Body Man book tour

 

When belief hardens into certainty, it can push people toward decisions that reshape far more than their own lives. Two men, shaped by completely different experiences, begin moving toward the same moment without fully understanding how deeply their choices will intersect. In Body Man by Al Pessin, that convergence drives the story forward.

 Body Man: A Thriller by Al Pessin

From the White House to backwoods strongholds and fractured communities, the fallout of a failed assassination attempt sends shockwaves through a nation already on edge. A newly elected president becomes both a symbol of change and a target.

Spencer, his closest aide, is suddenly entrusted with influence that extends beyond his role, navigating decisions that carry national consequences. Carl, a disgraced Marine sniper, is pulled into a militant network that sees violence as a necessary response.

As unrest escalates into open conflict, the military begins to fracture and cities erupt. Leadership grows increasingly unstable, and both men continue forward, guided by conviction, even as the meaning of patriotism becomes more uncertain.

The question remains unresolved: who is protecting the country—and who is tearing it apart?

 

Author Interview

What’s a detail, theme, or clue in your book that most readers might miss on the first read but you secretly hope someone notices?

I think people will discount one of the characters, who will play an important role later on. I intentionally drew this character with physical and personality traits that make them easy to ignore, both for readers and for the other characters. This works very well for the character in question. I think when this character’s true role is revealed, it will be both surprising and totally reasonable. And readers may think of people in their lives whose abilities they discount when they shouldn’t.

 

When did this story or idea “click” into place for you—was there a single moment you knew you had to write it?

There has long been a divide in modern American politics. You can date it at least to the Kennedy-Nixon election in 1960. And it deepened significantly in recent decades. I got the idea for Body Man in 2015, when Donald Trump’s entry into politics revealed that the divide had grown deeper than most people had realized. Since I mentioned President Kennedy in this answer, I must also note that political violence in America is not new. But it seemed to me in 2015, and still today, that the potential for violence has increased with the proliferation of weapons, the organizational strength of the Internet, and the increased role of the super rich in funding political movements.

 

Which character or real-life person surprised you the most while writing this book, and why?

Carl’s development as a young man was an interesting and sometimes surprising journey for me. To be honest, I was more like Spencer at their age. So he was relatively easy for me to write. But the more I worked to make Carl believable and three-dimensional the more I learned about and empathized with the impact of his upbringing on the man he becomes. In books and on screen I too often see two-dimensional villains. I was determined to make Carl relatable, to ensure that readers understood why he does what he does, even though they (and I) will still condemn it. I did this in my earlier books (Sandblast, Blowback, and Shock Wave) as well, where Islamist terrorist characters have backstories, understandable (though condemnable) motivations, individual personalities, and some of them are victims themselves. I strive to be cliché-free, and am most pleased when reviewers say things like Body Man’s characters are “believable (and) identifiable” and the plot is “all too realistic.”

 

What’s one belief, question, or emotional truth you hope readers carry with them long after they finish your book?

I hope readers come away from Body Man with a few thoughts. One is that the more extreme views proliferate the more likely we are to experience something like what happens in Body Man, or worse. Another is that, while I’m not suggesting moral equivalence, neither side is perfect or blameless. A third is that (as mentioned above) it’s important to make an effort to understand each person’s background and motivations in order to have any chance at all to avert deeper division and the potential for catastrophe.

 

Tell us about a moment during the writing process when the story (or message) took an unexpected turn.

The basic outline of the story and its message did not change. But I did deal with issues of how far to go in some instances, notably regarding what would happen at the Inaugural Parade and exactly how the crisis at the end of the book would be resolved. 

 

If your protagonist (or central figure) could give the reader one piece of advice, what would it be?

I’m not sure either main character gleans the advice from their experiences that they should. If I can speak for them, I’d say for Carl: get an education, think for yourself, don’t believe everything you hear. And for Spencer: don’t be over-awed by your heroes and know your own role and limitations.

 

What real-world place, object, or memory helped shape a key element in your book?

There are many. I lived in Washington for 20 years, so the locations there are very familiar to me. I covered the White House for a year and a half at the beginning of the Clinton administration, so I’m familiar with the building and its processes, which I hope helped me make those scenes seem real. In fact, like Spencer, I went job hunting in Washington during spring break of my senior year of college, toting a pile of resumés (though I was visiting news organizations, not congressional offices). I also grew up in Michigan, so I know some of the places I used in the book and I think I had more ability to paint characters from Michigan than I would have if I’d made them from another part of the country.

 

What’s something you had to research, learn, or experience to write this book that genuinely surprised you?

Police procedure was a challenge. Thankfully, a member of my writers group is a retired police officer. She kindly tore apart the last several chapters of my first draft and helped me put them back together in a more realistic way, hewing to proper procedures. This can be more difficult for writers than simply writing the plot the way they want to. But in the end, whether police procedures, military tactics or political structures, taking the more complicated route is always better, helping build tension and adding verité. My friend also enlisted the help of a ballistics expert, who added a lot to my (and the reader’s) understanding of Carl’s training, the challenges he faces in Washington, and how he performs there.

 

About the Author

Al Pessin is an award-winning author and veteran foreign correspondent whose decades of frontline reporting fuel his high-tension political thrillers. He’s covered war zones from Iraq to Afghanistan, interviewed militants in Gaza, and was once expelled from China for “fomenting counter-revolutionary rebellion.”

Before turning to fiction, Pessin spent nearly four decades with Voice of America, serving as a White House and Pentagon correspondent and reporting from global hotspots across Asia, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe. His debut thriller Sandblast launched the Task Force Epsilon series and was followed by Blowback and Shock Wave.

He lives in Florida with his wife and their Labrador, Rory.

Visit Al at his website and follow him on Facebook and Instagram.

 

Available April 21, 2026

 

Amazon: https://bit.ly/4tq8fHx

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/235788913-body-man

 

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