SIXTY SECONDS
THE NEWS ANCHOR AND JOURNALIST, 53, ON THE NEW COLD WAR, INSOMNIA AND BEING MISTAKEN FOR QUARTERBACK TOM BRADY
Thursday, June 4, 2020
Your new novel Double Agent is the follow-up to the bestselling Secret Service. Was the pressure on for the sequel?
I’ve never thought of writing a trilogy before. One of the things that first got me into reading was one of the old, great Cold War trilogies, Len Deighton’s Game, Set And Match. So I suppose, at the back of my mind, I kind of always wanted to do something similar to that. The moment I finished Secret Service, I loved being in that world and the characters so much that I almost immediately thought of another idea.
Are spy thrillers your favourite kind of novel?
Quite possibly. I love when you read a spy thriller and you think you know what’s happened and reached a conclusion but then in the sequel you are asked to question everything you . thought you knew. Line Of Duty does this particularly well. You watch the first series and think, yeah, that was clear, and then in series two they ask: are you sure about that?
You’ve mentioned that we’re heading towards another Cold War. Sounds ominous…
It occurred to me over a period of time that we were living through a new Cold War and, in fact, it was kind of greyer and more complex than the last. Social media have become the arteries of Western democracy and the Russians have done a very good job of polluting them and helping to turn ourselves against ourselves and to fuel dissent. I figured it would be pretty easy for them to corrupt someone and for that person to have a chance of high office. That’s not a new idea in literary fiction, it goes back to the time of The Manchurian Candidate, but it didn’t half seem a lot easier to achieve in the modern world.
Does this mean ITV knows about some secret Russian operatives?
Oh wow! I was very careful not to fall into the trap of a character being obviously based on anyone. You take inspiration from all kinds of things but I didn’t want to get into the position of someone saying that that’s so and so.
Just what is it about the Russians that makes them such good villains?
One of my favourite films was From Russia With Love and they are very satisfying villains. They really put their backs into it, I suppose. Putin is a pretty convincing, satisfying villain from a Western perspective. When you think about the expansion of the Russian influence in the past ten years alone… just look at what he did in Syria and in various other countries. He was brought up in the Cold War and I’m not sure he’s ever outgrown that mindset.
The Russians have done a very good job of polluting social media and fuelling dissent
Kate, your protagonist, suffers with insomnia, which is something you went through yourself. Was it difficult to revisit that?
Some of the feverish state of mind I had during writing Secret Service is clear in my writing. I had no idea really what was happening to me. I started writing Double Agent after I got better. I was writing consciously about insomnia with the insight that comes from having to spend an intense few months learning about yourself.
You’re best-known as a news anchor for ITV. Is there a big rivalry between you and the other major news channels?
A lot! When he wins the Super Bowl there’s literally no point in me going on Twitter – there’s probably a thousand messages. I think, God, how many Americans can’t spell? I occasionally answer them just because it amuses me. And the ball-tampering? Oh my God. I don’t know a lot about American Football but I know that deflating balls Channel 4’s Matt Frei. is a really big deal because I’ve had many thousands of insults about it. Whether he’s learnt about Brexit, I don’t know.
We all get along pretty well, actually. I’m far too old for rivalry and I’m quite some way off worrying about that. There’s a bit of corporate rivalry, maybe, but not much personal rivalry. In fact, Matt Frei from Channel 4 is godfather to my youngest son – he was Asia correspondent for the BBC when I was Asia correspondent for ITV, and we’ve been great mates ever since.
Is coronavirus the biggest story you’ve ever covered?
Yes, absolutely. This is happening in our home society, it is all around us, the level of threat is undeniable, the disease is unpredictable and we don’t know what’s going to happen to the economy. There isn’t much security at the moment and that’s very challenging for people. It’s an incredibly important story and you go to work every day really desperate to get it right.
You’re fairly active on social media. Just how often are you mistaken for American footballer Tom Brady? Could make for an interesting job swap…
Good luck to him is all I’ll say!
Tom Bradby’s new novel Double Agent (Transworld Digital) is available now