
You know they're good. They're good. But I can't. We can't reveal it. I will say to you, though, the one thing I can say is avoid Steve. Don't. Don't go anywhere. Avoid. Avoid, Steve. That's not necessarily a future. That's not necessarily a note of the future. It's just in general. Just avoid Steve. 

I've had trouble. 

Rich Bennett 1:43
With this because I've got a podcast coming up with a guy named Steve, so I need to cancel. 

Dick Wybrow 1:49
Maybe just you just to keep your distance. That's all I'm saying. Something about Steve's. I don't know what it is. I'm sure they're lovely people, but some of them aren't. 

Rich Bennett 1:58
So actually, when did you move to New Zealand? Because you're. Well, you're it. Correct me if I'm wrong. You're originally from the United States. They moved to Canada all the way around. Way around. 

Dick Wybrow 2:07
Alan Where I was, I was born. I was born in in Winnipeg, tells Nine Live the United States for about 30, 35 years. We moved here 11 year, 11 years ago this month because I'm half Kiwi. My father's a new Zealander. And so there was one there was one point here, like I'm saying, about 11 and a half years ago where I was working at CNN. It was kind of a I wasn't digging in anymore. I was looking for something else and I was Googling around, as you do. And and I noticed something. I saw something on a website. And I went into my wife and I said. Hey, it turns out I'm a citizen of. New Zealand. It's called Citizenship by Descent because my father's New Zealander. I said, So I've got citizenship. And she literally says, What are we doing here that Rich? That was October. By January, we were in country. That's what we did. That's it. That's how we move. Almost almost like we were evading the mob or something. We just got. Out. Sold our stuff, gave away stuff, put what we had left on to a pallet and shipped that over on a slow boat and hopped on a plane. And we came out here and so, yeah, we've been out here for 11 years now. 

Rich Bennett 3:13
And beat all your furniture out there, didn't. 

Dick Wybrow 3:16
What. We didn't have any furniture. We so I mean because you, you know. 

Rich Bennett 3:19
The stuff that you packed up for the boat to go. 

Dick Wybrow 3:21
Over. Well no, that wasn't furniture because, you know, you got, you got yourself that favourite chair of yours. But put that favourite chair. And take that halfway across the world that, that $150 is now worth two, 3000. Dollars. $1,000. No, no chair anymore. But bizarrely my wife, she. She has her tastes really the things that she wanted to keep. And so she had a bunch of flavored coffee creamer. The stuff was it was. Over it all these for like a dollar. And yet we load it up. We had all this coffee creamer. What is it? You lose coffee creamer? But I'll tell you what. Now, these days, man, I miss that creamer because they don't do coffee creamer in this country. You got to look around for. Not really. It's not a thing so much. They do milk, they do milk and their coffee, which is horrible. But no. So yeah, we've been here for 11 years now. 

Rich Bennett 4:10
I cannot do regular milk in my coffee. 

Dick Wybrow 4:13
I'm sorry. Now they do. It's funny because they'll go like, Oh, you put creamy, your coffee grows and then they put whole milk and they're like. That's borderline. Cream that they're no skim milk. Yeah. Big thing. Yeah. So it's pretty much whole milk because this is a pretty good agrarian country. So straight out of the cow into the coffee. 

Rich Bennett 4:31
Now I would have to next and just I guess go for the Baileys Irish cream. 

Dick Wybrow 4:35
Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 4:36
Yeah. Something to thicken it up. 

Dick Wybrow 4:38
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No the milk. I'm not really into. They got something here called Milo, which supposedly is sort of healthy like a malt drink. It's just chocolate milk, but they sort of they couch in this. But you know, it's like your Wheaties, right? Wheaties is just, you know, of course, Wheaties is just junk. I mean, it's food, but it is just breakfast. And the same thing with Milo. They put somebody on there playing soccer and that means that this is. Healthy right. On the front cover, Somebody playing soccer or football like you call it here. Look, it's healthy. This kid, he drinks it and you look how good he is at soccer. So, no, but you go in any business here, they got coffee and they got a big to this Milo stuff and you it there and you drink it all up. Yeah, it's not bad. All right. Like I said, it's kind of like a secret. 

Rich Bennett 5:22
All right. So are you born in Winnipeg? 

Dick Wybrow 5:25
Yeah, exactly. 

Rich Bennett 5:26
Spent 30 or 30 years here in the States? Yeah, but you before you got. And we were talking briefly before we started because you were in radio and TV, but before that, you were a comedian. Yeah, I did. So when you were back in high school, what was your plan? What did you want to do when you got out of high school? Because you were I mean, you were a comedian first. 

Dick Wybrow 5:48
Yeah, it's funny because there wasn't a great desire to be a comedian. I loved comedy, mind you. You know, I was one of those hard rockers. I had the Iron Maiden T-shirts, the black ones with the sleeves ripped off. I was that guy. But secretly, when I would listen to my cassette tapes. Yes, cassette tapes. When I listen, my cassette tapes, I had Eddie Murphy and Bill Cosby and Richard Pryor and George Carlin, all these guys to listening to whatever real Slayer, whatever it is. Say, Hey, what you got? Nothing. 

Rich Bennett 6:19
I was just white, man. Yeah. 

Dick Wybrow 6:21
And so I would listen to that. So I fell in love with comedy. What I loved about it was the storytelling. And so then when I got out of high school, I started setting short stories out. I was doing a lot of writing and, and and this is back in the day when you should put what's called an AC self-addressed stamped envelope. So you put a stamp on there, you put your address on there, you put that in your envelope with your short story, you send it out. So basically, when they reject you, you're paying for that. Rejection is what that comes down to. Yeah. And so and. This is pre-internet, right? So when you would send something out, you'd have to wait not weeks, not days, not hours, you months sometimes to hear back. And so it was such a long process. And so somewhere in my head some somebody made sense of this and said, like, you know what, if I write something in the afternoon because I could write stories or storytelling, if I got up on stage, I would be published that night. And so that somehow made sense to me. So I would do stories, jokes and bits, whatever, but I would do some storytelling on stage. And so that's how I got into standup. It wasn't necessarily a great desire to be in front of a mic. It was just because it gave me an opportunity to get published that night. And so I write all these stories out, These these bits and stuff get up on stage. And that's how I got into standup comedy. Basically, I desire to do storytelling. 

Rich Bennett 7:40
Smart idea. 

Dick Wybrow 7:42
It's a roundabout way to go at it and I accept that. But yeah, no, it worked out for me. I did pretty well. I got a chance to tour the bunch of comedians I worked what one of the last gigs I did was Dan, Wendy, Larry, the Cable Guy. He and I did a show. Oh, yeah, He's a good cat. We did a show in Melbourne, Florida, and a bit like this, like this Chinese food restaurant annex. Right before he. Took off. Huge. And I had Adam, I had a blast stand up comedy. It was it was a really fun time. But it really especially in the beginning, you know, because you when you would come in and this would have been early nineties or so and this is and you'd do a show and people would be coming out of the clubs and they weren't massive clubs, right? And a couple hundred people or whatever. But you put all of those people in one club and you've just felt like you were in a Roman colosseum. You're like, Are you entertained? It was just that was amazing. Just the hours, amazing feeling. And it was it was like, like surfing. Because if you got get the crowd going, you would just sort of like float across the top of it and and it was so much fun because they're on board, right? Everybody is there to have a good time. They spent their ten bucks on their two drink minimum. So everybody's there to have fun and you're just the one lead them through it. And it was what it was really common, man. It was no better feeling in the world. It was fantastic. 

Rich Bennett 9:02
But he needs a great comedian there, too. Yeah. I mean, Bill. Bill Cosby. Larry, Larry, the Cable Guy. I remember the first time I heard Larry, he was always coming on a local radio station here. 

Dick Wybrow 9:14
Yeah, that's what he used to do. That's how I met him. Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 9:17
I and I would be rolling. And then when they did the the blue Collar comedy tour and he came around here and I went and saw him, and I was in stitches. In stitches. I mean, you can't, you can't stop laughing with him. 

Dick Wybrow 9:33
You know. 

Rich Bennett 9:34
And the same with all the other guys. 

Dick Wybrow 9:36
And like you mentioned it too, for as much as you know, Lehrer comes across as it is like, you know, and you see the whole bit of like, what the hell is this real show? You do that and then but he's got a real sort of casual, bumbling style. That dude worked his butt off. That guy worked harder than anybody else I knew because he would call in to radio stations all around the country. He would be on he'd be on Rock 100 Odyssey in Orlando doing mornings there. But he would call in to stations all around the hour, all around the country, and he would. And that's how he got his name out there. You know, some stations would pay him, some of them he would do for a while. But his he had his business model, I'm going to do this. I'm going to take advantage of this. And he just grew and grew his network until somehow within that, Foxworthy heard him or something on the radio, and that's when it all took off. So he made that opportunity for himself. So for as much as he sounds like he's just like, you're kind of stumbling around. I'm just doing my thing. That is a smart, smart business man. The way he does stuff. 

Rich Bennett 10:37
I took it when they did that blue collar comedy tour. Larry reminded me 

of Tim Conway. Oh, yes. Tim Conway would do everything possible to try to get everybody else to crack up. I'm not talking about the audience. I'm talking about the people on stage. With more on the show with him. Larry's good at that. He would have Fox and Bill Engvall could not stop. Yeah, it's just kept rolling. 

Dick Wybrow 11:02
Yeah. No. 

Rich Bennett 11:02
So how how did you go from being a comedian into radio? 

Dick Wybrow 11:07
So I luckily for. Me and maybe it's fear driven for the most part, I could always sort of see the writing on the wall. So when I was doing standup, everything was humming along really, really good. But then there were sort of fewer people coming into the clubs. Things were still going good. But like university, if you're people because what it was, is television started to get this idea. All these TV executives, some of the worst, horrible people in the world. Now, the TV executives, I went like, wait a minute. So instead of paying for scripted programming, instead of paying all these actors, I could put a microphone in front of a brick wall, put a guy or groan between it film, then put that on TV, and that is programming. And that's what they did. And so you saw stand up shows on A&E and a. Food network and a stand up show at some point. So it was all over television, really? Yeah, Everybody did. Absolutely Everybody did. Yep. And and so I started to see like this, at least for a period of time. This is going to pull people away from the club. So I got that's where I made the transition into radio. And, and I knew a bunch of people because I had done a lot of radio as a comedian. And so I and I'm going to a broadcast school for about six or nine months or so and got a job down in El Dorado Springs, Missouri, doing country radio just two and a half hours. 

Rich Bennett 12:27
What broadcasting school it was. 

Dick Wybrow 12:32
It's up in Minneapolis. I kind of can't name the thing, but yeah, but now it was. It was the. 

Rich Bennett 12:37
Same when I went to. 

Dick Wybrow 12:39
No, there was like the Cleveland School of Broadcasting out there somewhere. But now this one is more of a local up there. But no, I ended up in fact. So I went down there and it was a station that when I went there I had to turn the station on in the morning. That's how small the station was. It was a converted farmhouse right behind me outside the door was the tower. So the tower is out here and I had to go and check the lights because every hour you had to make sure the lights were on. Right. But I was pretty sure I was getting hair cancer from that tower so close to the back of my head the entire time. But yeah, I. 

Rich Bennett 13:12
Wasn't located at the crossroads, was it? 

Dick Wybrow 13:14
It was not at the crossroads, man, but I felt like I was at the crossroads sometimes because every now and then I get this weird feeling like I'd be doing the show and all this little circle pops and everything, old school style. And because this was farm country, man, this. But I get this feeling of being watched and I must have picked up on it. But I took a look. I finally looked over at one point and there used to be these dusty, dirty blinds. And I swear to you, Rick, there was this. Eyeball staring at me through this little crack in the blinds, and I realized the cows would come in and they would wash through the window. And I don't know if they were looking for food. Oh, I don't know if they were. I don't know what it was. Maybe they were bored. But I had cows watching me through, and that's unnerving the big cow eyes. And they wouldn't laugh. The joke's on her. The worst crowd. Cows are the worst. Crowd I would never do. 

Rich Bennett 14:06
She said. That was that back during the mad cow disease? 

Dick Wybrow 14:10
You know, if they'd been Hayley's had mad cow, they would have had a little bit of. Energy to the man. They would. Be disturbed. Group your. 

Rich Bennett 14:15
Ass out. 

Dick Wybrow 14:16
There at me, man. Did you sit and glare at me? And so I did. Morning. And I couldn't go by Dick then, right? Because it was country music. I did the morning show and so we were talking a little bit about this before the show. And so the owner goes, No, wait a minute, you've got red hair. You you do country in the morning. So we're going to call you Rooster. So I went by Rooster at my first job. And so you can do all your jokes about the rooster and all that, because I did. But so yeah, I did that for about a dozen years or so. Bounced all over the United States doing radio. It was a it was a that was a fun time in radio that mid to late nineties had a lot of fun. 

Rich Bennett 14:52
So what made you decide to get out of radio. 

Dick Wybrow 14:54
Same thing. So in about 1998 or so they changed the rules of of radio to where you could own because there was a time when like back in the back in the early days you could own like you know seven radio stations, you could own two television stations and you could own one newspaper or something and some sort of bizarre sort of rule set up. And then I think it was in 98 where they were like, let's get rid of all that. We don't need any of that anymore, deregulate. And so they got rid of that. And I'm a big fan of deregulation, but what it did was then you got Clear Channel came in and this state, these guys had like 1200 radio stations within a couple of months, which is now iHeart Radio, and it just got bigger and bigger. And the problem with that was to be able to make the nut they needed to make their biggest expense was salary. And so now you've got a guy out of Dallas doing afternoons in Atlanta, doing evenings in Cleveland. So there were 12 different stations. And so and you could see it was kind of watering down radio. But more importantly, all those because back in the mid and late nineties or so, you had a lot of big shows and you see fewer and fewer of those shows around these days. A lot of them go on to satellite, whatever it might be. And so I could see that that environment was changing, that that what I was doing was becoming less valuable, or if I wanted to keep doing it, I had to do it in 15 different markets. And so I bounced out. I got to I got out right before the big crash. 

Rich Bennett 16:22
I think he killed a lot of people from wanting to get into radio because the jobs weren't out there anymore. 

Dick Wybrow 16:29
Yeah. And radios were a wonderful medium. I mean, of all the things I've done, I had so much fun. I loved I did a night show in Orlando and I had so much fun doing nights because for one, there were no bosses around. Yeah. And that was the greatest. But it was. It was just you and another person. I mean, this is, you know, this isn't the forties. Where where else do I listen to Milton Berle at night together. Yeah, it's. This is one on one. And so when you're talking to radio, like right now, odds are rich, you and I are speaking to one person, listening on their headphones or mowing the yard or driving in their car. And that's what I love about the podcasting is because it's that's all the great thing about radio was it was a one on one relationship with a person listening and and that was one of the greatest things about radio that relationship and I had so many amazing listeners at that nighttime show in Orlando that's one of my the most fun I've ever had. I really, really loved it. 

Rich Bennett 17:27
Well, the funny thing is, if podcast and I saw statistics well for 2023, that podcast listening had surpassed radio and TV. 

Dick Wybrow 17:40
Right? 

Rich Bennett 17:41
More people listening to the podcast or watching TV or radio, I wouldn't thought that would happen. 

Dick Wybrow 17:47
Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised by that, especially because, you know, there's there's so much of it out there. But and it's it's like anything there's there's so much of it. And eventually some of those people that are just kind of throwing darts in the dark start to fade away a bit in folks like yourself rise up to the top. And yeah, I can definitely see that because I think they were difficult to to sell time spent listening. And if you had a yourself exceeding 20 minutes or so, you're killing it in radio. But because a lot of people consume radio as they drove to work or whatever it might be and podcasting man, people listen to podcasts for an hour, an hour and a half. They, you know, you take a look at some others. Yeah, some folks man a couple of. Those comedians you podcasts 3 hours long, it's. Like, are you stoned? 3 hours. What are you doing? 

Well, yeah. 

Rich Bennett 18:35
I think the thing is the big difference between that and radio. With radio, there was no there's no pause button. Yeah, with a podcast, if you're getting into that conversation, you get to work, you got to go into work. You can hit pause. 

Dick Wybrow 18:48
But you know, they get. 

Rich Bennett 18:49
Back out it start. 

Dick Wybrow 18:51
Again, and the other side is it's so segmented, right? Because back when that was always the complaint about radio. So back in the day there's radio there's top 40 easy listening rock and then became active rock and then became album oriented rock and then it became, you know. 

Rich Bennett 19:06
Adult everything. 

Dick Wybrow 19:07
Now, Exactly. It's segment, this segment. And so podcasting has done sort of the same thing. I just talked to a couple of guys here in the last week or so, and these guys, they find obscure albums, music, and they they talk about the music on the album. So here's one of these guys is talking about some Hungarian death metal album that we all listen to. And it's like if, you know, I mean, it was a sort of thing like if you are into obscure music, obscure rock, whatever these conversations, you'll find it. If you have an interest in goats, you will find. A podcast talking about goats. If you're an interested in people who shave goats, there will be a podcast out there for people who shave goats. There will be. And so that is something really cool. My podcast is you will find, you will find your people, you will find your tribe. 

Rich Bennett 19:59
Oh God, yeah. It's funny you mention that because yeah, with mine, I mean, we're number one in the addiction category because we talk addiction a lot, right? But I just like to have conversations and somebody I had on recommended that I get this military veteran on that has this beagle and they like to go squirrel hunting. Yeah It's like, okay, sure. First time I ever heard on the podcast because he brought squirrel in and I try. It's good, Dick. You got to try this. Good. 

Dick Wybrow 20:29
You got to, but you got to get it. I've had it, I've had it. You've got to get into a brine now. You got to get to brine it. 

Rich Bennett 20:35
Oh, this stuff was he brought in the regular squirrel. Squirrel Cassidy is it is useless to to podcast episode after. 

Dick Wybrow 20:42
Squirrel. Case it is that's what. I mean and see that you're not going to get you're not going to get that anywhere else. Okay so this is. Only happens in the podcast world. 

Rich Bennett 20:52
Exactly. I love it. I see you live radio. You get into TV? Yeah. You're in TV for how long? 

Dick Wybrow 20:59
Oh, is it 20 years or something like that? I don't know. I started at CNN in 2000. I was I was doing a rock afternoon show in Atlanta, and I had the option to go to work in Michigan potentially, or but my my kid, I had moved I have I had three kids and I'd move them because that's what radio does. You move them. And it was his senior year of high school, and it might have been a bad choice, but I was like, Now you can't yank him out of school. I got to give him his last year years. Great, if you've been there for a while. So I went to go find a different gig and I ended up going and working at CNN, and I got into the radio side of what was CNN, which eventually turned into television. But I hopped out of radio from there. Yeah. And I did that CNN for about yeah, for about ten years there. Then came over here to New Zealand to keep up the TV thing. 

Rich Bennett 21:50
But you're not doing TV anymore now? Right now. 

Dick Wybrow 21:52
No. So about and it's the same thing as we're talking a minute ago is right is I could see at least in the last couple of years because I watch all the numbers. I bet it's one of the things I do. Do I like spreadsheets? But I could see television viewership was crashing and and it would and, you know, it's ten, 15, 18% or so. And that may not seem like huge numbers, but I do that over seven years, eight years, ten years, and that is a dwindling audience. And so I could tell as things were going on, that TV viewership or the entity that is TV, because television can't quite work out how to do TV in the digital space. It keeps trying to work it out. Yeah, it's probably in reverse. They probably need to find something the digital space and chuck it up on TV because they've been trying for 20 years to work this stuff out to get TV into digital. So so I could see that. And so about a year, year and a half ago I've got, I had another series going, but about a year and a half ago I was like, I got to get this going because I think TV's fading or TV was fading, but I think I was fading out. And so as of December of this past year, the show that we had on the air here in New Zealand, it was a top show. It had some of the best ratings the last 15 years, but they cancelled the show even though. The ratings were it. Were some of the best I'd ever seen in that timeslot. They canceled the show just because of they couldn't find ways to take what we were doing. It was a live news comedy show with an audience. It was an expensive show to put on the air. They couldn't find ways to put us into the digital space, which is what they're looking for these days. 

Rich Bennett 23:28
Wow. 

Dick Wybrow 23:29
Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 23:29
So now you're now here it is. Your time. I like to say author preneur and. Yeah, right. 

Dick Wybrow 23:36
Yep. 

Rich Bennett 23:37
But what, what when was it when you actually started writing? Because I know you didn't start writing all these books once you left TV. 

Dick Wybrow 23:43
No, I started writing when I was like a lot of folks. I started writing when I was really young. I was a real shy kid, you know, And when I came across, when we came across, oh my gosh, yes, I'm still somewhat shy, to be honest. But when we when we came across from Canada to the US, I was a chubby redhead, nine year old Canadian, and that is a target. 

And so I was I was a shy kid, man. I was a real shy kid. And so I would write a bit on occasion because if I couldn't make friends, I could make friends and create friends and so it's great, these stories, right? But but it only sort of turned humorous, basically, because at the time you mean you knew as a kid you're not funny. The kids aren't funny. They think they're funny. But it turned humorous because of putting basically my writing because I was. 

Rich Bennett 24:39
Sitting by Bill Cosby. 

Dick Wybrow 24:40
Again. He had a little bit of that, right, Because it couldn't it it comes in the ghetto. But no. So I'm sitting there in my lunch room. And so like I said this, I'm in New Jersey. And so by myself at the lunch game. 

Rich Bennett 24:54
You in public school in New. 

Dick Wybrow 24:56
Jersey, dude, first place I came to redhead, chubby Canadian red haired guy sitting. 

Rich Bennett 25:01
Here. Oh, my God. 

Dick Wybrow 25:02
So I so it was aggressive and so these three kids would come over and it would always be the same pattern. They'd say, What you got for lunch today? And, and they would. And I'd be Iowa. And so they would take a look of what's in my bag and they would take my pudding out of there. And I tell you what, for a nine year old chubby little nine year old and I was Pudding was my only friend and they were taking. My friend away. And so one of these days when they came on by one of these days they came on by. I just flipped it. I just flipped it. I was like, Well, I've got booger tan, but usually I get Ibo jerky and I would just just flipped. I'd never done anything like that before, something my head snapped. And but here's the thing, Rich, Right? So these kids. Laughed. Oh, they found it funny. It was gross out, but it was funny. And more importantly, they did not take my pudding. And that taught me so much. It was. For one. It was, you know, this is power, right? Comedy, humor. Humor has a fantastic way of like, if I've got you laughing and if you're sort of an antagonist, whatever, that's a power shift. I am now in control. You are now you are now doing my bit again because you're now laughing. Yeah, but no, basically it was it was it taught me in a short period of time the voodoo of humor and not only the idea of power shift, but also these guys started to like me a little bit more. It also created a scenario where I had to write jokes about my food. Right. You know, every every other day or so, if I want to keep my PO and had to come up with something. But they ended up. Becoming sort of friends. Of mine. But that's basically is is my love of pudding sort of created this interest in humor and and I had a lot of interest in, you know in standup and all that even at that age just the mechanics of comedy in that. But no, that was it. My love of Pudding created this interest in craft and humor. 

Rich Bennett 26:58
So he started writing about putty. 

Dick Wybrow 27:00
Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, so I, but I would just write stuff about that. But, and then that started to grow because as a kid, you know, especially nine, ten years old, you still work in the world out. And I. Noticed this. This was something no one had ever told me about this. And I knew of course, we knew about humor. We had seen television, movies or whatever, even a bit of standup. But I never felt that. Before that because I was a shy kid, I had never felt that power shift before and I didn't know what it was. But I picked up on something like that, something innate in their thinking. There's something here that I like and something that I apparently have some ability to do. And so I just sort of honed that as I grew older and older, still shy kid. But I would I'd put that into the writing. And so I started to write when I was the first book I wrote was when I was 17. And, and yeah, I wrote a book at 17 and, and it was terrible. That should have been set on fire. It was an awful book, but it was also especially for people that are trying to write a book. I know there's a number of folks listening that are trying to do that. Just get to the end. That's a great feeling, even if it's not great just getting to the end. The book you put at the end, at the end of it, and maybe it's only 100 pages long, whatever, but so that's what I did. I wrote a very awful book and it took several more very awful books after that really get to something where I felt as though I could actually present it to people. 

Rich Bennett 28:21
So are those books available still? 

Dick Wybrow 28:24
No, thank God. So terrible. But here's the thing. So because of I had always been writing and I had done some screenwriting and some teleplay writing because I was in Southern California doing radio for a while and I actually got some interest with some of my stuff. But as things got these things, you know, they interest and then suddenly they fall down the interest and then they fall down. And it wasn't until 2012 when I was working at CNN that time was coming home. I was kind of like, got a job. And I said to my wife, I was I was kvetching because at the time, 50 Shades of Grey was a big deal. Everybody was talking about 50 Shades of Grey. And I was just like this. I mean, I relaxer it. It's so awful. I was complaining and I got nothing against this, this, this writer, I mean, she's done some amazing success with this, but I was kvetching about it and, and I sort of say, you know what? Because at the time there was all these, like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Slayer, I said I should take and we should make a zombie book out of of 50 Shades of Grey and called 50 Shades of Grey Matter because the brains, you know. And to me that was funny, but I threw it as a one off. And I said this to my wife and she goes, You should write that. I was like, No, no. And no one's going to read that. You go, No, you should write that Maybe somebody will actually buy this. 

Rich Bennett 29:37
Really surprised. 

Dick Wybrow 29:38
Me. So I was like, okay. So I wrote it as a five part series and put it up on Amazon 2012. The very early days of like some of the independent publishing, I put it up in September book one. I mean, whatever. There's no advertiser or anything. I just threw it up there. I got a couple of comments, but I book two. Then when I put up. Book three and again, these are it's one book in five sections. When I put up the third part, it started to take off and rich by by December, it became the number one comedy book on Amazon in December 2012. And I was like. What? That doesn't make any sense to me. I couldn't believe it. I mean, I might have made. 

1500 dollars or something that month or something. But that was that was I. Felt almost free money. I was getting paid for something I like to do. But like I said, it was the top comedy book. And that one actually is still I wouldn't recommend reading is not great. 

Rich Bennett 30:35
It's from the Hell series. 

Dick Wybrow 30:36
No, that's so the swords. I changed the name to the swords. 

Rich Bennett 30:39
Oh, okay. Yeah. 

Dick Wybrow 30:41
And then it took him years and then took a couple of years after that that I don't like, but it's the same sort of thing I learned each time. I should have composed this stuff, but that was really the first time I embraced some of this gonzo style that I've got where it's just like anything goes. Because because before then the stuff that I had some success with, I was writing to the market thinking people like spy thrillers. So I wrote two thirds of like a trilogy, but I wasn't really having the fun with it. And if you're not having as much fun with that, it's not as much fun to read. I had a blast writing The Swordsman there back then 50 Shades of Grey Matter, and people picked up on that and like, What the hell? Ink Theory tweets that show the 2018 last book is coming out later this year. There'll be nine books in that series. I've had a blast with it and it's and it's insane. And it's just it's it's a romp, right? And then Cain which I like you've mentioned I used to do that in August. I mean, there's a gonzo idea. People seem to love it, but it's a gonzo idea. 

Rich Bennett 31:40
And so and they're all self-published. 

Dick Wybrow 31:44
Yeah, they're all independently published. Although podium after I put Cain out in August, it did so well that podium audio came around and said, listen, we want to turn this into an audio book series. And so these guys are huge. These guys are huge. And so coming up here on January 16th, the first Cain book comes out, I've got two amazing narrators and I can't wait to I mean, it's fascinating, man, if you think about that. I'm in Auckland, New Zealand, and my domain is one quarter of a two car garage because here in New Zealand they carpet their garages. Right? And not most people don't park in the garages. Right. And so this is a room so where I'm sitting right now is one quarter. This is my space, one quarter of a two car garage. The rest of all this, this belongs to my wife. All of that is her space. My space is this one little quarter of a two car garage. But this thing that. I wrote. 

Rich Bennett 32:38
Happy Wife. Happy Life. That's right. 

Dick Wybrow 32:40
Man. But this thing that I wrote, like at 4:00, 430 in the morning before I would go to work at at the television show, I write this thing at 4:00, 430 in the morning in a two car garage in Auckland, New Zealand. And now I've got these two trained Hollywood actors putting their talent behind this to create something beautiful. I can't wait, man. It's going to be so good. It's going to be so, so good. It's exciting. It's a lot of fun. And it all, you know, it's funny because I think ten years ago, maybe ten years ago or so, I would have hesitated about writing something like this. But thankfully I've got narcolepsy. And with the narcolepsy, you sort of a bit in a bit of a dream state and you make choices that maybe other people wouldn't make. And so in my. Head and. In that narcoleptic haze, I was like, Yeah, right. That that's also a good idea. Sure. Write a story about a wolf that gets bitten by a guy and turn to do a human. And then when the full moon comes out, turns into a werewolf. But then when the moon is not full, turned into dogs, that makes total sense, right? That story. And I did. And so far it's going really well. 

Rich Bennett 33:48
Okay. With with these stories, especially with the supernatural. 

Dick Wybrow 33:52
Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 33:54
It for some reason all I can think of now is that damn cow looking in the window at the radio station. 

Dick Wybrow 34:01
I think. 

Rich Bennett 34:01
That we're having. 

Dick Wybrow 34:03
Some time to look over here. And I do look over here sometimes, and I wonder because I do have shades over here and there is a bit of a I'm waiting for that big eyeball to be staring at me through the windows. Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 34:12
Well, did you ever have, like, a paranormal experience or anything? 

Dick Wybrow 34:17
No. You know, I think it is. I think for one it's a little bit about the license that that supernatural gives you to do anything within reason. I mean, you've got to stick within rules of storytelling. I mean, you can't write like you sort of it's like, like any other entertainment medium. You're making a promise to the reader or promise to the listener, right? You got to deliver. So as I'm creating a story, yes, I could go off on a tangent left turn and make some crazy nutty choices, but you're making a promise to the reader that you will fulfill this sort of story arc and what you're doing. But aside from that, it sort of anything goes. And I really was attracted to that, and I'm attracted to this idea about that. Maybe there's a little bit of magic in the world, right, for as much as because I'm because I took physics in the one year in college and I'm going to I like science and physics and all that. And I believe in what I can see. But I have a real I, I do have part of me that thinks that there's a little bit of magic in this world that we don't quite understand, that we can't really put our hands around. And every now and then we get a bit of a taste of that, don't we? Every now and then there's some like way that is that's something I can't explain. How did this happen? How do those that confluence, those moments come together? And so I guess that's me in the supernatural world sort of embracing this idea that there's, you know, because the books aren't this is no magic spells and fairy dust in wizards is none of that stuff. Yeah, there's a werewolf guy in there, but who turns into dogshit on occasion. But, you know, aside from that, 90% of it is just your everyday people trying to get through life and working stuff out. And there's just that little bit of magic in there. And all my stories are pretty much that way. They're just people trying to get by. Usually people that are sort of ones that that seem like they're regulated, right? People like, you know, Imelda in this story, she's a former criminal. Criminal maybe not former, maybe not so former. But she she used to be a getaway driver and she becomes his driver because she's trying to get away from this crime family. And here's Cain. And he's like, you know, I could imagine he's a wolf that turn into a human who's looking for this person who bit him, who can turn back into a wolf. So these are people you would not expect much from. And they come together, though, and a little bit like my other series. But when they come together, these sort of broken sort of people, they can do amazing things together. And and I find that a lot of fun. 

Rich Bennett 36:39
Wow. I could not wait for this. You mentioned narcolepsy. Yeah. Do you think that's actually helped with writing? 

Dick Wybrow 36:49
I do. It's funny because there's a lot of different types of narcolepsy. There's some people that have kind of like these two where if they hit a like a strong emotional state or if you scare them, they'll actually lose. I mean, they'll lose their muscle tone and they'll just lie down to the floor. And that's pretty dangerous. Thankfully, I don't have that. My heart goes out to people that do have that. I'm just I'm just sleepy all the time. Somebody once somebody when one of these narcolepsy forums I'm in said, like for people who don't understand narcolepsy, stay up for 30 hours. 30 hours now go to work and come home, make dinner, Jesus. And then sit down and talk to your spouse. And so, you know, so like, when I'm talking with you, Rich, I'm going to make sure I stay laser focused because I could easily drift off and suddenly I'm not listening anymore because my mind wanders right? It's something I've got to do and I know nothing against you. You're a great host. It's just me, myself. But as you as you mentioned, I do find I do find it as a superpower. I really, sincerely do. Yeah. Because, like, for example, when you lay down at night and you're about to go to sleep. Do you ever get those Those. Ideas come in, the ideas start flowing. And you're like. 

Rich Bennett 37:57
Absolutely. 

Dick Wybrow 37:58
Yeah. And you think, like, man, that is a great idea. I got to write that down. Then you wake up the next morning and you can't hear what it is and you didn't write it down. Yep. So but State of mind, I'm in there 80, 85% of my day, You know, I take medicine and all that, but I'm, I slide into that state of mind. And so I think that, that zone and that dreamlike state that I'm in most of the day I think helps with the creativity. And so I am wow. I embrace it as a superpower. I see narcolepsy as something that is driving my creative process. 

Rich Bennett 38:28
Yeah, well, good for you. And I'm glad that's the case. I just had three young ladies on who written books. All three have dyslexia. 

Dick Wybrow 38:39
Wow. 

Rich Bennett 38:40
And yeah, but they didn't let it stop them. Yeah, and two of them actually run started and run nonprofits. 

Dick Wybrow 38:48
Right? Right. Yeah. I think it's. Yeah, it's a sort of thing that, you know, you can sit and go like, oh, this sucks. I've got this endless and narcolepsy and the worst thing in the world to have out there. It's, it's frustrating, but so all I can do is, is try and use it to my advantage. And I think I think I'm right. I think it's working. I think because because they're crazy. They're crazy stories and supposedly funny people seem to like them actually. 

Rich Bennett 39:13
Can you describe a moment during your writing when a character or even the plot took an unexpected turn? 

Dick Wybrow 39:20
Man I have a very small example is my favorite to use, I think because it's so small, because when I'm when I'm writing and if you're and if you're really in the zone, the characters start to make decisions for you. And I know I'm nuts. That sounds I know how flaky that sounds, but I'll give you an example. So in my other series, I had two characters were sneaking into like this Facebook headquarters sort of thing, right? The evil, evil sort of headquarters they're sneaking in and the only way they can get it in is this underground tunnel. And then the floor is electrified, so they can't touch the floor or they die. So what they decide is a two of them get on top of these. You know, the Roomba is the motorized vacuum cleaner. And they're riding these Roombas. Underneath across this floor because they can't get to floor, they're going to die. Right. So here's the idea. So that was the plan. That was what. Was in my head. But then suddenly one of the characters decides, Wait a minute, I want to get ahead of you. And the other one goes like, No, I want to get ahead of you. And they turn this into a race. So this was not the plan. This was not the plan. But as these two characters are going under here, they decide that. Yeah, there's death all around. The touch a floor, they're going to die. They're going to this evil lair when they throw this stock up in front. And so the Roomba chases after the stock and he goes farther and the other one threw something up. But they made that choice. The characters made that choice. To turn that into a race. I didn't go into. That thinking it was going to be a race, but the characters themselves in my head, in that subconscious, in that little bit of magic in the world, whatever it might be, decided that this is going to happen. And it ended up being a fantastic scene. Not by design. I just sort of almost transcribed what was coming out of out of my subconscious. It was great. But now, yeah, and there's moments like that all through the writing. But That's a nice little simple one. Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 41:08
Oh, God. Oh, I. This has got to become a dare movie. 

Dick Wybrow 41:13
Yeah, I hope. So. You know, there is some interest in in Kane. There was some interest of. We'll see what happens, but I won't put a kibosh on it. But yeah, we'll see. We'll see it. 

Rich Bennett 41:23
It'll happen. It'll definitely happen. I think it will. 

Dick Wybrow 41:26
Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 41:27
People to 

have you actually come up with the characters. I mean all they can be from a vision you had while sleeping or something. 

Dick Wybrow 41:38
No, I think, like, for example, with Kane, I had the impetus of Kane was I had written another book about the television world. And, and in doing so, I interviewed a lot of news. People write I was into TV news, but I and so this phrase kept on coming up again and again, the phrase being dog bites man. That's the story because it's common man bites dog. That's a story and that's it. And that phrase stuck in my head, man bites dog. That's a story. And and it's a common phrase. This is a well-known news adage, but for some reason that rolled up in my subconscious and I started to think, well, what if I wrote that as a story? Man bites my dog, what would happen? And so Man bites. I became Men by Wolf. And then, of course, then he tried to do humor. And that's how that sort of that genesis of that. And then something else in my head, and maybe because I'm Canadian, I guess, but I thought, like, what kind of human would you turn into? He would turn into a big human right because he's a big, powerful wolf. He'd be huge. So he six foot seven, he's a big guy. But let me see, what else could he be? A French-Canadian. 

So he turned to a six. Foot seven French-Canadian. And that, to me, struck me as so funny and funny. I was like, Yeah, that makes total sense to me. And that and that's what I mean. So then from there I think it gets in the subconscious and he starts cooking and then you start to think it from the wolf's perspective. So he was a wolf just a few weeks ago, months ago, just a year ago. So how would he view the world? How would an animal view the world? And now you're starting to get some his personality, how he views some of the things that humans do is confusing or strange or they don't quite make sense. And so that starts to create a bit of a personality in them, you know? And then, of course, he was a wolf, he was an alpha wolf. And what's cool about wolves is they're the alpha pairs is male and female are pairs. They're together. So he's got a wolf wife. He's got a wolf wife who's waiting for him. That's why he wants to get back to his pack, because his wolf wife is is waiting for him. She may not be waiting. For him any more, who knows? But so. Then but. He was an alpha wolf at. The time. And so the character is like, maybe he's going to be arrogant. Do you get a six foot seven French skinny man? Used to be a wolf. He's a little bit arrogant, get a bit of a swagger to him. But then as the shore progresses, you realize that he hadn't always been the Alpha Wolf, that he came in after another alpha wolf ended up getting killed. So he sort of sees himself as second best. He can't quite get that out of his head that, yes, he was alpha and he wasn't first choice alpha. He was. And so that's what I mean. As you progress and create and all these bits and pieces start to come in, now you've got this six foot seven French-Canadian Alpha wolf who has a bit of a insecurity, even though he comes across with a swagger, who views humans in a particular way from a animal point of view. And you're creating that character right there and you're creating this entire mind around it, and it's it's fun. It's really fun to do. 

Rich Bennett 44:25
Oh, God. Oh, man. It's 

just six fits. 

Dick Wybrow 44:33
And it's funny because you also need the foil, right? Or to some extent, right? So so he's people really find him him pretty funny. And then I've got Imelda who is as you know, a smart talking bit, a street smart, and she's short, even though she's the criminal former criminal that so a former criminal. She's the one kind of keeping everything on the straight and narrow. So she's got to keep him in check because because he he's got a big thing where he he's an animal, right? Former animal as so he doesn't he says animals don't lie. So he'll walk right in and some will say something to him. He says, oh, you're a big guy, so I am off. It's like, No, no, ixnay don't say that to people. So she's constantly trying to make sure he doesn't say something to get them, you know, eyeballs on them. So, yeah. Now it's. And it's fun. 

Rich Bennett 45:21
Actually. Actually. What do you believe is the key ingredient in creating stories that resonate with readers on a humorous level? 

Dick Wybrow 45:27
I think humor is about interaction between people. I mean, I don't write jokes, right? It's about interaction between people. Something as similar as somebody brought this up to me just the other day, like there's a moment when Cayne goes into a car show in and it would have been Minneapolis probably. Yeah, you go to a car show in the Minneapolis area and walks up there and and, you know, he's got a bit of an accent. He's there with Imelda. And the woman behind the counter says, I'm like, where you from? And he she said, he's French-Canadian. And then she looks up and goes, Oh, we love to have people here from overseas. And so. It's, you know, that's it. That all comes from the interaction, That all comes from interaction, you know, And it's not just here's a comedy joke. It says that says so much about her and then so much about them. And that's where the fun is, right? Is sort of the. In character, not in just. The fun wordplay. It is the fun interaction between characters. 

Rich Bennett 46:27
How do you balance the elements of suspense and comedy in them? 

Dick Wybrow 46:31
You can't. It's a big thing. And I learned this sort of in radio. You know, you've got to keep you've got, like we said, you have an obligation to the reader to keep the story going. And there's that that old line from, I think, Ernest Hemingway, Kill Your Darlings. Yeah, this might be a great joke. It might be a great moment. This might be hilarious. It might be the funniest line ever written. But if it doesn't fit into that storyline, if it doesn't fit into that character, save it, give it to somebody else. You know, put it off to the side. And so the balance is the story comes first, the characters come first, the humor is there. But I never sacrifice the characters or the storyline for the humor, and that takes a bit of a discipline. Guess I'm ago. I it's such a good joke. That's such a funny moment. But if it doesn't quite fit, it's got to go and you can use it somewhere else. You know, you'll go if it's really, really good to come up somewhere else. 

Rich Bennett 47:22
The third book in Cane Juice came out, right? 

Dick Wybrow 47:25
Yeah, it just came out. So yeah, in the last last week or so. Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 47:30
So with this series, well, actually I would say it's probably all your books, except for the ones you wrote when you were 17. You know, when you burned them, who would you say is your ideal reader for this? 

Dick Wybrow 47:43
It's like. 

Rich Bennett 47:44
Practically everybody, because I can see people laughing their ass. 

Dick Wybrow 47:47
You know. That's the thing. It's it's tough. It's so funny, man, because if I would have picked. Could you assume your ideal reader is someone like you, right? I mean, because you're sort of writing it for yourself. But I've got readers in Canada, America, Australia, UK. In fact, I had a woman in UK, one of my ideal readers, I guess a woman in the UK, ended up influencing the third book because of something she said. Because every now and then I'll do like this in a way, I'll do Zoom calls with reader groups like a bunch of folks will get together and read it and the retail sales. Hey, you mind? Could you talk literature? Sure, of course. And so that very morning I was starting the third book right I was writing and. I was just struggling. I had sort of some of the basics. I couldn't quite. Something was kind of missing. I wasn't having I didn't have the essence of it or something. So I put that aside and I'm talking to these folks in the United Kingdom. And this woman from I always say she's from New Brighton. I don't know if that's what she said. I don't know if it just sounds like a cool place. And if you're from New Brighton, you know it. You're probably laughing at me because maybe this is not a cool place. I don't know. But anyway, so one from New Brighton. So again, I was struggling that morning trying to work out some of the bits and pieces for Book three, and she says, I can't wait, I'm not going to do the accent. It will not do it. But she says, I can't wait to find out more. About Kane because Kane, when he turned from Wolf into a human, he was originally a teenage boy, you know, for that year he grew into this, you know, 25 year old. So he grew up very fast. But for that year, he was raised by this French-Canadian couple. And so I didn't get into a whole lot of that. And so she said, I can't wait to find out more about his time on the farm with this French-Canadian couple and when he was growing up and how he learned how to be human. And I said. That's exactly what I'm. Doing in book three. It's funny you say that, because that's my plan of what I have to do with the plan for book three, what I'm doing. And that's what I mean. She at that moment in time and that to some extent rich man that's a little bit that magic in the world because I needed some sort of inspiration. I couldn't quite get my head wrapped around it and hear this love, this woman from New Brighton who says, You know what, I'm I want this. And I went, That's exactly what it should be. That's exactly where I should be going. So through the thread of the third book, we find out about how he made this transition and some of this great wisdom and advice that this couple gave to him, this older couple gave to him. And it's really lovely and emotional in some parts. It was really, really fascinating journey to take and and a lot of that was inspired by her. And so I thanked her for that and gave her a copy and everything. And but no, it's it's been it's it's been an amazing back and forth with readers. There would have been a time, even not that long ago, 20 years ago or so, 15 years or so ago, when people put stuff out and then maybe people sent in mail to Dean Koontz or. Or or. Whoever it might be. Stephen King. But these days I get readers contacting me all the time on email or Facebook or whatever it might be, and I love that. And that's great. Yeah, it is. It's really positive. They're really great. I've got amazing readers. They're so fantastic and a number of them. I've become pretty good friends too, where I end up sending early copies of my book and say, Hey, how does this sound to you? As what's called beta readers? You send out early copies and it's not even like, Hey, make this better. It's like, does this make sense? Is this all make sense? Is there something? Because some of my readers know my stories better than I do because I move on to the next stories? Hey, well, listen, that one character you said, but for me here and more this but had this is like, Oh, okay, good. I'm glad you mention that because I needed to keep that back. But now they've been great. The interaction with readers, that is, for all the negatives we might have in the social media age and all that, that is one of the most lovely things in my world right now, is that interaction with these people who are very likely will never meet but are very close to me. Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 51:39
So how many different writers groups do you actually belong to? Yeah, that was done through Zoom, right? 

Dick Wybrow 51:47
Oh, yeah. Yeah. You know that there wasn't a writer's group that was just. That's one of those. 

Rich Bennett 51:51
Where. 

Dick Wybrow 51:52
A group of readers will get together and they'll. They'll read the book like, and I can always see, like, I'll see a burst. 

Rich Bennett 51:59
Like a book club. 

Dick Wybrow 52:00
Exactly right. Yeah. So book clubs will get together and then they'll contact me. And I've done that a dozen times or so. Yeah, dozen times or so. Yeah. And they'll contact me and I'll zoom in to it. And I'm always willing to, if you've got a group of folks have read it and want to chat about the books, yeah, I'm always up for that. But that's been great. But what it's funny you mention that, Rich, because when it comes to writers groups, it's so solitary here and, I don't know, four people that are listening. If you're a writer, I know a. Lot of people get a lot out of that. I'm not great with social interaction. I think I like my little room and I actually don't. I lurk in. One or two of them, but I actually don't have, aside from writer friends, a couple of them, my version of friends, I email them once every six months and they email me once every six months. But I don't have a lot. Of other interaction and writers groups. For the most part, it's readers. I speak to a lot of readers. 

Rich Bennett 52:51
Yeah. So as an author, what's, you know, when you start writing or even in the middle of it or towards the end, what's one of the biggest challenges you face? 

Dick Wybrow 53:02
I think for me, sometimes a challenge is just every time I start a new book, because I've just started book four here in the last week or so, and I should almost write it now because every time I start every single book I've started and this is like book 15 or 14 or something, whatever ever, and I go every time I go. I'm no good at this. Hi, I'm a terrible writer. Everything starting a. Book is tough. It's just one of every single time you get that imposter syndrome, right, like, what am I doing? What I think I'm doing? And so you've got to get through that inertia, that initial inertia, and then you're flying. That's one of the hardest parts, is to keep going. And I know and I know you've got you got listeners that are struggling to write the book. Is it just push through it? Your goal is to get your clay together because your first draft is going to suck. It's just they all first drafts suck. Just get the clay together. I'm writing stuff right now. I know that it's not going to make it to the end, but if you get all your clay together, you get your you get your lump together, and then you can make it better afterwards. And that's the trick. So right now I'm right. My lump, I'm right, my lump. And so get my 9000 thousand words or so I do about 3000, 4000 words a day, sometimes 8000 words, depending on how things are flowing. Wow. Get that done. And then you come back and revise it. And and again, I'm really encouraging I know there's somebody listening right now. Here's a bit of the magic, right? Here's a magic we were talking about. There's a reason why you're listening to this podcast. You you, you the person listening right now hearing this, I'm talking directly to you. You're hearing this because you've been trying to write that book and you can't finish it now. This is what you need to do. Just do it. Just write. Don't don't go back and edit as you write. Don't don't go back and do this. You need to. This is why hearing this now. Just push through and get to the end. And once you got all that. Clay, then make it better. You're going to write scenes, you're going to come later, you're going to write dialogue you'll never use, but just push through and get to the end. And that's how you finish your book. Don't listen anybody else, just finish it. So there's my inspiration to that person. There's that one person hearing and love that needs to hear that. But that's what you do. You get to it and then once you get that mass of clay, you just sort of you mold it and take all the stuff out that doesn't look like a book for and then you're good to go. 

Rich Bennett 55:10
So with you because you're yourself published. Yeah. 

You say you're not great in social settings. 

Dick Wybrow 55:18
No. Right. I think part of that I will accept part of it is because of the narcolepsy, because After a few minutes I do get tired. 

Rich Bennett 55:26
Okay. What have you actually, besides getting on podcast, what's your biggest the biggest way that you market your books? So I should say the most successful way that you've been marketing. 

Dick Wybrow 55:40
So I like social media a little bit of that. I've got some amount of editing skill when it comes to stuff like, for example, it's funny. So, so Podium has put this audio book together, which I'm stoked about, like I mentioned, comes out on the 61st. 

Rich Bennett 55:54
I can't wait for that. 

Dick Wybrow 55:55
So but so I went to podium, I said, Hey, listen, I want to talk to the narrators. They're like, I want to talk to them. So I want to interview them for what? It's because I want to take the interview and I want to make little pieces of it for social media. Oh, okay. When I was ever done, that's great idea. Yeah. And so what I did is I got on Mary McCann and Tim Campbell and I interview them like you and I are speaking now, and I'm taking bits and pieces of those and putting them out and putting in put another one out here in the next couple of hours. And it's just part is to talk about the book, also talk about the amazing work they do, but that sort of thing. I think it's just coming up with some ideas that are a bit different things that I like to do that I find fascinating. But I'll be honest, what has driven this book has been my readers and I am so thankful, man. I am so thankful I've got a newsletter list that I've got some folks on there, which is fine, they're great, but it's just been this word of mouth. There was just a post here this morning. Sorry, there's just a post here this morning of woman saying saying like a friend of mine knew. I wish I remember. She a friend of mine knew that I liked unusual books and told me about this book. I started reading and went back to it, said, You've got to read this, too. Now we're both reading. And that's that's the marketing I've got. Wow. Yeah. So I've got some. But you know, it's just word of mouth. It just people, other people are hearing it about about the story from other people. And that's one of the most powerful things in the world. You can put up ads and you can put up social media posts, you can put up your cover all over the place. You can do podcasts like yours. But really, in the end, it comes down to if a friend of yours says, Hey, check this book out, and I loved it, you're going to check the book out? 

Rich Bennett 57:30
Yeah. Oh, absolutely. Something very important. Tell everybody your website and where they can find your books. 

Dick Wybrow 57:37
It's just my name. It's Dick. Why Briancon? All my books are on Amazon. If you're a big like or don't like Amazon, you can actually you can pick them up. You can pick the paperback up from like Walmart. Barnes Noble, a bunch of different places. You might have to go in and have them order it in, but they can order that back in. And then, like I said, I'm really stoked about the first three books in the series are going to be, like I said, turned into audiobooks, have been turned in audio books, first book coming out January 16th, which I'm stoked about. 

Rich Bennett 58:07
I cannot wait for that because I mean, that's the main. Main way I do read books now is by Audible. 

Dick Wybrow 58:13
Yeah, yeah. For as much as I work around, especially because during the full time author thing, which means I'm going to do a lot of stuff around the house because the wife's like, You don't have a real job. It's like, So last year, yesterday I was like washing the car yard. And as I do that, I listen audiobooks. So yeah, now I do too. 

Rich Bennett 58:30
You're there to wash your car right now is going to freeze right. 

Dick Wybrow 58:35
Well it's summer here man. It's allegedly summer. It's been raining every day since last January, but allegedly it's summer here in New Zealand. 

Rich Bennett 58:42
All right, go ahead, rub it in. 

Dick Wybrow 58:43
Yeah. No, it's not bad. It's not bad. It's tough to get used to that, right? Right now, my temperature is at 16 degrees to you. It's cold to me. I think that's just about 60. 

Rich Bennett 58:55
O 16 degrees Celsius. 

Dick Wybrow 58:57
Yeah, it's easier here. You want here. Well, I know we're going to get a little bit learning. Here's a fast trick to be able to do Celsius to Fahrenheit because I still do the conversion. I had it Dublin at 30, basically. Basically, that's how it works. So if the temperature says 15, double it to 30 and 30 at 60, so 15 is about 30 is round about that. Oh, it's rancid, it's real rough, but it gives you a bit of an idea about how cold it is because I don't know what when they say it's ten, 12, 15, 20, I don't know what those numbers mean even to this day. I've been here 11 years, but I do it my head here. It's about 60. It's about 65. That's about 70. It's funny. Yeah. 

Rich Bennett 59:36
If you told me that because a lot of these videos I'm writing or watch for recipes, if they're from England or whatever, it's always in Celsius. 

Dick Wybrow 59:43
Yeah, well, I don't do that recipes because as a. Critic, as act. Do you know what's funny though? All the sort. Of like a significant chefs a lot of the significant chefs use Fahrenheit because there's more numbers in there and you get more exact. 

Rich Bennett 59:54
Yeah yeah I just heard on the grill. Makes it easier. 

Dick Wybrow 59:57
Yeah, you're better. Bet your best bet. 

Rich Bennett 1:00:00
Before I get to my last question, is there anything you like to add? 

Dick Wybrow 1:00:04
No. I've really enjoyed the time with you, man. And I do want to reiterate to to the folks that are trying to write a book, you know, get out there and do it. Just just finish it. Just finish it. Don't worry so much. Just keep writing. Push through that insecurity, because I get that insecurity every time I write and through to make it happen. 

Rich Bennett 1:00:20
Yeah, thanks for saying that, because I started writing one last year and I just been I haven't touched it in a couple of months. 

Dick Wybrow 1:00:29
It's just fair, man. It really is. And I got it. I got it. Every single time I write, just push through it. It's such a joy just to be done with. If nothing else, you could have written a book. How many people? You know, written a book. Just do it. 

Rich Bennett 1:00:41
I'm going to matter of fact, I am going to work on it this weekend because you told me to do. 

Dick Wybrow 1:00:45
A brother and I want to read it. I want to read it. When you're done, shoot it. 

Rich Bennett 1:00:49
And if my mentor calls me, he's going to ask me how career I've been writing and he's going to yell at me. I don't want that to happen. So you've been on several interviews. I have, and I love asking people this question. Is there anything that a host has never asked you that you wish they would have asked you? And if so, what would be that question and what would be your answer? It doesn't necessarily have to be about the books or writing. 

Dick Wybrow 1:01:14
Yeah, anything a host has never asked me. Oh, 

I would say, 

I guess. I mean, the whole point is. Like a lot of folks ask what inspiration People love talking about inspiration. But I think one of the I guess maybe a tenant, right? Maybe a tenant in my life is something that's actually outside of writing, something that sort of that I try to live by is as best as I can. That has nothing to do with writing. Fact is just the opposite of all the stuff we're talking about. Because I did standup comedy and radio and that's always about talking and this is me now, right? I mentioned earlier about humor, but one of the sort of as a tenant I try to live by as much as I can is to shut up me, to shut up and listen, because it's so important to listen to somebody. We forget the insane value. There is in just listening. Not listening. In, hearing, and like waiting for their lips to stop moving so that we can say our thing. But we forget the extreme value there. Is in just a listening to somebody and what they're into at that moment. And if nothing else, in a selfish way, if you would go to a party and just listen to somebody and ask questions about whatever they're into, you might say doesn't words, that person is going to walk away from the party, go, That's an amazing conversation and. They'll love. You for it. But it's just is such a gift to give to somebody, to really listen to what they're saying. Pay attention with no agenda and you'll find that that actually makes you feel really good, too, because you can feel that joy coming off them because we don't listen to each other anymore because we're so busy trying to get our thing in there. Here's my social media post here. Let me jam this down your throat. But so I guess my thing is like, as best as I can, I try to live by this tenet of when I meet somebody new. I want to just as much as I can be into what they're talking about in that moment, whoever they are in that moment, because you can feel the joy coming off them because we just don't do that enough for each other anymore. So I would yeah, if I could give any suggestion, just give it a shot. You might do it already, but just you meet somebody on the street, talk to a neighbor, don't put your thing in it. Make a point. You put your stuff aside and just whatever they're into, be into that and you'll see that you'll see that joy in their face and that light up. And it makes you feel great. 

Rich Bennett 1:03:31
And you could be helping them. 

Dick Wybrow 1:03:33
Yeah, well, because you never. 

Rich Bennett 1:03:35
Know. That person could be having a bad day one. 

Dick Wybrow 1:03:38
Hundred percent man. And you could turn all that around just by listening, not trying to solve any problems, just by listening to them. 

Rich Bennett 1:03:44
Yeah. And you can learn something as well. 

Dick Wybrow 1:03:46
Yeah, of course you don't. You don't. 

Rich Bennett 1:03:48
Learn anything. 

Dick Wybrow 1:03:49
You don't learn anything by flapping your gums, man. 

Rich Bennett 1:03:52
No, no, exactly. Dick, I want to thank you so much. I cannot wait for these to come out on Audible because I am dying to listen to them. Everybody listening makes sure that you get not just the main series, get all of Dick's books, and after you read them or listen to make sure you leave a full review because that's definitely going to help him sell more books and more words as well. 

Dick Wybrow 1:04:22
Yeah. Yeah. Well, here we go. 

Rich Bennett 1:04:23
He needs to remain. He needs to stay. That award winning author got to make it happen, man. 

Dick Wybrow 1:04:29
Yeah. Thank you, Rich. Appreciate it, brother. I really enjoy the time that I met, and. And I hope it warms up where you are. I don't think come January, though, I can't imagine you going to see heat or the sun anytime the next three months.