From war and law to driving the Bourne franchise: how Joshua Hood is living his dream
Joshua Hood is a decorated combat veteran and a former SWAT operative — but he always secretly wanted to make thrillers. Now he is driving the blockbuster Bourne franchise.
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THE quiet man with the hidden past is a standard plot device in spy thrillers but in the case of Joshua Hood, it’s not just referring to his characters.
The softly-spoken author of The Treadstone Resurrection — the start of a new series set in the world of Robert Ludlum and Matt Damon’s Jason Bourne — served in America’s elite 82nd Airborne Division in both Iraq and Afghanistan and then spent eight years as a sniper in a SWAT team.
However, Hood always wanted to be a writer.
“Since I was about eight years old I was writing short stories,” he says.
“But my mom, who was wonderfully supportive, told me that the only ones who make money from writing are those that write ransom notes!”
So instead of becoming a writer, he joined the army when he finished college. Being college-educated, it meant he didn’t start as a humble private but went in as an E4, or corporal, which meant he had jumped about two years in the pecking order.
“My first team leader, he was not amused,” Hood says. His ambition to be a writer also didn’t impress the veteran, who mocked Hood as “Bill Shakespeare”.
So Hood put aside those thoughts as he served, getting decorated for bravery in Afghanistan.
“My primary concern was not getting blown up!” he says. “That and coming home.”
On his return he used those skills to lead a SWAT (special weapons and tactics) law enforcement team in Memphis.
“I have a skillset that not many people have,” he says simply. “I saw there was a lot of crime and other things and I believed I could do something for my community.
“It wasn’t totally altruistic. I needed something that you couldn’t find working in a cubicle.
“I was a hammer and needed a nail.”
He says those years were more about thought than action. “There is a saying here that SWAT shows up to take out the trash,” he says. “That’s not always the case. There is a level of precision, you are accountable for every bullet. It’s different to when you are in a big firefight, calling in airplanes to drop bombs!”
But all that changed in an instant.
“When you are running around, you don’t take a whole lot of time to reflect. It wasn’t until my son was born that it hit me. At that moment something changed in me and I couldn’t do that job any more.”
He started working for American Warrior Initiative, a charitable group that helps veterans with, among other things, post-traumatic stress disorder.
“We’re tough guys and we don’t open up about our struggles coming back,” he says.
“It was a wonderful platform to say, ‘I can admit it and there’s nothing shameful about it’.”
The he received a phone call from his old team leader, a man who had become a friend during their years in combat, who told Hood he had finished a creative writing course and written a book.
“I got off the phone, went upstairs and started my first book,” Hood says.
It must have seemed like fate. He had 81 rejections and thought about giving up but he had served in the 82nd Airborne so sent out his book for the 82nd time — and was accepted.
“You can’t make this stuff up!” he says. “82 is my number, unless it comes to changing diapers 82 times …”
He wrote two books about a veteran called Mason Kane, which he says helped him deal with his PTSD.
“It was very cathartic,” he says. “When I write about the smells, I’m kind of back there. I was able to get it all out there in front of the world.”
Then came the chance to write a series for the Robert Ludlum estate.
“I thought someone was pulling a gag,” Hood says.
Success brought a “moment of triumph” and then a feeling of “What did I just get into?” he says.
“The way I describe is he let me borrow his Bentley and wants me to drive it around. I don’t want to bring it back nicked or scratched but with a full tank of gas and the windscreen washed.”
The Treadstone Resurrection sees a former Treadstone operative — a man like Jason Bourne, of the blockbuster book and movie franchise — trying to live a quiet life, only to be dragged into a conspiracy involving rogue CIA agents, South American dictators and dark political forces in Washington.
The writing is very reminiscent of Australian best-selling writer Matthew Reilly but obviously the details about weapons and combat come with the expertise of Hood’s background. As does the hero Adam Hayes’s struggles with PTSD.
“I have a responsibility as an author in this genre not to glorify things,” Hood says, adding he didn’t want to write “gun porn”.
“I wanted to show what he had gone through and the after-effects, so it was also a cautionary tale.
“I didn’t want to write violence for violence’s sake.”
He is working on a second Treadstone Resurrection novel now and is also planning a series about his years in SWAT.
He says the secret is simple — hard work.
“Hard work beats skill every time. You have to be willing to out-work anyone you meet,” he says.
“I have a tattoo that says: ‘Rise and grind’ and that’s the mentality I’ve always had. I wasn’t born with an amazing gift but I’m willing to work and put in the hours. The only limit is you.”
The Treadstone Resurrection is out now through HarperCollins’ Head Of Zeus Publishing.
BOOK OF THE MONTH AND YOUR OWN HANGOUT
Thomas Cromwell used his own very special weapons and tactics to rise to the top through the power games and plotting of Henry VIII’s court. His story comes to a close in Hilary Mantel’s The Mirror And The Light, our Book of the Month, which you can get for 30 per cent discount at Booktopia with the code MIRROR10.
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Originally published as From war and law to driving the Bourne franchise: how Joshua Hood is living his dream
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