Turn Me On, Dead Man

The earliest work of "Paul is dead" fiction was a comic book published by Revolutionary Comics entitled "Paul McCartney, ALIVE or DEAD?", the final installment of an eight-part series The Beatles Experience. [1] The author, Todd Loren, imagines a parallel universe in which John Lennon was moved to place death clues on the Beatles albums because Paul had, in fact, been killed in a car crash in 1966. A truck hits Paul's Aston-Martin and the driver of the truck recognizes Paul. Rather than calling the police, the driver of the truck finds Brian Epstein's phone number and calls him. Brian then calls Ron White at E.M.I. They decide to cover up the accident and bring in a replacement for Paul who had recently won a Paul McCartney lookalike contest. They try to fool the other Beatles but John realizes that this isn't the same old Paul.

On subsequent Beatle albums, John leaves a number of clues about Paul's death. After Brian Epstein dies, only three people know of the deception: John, Paul's replacement and Ron White. John wants to come clean and tell the public but Ron White forces him to back down. Soon the Beatles would split up because John could no longer live with the lie. With John's Lennon's murder in 1980 and Ron White's death in 1989, the only person remaining who knows about this whole sordid story is "Paul".
Todd Loren was murdered shortly after the publication of The Beatles Experience. Stripped suggests that Loren may have been killed by Andrew Cunanan, who went on an infamous murder spree in 1997. Bullet Proof Films is producing a documentary on Revolutionary Comics, focusing on Todd Loren's defense of his First Amendment rights and they also explore the connection between Todd Loren and Andrew Cunanan.

The first novel about the "Paul is dead" rumor is Carry That Weight: The Story of the Beatles by Ernst Schultze. [2] This story has an interesting premise—that Paul's replacement, William Campbell, was actually more talented than the original Paul. William Campbell was an orphan who assumed the role of Paul McCartney gladly and quickly developed ambitions that went beyond the intent of the conspirators. This explains the changes in the Beatles music in their latter years, such as the ambitious approach the Beatles took in making Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Despite the clever premise, this book is not an easy read. The characters in this story are often abusive to one another and the negative dialog detracts from the story.

A book with a better heart is Dr. Lev's Billy Shears: The Secret History of the Beatles. [3] Dr. Lev's story focuses more on the romance between Linda Eastman and Paul's replacement, Billy Campbell, otherwise known as Billy Shears. As told in Billy Shears, Billy and Linda Eastman had briefly met before Billy becomes Paul's replacement, but their romance does not occur until his life has been dramatically transformed. Billy Shears: The Secret History of the Beatles was written to be made into a movie and Dr. Lev has even written and recorded the music for the film, which you can obtain from his website, http://www.Paul-Is-Dead.com. This book is intended to introduce a new generation to the significance of the Beatles and it emphasizes the exuberant optimism the Beatles stood for. Billy Shears includes plenty of references to the music and events of the Beatles' career. Dr. Lev has become a regular at Beatles conventions giving presentations on the "Paul is dead" rumor and selling copies of his book. He believes the Beatles intentionally placed the clues about Paul's death on their albums. In this way they created a new art form—a mystery for fans to solve.

In I Buried Paul, Jerome Wallerstein injects himself into the story of Paul's untimely demise—that is, he makes himself a character in this work of fiction. [4] As told in I Buried Paul, Wallerstein was the Beatles' drug connection. In this capacity he was privy to many aspects of the Beatles lives, yet he was never accepted into the Beatles' inner circle. Wallerstein was there when Paul was killed in 1966 and took part in the conspiracy to hide Paul's death but was forced out soon afterward. The premise of this book is that thirty years later Wallerstein is terminally ill and wants to relieve himself of the burden of his involvement in the conspiracy. The first half of the book is written as a first-person account, but the second half is an extended interview, as Wallerstein (the character in the book, that is) has become to ill to complete writing his memoirs. I Buried Paul is an absorbing read—imaginative and well written. Wallerstein leads the reader into the Beatles' world and builds a compelling, utterly believable account of the nature of the Beatles' relationships and creative process, as well as their drug use (a lot of detail here). Wallerstein definitely knows his stuff, so to speak, and once you start reading this book you won't be able to put it down. Jerome Wallerstein, the character, dies at the end of I Buried Paul, but the real Jerome Wallerstein is still alive and you can obtain copies of this book through his website, jeromewallerstein.com.