Biography
David Clive Price has had a passion for Asia’s peoples and cultures ever since he went to Japan in the 1980s and wrote a book about his travels throughout the country. This passion developed further in Hong Kong, where he struggled to make ends meet as a writer in the 1990s, wrote economic reports about Asian countries, and travelled all over the region researching features for international magazines. Finding himself on his pin ends with his Chinese spouse in a walk-up one-room apartment above a nightclub in Hong Kong, he resolved to join the corporate world and became Chief Speechwriter for Asia for one of the world’s leading banks. It was 1995. Hong Kong was preparing to return to China. David spent the next few years writing speeches to be given all over Asia and the world. He also began publishing a series of books on South Korea, Hong Kong, China, India, and Buddhism in the daily life of Asia.
Freeing himself from corporate life, he set up his own consultancy advising Asian multinationals and Western companies with Asian operations on their strategic and intercultural communications. This experience, and the challenges he faced launching his own business, form the basis of his new book The Master Key to Asia: A 6-Step Guide to Unlocking New Markets and his innovative Master Key Series on the business cultures, etiquettes and customs of Asia’s high-growth markets. Check out his blog posts at www.davidcliveprice.com and his daily posts on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.
Interview with David Clive on his book, “Chinese Walls”
David, tell us about your latest story, “Chinese Walls.”
The story of a corporate (married) high-flyer who risks all on a secret gay relationship in Hong Kong and almost loses everything by not being true to himself.
Approximately how long did it take you to write the story?
6 months but with many revisions afterwards as I widened the scope and theme.
Where did you get the idea for this story from?
I worked as a speechwriter in Hong Kong and London for business and political leaders before I set out on my own. I wrote it in both London and Hong Kong. I was an ‘out’ gay man at work, and my Chinese partner came to the office to meet me sometimes. But what if I wasn’t out (many were and are not)? What would have happened? And what about all my women friends in the company? They were facing similar or related problems with the male hierarchy. A cross-cultural novel about there glass ceiling and the glass closet came to my mind – and I was the right one to write it.
Do you think Life experiences, research or just your imagination makes you a better a writer?
Imagination no.1, closely followed by life experiences.
What would you name the autobiography of your life?
Diving Right In.
If money was not an issue, what one thing would you love to do?
Fund an educational academy for aspiring young Asians that don’t have the money for college (and a scholarship for Asia-based writers at my Cambridge college)
If you could only pick two people, living or dead, famous or not, to read your book, who would they be and why?
I would love John Kander, the composer half of Kander & Ebb (Cabaret, Chicago etc), to see I made good and can write the novels he always said I could write when I was his occasional house guest in NYC in the 1970s-1980s. The other one
would be Charles Dickens, who wrote about all kinds of socially taboo subjects.
Check David’s work out on these fantastic sites:
NEVA SQUIRES-RODRIGUEZ 
Always a fun moment to hold your book in paperback! Congratulations…a lot of emotion going on in the snippet – wow! Great 8…
LikeLiked by 1 person
Interesting interview. Thanks Neva and Clive 0)
LikeLiked by 1 person