Dave Cullen

Prestigious journalist & author of both New York Times bestsellers "Columbine" and "Parkland" Winner of the Edgar Award, the Goodreads Choice Award, and the Barnes & Noble Discover Award

I. I see you as someone who goes into another world, explores it deeply, and comes back to tell the rest of us what it feels like. How does that sound?

DC. That sounds great. (He chuckles).

I. Thank you for having me here in your Brooklyn home, it’s very peaceful, I must say.

DC. I moved to Greenpoint because it’s right across the river from Manhattan, tucked between Queens and Williamsburg. It has this quiet solitude that I need to write. Believe it or not, I do a lot of my writing outside—walking and dictating. In Manhattan, there was a constant buzz in my head that I could never turn off. Here, I can finally let my mind be quiet. The road hasn’t always been easy. I had a dark decade…

I. A decade…

DC. Yeah, that was intense. The worst part was a seven-year stretch of depression where I literally couldn’t get out of bed, just sobbing all day. It was a dark ten years. Interestingly, my last book overlaps with those same years, so it’s going to be 25 years in the making. I started it in 2000.

I. Twenty-five years is an incredible commitment to a single story. What is it about?

DC. It follows two gay soldiers I met when they were captains, about ten years into their careers, and I’ve followed them for over twenty years. I never thought I could actually pull it off, but doing it shattered that sense of “impossible” for me. It gave me a certain swagger—a self-confidence I didn’t have before.

I. You actually have some military training yourself. I see your uniform pictures.

DC. I do. After I finished basic training, they had me stay on as a “drill corporal,” which is an assistant role. A year later, some of my drill sergeants came to my graduation and were just shocked—like, “Cullen, look at you!”. The transformation. I want to use that perspective to bridge gaps. I want liberal people, who often have no idea what the military is actually like, to have an eye-opening experience of what it’s like to be a soldier. And on the other end, I want conservatives

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