We chat with author Paul Vidich about Beirut Station, which is a stunning new espionage novel and follows a young female CIA officer whose mission to assassinate a high-level, Hezbollah terrorist reveals a dark truth that puts her life at risk.
Hi, Paul! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?
Before I was a published author I worked in media as a senior corporate excutive, and before that, in my twenties, I was an aspiring and unpublished author. Rent, family responsibilities, and the usual demands of young adult life led me to take up a business career, but ultimately I wanted to get back to writing. I quit my job at AOL/Time Warner in my fifties and applied to MFA programs. I began a ten year, heads-down, dedicated effort to write something worth publishing. I live in Soho with my wife of 45 years.
When did you first discover your love for writing and stories?
My parents were professors and their colleagues were often well spoken. I remember hearing stories as a child at social gatherings and I would listen intently. I would sit beyond the circle of these erudite men and women and marvel at their ability to talk enterainingly. We all become interested in telling stories by listening to stories as a child.
My interest in telling stories came later – as a high school teenage producing and acting in plays. I was taken by the idea you could represent the world through a story. My choice to write stories and put them into the world for others to enjoy came when I moved to New York after college and I was trying to figure what to do with my life.
Quick lightning round! Tell us:
- The first book you ever remember reading: Lord of the Flies
- The one that made you want to become an author: Graham Greene
- The one that you can’t stop thinking about: John Le Carre
Your latest novel, Beirut Station, is out now! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?
Love story. War story. Betrayal.
What can readers expect?
Beirut Station is a spy novel, but it also is a revenge tragedy. A Lebanese Jew whose father was murdered by a Muslim extremist group in the 1970s, returns as a Mossad officer to exact revenge for his father’s murder under cover of the Lebanese Hezbollah war. The trail of blood deepens when a CIA officer is murdered and the cycle of revenge ends when the protagonist, a young Lebanese-American CIA officer, sets in motion the novel’s final, violent conclusion.
I write about spies because the moral possibilities of the world they occupy often test the ethical constraints that bind most of us, and provide a rich resource of fictional possibilities.
Where did the inspiration for Beirut Station come from?
I read about a joint CIA Mossad operation to assassinate the Hezbollah terrorist, Imad Mughniyeh, who masterminded the killing William Buckley, CIA Station Chief in Lebanon in 1985. One killing in the Middle East begat another in what seems like an endless cycle of violence.
At the same time, I was reading Aeschylus’s revenge trilogy, the Oresteia. In the first play, Clytemnestra kills her husband Agamemnon, who had sacrificed their daughter to secure good winds for their Greek Army boats to sale to Troy. In the second play, Orestes, the son, murders his mother to avenge his father. In the third play, Orestes is put on trial before the Furies, the ancient Greek creatures, but his life his spared by Athena in order to end the cycle of revenge. The two things worked together to plant the germ of Beirut Station in my imagination.
Were there any moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?
My journey getting to know Beirut, which I did through research, was a lovely experience. I enjoyed creating the Beirut my characters lived in: the smell of jamine, the terror of night bombs, fear among the families waiting for evacuation, and the loneliness of the non-official cover CIA officer living a double life.
Can you tell us about your research process?
I usually do six months of research before I begin to write. The research helps me find an incident, or character interesting enough to support a novel. I operate on the principle that the more I get to know a character, the longer I spend with them, the more likely they’ll have the complexity, humanity, intelligence, and cleverness that will engage the reader. I build a story around the historical figure and fill out a cast of fictional characters.
I develop a dossier for each fictional character: name, age, birthplace, religious beliefs, family history, desires, fears, education, motivations, and vulnerabilities. I visualize a character’s entire life. Most of what I develop never appears in the novel, but knowing it allows me to give a character depth and gravity. Characters in a novel are like strangers we meet in life – we get to know them through the telling surface details that make us curious about who they are. Hints and suggestions often work better than flat observations, but to credibly hint and suggest, you need to know the deeper person.
This is your sixth published novel! What are some of the key lessons you have learned when it comes to writing and the publishing world?
Writing requires craft, which can be taught, but it is also requires the discipline of daily work, which can not be taught. Writing every day for several hours is the only way the amateur becomes a professional. Write. Write. Write. Some of the material will be good, some terrible, and a few bits remarkable, but you don’t get anywhere without the daily effort of putting pen to paper.
Dress it any way you, publishing is a business. Publishing houses need to make profits, which lead them to publish some remarkable work and also bunk. But, if you’re an author looking to have a book published, you have to think the way the editor thinks: who will buy this book?
What’s next for you?
I have been fascinated by Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election and the tensions that arose between the Trump White House and the US intelligence community, which was never comfortable with the Trump-Putin relationship. That’s fertile ground for my next novel.
Lastly, do you have any book recommendations for our readers?
Of the classics, read Rebecca and The Talented Mr. Ripley. Both extremely well done. Of recent releases, try The Peacock and the Sparrow by I.S. Berry.
