Andrew Klavan’s Another Kingdom trilogy—inspired by Arthurian legends, Cervantes’ Don Quixote, and Tolkien’s fantasy—marks his potential final fiction work before pivoting to nonfiction, possibly a philosophical treatise. He dismisses conservative fiction’s sanitized morality, favoring flawed protagonists like Game of Thrones’ characters, while critiquing Hollywood’s 1960s shift from entertainment to leftist propaganda. On faith, he reinterprets Christ’s crucifixion as divine empathy with human suffering, and advises new Christians to read accessible translations alongside prayerful study. His final book is due this fall, blending detective thrillers with religious fantasy, leaving listeners to ponder whether his next project will dismantle modern ideological divides—or just outrun them. [Automatically generated summary]
Hey everyone, we are live with our newest episode of The Conversation.
I am your host, Alicia Kraus, and with me is the leader of the multiverse, Andrew Clavin, who will be taking your questions live for an entire hour starting now.
So we love doing this with Ben's last book, New York Times number one bestseller, by the way.
Don't know if you heard or not, that we wanted to do this with Andrew's new book, Another Kingdom, which I am so excited to read.
You know, a book is really good when you have to have a map of the fictional kingdom inside of it.
Excellent map, a really nice map.
Like a beautiful map in order to understand it.
And so we're announcing that this is a very special episode because we are doing this live signing of Drew's new book, Another Kingdom.
And for this episode, you actually don't have to be a subscriber.
I can't believe those words just came out of my mouth because I'm so used to saying only subscribers can ask the questions.
But this episode, you don't have to, guys.
But when you purchase a copy of Drew's book, you can write in a question for him to answer live here on the air during this special episode of The Conversation.
So head on over to premierecollectibles.com slash Another Kingdom to get your signed copy now.
And don't worry if your question isn't answered because we have this massive stack of books.
So you will still get a signed copy that you pre-order over at premiercollectibles.com slash Another Kingdom.
And we can't wait to get started.
Absolutely.
But first, you have now what I had a couple weeks ago, deathly illness.
I'm going to tell you something.
And you have laryngitis.
I'm going to tell you this.
I'm joking, but I'm not joking.
The devil hates this book.
The devil hates Another Kingdom.
I swear it.
This book came to me.
I told you once, this book came to me in a sudden burst, which has never happened before.
It was like implanted the entire story at one moment.
It's like inspired.
And I felt inspired.
And ever since I started, like I have been besieged.
When I first finished this book, my house was suddenly filled with centipedes, ugly, horrible caterpillars all over the place.
I thought something is really weird about that.
Just suddenly, on the day I finished it, right?
Yes.
Knowles and I started to do the podcast.
I didn't even want to do the podcast.
I felt compelled to do it.
Like when I was praying, I had like do this podcast.
When Knowles and I started, every day something went wrong technically.
And we started joking about it.
We started just saying the devil hates another kingdom.
The devil is trying to stop us.
No matter what happened, every time there would be a landmark moment for this book, this story, something would go wrong.
So here the book finally comes out.
You've been so kind to bring me on, to let me do this and all this.
I've lost my voice.
My plane got canceled.
I woke up last night with horrible cramps in my leg.
By the time I was finished, I was like Denzel Washington and fences screaming out the window at death, you know?
So listen, I'm just saying, folks, if you don't want the devil to take over the universe, you have to buy a copy of this book.
You know, I'm not saying you'll go to hell if you don't, but just telling you, the devil hates this book.
We can get some oil in here.
Lay hands on you.
Absolutely.
Heal me.
Rebuke things.
I can call my pastor up.
We have some questions, and this is going to be really fun.
So you know how this works, right?
You're going to answer the question.
Like this question is from Connor.
And as you're answering Connor's question, you're going to be signing Connor's book.
Got it.
Isn't that great?
Perfect.
And people can head over to premierecollectibles.com slash Another Kingdom if they want, you know, to see their book signed right now.
So Connor says, what school has been your favorite YAF campus lecture in the past year and a half?
Hint.
Hint, it was at GCU.
Well, let's say GCU.
No pressure.
GCU.
By the way, I think Connor might be like the leader of YAF or GCU if he's the same Connor I'm thinking of.
GCU was among my favorite colleges with all the rest of them.
And I have to tell you, the receptions I have gotten at colleges have been so great.
I mean, it is so wonderful to actually get to talk to the people who listen and who read the books and all that stuff.
It just means a tremendous amount to me because you're talking into a microphone.
You do not see people.
And then when they come up and tell you they like your work, it's great.
So you enjoy the part of getting to see your audience in person?
I actually like getting the questions more than I like giving speeches.
Really?
Yeah, I like to hear what's on their minds.
You know, that's usually Ben's favorite part.
Although I think Ben's QA's are much more competitive.
Well, then he rips them up to pieces.
Destroy.
Destroy.
So I don't want to be an ageist here, but you are an older gentleman.
You're, I would say, the patriarch of the Daily Wire.
I am Gandalf level old at this point.
Yeah, the white or the green.
And so do you feel kind of invigorated or hopeful for the future or that the kids are going to be all right when you go standing on the ground?
Absolutely.
And one of the reasons I don't destroy people.
Because when I look at them, they're very young to me.
And I just want to help.
I just want them to be happy, you know.
And so, yes, when I meet, especially the Yaff people, the YAF people, they are so on point.
They're so smart.
They're brave to do what they do.
And it really does make you feel like all is not yet lost.
All right.
So, you know, Drew does have bias towards GCU, apparently.
Constantine wants to know, what are your thoughts on the brothers Karamazov?
Am I saying that right?
Yeah, the Karamazov.
The Kara Karamozov.
It is my second favorite Dostoevsky book.
You know, obviously, Crime and Punishment changed my life by taking me out of the realm of the relativists and convincing me there was such a thing as right and wrong, a moral universe.
I didn't understand the Brothers Karamazov when I first read it.
I've now read it three times.
By the third time, I sort of caught on and I got it.
Yes, and it's a beautiful book.
And Dostoevsky is a prophet.
He saw communism coming.
He saw Nietzsche coming before Nietzsche even wrote a word.
His books are so beautiful and so full of faith.
And they always make me laugh because they're the greatest Christian novels ever written.
But they're so full of life.
You would never find them in a Christian bookstore because they're too real.
By the way, Constantine was writing us from Sydney.
So he bought that book, and that book is going to go to Sydney.
God love them.
So that's really cool.
I would leave that cap off of that pen.
I guess so.
I'm just saying, we got a lot of these designs.
Dominique wants to know, hey, Drew, thanks for being a voice of reason in a time where everything seems so chaotic.
I was wondering, what are some of your favorite video games to play to take you out of this crazy reality that we live in?
Well, I love video games.
I love simple video games, but I love the games that have a puzzle in them.
So games like Braid, Inside, Limbo.
I really loved all of those.
I'm just finishing the new, oh, the one about the demon.
I've lost it.
I'm also playing on Switch.
I'm playing the new Super Mario, Super Mario U. I'm kind of looking forward to that.
Out of all of the things that you just mentioned, that's the only one I know because I'm not a gamer.
I'm sorry.
I'm looking forward to The Devil May Cry 5 or 8 or whatever it is.
I always like those games.
They're really campy and silly.
And Diablo, that was what I was thinking.
I just finished Diablo 3, which I really enjoyed.
And video games do take you out of things because you're so immersive.
The minute you put that thing in your hand, you're in the picture.
And it's just great.
I love it.
What do you think about the kind of, I hear a lot of talk of the future of gaming when it comes to AR and VR incorporation?
I think the new VR is so exciting that it actually maybe is one of, I'm not big on gimmicks.
Like I'd never like movies that were 3D and all that stuff.
But the new VR is so good.
It could really be an exciting new way to experience art.
Okay.
All right.
Drew wants to know, hey, Drew wants to know from Drew, what has been your favorite book that you've written to date?
You know, it's funny.
Books are like kids.
You don't really have favorites.
You know, each one of them.
It's special for their own reasons.
Yeah.
Each one of them is special for its own reason.
It really is true.
But there are books that are special in your life.
So Werewolf Cop is a book that didn't do all that well commercially, and I think it's one of the best books I ever wrote.
And to be honest with you, I think it's one of the best works of popular fiction of the last couple decades.
And so it has this, I kind of have a care for it, like the child with a limp or something like that.
And of course, Another Kingdom has been such a great experience.
Writing Another Kingdom has been great.
Doing it with Knowles has been terrific.
So it's always the latest book is always a special favorite because you just finished it.
It's new and fresh.
Right, right.
It doesn't talk back yet.
And there's another one that was like Werewolf Cop, The Uncanny, which is kind of a prequel to Werewolf Cop that changed my life, you know, and it also didn't do all that well.
But when I was finished writing it, my mind was free and it really did something to me.
I write about it in my memoir, The Great Good Thing, that it just really changed everything for me.
And so those are books that are kind of special because the world didn't love them, but I love them.
And so they do have a special place.
This book is, this may be the last novels I ever write.
Really?
I'm not sure, but it feels that way.
There's something that is completing me in writing, that is completing the mission I started out with.
And they are a statement of a place that I've come to, that I've never been before in my life, a place of real serenity and joy.
And it's coming out through this book.
I'm almost finished with the third one, the last one.
And I think I may move on to pure nonfiction after this.
So I'll see.
So what would you write after this?
Because you've already written a memoir.
Yeah, I would write a kind of philosophical sequel.
I'd like to write about the books that have affected me.
So I think I might do that next.
Books That Speak Again00:04:21
That'd be great if it could be like a primer for the books that you would recommend that people should read.
All right.
And we should note, you said that you've loved working on this with Michael.
He means the podcast.
We all know that Michael does not write books.
Of course.
Well, he does, but they have no words.
I just wanted to clarify so we weren't spreading fake news.
Michaela wants to know, why do academics hate conservatism and capitalism so much?
As a college student, I'm amazed at how they want to uproot all of the conservative values, even here in my red state.
You know, I hate to say, I hate to take my opponents and give them psychological reasons for what they think, because I do like to listen to their reasons.
But it is interesting that in any study that has to work, engineering, agriculture, science, STEM, you find a lot of conservatives.
But in the areas that don't have to work, the liberal arts, history, and literature and things like that, that's where you find the socialists and the woke people and the people who have these theories that just don't work.
One of the things about capitalism and about freedom, about liberty itself, is that it elevates the common man.
It means that the guy with a 175 IQ and the guy who's not got 175 IQ are really working in an open field where either one of them can wind up the CEO of a company or can create something or do something, some sport or something that makes him a millionaire or a billionaire and can succeed.
And that takes away the value of the guy with the high IQ who thinks he's so special, who thinks he's elevated above everybody else and should be respected more than everybody else.
And I think the most beautiful thing in a free country is the intellectual who respects the common man, who says, yes, I have my field, which is the intellectual field, but he has his field and he can make it and become wealthy in that field too.
Just too few people feel that way.
Too many people feel that the elites should be in charge, that the guy out in the Midwest in his checkered shirt is less than he is and shouldn't have a fly over country.
You know, Dick Cabot, the elitist talk show host, once said to me in a radio show, what is this thing, free speech?
Why should stupid people get to speak?
And I think that there's a lot of people who secure their own position in their minds by saying that other people are less than they are.
And I think that's why they hate capitalism, and I think that's why they hate liberty.
All right, good answer.
Jonathan asks, how often do you reread books?
Personally, I usually treat books with singular stories as single use item, like single use items, while treating books with numerous subjects as unlimited use items.
You know, I've reached the point where a lot of the books I read in youth come back to me and I want to reread them again from a new perspective.
The books that shaped me informed me.
I just reread Don Quixote, which I had read since high school, and suddenly I thought, oh.
Now I see why this is such a great book.
I read books when they come, I reread books when they come back to me, and they kind of ask to be reread.
They sort of knock on the door and say, wait, you know, I have something new to say to you.
And frequently I go back to them, especially now, and find that, yes, they are speaking to me in a whole new way, a whole new voice, and that they connect to the time I read them before.
I love to read new books, but I have read at this point, as Knowles likes to jokes, I've read all the books.
I have read a lot of the classics and a lot of the canon of literature, and I go back to them to see how they speak to me in new ways.
So it's really not about the nature of the book, whether it has a single story or many different stories.
It's about how deep it goes and whether it can speak to me again.
It's very unlikely I'll go back and read some thriller that just had a sort of, you know, was a thrill of the moment.
But like I said, I've read the Brothers Karamazov three times.
I've read Crime and Punishment three times.
And Shakespeare I go back to all the time.
If there's depths there that can be sounded again, a new voice that can speak to me through time, I'll go back and read it.
So you said that you will reread books that kind of call to you.
Yes.
Is it when you're walking through your library?
Is it a dinner conversation with friends?
What kind of spurs you to go, oh, I'm going to go back and give that another look?
Sometimes it's a conversation, but oftentimes it just comes back into my head with this kind of persistence, you know, sort of saying to me, you know, I've got something new to say, come back.
And then I go back to it, and it always does.
It always has something new.
That's really interesting.
Next question comes from Kyle, who says, who do you think is the frontrunner in the Democratic presidential primary at this point?
Open World Revelation00:06:14
Do you think any of the candidates as they stand right now has a legitimate chance of defeating President Trump in the upcoming elections?
Well, to answer the second question first, I never say nobody can do anything.
I mean, the last time I said that was about Donald Trump.
I said, I'll never win a primary.
But, you know, so I never count anybody out.
But I do think that right now, I can picture Bernie Sanders winning.
I can picture him doing what Trump did, which is dividing everybody else and winning with 30% of the vote.
The one I fear most is Kamala Harris, because she's sinister and she's smart.
And she'll do anything, as we know, from her past.
She'll do anything to get elected.
I think right this minute, if I had to place money on an election, which in these days I would never do, right this minute I think Trump's going to win.
I think that he has been victorious against this Russian collusion nonsense.
The economy's going well.
People are beginning to kind of get used to him.
It's funny.
He's a character, and he's got a lot of flaws, but there's nothing secret about him.
When you compare him to like Barack Obama pretending to be this godlike statesman when really he was just a Chicago city paw, you compare him to Hillary Clinton with all her, you know, first woman president rhetoric who was really inside such a desiccated ruin of corruption.
Trump is exactly what you see.
We know him, we see him.
He has his flaws.
They're big flaws.
He has big virtues as well.
There's nothing secret about him.
And I think people might be getting used to that and starting to like it.
I notice his poll numbers creeping up.
And I think he may have turned a corner.
I hope so, because I think he's done a good job.
All right.
I'm kind of embarrassed that I don't know what this next question means.
You know, I don't know what it means either.
Oh, no.
Go ahead.
But John wants to know, as you sign his book, what's your favorite sandbox video game?
Hey, guys, do you know what a sandbox video game is?
Should I Google it, Roque?
What's that?
It's an open world.
Oh, you know, that's what I thought about.
I'm not a big fan of open world games because can you explain that to me?
Sorry.
You know, in an open world, you wander around, you can go all kinds of different places.
Most games have a kind of track that you're on.
You can follow.
And I kind of like that because it's like being told a story and the open world.
You know, it gets kind of tiring to me just riding around.
I've started a bunch of them, and I don't think I've finished any of them.
So there was one Spider-Man game that had an open world that I kind of enjoyed.
You stop off, but I don't really like them.
I like a game with a story in it, and a story demands that you're on a track because the track is what is the narrator.
The track is telling you the story.
That's the best I can do because I can't remember the last open game.
Yeah, ICO had a sequel called Shadow of the Colossus that was kind of an open world game that I liked a lot.
So that's the best I can do.
All right, Arun is asking, Hi, Andrew.
What can the success of Game of Thrones teach conservatives about how to write good fiction?
Tell the truth.
I mean, this is the thing about it.
Everybody complains about the naked ladies in it, and it is exploitative.
You know, there's no question.
HBO does this thing the first three seasons.
They'll be having a conversation.
Just two girls will be banging each other in the background so they know you'll keep your subscription up and you'll stick around.
And there's no question, no question that Game of Thrones did that.
But with all that said, it told a great story.
It tells a great story in which real things happen.
People cheat, people lie, people curse, people kill, people make love, they have sex.
With their brothers or their cousins, with everybody.
I've never watched another person.
With anybody.
With anybody.
Saying what I've heard on Twitter.
But you know, I keep getting this email.
I get it again and again.
You're a Christian.
Your story should be happy.
There should be no cursing.
There should be no sex.
And I think, yeah, there should be no life.
God is God of the real world.
And you find God by studying the real world.
I found God by studying the real world, not by studying my fantasy life, by studying the real world.
So any honest work can lead you to God, even if it's by an atheist, which has happened to me many times, where I've read an atheistic book and thinks, yes, that's more realistic than a religious book.
And I see God there because it's more realistic.
So I think what we have to do is we have to stop being so I always say it like this: conservative fiction does not look like conservative life.
I live a conservative life.
I've been longtime married, faithfully married.
I work hard.
I'm diligent.
I try to be honest.
Those are not the characters I write about.
They don't make good stories.
I don't want my life to be a good story.
If my life is interesting, I'm in trouble.
I want my characters to be interesting.
And I want them to plumb the depths of human sin and degradation and reality so that you can see what life really is.
Alrighty.
I mean, and there's a lot of that in the actual Bible.
The Bible is.
Maybe some people should go back and read about David.
It's like days of our lives over there.
All righty.
Denzel says, Dear Lord Commander Clavin, protector of the seven multiverses, what do you think is the best way to approach the book of Revelation?
What a great question.
You know, there are so many ways to read it.
Some people read it as prophecy that is relevant now.
What is going to happen next?
How will the end times come?
Some people read it as a prophecy of what already happened in 70 AD when the Jews' country was wiped off the face of the earth by the Romans.
They read it as a prophecy that's already taken place.
Recently, however, I read a book just a couple of weeks ago that said it was really a description of the Mass.
It was really a description of the Catholic Mass in which heaven comes down to earth.
And so that when you are in the Mass, you're living through the prophecies of the book of Revelation.
And for those who don't know, the Catholic Mass is a very stately liturgy that takes you through confession to forgiveness to a remembrance of the Last Supper and Jesus.
And at the same time, you're supposed to be worshiping with the angels and archangels who are essentially joining you in communing with the body and blood of Christ.
And this book put forward the idea that the book of Revelation is a description of that amazing experience.
And I can't say whether that's true or not, but I think it's a really interesting way to read the book.
Catholic Mass Liturgy00:02:01
Interesting.
I'm sure Knowles would really like that definition of it.
David wants to know, who is your favorite president?
Oh, man.
It's such a short question, but it's really passionate.
Yeah, you know, I will give you three answers to that.
You got to love George Washington.
You've got to love George Washington because no matter how many times they try to revise him, no matter how many times they try to say, oh, he wasn't as great as people say he was, he was.
He was a genuinely virtuous man who genuinely, through his virtue, through his love of freedom, brought the country into being by surrendering his sword and his soldierhood and his command and his commission to the civilian authorities.
So you got to love President George.
I love Abraham Lincoln, not just because of his stately commitment to liberty and freedom in the Union, some of which I have questions about, but I love him because he was the greatest writer who was ever president.
I mean, he is certainly the greatest master of prose to ever hold the highest office in the land.
And then I really do love Reagan.
I mean, Reagan changed me.
He was in my time.
He was the guy who revealed to me that the left, that the right was not evil.
You know, because he came around and they did the same thing they did to Trump, same thing they did to George W. Bush, same thing they do to virtually every Republican president.
Evil, racist, mean, warmonger, kill us.
If he said red, then the answer was green.
If he said black, the answer was white.
Racist, racist, racist.
And while black people rose in his administration more than any other group, except I think single women who did better in his administration.
And when the wall fell down, when the Berlin Wall fell down, I swept up in the left, completely convinced that the left was right.
When the wall fell down, I remember thinking, you know, that old buzzard was right about everything.
What-If Propositions00:04:02
And that's when I stopped and thought, well, wait a minute, you know, how is that possible?
How could that possibly be true if he was an evil, stupid, warmongering, simplistic?
How could he be right about anything?
How could he be right about anything?
And so right.
You know, people don't remember this because everybody lies about it now.
Nobody knew the Soviet Union could fall.
They all say, oh, well, anybody, nobody, only Reagan.
He only knew it.
Only he, Thatcher and the Pope, knew that the Soviet Union was weak and could be undermined and could be taken out.
And so it was miraculous when that evil slave empire died and it changed my mind.
So I always have a special place in my heart for the Ron.
I love to hear that experience from someone that was there.
Yeah, it was amazing.
Dalton has a question.
He says, hey, Drew, how would you go about writing a superhero story?
Well, I mean, if this is your last fictional trilogy, what are we going to do?
Well, you know, the question to me is always the same.
I always get a story, with the exception of Another Kingdom, which came to me whole.
Most of my stories come to me as a kind of what-if question.
They come to me like, what if this happened?
What if that happened?
And then the thing that makes them a story that I want to write is when the perfect character comes to fit that story.
So, for instance, Don't Say a Word, my kidnapping story came when I was walking in to look in on my little baby daughter, because when they're little, you want to make sure they're still going up and down when they sleep, right?
And I was going in, and as I was about to turn the corner into the nursery, I thought, what if she's gone?
And I thought that would be kind of weird because I'm locked in.
I'm in a New York apartment.
What if she was somehow gone?
And who was the perfect person for that story?
For me, it was a little wimpy intellectual guy who suddenly was opposed to a physical danger that he simply wasn't equipped to handle.
But he loved his daughter so much that he was ready to die to handle that situation.
And that made it a beautiful story, not just an ugly, suspenseful story.
It made it a beautiful story.
And so with a superhero, it's really hard to find the story that's going to make him matter, that's going to matter to him.
When Frodo goes off to destroy the ring, he's a little guy.
He's a little guy against massive forces.
And aren't we all, you know?
But when Superman goes off, you've got to somehow create an oppositional challenge that is going to raise him in some way from what he is at the beginning to what he is at the end.
So what I would say is I wouldn't write a superhero story.
I would write a story that starts with a proposition, a what-if proposition, that only a superhero can elevate.
Yes.
So that's how I would approach it.
So would you say then that it might be more difficult to write a superhero story?
It's the reason I don't like superhero stories.
It's because very rarely do the stories really elevate the characters.
The characters can't really die.
They don't really have sexual flaws like most of us are.
Anybody can be perfect until he meets a member of the opposite sex, right?
I mean, we're all perfect when we're alone.
You know, it's only when you're suddenly dealing with somebody that you want, but who frustrates you, but is dangerous to your consciousness.
And that never happens in superhero stories.
So it's only in stories like Logan, where the guy is really flawed and he's put in a situation, I don't want to have any spoilers, but he's put in a situation that really challenges his identity.
That's the only time a superhero story means anything to me, which is why I tend to like origin stories and superhero stories more than the sequel and why they start to lose me after a while.
Because it is hard.
When a guy is so powerful, when he's Superman, what could possibly elevate him from where he is?
What could possibly challenge him in his deepest level?
Sometimes they pull it off, but oftentimes they don't.
I would say the Thor-Loki connection.
The Thor, of course.
I mean, that's really all I know because I'm the person that just goes and watches the superhero movies.
I really want to see Shazam.
I've heard good things.
Overcoming Apathy00:07:15
Yes, me too.
I've heard her.
Sounds really funny.
All right.
Arun says, Andrew, how do I respond to my liberal friend who recently told me, quote, you would understand the struggle if you were a person of color when we talked about politics?
Note, I'm an Indian immigrant.
Well, you know, the other day.
Does that not qualify as a person of color?
Well, the other day I was at the University of Texas in Arlington, and somebody got up and said, raise your hand if you're a person of color.
And all the black and brown people raised their hands.
And I said, does that mean the rest of you are persons of no color?
You know, I mean, we're all people of color.
You know, my color happens to be olive or white or whatever.
You know, and so I think it's a bogus thing.
How often, how often is what the left says a synonym for shut up?
You can't talk because you're white.
You can't talk because you're a male.
You can't talk because you're a white female.
And then when a black person like Candace Owens stands up and says, I disagree, they just start cursing at her.
They just start screaming obscenities at her because they've lost their argument, which is shut up.
So my response to that is always the same.
Either it's right to judge people by the color of their skin or it's not.
I say it's not.
I say we're made in God's image, period.
That's the end.
To me, there is no appeal from that.
If we're made in God's image, there's no going on.
There's no next sentence to that.
There's no but after that.
If we are all made in God's image, and if it's wrong to categorize people according to the color of their skin, then it's certainly wrong that a white person can't address the pain of a black person or vice versa.
We're all in existential pain, every one of us.
None of us is what we want to be.
All of us have sinned.
None of us is righteous.
No, not one.
And so I think so often, so often, you can look in another person's eyes and you know the failure they feel, the insecurity they feel, the pain they feel, and that doesn't have anything to do with color.
And I think it's just a bogus way of shutting people up.
Alrighty.
Elias says, Dear Clavin, usually I am a very caring and involved person, and I always am when it concerns others.
But lately, I've been hit with such waves of apathy concerning my own well-being, the outcome of my grades, job searching, and even my own desire to be faithful to Christ.
I know what's right and wrong in life, but how do I overcome sweeping apathy in my life?
Thanks for all you do.
Listen, your problem is not apathy.
Your problem is something else that you're not facing that's causing the apathy.
I mean, apathy is not a thing.
You know, it's a symptom.
And so it's like depression.
It probably is depression.
So something is bothering you that you haven't faced.
And I can't tell you what it is.
You probably already know.
You're probably already telling yourself it's not that as I'm speaking, but it's that.
That's what it is.
It's something that is bugging you that you don't want to face because you're angry about it, because it threatens you, because it maybe undermines your relationship with somebody that you want to keep intact.
But that apathy is a symptom and you need to confront the underlying cause.
It's kind of like saying, how can I overcome my depression?
You can't.
You got to overcome the thing that's causing the depression, the thing that's depressing you.
When you suddenly lose interest in the work you do, and that's happened to me.
I mean, you know, it happens to everybody around 45 or so.
You have this moment when you think, what was I doing again?
You know, I can't remember.
You have to pause, step back, say, okay, you know, I don't care about these things.
Why not?
What's happening?
What's bothering me?
What's eating at me?
So I would just say, look inside yourself, get help if you need it.
Get help to look inside yourself and find out what that thing is that's caught up with you.
You've suppressed it up till now, but now it's caught up with you and it's causing you to be depressed, basically.
All right.
Good answer.
Wouldn't even have thought of that, but you know, he's wise people.
I've been around for a long time.
Joel's question is, hello, Mr. Clavin.
I'm 26 and not so recently, I ended a two-year relationship with my first girlfriend.
What was about 16?
I'm sorry, that was about 16 months ago, and I'm still having a lot of difficulty letting go.
She was a lovely person in most ways, but we had different values.
Her ideology was atheist and liberal, bordering on leftist.
But that being said, we could still have cordial discussions about it, and her behavior was more consistent with conservative values.
If not for the fact that I want my children to be Jewish, I probably could have seen myself marrying her.
I've always had difficulty moving on from things, but this in particular is having a very negative effect on my life.
I'm growing more and more resentful towards my ex and frequently get bouts of anger and depression.
I don't drink because I know I have an addictive personality and I'm seeing a psychiatrist and taking a low dose of antidepressants, but it seems to be treating the symptoms rather than the issue.
Kind of piggybacks on this last question.
Do you have any advice on how to move on?
Sincerely, stuck in the past.
Yeah, you know, it's going to take discipline.
And this is the thing.
You know, sometimes when I hear questions like this, I always feel that the second part of the question has been left off.
It's like, how can I move on without doing anything?
How can I move on psychologically?
We all want the easy way out.
Right, we all do.
You know, how can I move on psychologically without moving on physically, you know?
And I think the thing is, you've got to now focus on other things.
And even if they're made-up things, you got to do it.
More important than any antidepressants you're taking, get some exercise, go out and work out, do it every day, force yourself to do it, do it a little more each day.
Take up things that put you in contact with other people.
You know, when I suffered in college, I suffered a terrible, terrible bout of depression.
I don't like to join things.
I don't like to go out and do activities.
I joined things.
I went out and I took up activities because those are the ways you get out of that depression.
You get free.
I don't want to tell anybody to go off his meds because I'm not a doctor and nobody should listen to me about that.
But I feel that they're prescribed too often when there are other causes available.
Like in other words, people come and say, like, oh, my girlfriend left me or I broke up with my girlfriend.
I'm depressed.
And they prescribe an antidepressant.
And you say, well, why?
You're not depressed because of some chemical thing.
You're depressed because you broke up with your girlfriend.
You can't move on.
So you move on by moving on.
You move on by getting the discipline, saying, every day I'm going to do this thing and I'm going to do this thing and these.
And that's going to get me exercise and cheer me up.
That's going to get me out with people and I'm going to meet new people and have new interests.
It's going to take me out of myself.
I'm going to go to church and church has volunteer work.
I'm going to do that volunteer work.
Do those things.
You've got to have the discipline and the strength to break through.
And I know it's kind of a catch-22 because the depression saps you of your strength.
You've got to fight back.
That's one of the reasons, again, don't go off your meds on my say-so, but that's one of the reasons I worry about those meds because I think like, do it yourself, you know, beat it, and then you'll know you're bigger than it is.
And that's what I ultimately did.
I exercised, I joined things, I got better, and ultimately I needed help for my overarching problems, but at least I beat that period of depression and went on into a new part of life.
All right.
Acquiring Wisdom Through Service00:11:25
Jose wants to know the best book to learn the differences between fascism, socialism, and communism.
Well, that's kind of an interesting, I mean, there's all kinds of books.
You know, that almost sounds like you want a handbook of some kind.
Does it even exist?
Yes, I don't even know.
You know, like, I'm sure any book of political philosophy that's written by a conservative or at least a patriot will help you with that.
but the book that i really think you should look at is witness um it is it is just a um have you read witness Oh, you got to read it.
It's a life-changing book about a guy who became a communist spy and then gave it up and turned over states' evidence and brought out an even higher communist spy.
And it's one of the turning points in communism in America.
And it really describes what's wrong with the philosophy, why it draws people in.
It's a life-changing book.
It's called Witness.
And it's just absolutely terrific.
Whitaker Chambers, for a minute, I couldn't remember the name of the guy.
Whitaker Chambers, he exposed Alger Hiss.
And just like today, just like today, the mainstream media and the elites loved Hiss.
He was an elite.
He was in the State Department.
They loved him.
And they defended him.
And they never forgave Whitaker Chambers or the lawyer who supported him, Richard Nixon.
They never forgave him for bringing the man down because Hiss was guilty, guilty, guilty.
And they said he wasn't.
And Whitaker Chambers, this kind of sloppy guy, brought him down.
And Chambers' book is just a landmark in American history and American literature.
And it will help you see a lot about communism.
For Nazism, of course, you want to read The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich.
But still, Witness is just a great book.
All right, good to know.
Dwight wants to know, how does he best interact with Christian brothers and sisters who are embracing the white guilt and other SJW principles within their churches and private lives?
It seems like they embrace their feelings more than their truth.
Well, what I would say is your assignment is not to convert them to your way of thinking.
That's not what you're there to do.
If you look at yourself as some instrument of change, you can't really reach them.
Your job is to share with them in the body of Christ.
That's your only job.
And if you do that, and if you speak the truth as you see it, right?
If you speak the truth as you see it and you live the truth as you see it and you're not afraid, but you're polite and you're kind and you're loving and you love them in the body of Christ, that's the best you're going to do.
You may not change their minds, but you might.
And it's one thing that really is helpful to people is everything, the one thing the left knows, and I was on the left and I know this, they don't always know what they know, what they think they know, but they all know that we're evil.
And if they can see that you're not evil, that you are their brother in Christ or sister in Christ.
It starts to crack the dam a little bit.
It cracks the dam a little bit.
That's what I was talking about with Reagan.
Once I thought like, huh, the people who supported them may be wrong, but they're not evil.
So what are they saying?
Why did my father think they were Nazis when they're obviously not?
You know, let me take another look at that.
And if you can represent that to people in your church, if you can represent that to people in your religion, that to me is probably the most important thing you can do.
And so don't think of yourself as, I got to change their mind, because you're not going to change a lot of their minds.
But just represent and make sure you're honest about what you think and make sure you're polite and loving in the way you describe it.
And they'll start to think, you know, I don't agree with him, but he's not as bad a guy as I thought he was.
My husband and I love to use the word fellowship and that sometimes the fellowship and the relationship, you can plant seeds and things can happen and change.
I agree.
So I'm just, you know, I'm not as old and wise as you are, but you'll never be asleep.
I think I'm older than some of our viewers.
You'll never be as old as I am.
So folks, just remember that this is a very special episode of the conversation because I'm not going to yell at you that only Daily Wire subscribers get to ask the questions.
Although you should be a Daily Wire subscriber because then you get to ask the questions tonight on our very special, special Mueller Report edition of Backstage.
By that time, I'm just going to be holding up signs.
You're just going to write out the best.
I disagree, Ben.
I mean, we're running straight from this special episode of the conversation right on over to that episode of Backstage.
So stay tuned for that.
But all you have to do, you get Drew's book.
He will sign it for you and answer your questions if you buy a book that you want signed over at premierecollectibles.com slash another kingdom.
So hurry, go get your copy over there.
We've got a few minutes left for questions to come in.
But don't worry, even if your question doesn't get asked by Moi to Drew, he's still going to sign this whole stack of books and all the other orders that come in for these signed books.
I will.
So you'll be able to rest your throat tomorrow, but your hands are going to be tired.
Just letting you know.
I hope you don't get arthritis.
All right.
Stephen says, in your opinion, what is the meaning and significance of Jesus' cry, why have you forsaken me at the crucifixion?
Oh, boy.
Good Easter weekend question.
It is a great Easter weekend question.
Here's my take on it, okay?
I've heard people say, you know, it's part of us, it's one of the Psalms, and it ends on a note of hope.
And I've heard people say that that was what Jesus intended.
I don't actually believe that.
I believe you have to understand that God doesn't live in time.
He lives outside of time.
So everything that has happened or will happen is all one to him, right?
But there's only one thing that an all-knowing God can't know, and that is what it's like to not know.
And when I read the Gospels, what I read is God learning what it means to be a poor human being who doesn't know that we can live forever, who doesn't know that the spiritual world is more important than the physical world, who worries.
Remember, Jesus is always saying, don't worry, don't worry.
And you think like, don't worry.
You know, what do you mean, don't worry?
Have you seen what's going on here?
You know, of course you worry.
And in that moment, I think there is a moment in the Gospels when Jesus understands he's going to have to die in order to know us, in order to redeem us, in order to understand us.
And that's the moment when God understands death.
And I think that on the cross, Jesus understands the full terror and tragedy of being a human being.
And in doing that, he brings us to God and says, look, this is who they are.
This is what they see.
And of course, there's no point when God doesn't know that because he's all time, he's above time.
But still, that is the moment in time when he understands that he's made creatures who die.
And when you die, it's very hard to have faith.
You know, Jesus says these things that don't make sense.
When Peter starts to sink beneath the waves, he says, oh, ye of little faith.
And you think, really?
Like, how much faith do you have to have to walk on water?
He step on water.
That's more than I've ever done, you know.
And I think it takes time for God to understand the full tragedy and horror of being a human being and to forgive us, to forgive us in the knowledge of that.
And I think it's a beautiful and tragic moment.
And I don't like to undercut it by saying there's hope because I think in that moment there is no hope.
It's only at Easter that the hope comes.
And we should remember in our moments of having no hope that Easter comes.
It really does.
But it's a terrible, I know what it feels like to despair.
And in that despair, that's what you have to remember.
That despair is really despair.
It really is as dark as it seems.
It really is as deep as it seems.
And it's not beyond God.
God has Easter in his pocket, and he's coming for you.
And I think that that's what it means.
Wow.
I've never heard that before, but I like it.
All right.
All right.
Emmett says that his question is, what is wisdom?
How is it different from knowledge?
And how can a young person like me acquire wisdom earlier?
I've heard it's just a matter of experience, but I know plenty of old people who are entirely without wisdom, so there must be more to it.
Yes, of course.
I mean, first of all, you know, there's no fool like an old fool.
That's why, because you've had the time to learn, but you haven't.
You know, the best way, I think, to acquire wisdom faster is the arts, is art.
Because you know how on towels they have those little nubs, and the nubs give the towel more space?
This is why they have those nubs, because it soaks up more water, has more area.
Art is like that.
It gives you little nubs of experience that you couldn't have.
You don't have time to have on your own.
It takes, what, a week, say, to read a book, and you've lived an entire life that you wouldn't be able to live in a lifetime.
So I think that's a wonderful way.
But the most important thing is to, I mean, it's in the Bible.
Judge not lest you be judged.
When you look at people, try to see not what's wrong with them and not why you're better than they are and not why they're lesser than you are and you're cooler or whatever.
Try to see how they're with you in their pain and their suffering and in their confusion and in all the things that we experience in life.
When you don't go right to the judgment place, you acquire a little bit of that person's spirit for your own.
And it really does start to make you wiser.
The people I know who are old and are not wise, one of the things I notice about them is they've never changed their opinions ever.
They're like a little train on a circular track.
Sometimes they'll say something different, but they always come back to the same station again and again and again.
And they know what they know and they never change.
You see that with Barack Obama.
I used to watch it, look at him and think that's one of the least wise people I've ever seen.
Because one of the things, and look, I know every, I've lived so long, I know everything.
I make mistakes, and when I make mistakes, you have two choices.
Either say, ah, I made a mistake.
What do I know now that I didn't know then?
Or you say, no, no, that wasn't a mistake.
I was right.
Everybody else was wrong.
And that's what a lot of people do.
And that's how you cease to acquire wisdom.
That's how you keep from acquiring wisdom.
So an open mind, you know, so much of this is in the Gospels.
I mean, so much of the Gospels, it sounds like a command is really just good advice.
You know, love your neighbor, love your enemy.
When you love your enemy, suddenly you realize, ah, you know, I see kind of where he's coming from.
That makes you wise.
And so, you know, judge not, love your enemy.
Those are great ways to wisdom.
But also, you know, like I said, the arts and coming to the arts and coming to the great works gives you lives.
You just don't have time to live.
And a lot of what I know comes from reading Shakespeare, reading Aristotle, reading Homer, and then looking at life through their eyes.
And it gives me like other beings inside me that I can turn to for advice.
Interesting.
All right, guys, we're kind of in the final countdown.
So you got to head over to premiercollectibles.com slash another kingdom.
If you want one of these awesome books, sign.
And I mean, can we show people the inside?
Yes.
First of all, this cover is so great.
And I love that it has book one because it is a trilogy.
What a great cover.
This is where Drew is signing your special autographed books.
How many books have you autographed in your lifetime?
Oh, gosh, I don't know.
I once signed so many in a single day that I forgot how to write my name.
And I didn't realize this, but you actually dedicated it to the God King in his better half.
I did.
He's much better.
I mean, he's incredibly better.
Yeah, let's be honest.
Well, he's almost better, two-thirds of it.
And you call them friends from both kingdoms.
That's so sweet.
You quote C.S. Lewis.
I do.
Which is beautiful.
But I'm obsessed with this map.
It's a great map.
It's a really great map.
It's so cool, and it explains the other kingdom.
It's a great thing because it's not just a book.
It's a beautiful book.
It's a nice thing to have in yourself.
Yes.
And being spiritually attacked, by the way.
Artists Returning to Play00:14:51
And we're under spiritual attack.
Save us, please.
Please.
So make your double.
Buy my book and beat the devil in it.
All right.
Brandon says, Dear Supreme Lord Clavin, do you believe that there was a specific point in time when the leftists in Hollywood made a conscious decision to no longer make art for the purpose of entertainment and instead to push pure leftism on America?
If so, what film, TV show, or other pieces of art do you think demonstrates that?
No, it wasn't a specific moment in time.
It was a progression from the studio system when the businessmen were in charge, people who weren't always nice people, but were people who were true patriots and true businessmen.
And they told the artists what films to make.
And that's why the artists couldn't go out and push leftism because the people didn't want it.
In the 60s, not only did the studio system fall apart, putting the inmates in charge of the asylum so that the actors became the powerful people and the businessmen were kind of sidelined, but of course the culture fell apart.
So the leftism entered that way and all the artists were pushing this new leftism, these new ideas that were coming in.
It was really a bad moment for our culture and for America, a revolution that failed and yet nobody wants to let it go.
And so that's what happened.
It was over that time that the principles of business for technical reasons as well, the principles of business left Hollywood and the principles of leftism entered in.
And it really is a shame because the great movies, it's not that they weren't liberal in the best sense of the word, but they loved the country and they were liberal in the sense of let's include everybody, which if that's what liberalism is, I'm a liberal.
You know, yes, let's include everybody in this fabulous country.
But in order to be part of the fabulous country, you have to believe in the ideals of the fabulous country.
And the businessmen who started Hollywood did believe in them.
The artists who are working there now, many of them don't, and many of them are ignorant of what they are.
And that's a real shame.
So I think kind of a funny example of how Hollywood doesn't get that conservatives watch their things is HBO being really perturbed at Donald Trump for using a couple of, creating a couple of Game of Thrones memes.
And it just dawned on me like, I mean, there's trademark violations and I want artists' work to be protected and all this stuff, right?
But it's like, out of all of the memes out there, why do they just go after the President Trump?
And do they not realize that Trump voters watch their shows?
I know.
And their movies.
Their plays and their music and their fashion.
They hate us.
And we do keep coming back because they're talented and we want their stories.
But it's ridiculous for them to despise their own audience.
And it's really shameful to despise your audience.
I mean, listen, I'm happy if leftists read my books.
I'm not writing books for right-wingers.
I'm writing books for people, you know, and I think to despise your audience is a terrible thing.
It's a terrible way to live, too.
Yeah.
How enjoyful.
All right, Robert says, do you prefer cats or dogs?
I got to say that.
That's a good question.
Do you have any pets?
I had a dog.
My dog died a couple years ago.
And, you know, we don't really want to get a new one because we want to be free to travel and everything like that.
I love dogs.
I had cats for years.
Anyway, I liked them.
I mean, I'm not saying anything against cat people.
I had cats for years, and I never really quite loved them.
I liked them.
They were fine.
I had a cat.
I had a cat who used to sit and watch me write back in the day before computers when I'd write with a pen.
And she would sit and watch me for, I worked for four hours every day.
And on the fourth hour, she would just sit there, watch me.
On the fourth hour, she'd just take my pen away.
It's like she was your little timer.
Yeah, it was really, it was really nice.
So I like that cat very much.
But dogs, God should have stopped with dogs.
Dogs are like the gospel alive.
All they want to do is love you.
They give you love to you no matter what.
When you're down, they give you love.
They're happy.
They're happy for you.
They're perfect animals.
And if they could play the piano, they'd be perfect.
All right.
If you play the piano, they'd be perfect.
And knock the pen out of your hand when the time is up.
Saying, go get a drink and take a break, Drew.
All right.
Leah says, Dear Andrew, do you read science fiction?
And if so, do you have any books or author recommendations?
You know, it's funny.
All my life, I thought I didn't like science fiction, and I thought I'd never read it.
So finally, I thought, well, I ought to read some science fiction.
You realize you'd read a whole bunch and you never realized it.
I read it all.
Yeah, I'd read a lot.
You know, I really, the thing I don't like about science fiction is they don't do characters well.
They do big ideas.
So you read Philip K. Dick, who's a very, very interesting writer, but his characters aren't really interesting.
But I do like his short stories.
I do like Do Android's Dream of Electric Sleep, which became Blade Runner.
And a lot of his stories are just really, really interesting.
I like Ray Bradbury when he's good, especially his short stories.
I think short stories are a really good venue for this.
And I like, you know, I'm not a big fan.
I love the movies of Lord of the Rings, but I found the books a little tiring.
But I love The Hobbit.
I thought The Hobbit was great.
Really?
I don't know if that counts as fantasy.
I mean, so.
I think it's fantasy, but not sci-fi.
And there's another book that is everything I dislike.
It's all ideas and no characters.
But the ideas are so interesting that it really grabbed me.
And that's Childhood's End.
And I can't, the name of the author goes out of my head, but Childhood's End is, I saw the TV movie on Sci-Fi channel and read the book.
And I think that's a really, really fascinating book.
Okay.
Well, I mean, a good thing we have Google and Amazon.
Yes, I'm sure it's where people could buy your book on Amazon.
Arthur C. Clarke, I think.
All right.
They could buy it on Amazon, but why would they when they can get a signed copy over at premierecollectibles.com/slash another kingdoms?
Yes.
We have 10 minutes left.
Let's try to roll through as many questions and signed copies as we can.
Samuel asks, what are some of the challenges you've encountered in writing screenplays compared to novels?
Well, that's a really good question.
I mean, screenplays are almost all a structure.
It's like building the framework of a house instead of building the house itself.
And so you've got a couple of problems.
One is very little of what you write is going to be on the screen.
So everything has to be incredibly condensed.
You can't write long conversations unless you're writing that kind of boring movie.
And I write action, you know, genre story.
So you just have to be incredibly tight, incredibly condensed all the time.
And the other thing is, and this is a shame, because movie stars are so powerful, the things they won't play.
They won't play certain kinds of flaws.
They won't play certain kinds of weaknesses.
And sometimes characters don't make sense because they won't bring that weakness to the screen because a movie star has to protect his name and his image.
And so there's a little bit of dishonesty in writing screenplays, which is why I've never loved them the way I love writing books, because I'll make my characters really flawed.
I'll give my characters true difficult flaws that human beings have.
Not just, you know, the one they all love to play is alcoholism.
I drink too much, you know, because that's cool.
That's like manly and hip.
But they don't want to play like, I'm a sexual deviant.
They don't want to play that.
You know, they don't want to play like sometimes.
Sometimes I'm cowardly.
Sometimes I am not a good dad.
They don't want to play that stuff.
And so that's a big problem because you want to appeal to a star to get your film made.
But stars, in order to protect their image, tend to be less honest than a character in a book.
So that's why I love books.
But screenplays are fun.
And collaboration is fun.
All right.
So Stephen says, have you read Philip Kerr's Bernie Gunter series?
If so, what did you think of it?
You know, it's funny.
I knew Philip before he died.
I knew him in England, and I've never read one of his books.
And I'm embarrassed by that.
I hear he's really good, really interesting.
And he died very young, tragically.
But I just haven't written, so I can't talk about him.
But because he died, he got a lot of his last book just came out posthumously, and it's gotten a lot of play.
And I was reading it and thought, wow, that really sounds interesting.
I'm sorry I haven't caught up with him.
So I will.
All right.
Justin says, Sage of the multiverse, I often hear Christians after achieving some great event or moment in their lives say something like, God did this.
I couldn't have done this without God.
I know the argument goes something like, God gave me the ability to perform or God is responsible for my success somehow.
I think we can agree that even if you have God-given talent, you still have to work to achieve success.
So my question is, if giving the credit to God in these situations is an act of humility or not?
I think it's an act of honesty.
I mean, you know, God is not just the creator of life.
He's the sustainer of life.
If you pull God out of the equation, everything just starts to decay.
So all things decay, and we're mortal.
Matter is the language of the spirit.
Matter is the way the spirit speaks and matter dissolves and decays.
But it's infused with life.
And as long as it's infused with life, it's infused with God's spirit.
And if you've ever succeeded at anything, if you've ever achieved anything, you know how little you had to do with it.
Because we talked before about some books I've wrote that I think are really great, like Werewolf Cop, that didn't make it.
You know, whenever something good happens, you know that God had a hand in it.
He said, you know, no, no, this is a time when this is going to go well.
So I just think it's honesty.
And I think that, you know, people who are honest, when they achieve success, they don't become, a lot of people become egotistical, especially for the first year.
But after that year, if you don't stop back and say, you know what, so much of this was luck.
So many people do good work that doesn't get recognized.
Many great, great artists have died without selling a single book or a single painting.
The good things that happen to you in your life from writing a good book to having that good book recognized all have to do with God.
Just about everything has to do with God.
So saying thank you, acknowledging your debt, I think is just a way to remember that we're hostages to the will of the will of God.
And I think that when we, there's an old expression, I think the Greeks, it comes from the Greeks, that a hero is led by fate.
Everyone else is dragged by it.
And I think that that works with God too.
Sometimes a hero is led by God and everybody else is dragged by it.
The only thing is that God will let you walk away.
He will let you say no.
And it's only when you agree to God's life that you get the life God meant for you.
And so I think that thanking God is just realism.
And it doesn't have to be, you might not be humble.
It might not be humble.
It's just honesty.
All right.
Amy says, Dear Andrew, can you offer any guidance for someone who is new to Christianity and reading the Bible for the first time?
Yeah, sure.
I mean, you know, one thing is I love the King James edition.
I love the King James.
I love the language of it.
I love the way it has spoken through history.
But you want to read a Bible that you can understand.
You know, you want to read a Bible that has simple language in it that makes sense to you so you get the story.
There's even an old book by Pearl S. Buck, a very fine writer, who wrote a book called The Story Bible, where she just rewrites the stories and tells you the stories of the Bible.
So don't be afraid.
Don't be afraid to find the Bible that you understand, that speaks to you.
Don't be afraid to read commentary that tells you what it means.
A lot of commentary is a little too pushy for me.
It tells me what I should think.
But commentary, you know, my beloved son Spencer has a thing called the Isaiah Project, which you can find at his website, Rejoice-Evermore.
And he explains, he has a thing where you pass the cursor over a word, and it tells you what Isaiah is talking about when he talks about the city of Tyre, or it tells you what it means.
And so don't be afraid to look for commentary like that that will help you to understand the Bible, what the people in the moment were talking about.
What did Jesus mean when he said such and such?
What would that have meant to the people listening to him?
I think that just, that doesn't make you shallow.
It actually helps you to get more into the depth of the Bible.
And also don't forget to pray for understanding and for guidance and just for a relationship with God that the Bible will speak into.
I got to say, had this been a boy and not another girl, although she hasn't identified yet.
So I'm so heterogeneous.
She gives a choice, I know.
Spencer was on my short list.
It's a good name.
Because we have lots of S names in our family, so I don't want to keep that up.
All right.
James says, were there any books or authors that helped to inspire you when you were writing Another Kingdom?
Great, great question.
I read, I went back, when I was a kid, I discovered the King Arthur stories.
And so I went back and read not just King Arthur, but many of the great chivalric poems, like The Fall of Jerusalem and Orlando Furioso, some of which I had read, some of which I hadn't.
I went back and reread, as I told you, Don Quixote, because I wanted to read a modernist version of the night stories and how they were silly and how they weren't silly, what it meant to believe in chivalry in a world that doesn't have much chivalry in it.
I also went back to some of my favorite old detective stories because it's not just a fantasy story.
It's also a very real thriller.
And so I started to reread and read new thrillers to kind of repolish my skills as a suspense writer.
And I also went back and read some of the religious stories that worked into the fantasy world, like C.S. Lewis and Tolkien.
And so I read a lot, a lot of stuff, just to remind myself.
Just to write this little old book.
Just to write this little old book, yeah.
And I'm just now finishing the course of books that I wanted to read for the whole trilogy and writing the last book in the trilogy.
Okay.
And when do you think that you'll be like last period, last page?
I hope to get it done by the end of the summer.
Okay.
Yeah.
So we can record it in the fall.
That'll be really exciting.
Sarah says, hi, Drew.
Can you name the last book that brought you to tears of sadness, not tears of joy?
She's very specific here.
Love a good question from a good gal.
Like we're very detailed, especially about emotional aspects.
She says, what about the last book that caused you to laugh until you cried?
You know, I'm not going to tell you the last book because I just can't remember things like that.
Let me tell you the books that made me cry and laugh the most.
A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway quite literally broke my heart.
I have had my heart broken in real life.
That's what it felt like when I read A Farewell to Arms.
I was so in love.
I don't want to give anything away, but I was just loved the story.
I believe that that was the late Senator John McCain's favorite book.
Wasn't it really?
A wonderful, wonderful book.
And the books that make me laugh more than anything are the Jeeves books by P.G. Woodhouse.
A Farewell to Arms00:02:31
There's, I think, like seven of them.
When I read those books, and I read them in a period of struggle, so it was hard to make me laugh.
I would sit up at night and read them, and I laughed so hard that one day my wife woke up and hit me with a pillow to get me to shut up because I was waking her up because I was just in stitches.
I couldn't stop laughing.
If you haven't read the Jeeves books, one of the ways I know if I'm going to like somebody, if I walk into his house or her house and there's Jeeves on the bookshelf, I know that we have something in common.
Same sense of humor.
Same sense of humor.
That PG Woodhouse, it was just the funniest books I've ever read.
All right, last question comes from Tina.
She wants to know: how do you stay so handsome?
It's a great question, Tina.
I know everybody asked me that.
You know, I do work out constantly, and it does help me feel good, you know?
Yeah.
And I think that's one thing.
And of course, you know, I mean, you know, Alicia, how crazy I am about my wife.
And I think when you're crazy about your wife, it keeps you young.
And you got to look good for her.
And you got to look good for her.
So, you know, that's how I stay beautiful.
And I got to say, I think the beard helps.
Everyone knows I'm being beard.
You love the beard.
My husband is like a real-life Viking, so I'm a fan of the beard.
I'm working overtime to keep it soft for my wife because she complains about it.
We're going to run over to do Backstage.
So, and you're going to maybe spend Easter weekend signing some more books.
We're going to sign some more books.
So if you want to get a signed copy of Drew's book, new book, Another Kingdom, it's the first in the trilogy.
Season one, Another Kingdom with you and Michael is available at Daily Wire.
I don't think season one is anymore, but season two it is.
Oh, it is?
Oh.
You see, this is season one.
Oh, okay.
Good to know.
Yeah.
So go over to premiercollectibles.com/slash Another Kingdom to get a signed copy of Another Kingdom signed by our very own Andrew Clavin, who, by the way, your signature or your autograph was so consistent.
You had a really cool like A and Uncook K on it.
You had a lot of practice.
I need to practice my signature because it's not as cool as yours and Ben's.
But go over to premierecollectibles.com/slash Another Kingdom.
Don't forget, tune into Backstage because we're going to run over there right now.
The guys are going to be all Mueller, all fake news breakdown, all mainstream media freakouts, all celebrity responses.
There's tons.
There's just a little bit to talk about tonight.
So be sure to tune in for that.
And tune in next month if you absolutely have to.
I mean, I'll be here, but also I'll be asking Michael Knowles the questions.
We're going to set up a special thing where you can actually squirt him through the camera with your super squirt.
Lavender oil and something else.
I don't know what it was.
Don't be ruining lavender for me, you crazy college leftists.