There are many Brian Freemans.
Some readers gobble up his Jonathan Stride mysteries, set in and around Duluth. Some know him for thrillers, such as the Florida-set “Break Every Rule,” which hits stores in September. And some think of him as the guy picked by the late Robert Ludlum’s estate to continue the series about international man of mystery Jason Bourne — “The Bourne Shadow,” Freeman’s fifth, is in stores July 16.
We spoke with Freeman — a Carleton College graduate who lived in Minnesota for decades before moving to Florida’s Atlantic coast in 2022 — about Ludlum’s favorite punctuation mark and how a juicy murder helps him get in the right frame of mind for a Bourne book.
Q: How do you shift between writing your own books and those with Ludlum’s name on the cover?
A: Fortunately, a lot of my books are very different. One week I might be working on a police procedural like my Jonathan Stride books and the next week, I have a more emotional book with a female, first-person narrator like “Deep, Deep Snow” and then an action thriller with bodies dropping left and right like the Bourne books.
Q: You often write on your Florida patio. Do you move somewhere different for the Bourne books, to get in a different headspace?

A: What makes it interesting is trying to combine my own style with his distinctive, breathless style. If you try to imitate that, it can feel like a caricature, so I try to make it a hybrid. When I pick up a Ludlum book, I have to remember, “This is not a Brian Freeman book.”
Q: Are there specific things that make a Ludlum book a Ludlum book?