The Dyslexic Author (by sarah)

This week is Dyslexia Awareness Week, it is also the begininng of an insane writing challenge called NaNoWriMo which stands for National Novel Writing Month. The idea is that you write a minimum of fifty thousand words in a month and I have been doing this challenge and a picture book sister challenge called PiBoIdMo (Picture Book Idea Month) since 2009, which is now scary long ago.

When I first started the challenge and using the forum I felt very edgy, being severely dyslexic made me hesitate to enter into online written discussions with grammarian monsters - the sort that correct friends' emails. How was I ever going to compare to such writing experts when sometimes I can't spell mine or my kids' names correctly?

Trying to belt out a novel is an amazing experience but it is also an emotionally fraught one, especially for those low on self confidence. Self confidence is a key to success - it is not the only key but it is one of the main three - Self Confidence, Endurance and Improvisation/Adaptability. Dyslexics, due to our education system and social attitudes, tend to be high on intelligence and low on that whole confidence thing. To keep going with the writing you kind of need to believe that your story is good enough, that your imagination is fantastic and that everyone is going to want to read it. Many authors go through a cycle of thinking their stuff is amazing and will win a nobel prize, to sinking into a pit of despair over how rubbish it is.

But dyslexics have an added edge of nerves, an extra question over their abilities. Not only is there the language structure issues but there is the widely held idea that if you cannot spell you cannot write. This is wrong.

And it turned out that the way NaNoWriMo works is fantastic for boosting dyslexic writers. It goes something like this - everyone is rushing to get down as many words as they can, you are encouraged to leave the typos as they are and just keep going, everyone has typos, inversions of letters, missed letter where they are just typing so fast. Normal people see these and correct them, the dyslexic brain may think that that is the correct spelling and at other times it will see it as wrong - but conversely it might see the correct spelling as wrong and correct it to something incorrect - DOH!

What this means though is that when you are sitting in a cafe or pub with a group of writers your red line squiggles are no longer an issue - everyone has them. Then there is the concept that you can edit a book with mistakes in, no matter how many mistakes there are, but if there is no book to begin with you cannot edit it into something. This frees you up to write.

One of the things I also found was that increasingly I was learning language intricacies and histories and that I could grab the grammar nazis by the proverbial and correct them if and when they started. Grammar is not a fixed thing - look at the history of writing and you find that Shakespeare couldn't spell his own name, that names themselves are pretty fluid, that grammar is just basically a mark up language to tell the reader when to breathe when talking out loud.

But can a dyslexic ever be a writer, be a published author, a journalist?

Yes, they can, and when they do they tend to be multi-genre writers, not brilliant for becoming a household name but good for writing how-to and last minute books, to be able to switch the brain from science to sports to craft, to be journalists (with patient editors!), to be non-specialist all round jacks of all trades. And, increasingly, this is becoming acceptable back in the realm of fiction, thanks to authors such as Neil Gaiman.

So where does that leave me? I have said repeatedly that I must be insane trying to be a writer whilst being very very badly dyslexic but, you know what, I wasn't - I find that being dyslexic helps with research for stories and articles, as I can't rely on words or even the grammar. I often have to use both plus the context, meaning that I can often pick up on the big or small picture, the hidden concepts and deeper meanings. It also stops me making stupid assumptions as I can't take the writing literally and if it doesn't seem right I am forced to ask, to check. For science writing this is extremely important.

Now before we go any further, dyslexia is not something I can really define; it is just a part of how my brain is wired so I will not say that my writing success is because of, nor in spite of, the dyslexia. It could have stopped me; it was a hurdle, and it has stopped many but mainly because they are told they can't do things because of it. Also, yes, I am contrary and stubborn so when people told me I could not, or that I would find stuff hard, I was determined to show them I could do it - especially when my intelligence itself was under attack.

But would my life achievements have been different without the dyslexia? I kind of think not, I just had to take a different path. And that path has been strange and winding and this last week I have found myself writing craft workshops, reading my kids poetry and stories to kids whilst dressed up in ridiculous outfits at various kid clubs, being asked to perform my page poetry at several events, asked to run writing days for adults and kids, getting sci-fi stories accepted, writing blog copy and presenting my project Cuddly Science which includes script writing and picture book writing and report writing and talk writing.

And that was just this week. This last month included articles on sci-fi/fantasy and science and crafts and gardening and grant applications, and this last year saw me become a member of the Poetry Society, British Science Fiction Association and the British Science Writers Association (and yes that does confuse me especially as there is also the British Hen Well-Fare Trust that we got the chickens from too!), I have been asked to present awards to school kids and I completed a Science Communication course - something I dismissed as a "can't" during my undergraduate degree, due to the dyslexic issues.

I now firmly place myself in the role of writer, of author and so do others. I am finally what I was told I could never be - a dyslexic author. It was not trial free and it is not yet over, it kind of will never be over and I'm ok with that.

Back to NaNoWriMo, I find myself actively encouraging dyslexics to write - to take part and I love wondering around the forums and Facebook pages and twitter seeing articles like this pop up and I love to be able to say to those who are worried, those who are struggling, don't give up, you can succeed at this. And that doesn't just go for writing, it goes for every aspect of career and life 😀

May – the beginning of the Summer (by sarah)

It's a new month, a new season and I have a new to-do list. It is time for reordering and sorting. I handed in my last piece of coursework on Tuesday for the PGCert and have plans to take the project I've designed to the next level.

It is called Cuddly Science and you be hearing a lot more about it 🙂

Apart from that I'll be running workshops at The Brewery in Cheltenham for a Poetry Fun day and performing along side the wonderful Joy-Amy, I will also be performing at a slam at the Swindon Poetry Festival and at In Verse. I have the first of the music festivals this month too 🙂

I will also be doing some workshop with the kids at Jean's drama group.

And just to be a tad insane I am taking a ten week course in Improv and Stand Up - as in I'm going off to learn some stage crafty stuff myself. I've been meaning to do something since I left Imperial to be honest but it is now more urgent as I need better performance skills than I have to deliver Cuddly Science to the quality I want. It is ok at the moment but needs to be more - plus I felt that the performance poetry stuff could do with these sorts of skills as well.

It is also a matter of confidence and the accumulation of new skills. I find the concept of stand up comedy pretty terrifying and yet it was what I was edging towards with the Science Show-Off stuff I did. Also I don't like being scared of stuff - once I was scared of heights - petrified of them, my solution was to become a climbing instructor.

Apart from all of that there is the comic book to still be working on and the continual give aways for The Monster Blogs 5 year anniversary 🙂 I also want to get going with a bit more of the Science Writing and communication stuff in general, I still need to do some training for being a STEM Ambassador (science, technology, engineering and maths), to go into schools and things.

As always I am a glutton for punishment and the being of May is Picture Book Writing Week - so I will be attempting to write 7 picture books in the next 7 days. I am going to be focusing on the accompanying texts for Cuddly Science 🙂

The rest of month I will in general be working on my kids books and illustrations - 30 hours min. The summer in general will also involve game design and an update of the blogs.

On the domestic front we are having issues with the insurance company and the dinning room roof still but in general we are starting to get there with the house. There are some infrastructure bits that still need sorting and the garden will hopefully be getting a bit of a make over with the girls swing installed. The allotment is going to be the main priority for a while though as we still need to dig over a lot of it and plant tons of stuff.

We've sorted the play room and are almost there with the girls room, still don't think we will get around to painting the walls this year though 🙁

But we should finally get the curtains up!

Easter Collection – digital launch (by sarah)

It is Easter Sunday and I thought it was about time I put Sarah Snell-Pym's Easter Collection out there in digital audio format - ie downloadable tracks. I've been giving and selling copies of it on CD for the last two years though this year is the first time I've put them online for sale.

There is a Face Book event and I'll be giving away some stickers and things and maybe a hard copy - CD's etc...

The whole Album is free to download for the next week though I have priced individual tracks at £1.

Screnzy, Poetry, Comics and Science (by sarah)

A new month has snuck up and begun on me - this sadly means I missed a couple of deadlines for poems and stories and that, that I wanted to submit. But it also means I am in a month of exciting challenges.

Number one is Screnzy or Script Frenzy which is a spin off of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), the idea is that you write a 100 page script in a month. I have been focusing on comic book or graphic novel scripts and so that is what I will be focusing on again this year. You can follow the progress more closely on Purple Monster. I will also be doing the script for my puppet show, which is part of my course work - I basically plan to spend 30 hours working on these types of project - priority has to go to my Ada Lovelace script as I have a deadline at the end of the month. (Ada is the science part! and has drawings to go with! Though I may also be running some science camp activities over Easter).

Number two is NaPoWrimo, this is another poetry writing challenge - again the idea is that you write a poem a day but I plan to spend 30 hours on poetry stuff in general this month. You can follow the progress of this on Turquoise Monster.

Number three is that I hope to release The Little Book of Easter Poetry audio for download - I will probably rope this in with the NaPo stuff. I also want to do some work on my game design stuff but I will have to see how things go especially as I am starting the month off event managing and comparing at the Jordans Cheltenham Poetry Festival 🙂

Sometimes I hate being a Jack (by sarah)

Jack of all trades... master of none.

Over the last two weeks I have been booked for four festivals and half a dozen workshops, I have submitted articles about science, created a little hand drawn poetry book, created a new raft of upcycling projects, been asked to perform, knitted a sparkly bag, and have started work on the art for a comic book I wrote about about 4 yrs ago. I have also written poems, flash fictions, posts on gardening and taken photos of things, harvested potatoes and sold a few boxes of hens eggs and so on.

As great and as wonderful as all this is, I ran out of money last Wednesday as I hadn't noticed it was half way through March and I had not checked if invoices had been paid etc.... I was 40p short for my lunch - they were lovely and let me off. It has also resulted in another booking which is always a good thing but...

I do a hell of a lot of stuff but it is so diffused! If I could focus on one of these things, I would get a profile for that thing but I can't - so for the festivals I am being a performer, events manager, photographer, craft and/or writing or science workshop leader and the writing and craft look the same. I have pictures of kidneys next to pastel rabbits upstairs next too abstracts, I have poems about war and politics and kids books and on and on and on and sometimes I can't think for it all.

It is fun and wonderful to be able to do all this stuff and in some cases to be able to mash it all together and come out with something that is amazing but... I am not brilliant at any of it. I am ok or good at it all (except the guitar playing and singing which I am naff at but do anyway). I know I have moaned about this all before but sometimes it feels like I will never achieve anything because I am doing everything.

The solution is obvious and one that just is not viable for me. I can't give up things because they are not just activities that I do but they are aspects of me. I know some people love the fact I do all of this stuff and it appears in blog posts like this one. But most people are interested in only one aspect of what I do and all the other stuff is annoying noise, risking them being turned away or not seeing the stuff they find relevant.

It is one of the reasons I've ended up with so many blogs - trying to split it out for other people. The issue is really that I don't have a brand or thing to be know for other than say - being the person who can pull some solution out of the hat for an event in crisis etc... That isn't actually that useful a trait as obvious the event will not be telling people they where in crisis so it only works if I've saved the bacon for them in the past and they need something again.

These musings coincide with a confidence crash - last week I was all like - hell! I am MASTER of ALL, but this week I am attempting to remember how to draw characters and am struggling. I know I am capable but I'm not happy with the pictures I've been working on for my college project - and I am also working on the comic book and really want both pieces of work to be fantastic. But I can't even stick to one style of drawing :/ I am surrounded by how to draw books which I am flitting through, drawing bits and bobs. I have an idea of what my projects need to look like and no one else seems to draw in that way but I need to see how to shift the bodies I've designed around, how to map the features to different positions and expressions and it is an incredible amount of work

IF... I had spent all the time since my GCSE's working on my art skills then perhaps I would be of a level I would feel happy about (rather than wondering if I can get the computer to map textures for me and taking swaths of fabric the 'move' in the right way).

I also got the marks back for my science writing and got a good/ok mark and am so angry with myself as there was stupid stuff like - I cut the excess 250 words from a 3000 word assignment and the feed back was that that stuff should have been in there - and then I find out that there is a 10% buffer meaning that I didn't have to cut those words at all and I spent a DAY on that. Missing simple things like that and not having had the time to get it in for a check before submission are stupidnesses and just so typical of me ( *coughs tax returns ).

But at the same time I can see that it is finally all starting to fuse together and be something. All the art, craft, science, environmentalism, music, writing - it is a dirty snow ball that is causing a career avalanche. Part of the issue is I am trying to up my game again - I seem to be doing this every two years at the moment. And the dam goal posts keep shifting - like I thought I would have "made it" poetically when I had performed at the Cheltenham Lit Festival but I've done that and there are other things I have my sights set on now. The fact I once thought there was a "made it" line you could cross makes me laugh now as it just isn't that way - once I thought completing my degree was "making it".

And so the goals keep shifting - I think the main issue for me at the moment is the pain, it is a low level but is niggling away but I can do things so I am trying to ignore it. Muscle fatigue has been interesting this week including not being able to get myself out of bed but again it has been alot worse - however I am avoiding going to the Drs as last 2 times I've been this close to completing post grad stuff, I have gone in with what I thought was minor things, only to end up with stays in hospital and no completion. Also the stronger pain killers stop me thinking and that is the last thing I want at the moment.

I think I just need to remember that ADHD is the Polymath Dream.