Speaker 1: Now here's a highlight from Coast to Coast AM on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: And welcome back to Coast to Coast George Nori with you.
Speaker 2: Jared Keen orned his PhD and creative writing at Florida
Speaker 2: State University. Doctor Keen is an assistant professor in the
Speaker 2: Department of English at the University of Nevada and Las Vegas,
Speaker 2: where he teaches American literature and graphic novel. He has
Speaker 2: written numerous other books and guides on various topics, including
Speaker 2: The Travel Guide, A Rock Band Biography, and edited short
Speaker 2: fiction anthologies including Las Vegas Noir and Dead Neon The
Speaker 2: Tales of Near Future Las Vegas. Jarrett, Welcome to the program.
Speaker 3: Thank you so wonderful to be here.
Speaker 2: How did you get involved in creative writing?
Speaker 3: Well, I just found myself drawn to the enterprise of
Speaker 3: creating inventive, imaginative stories. I grew up, you know, in
Speaker 3: the seventies and eighties, there wasn't a lot of stimulation.
Speaker 3: There wasn't a lot to go on except for you know,
Speaker 3: TV comics, and I just I don't know, I just
Speaker 3: I just took to it and I found a way
Speaker 3: to get a degree in writing. My dreams down on paper,
Speaker 3: on putting it in a word document and sharing it
Speaker 3: with others, with classmates, initially with my professors, but then
Speaker 3: I discovered that, you know, there was such a thing
Speaker 3: as the campus newspaper. I could write, you know, album reviews,
Speaker 3: I could write film reviews. I could do all kinds
Speaker 3: of things to make money with my writing. And so
Speaker 3: that put me on a what can I say, just
Speaker 3: a creative pass, and I'm very grateful for it.
Speaker 2: There is a phrase in writing called dystov pe pn Dystovian.
Speaker 2: What does that mean?
Speaker 3: It means well, according to my definition, it's you know, entropy,
Speaker 3: watching things fall apart and having fun with it. You know,
Speaker 3: entropy can be fun if if you let it, you know,
Speaker 3: guide your imagination. And I just find myself really drawn
Speaker 3: to these kinds of stories where civilization is either you know,
Speaker 3: destroyed or hanging by a thread, and you watch characters
Speaker 3: kind of deal and struggle through these imaginative scenarios. I
Speaker 3: love books like, for example, Stephen King's The Stand. I
Speaker 3: like watching the world collapse and then I love witnessing
Speaker 3: the characters struggle to piece it back together.
Speaker 2: Tell us about your latest book, Hammer of the dogs.
Speaker 3: Oh my goodness. It's an incredible story of teenagers in
Speaker 3: a ruined Las Vegas killing each other with drones by
Speaker 3: remote control. The valley is carved up by two warlords.
Speaker 3: One is housed in the basement of the Luxe or
Speaker 3: you know, the black pyramid. They're on the strip with
Speaker 3: the sky beam, that light that shoots up into the
Speaker 3: really the you know, the atmosphere. And then the other
Speaker 3: warlord has control of City Center, which is a posh resort,
Speaker 3: and so they're battling each other, and Lash finds herself
Speaker 3: engaged in a you know, a conflict she doesn't quite
Speaker 3: understand until she does, and then she finds a reason
Speaker 3: to put both of them in their place, so to speak.
Speaker 2: How realistic is it? What do you think?
Speaker 3: Well, all of the technology, all of the weapons that
Speaker 3: are depicted in the novel are taken from well, real life.
Speaker 3: For many years, I worked as a corporate communicator in
Speaker 3: the for the biggest resort company in the world, MGM Resorts,
Speaker 3: And I used my employee badge to you know, bust
Speaker 3: into these drone tech conventions at places like you know,
Speaker 3: Mandalay Bay, Caesar's Palace, and I was just awestruck and
Speaker 3: deeply disturbed by the technology that was available even just
Speaker 3: ten years ago. It's unbelievable. All the technology in the
Speaker 3: book is taken from the catalogs and brochures that I
Speaker 3: took from the drone tech conventions. Everything from the ornithopters
Speaker 3: or the bird UAVs, to the insect drones, to the
Speaker 3: snake bots to the sentient pistols. It's just amazing to
Speaker 3: see all these weapons developed. And what was particularly interesting
Speaker 3: is the way there is this I don't know how
Speaker 3: else to describe it, except it's like a vast and
Speaker 3: orchestrated effort involving the tech sector, the military, industrial conflict,
Speaker 3: higher education, foreign governments. They're all building up the drone industry.
Speaker 3: Surveillance and control are really what these drones offer. The
Speaker 3: ability to, I don't know, erase someone instantly with the
Speaker 3: push of a button. It's just too intoxicating to ignore.
Speaker 2: And the technology is going to get better and better
Speaker 2: and better, jured isn't it.
Speaker 3: Oh? Yes? And then with the advent of AI, the
Speaker 3: algorithms determining who lives or dies, it's it's just too
Speaker 3: almost too much to contemplate, But that's what lash the
Speaker 3: hero of Hammer of the Dogs is up against and
Speaker 3: that's why she makes a decision to embrace this these weapons,
Speaker 3: find a way to use them to fight back.
Speaker 2: Even though it's a novel. Even though it's a novel,
Speaker 2: how realistic do you think it might be?
Speaker 3: Well, you can see now. I'm sure you've read the
Speaker 3: stories of the drug cartels in Mexico using drones that
Speaker 3: they purchased off Amazon, and you know, improvising explosive devices
Speaker 3: and they're just basically bombing each other right now. This
Speaker 3: is something that unfortunately, I can see young people taking
Speaker 3: to it at some point, you know, finding a way
Speaker 3: to amplify the horror and the nightmare of the remote
Speaker 3: control killing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's uh, it's happening. Are you scared about this
Speaker 2: kind of technology? I mean, would would you hope through
Speaker 2: your book Hammer of the Gods, even though it's a novel,
Speaker 2: to convince people who goes, what can we do about it?
Speaker 3: Well, Lash offers an example, which is to not run
Speaker 3: from it, not be afraid of it, but to you know,
Speaker 3: take it on, to master it, to embrace it, to
Speaker 3: use it in a way that you know ultimately can
Speaker 3: defend us. Because if we try to take it out
Speaker 3: of our hands and allow the government to have a
Speaker 3: sole control over this technology. It's I don't imagine it
Speaker 3: will end well, but I know there are in fact,
Speaker 3: young people like Lash, the hero of my novel, The
Speaker 3: Warrior Hero, who will rise up and you know, like
Speaker 3: in the movie Terminator, they're going to uh, They're they're
Speaker 3: going to resist, and I could I can easily see
Speaker 3: that happening. So that inspires me, That keeps me sane.
Speaker 2: Absolutely. Now, did you have any inside information with the technology.
Speaker 2: How did you come up with these ideas?
Speaker 3: All of it, as I said, is pulled from these
Speaker 3: catalogs and brochures. But however, I will say this, I've
Speaker 3: had many drone pilots in my classes here at UNLV.
Speaker 3: I've taught them works like the Iliad and the Odyssey.
Speaker 3: I've taught them Shakespeare, and so they've told me a
Speaker 3: lot about what they deal with day in and out
Speaker 3: at places like Creech Air Force Base, where the drone
Speaker 3: war is waged on a daily, hourly basis here and
Speaker 3: just outside of Las Vegas.
Speaker 2: You know these drugs that you see, like you just
Speaker 2: mentioned on Amazon, they look like toys, but they're really
Speaker 2: pretty sophisticated, aren't they.
Speaker 3: Yes, And every year they become more sophisticated. In every
Speaker 3: day they find new ways, people find new ways to
Speaker 3: use them in lethal fashion. I mean, what's amazing, if
Speaker 3: you really think about it, is that, you know, the
Speaker 3: Right Brothers didn't really invent air travel. I mean, they
Speaker 3: invented death from above. It's really the most devastating military
Speaker 3: tactic of the twentieth century. You know, it's how World
Speaker 3: War two began and ended, you know, Harbor to Hiroshima.
Speaker 2: And for the military, it's safer to send a drone
Speaker 2: instead of a pilot, isn't it?
Speaker 3: Absolutely? And probably Uh, you know it's it's probably even
Speaker 3: more fail safe. It's it's a it's you know, more accurate.
Speaker 3: There's no emotional concerns. You know that the program, the algorithm,
Speaker 3: the you know, the computer will get it done.
Speaker 2: I don't want to give away too much of your book,
Speaker 2: but uh, it's kind of scary.
Speaker 3: It scared me writing this book. The only thing, like
Speaker 3: I said, that kept me grounded was the knowledge that
Speaker 3: I had a terrific uh warrior hero lash who you
Speaker 3: know it doesn't back down from a fight. Uh, even
Speaker 3: though even if she believes she's going to uh be
Speaker 3: snuffed in a you know, a conflict. She she she braves,
Speaker 3: she moves bravely forward. She's she takes on the bad
Speaker 3: guy and spills their blood in a way that you know,
Speaker 3: fans of Edgar Ice Burrows and Robert E. Howard's Conyan
Speaker 3: and the Barbarian, I mean Lash is a pulp hero
Speaker 3: in the old school style flash Gordon zorro Buck Rogers.
Speaker 3: I wanted to create a character that, you know, faced
Speaker 3: impossible odds yet finds a way to you know, finds
Speaker 3: a way to be victorious.
Speaker 2: Does she have superpowers?
Speaker 3: No, but she does in the end. In the end,
Speaker 3: Lash is revealed to have a certain trick that a
Speaker 3: certain surgeon installed in her brain. It's not I'm not
Speaker 3: going to reveal what it is, but it's something that
Speaker 3: helps turn the tide of battle in the penultimate chapter.
Speaker 2: If you have this turned into a movie, who would
Speaker 2: you want to play the part of Lash?
Speaker 3: I don't know. There's so many great actors. The one
Speaker 3: thing that really stands out at Lashes her physicality. So
Speaker 3: whoever the actor would be, whether it's the actor that's
Speaker 3: stars in Wednesday Adams for example, that actor would have
Speaker 3: to do some push ups and pull ups and basically,
Speaker 3: you know, get fit enough to be able to conduct
Speaker 3: a serious you know, drone war and ruined Las Vegas.
Speaker 2: Get him from the Wrestling Federation or something like.
Speaker 3: That, someone with serious upper body strengths.
Speaker 2: Let's just say absolutely. Now, have you ever played with
Speaker 2: a drone?
Speaker 3: Yes? I have? And the sound of a quad copter,
Speaker 3: you know, something you buy off of the Amazon website.
Speaker 3: It's very unnerving the way the noise of it is.
Speaker 3: I don't know, it's just upsetting it it it bothers me.
Speaker 3: But I have twayda rounds them and had fun with him.
Speaker 3: And of course I have two teenage sons who are
Speaker 3: They love having little drone battles in the in the
Speaker 3: backyard next to the pool, and so I've I've enjoyed
Speaker 3: fooling around with them. However, I can't, I can't get
Speaker 3: to uh. I don't want to go down that. Uh.
Speaker 3: I don't want it to become a serious hobby because otherwise, uh,
Speaker 3: I feel like I will be compromising not just the
Speaker 3: uh my love of the hero lash, but also you know,
Speaker 3: I do think that books like Hammer of the Dogs
Speaker 3: serve as a warning. You know, be careful with this technology.
Speaker 3: It's it's a Pandora's box. At once it's opened, you
Speaker 3: can't really close it.
Speaker 2: Can it ever get to the point where the drones
Speaker 2: fly out of control of the radio control that you're holding.
Speaker 2: It just goes too far and then you just lose it.
Speaker 3: Oh certainly. But you know what's scary with things like
Speaker 3: I almost said skynet, but you know, there are satellites
Speaker 3: now that allow a drone to basically, you know, you
Speaker 3: can be controlled wielded from you know, anywhere on Earth
Speaker 3: and reaching any destination. And that to me is you know,
Speaker 3: the kind of a nightmare. The starlink stuff is really
Speaker 3: frightening to examine.
Speaker 2: And I assume the military is using these extensively, aren't they.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, and they're using them in ways that we're
Speaker 3: not even aware of. You find out when you read
Speaker 3: stories just on you know, mainstream news stories. You find
Speaker 3: that drones are always surveying, always taking in information. Whenever
Speaker 3: there's a you know, a major event somewhere in the world,
Speaker 3: there's always like drone footage. It's scary to contemplate because
Speaker 3: it means you're being watched wherever you are you know,
Speaker 3: at any time of day or night, very unsettling, but
Speaker 3: of course that's sort of the fun of an adventure story.
Speaker 3: Like Hammer of the Dogs. I wanted to I wanted
Speaker 3: the reader to be frightened but also taken on a
Speaker 3: thrill ride, you know, roller coaster ride where you know
Speaker 3: that there's some bad technology afoot, but there's a hero
Speaker 3: there that's going to put it right.
Speaker 2: What is she? She's overlooking Las Vegas as well on
Speaker 2: the cover, isn't she.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, yeah, that's uh. The cover is of course
Speaker 3: done in that Frank Frazetta style, that's pulpe fantasy mode.
Speaker 3: And I wanted to kind of I wanted the book
Speaker 3: to be a throwback in many ways to the adventure
Speaker 3: fantasy stories that you know I enjoyed growing up in
Speaker 3: the eighties, with movies like Empire Strikes Back, Conan, The
Speaker 3: Barbarian Tron, all those great films that you know have
Speaker 3: stood the test of time and that people still love.
Speaker 3: An adoor today, you've.
Speaker 2: Got a human versus robot competition called the Magnus bout
Speaker 2: tell us about that.
Speaker 3: That's a nod to an old comic book I used
Speaker 3: to enjoy reading called Magnus robot fighter, and so the
Speaker 3: Magnus bouts. You know, you always have to have a
Speaker 3: kind of glad creator sequence in any great adventure film.
Speaker 3: We've We've seen it in everything from John Carter to
Speaker 3: well the movie Gladiator, Sparta Kiss, et cetera. So I
Speaker 3: just wanted to, you know, give a nod there to
Speaker 3: some of the great pulp adventures that came before Hammer
Speaker 3: of the Dogs, and so it needed a gladiator scene.
Speaker 3: And of course, when you have a technology wielded by kids,
Speaker 3: I think it's inevitable that young people will find themselves
Speaker 3: at odds, you know, physically confronting robots and fighting them
Speaker 3: in a you know, basically a deathmatch.
Speaker 2: What do you think of the possibility of that where
Speaker 2: artificial intelligence becomes so amazing they literally take over things.
Speaker 3: Yes, well, you know, growing up in the eighties there
Speaker 3: was a movie called Terminator that made a huge impression
Speaker 3: on me and a huge, you know, major impression on
Speaker 3: people of my generation. And so I don't know, I
Speaker 3: see us speak becoming more at odds with growing technology.
Speaker 3: Here at UNLV, of course, we're dealing as most universities are,
Speaker 3: with the chat GPT phenomenon. You know, computers a writing
Speaker 3: our students papers for them. It's a it can be
Speaker 3: a real problem. And uh there's also things like cyber
Speaker 3: hacking of every university suffers these uh suffers, this misfortune,
Speaker 3: and I think that, you know, it's going to become
Speaker 3: an increasing problem. If you've seen the recent headlines, you know,
Speaker 3: the MGM resorts Caesar's Palace have been hacked, and they actually, yeah,
Speaker 3: they actually Caesars Palace actually paid the hackers, you know,
Speaker 3: the ransom and the millions of tens of millions of
Speaker 3: dollars to uh to cease and assist the fiber attack. So,
Speaker 3: I don't know, I see it becoming increasingly problematic. AI
Speaker 3: will eventually, you know, be hacking on its own, and
Speaker 3: it's just it seems like a problem that's set the spiral.
Speaker 2: I was kind of foolish to pay the hackers. They'll
Speaker 2: just do it again.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't understand how that works. And you know,
Speaker 3: I'm told by it from the local papers here that
Speaker 3: it's a group of US and British hackers, but you know,
Speaker 3: I'm not sure how they know that. To me, it's
Speaker 3: something that can be anonymous and you have no idea
Speaker 3: where the attack is coming from. So I find that
Speaker 3: very that detail very interesting.
Speaker 2: What is vender reaction of your book from your students?
Speaker 3: Well, in many ways, I wrote it for them. I
Speaker 3: wanted to show them how to write a book. During
Speaker 3: the course of a fifteen week semester. Every week I'd
Speaker 3: bring in a new chapter, you know, two thousand to
Speaker 3: three thousand words and show them that the you know,
Speaker 3: the discipline and the momentum that you need in order
Speaker 3: to complete a novel. And I wrote it for them
Speaker 3: and in their honor. And what was really interesting is
Speaker 3: I inspired many of my students to embark on their
Speaker 3: own novel writing adventure. And so I've had at least
Speaker 3: four or five students at the time that I was
Speaker 3: working on Hammer of the Dogs who completed their own
Speaker 3: book and or you know, have published self published some
Speaker 3: of them, and others are circulating their manuscripts now in
Speaker 3: New York in the literary world, trying to get a contract.
Speaker 3: So I find that to be very satisfying. It's nice
Speaker 3: to be around young people because they're inspiring and they
Speaker 3: want to read fun dystopian adventures. And I admire that.
Speaker 2: How realistic do you think your book is? With what
Speaker 2: is happening in real life today.
Speaker 3: Well, young people are in fact each other remotely in
Speaker 3: places like Ukraine, and I find that to be very sad.
Speaker 3: And you know, I can easily see that spreading across
Speaker 3: the world. And so that's sort of the bitter sweet,
Speaker 3: the tragic aspect of it. What's bittersweet is that I
Speaker 3: know that, you know, young people will find a way
Speaker 3: to rebel, to resist, and you know, escape this nightmare.
Speaker 3: They just have to, like I say, embrace the technology
Speaker 3: and not run from it, because if you run from it,
Speaker 3: you'll just be on the run forever. I take the
Speaker 3: lesson of Terminator the movie very seriously. You know, you
Speaker 3: have to rise up against the machines at some point.
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