Q&A with Jack Beaumont - Author of The Frenchmen Series

Allen & Unwin
Jul 31
3 min read

We interview Jack Beaumont, author of The Frenchman series.

A&U: Hi Jack. Thank you so much for speaking with us. First up, for those new to the series can you tell us a bit about Alec de Payns?

JB: Alec de Payns is an OT (Officier Traitant) in the secretive Y Division of the French foreign intelligence service, the DGSE. That means he is tasked with infiltrating foreign criminal and terrorist networks and recruiting people who are in those groups, in order to gain information for the French government. He lives under many pseudonyms, and he has to build a ‘legend’ for each one so that when a rival intelligence service attempts to verify him. He is also a husband and father of two sons and lives a middle-class life in Paris. Attempting to balance dangerous field work with normal family life, and the office environment, is a constant source of stress for Alec de Payns – the man called Aguilar by the Y Division.

A&U: In Liar’s Game Alec finds himself on the run wanted for murder after the death of a North Korean defector in his charge. What inspired you to write this new Alec adventure?

JB: The North Korean defector in Liar’s Game is what intelligence services call a ‘walk-in’ – a person who turns up at a foreign embassy and asks for asylum, with the promise of valuable information. The inspiration for Liar’s Game came from the knowledge that most walk-ins are not genuine, and are either fantasists with nothing of value for the DGSE, or they have been planted by a rival service in order to infiltrate or mislead the targeted agency. However, when a walk-in is the real thing, they can be dangerous because the political damage they introduce is extreme. In Liar’s Game the walk-in is very real and has something to share that is so valuable that he is killed to stop it being disseminated. This is the inspiration – what happens when the walk-in is the real thing?

A&U: Your background working for the DSGE makes you uniquely qualified to write espionage thrillers. Without giving anything away can you tell us how that background informs your writing?

JB: I was an OT – officier traitant – in the clandestine operations section of the DGSE for seven years. I was tasked with infiltrating networks, obtaining protected operational intelligence and recruiting human sources in various countries. I have had first-hand dealings with some of the world’s most dangerous people and I carried out my job while having a wife and two children at home. Before joining the DGSE I was a fighter pilot, and also a military pilot flying special operations and intelligence missions in various crisis and war zones, which gave me an insight into the workings of conflict diplomacy and the role played by military, intelligence and politics. The main advantage I bring to the Frenchman novels is an insider’s knowledge of not only tradecraft and the in-field dynamic of intelligence operations, but also the tensions of field operations in conjunction with office politics. I also give factual insights into the difficulty of being an operative while having to be father and husband when I emerge into my real life. Readers have commented on the details of my tradecraft, and like the detail I go into – I’m giving them a ringside seat into how we plan and execute an operation, and all the things that can wrong…

A&U: You’ve had numerous pseudonyms in your line of work – what is it like to add Jack Beaumont, writer, to the list?

JB: Sometimes it’s a relief, to be able to talk about my previous profession. Other times the retelling of stories can make me anxious or give me the blues, when I think about people who got caught in an operation. Taking on the pseudonym of Jack Beaumont is helpful from the perspective of being honest about what happens to spies as people: the movies don’t tell the stories about the sleep disorders and the deep exhaustion of spending too many years in the field. You pay a price for this work and so does your family. In many respects, it has been a weight off my shoulders to allow my wife and sons to read novelised versions of my life, and of course, it’s great entertainment for the readers.

A&U: What do you like to read in your spare time?

JB: John le Carre, Jack Carr, Frederick Forsyth, Ian Fleming.