Paul Anderson is the co-creator of Chinese Whisperings, co-editor of The Red Book and author in waiting as the final writer of the chain with the unenviable task of tying the first and final stories together.

Displaying the same forward planning that saw him study law just in time for a glut of overqualified and underemployed legal graduates, Paul abandoned a career in law to become a writer just at the precise moment the publishing industry collapsed.

Undeterred by such auspicious beginnings, Paul ploughed his lack of business experience into a publishing venture with the only other writer he could find who was crazy enough had the vision and enthusiasm to join him. This website, and this anthology, are the fruits of that crazy idea. Whether these fruits are succulent and delicious, or rancid and will whither on the vine remains to be seen…

As you can tell, Paul rarely takes anything seriously, least of all himself or his business ventures, but it’s that sense of self-deprecating humour that makes him so darn endearing…

Paul calls West London home these days.

What was the first story you remember doing for the sheer joy of writing (i.e. It wasn’t a school project or homework!) and how old were you?

When I was about 11, I remembered reading a series of books aimed at boys, about American Football. I can’t remember their titles now, but they focused on a British school-kid who played rugby, but eventually gets drawn into American Football, joining a youth team and winding up by the fourth book in some kind of summer camp in the US.

I was very into American Football, and thought I could write a better American Football story, so started writing about a US college team that I invented (but sadly I can’t remember the name I came up with now). Needless to say it was terrible, and I don’t think I ever finished it, but it was the first story I wrote for fun!

I’ll bet nobody expected it to be a sports story!

What do you love about writing?

Having permission to daydream, to always ask the question “what if”. Others can wistfully ask what could have been, but with writing you can go ahead and find out what could have been. You can map out whole new histories. It’s like lucid dreaming in many ways, you are in control of what happens. It’s very intoxicating to know you have control over anything – it’s why men should never be gods.

If you could trade places with any fictional character (yours or someone else’s) who would it be and why?

I’m not convinced I’d swap with any of mine. They’re all screwed up more than I am, and most wind up dying horribly, or living lives of tragedy.

So I’ll go with another writer’s character. I am a great admirer of Arthur Conan Doyle, and I think I’d like to trade places with Sherlock Holmes. A renaissance man of many talents and immense knowledge, living a comfortable life of dinners, opera, and making a general nuisance of himself to all quarters of London society, from the criminal class to the ruling class and everyone in-between. OK, he was a slightly disturbed, cocaine addicted, borderline misogynist with poor interpersonal skills. But he was a damn fine violinist.

What is the easiest element of writing for you? What is the hardest?

The easiest element for me has always been coming up with ideas for stories. Whether I’m raiding the news, my own experience, or going with whatever comes out of my head, idea generation has never been a problem for me.

The hardest part though is trying to get those ideas onto paper. I find concentrating on one idea long enough to see it through very difficult. I’m like a magpie, each bright shiny new idea has me flitting off to examine it. I think this is why I have always been drawn to short stories primarily – there’s less commitment required in terms of the mental effort to stay with the story. A novel, that’s easily six months of pure effort, but a short story, when you’re really in the flow, can be as short as an afternoon.

What advice would you gift your 18 year old self about writing?

“Write this down, quickly. There’s this boy wizard right, and he has round glasses and a scar, he’s called Harry…”

My first bit of advice to myself would be to start writing. Don’t dream about it, don’t say you’ll do it some day, don’t envisage it as something for your retirement – start it now, and do it everyday. Because when I was 18 I was going to be a successful lawyer, not a writer, so I thought I had plenty of time. That was 12 years of lost time.

My next bit of advice would be to have faith in my own ideas. One of my most popular ideas has been kicking around in my head since I was 18. If I’d started it then, who knows where I’d be now? So I’d let myself know that the only silly idea is the one you abandon.

My last bit of advice is one I’ve thought long and hard about since I abandoned the law. And I think it would be to pull out of the law degree. Maybe switch to English, or something more readily useful to writing. But I had almost ten years of legal learning, to wind up in a position where if I’d started in an office at the age of 18, I’d be my manager by now. With time on my hands to write!

Websites

Once Upon A Time in the West of London
Write Anything – Sunday Columnist