My name is Paul Templeman and I’m a writer—which sounds like something that might be said at an addict’s self help group, and is entirely appropriate since writing has been a form of addiction for me for almost all of my life. When I was eight years old I filled 12 exercise books with a seemingly never-ending story about miniature plastic soldiers coming to life and fighting legendary battles across the breadth of the war torn living room carpet.
Since those days I ‘ve always written, not as a career or a vocation but because when the words are in my head I have to drive them out or I’ll descend into madness. Sometimes I’ll write things that I think I’ve read somewhere, that later turn out to be original thoughts.
I’ve never had writer’s block, although I have tried to acquire it many times. Imodium doesn’t help. There are plots swarming around my head for which I don’t have titles. It’s hard to know where to start.
Throughout my many careers I’ve used my writing skills to create sales proposals, technical documents, business plans, regulatory and legal documents and website collateral. My father believed the Civil Service held better prospects than what he called my ‘story writing’, and I lasted 10 months with the Department of Trade, before turning to the private sector where I made money and lost money multiple times.
I’ve been fortunate enough to have travelled extensively in business throughout the world, adding colour and narrative to the landscapes of my formative novels, but despite having written four full length novels and reams of other stillborn material, I’ve never pursued seriously my creative side professionally.
It’s only now in my latter years I have decided seriously to try to get some of my work into print. Other People’s Memories is a story that has been almost ten years in the making, Telling the tale of a woman that grows up with a set of parallel memories about places and people she has never known. This is available on Amazon here. I hope that soon a publisher will take up my new novel, The Marmaris Trail about the state sponsored looting of the Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg against the backdrop of the war in Ukraine.
My blog here is very much a work in progress where I intend to showcase some of my writing and to air my views and thoughts on current events, as well as to share recommendation on books.
