Paul Rousseau published his memoir, “Friendly Fire: A Fractured Memoir” on Sept. 10. The book tells the story of Rousseau’s shooting by his roommate in an on-campus apartment in 2017. Managing Editor Anya Capistrant-Kinney spoke with the St. Thomas alum to discuss all things books, psychics and hair.
All names and locations in the novel were either changed or redacted, as the author notes at the beginning of the book. Any names and locations mentioned in this interview are those used in the novel.
Anya Capistrant-Kinney: Hi, Paul! Congratulations on your book! It’s been a bit over a week since it came out now. How are you feeling?
Paul Rousseau: I’m actually pretty exhausted. This is the busiest I’ve been in my whole life. Which is obviously a good thing, since I’m doing lots of video and personal interviews. I’ve had a lot of pretty cool media hits. I’ve been on some podcasts and the BBC, for example, is going to be producing a long-form, nicely-produced interview with me in late October. I’m super excited about that. I also have some stuff coming out with Sirius XM this weekend. Just total PR push mode right now.
AC: Well, I appreciate you taking the time to talk with The Crest. Where are you calling me from?
PR: I’m based in the Twin Cities.
AC: When did you start your writing career?
PR: My official, genuine writing career probably started with the publication of an excerpt of this book back in 2017 with Catapult. They’re a book publisher now, but at the time, they were just a literary magazine, and that was the first time I got paid for my writing. But I wrote throughout middle school and high school, as most aspiring writers do. I was very much into amateur poetry. I even wrote short stories and satirical essays back then, not really realizing that that was abnormal for a kid or teenager to write nonfiction. I decided to do English as my college major. I wanted to be a musician, and I got accepted into music school, so arts were kind of always my thing. And then my mom was like, ‘It’s precarious to have a job in the arts, especially music.’ So we just had to do English somehow, with the goal for me to continue my education after my undergrad, get a master’s of fine arts and potentially be either a professor or a marketing copywriter.
AC: Did you ever go to grad school?
PR: No, that didn’t happen because of the injury.
AC: You mentioned you’ve been writing your whole life. How has that changed since becoming disabled?
PR: As I’ve taken it more seriously with my career that happened exactly at the same time where I became disabled. The reason the book is structured the way it is is a direct result of the injury. The content and the form are this symbiotic, harmonious thing. You’ve probably noticed that the chapters are two, three pages, sometimes much shorter. That’s because with the traumatic brain injury I lose a lot of mental stamina to do long form. This book is a collection of these mosaic pieces. Hence, like the “fractured memoir” subtitle on it. It’s like these little fractures all combining to sort of create this whole that the reader can play a part in piecing together.
AC: When did you know that you wanted to write this book?
PR: I don’t know if that’s still a path at St. Thomas, but I was an English major with a writing emphasis. It was always my intention to be a writer in some aspect, but fiction was my thought process there. But as soon as this happened to me, it became inherent that it was never an option to not write it. I just knew I was going to write it. It was an instant reaction to the event happening. I started drafting it two weeks after the shooting.
AC: In the book, you write that you want to “show what this disability can do” and “want people to know what happened.” Why?
PR: It’s such a terrifying story, and the news and every other party that tried to communicate the story got something wrong about it, often gravely so. Though it is hard for me to tell it, especially at the time, I’ve done a lot of work in therapy to be able to talk about it more. But at the time I was drafting it, it was a very difficult thing for me to talk about. I felt like people needed to know what happened, because it was such a one-of-a-kind case study. It’s all these things all at once: a call for reform and a case study on invisible disabilities. My focus firstly is that it’s a literary work that I tried to create, and I’ve been really pleased with some of the critical reception of it. It’s got a starred review in Publisher’s Weekly. I was just told by an interviewer yesterday that it is the best book they’ve read in the last five years. I was very, very moved and very touched by that. I’ve been getting this really good praise, and I’ve been really thankful for it all.
AC: In the book, you mention that your friend who shot you had four different guns in your dorm, including an AR-15. What are your thoughts on gun control?
PR: I’ve learned more about everything, I’ve been this, I call myself a quiet activist or a quiet advocate for gun reform. I’ve been able to put this book out into the world and I think it can create actual change. I believe in common sense gun laws and red flag gun laws. I believe that (the government) should have an assault weapon ban because it can be modified to carry copious amounts of ammunition. It’s the result of all these shootings we see every single day. Even more so, I think we need more strict storage laws to prevent unintentional shootings. Even right now, it’s just sort of recommended to store your weapons safely as possible without ammo, But in only 26 states are you required to safely store your weapon. So I think we need to get those storage laws beefed up everywhere.
AC: In your book, you write that a psychic predicted your future as a writer. How does it feel to be living out that path?
PR: It was pretty nuts. I mentioned that (the psychic predicted) this hair element to it. At the time, as a teenager, everyone was always like ‘your hair always looks so good.’ So hair was always a thing for me, even back then. Multiple times hair is referenced in the book, one of them being when (my roommate) Mark tells me to shower right after he shoots me and hair and blood run down the drain. And then I make a point of saying that the surgeon asked me, ‘do you want me to shave your head?’ And I was like, sure, go for it. I have a haircut scheduled for today anyway. You might as well save me some money. So, it’s just strange that that came up organically. Very bizarre. I love all that sort of paranormal stuff in my fiction, I write sort of speculative fiction. So I’m all about that.
AC: You also write that after you got shot you thought, “I did my best, it must be time to go.” Did you think you were going to die?
PR: Absolutely. My first inclination was to go to the mirror and see if there’s a hole in my head. Because then I’d be like, well these are my last moments. I was like, ‘Oh, this is it for sure.’ I wasn’t panicked at all, it was more just a sort of acceptance of it.
AC: Another thing that struck me in the book was the Public Safety officer who came after the fire alarms went off in your dorm from the gun. They saw blood on the floor yet when Mark lied about it they walked away. The police didn’t come until two hours later when your other roommate called 911.
PR: Later on in the book, I disclose how that happened. I went back to campus a month or two after it happened to read these public safety reports that were locked away in an office of the student center. But I always try not to blame that person. My other roommate eventually came home and strong-handed Mark into owning up to what he did. But two hours is crucial. I should have been hooked up to machines and getting treatment immediately. It has implications of friendship and all sorts of devious things I get into in the book.
“Friendly Fire: A Fractured Memoir” is available on hardcover and e-book.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Anya Capistrant-Kinney can be reached at capi2087@stthomas.edu.