Always on
This project successfully funded on 4th April 2026, you can still support them with a donation.
The Sibling, memoir, a sister's view of autism
Bishop's Stortford, Hertfordshire, United Kingdom
Aim
I aim to raise funds to copy edit and proofread the memoir, The Sibling, about a sister's experience of a brother with autism, to publish.
The Sibling is a memoir about my experience growing up alongside a brother with 
Autism, who was diagnosed in 1975, at a time when that term was almost unknown in the UK. The National Autistic Society was in still in its infancy. My story is how our misfit family traversed that decade, and the next, it's a story of family dynamics against a northern working class background, about my sibling identity and my time. Written with humour and heart, a quirky memoir about popular culture, themed on sensory overload. Extracts can be found on the Sibs website (charity patroned by Jo Whiley):
https://www.sibs.org.uk/jools
And on BBC Sounds.
It has been submitted to agents and publishers, who are all encouraging, Sophie Lambert said of The Sibling:
It was hugely meaningful for me to read this last night and absolutely resonated. It’s beautifully written and laced with wisdom, poetry and heart.
The Sibling would perch comfortably in bookshops alongside Cathy Retzenbrink, Catherine Simpson & Kit de Waal. Agents cannot find a niche that will make them enough money, so I would like to self publish. To do this, I need to raise funds for a copy edit, proof read and typesetting, plus publication costs.
If you donate, you get your name in the book!
A bit about me as a writer:
I'm a professional, prolific writer of life. Forty life stories for others in the last ten years as a ghost writer, including OBE's and significant people, as well as the important stories of ordinary folk and three children's books. I've written ten books of my own, and over thirty short stories, most recently performed at The Music Room in London, with The Word Factory. I'm published by Wasafiri and won their International Life Writing Prize, published with Mslexia, The Literary Consultancy, and Walker books for a prize winning children's short story and Hungry Tomato for non-fiction. I self published a historical fiction novel, Girl in the Mirror, set pre and post WW2, and recorded the audio book in 2024. Back in the days of Script Factory, Rupert Graves performed my prize winning short screenplay at Soho Theatre. I have an MA in children's literature and creative writing from Birkbeck, where Michael Rosen was my tutor, was the Writer in Residence for the Amazing Talliston House, and currently run life writing workshops, I've taken life writing courses with Nikesh Shukla, Lilly Dunn and Catherine Simpson. I used to be a teacher in primary and forest school, when not writing, I have adventures with the women's' group She Who Dares, (I wrote a book about them too) and my dog, Ruby.
Funding method
Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made