about the author

Clare Smith was diagnosed with autism at 57. Discovering she has Asperger’s led her to re-examine her life through the lens of this most complex of disabilities.She grew up in Northern Ireland during The Troubles and went on to work for the BBC, where she became an award-winning health correspondent while, with her husband, raising two daughters.After some twenty-five years there she began lecturing in journalism, but switched to volunteering after her diagnosis.She and her family moved to rural Norfolk. She lives quietly by the sea with her husband and two cats.

about the book

“A characteristic of autism can be a difficulty using speech to express thoughts, feelings, and experiences. However, there is often an eloquence in self-expression using the arts, including poetry. Clare’s sensitive and engaging poems provide an insight into her mind and her autism.”Professor Tony Attwood, author of The Complete Guide to Asperger’s Syndrome.What if you were given a life-altering diagnosis at 57? One that meant you aren’t who you thought you were? But one that explained everything?These poems vibrate with intensity and curiosity about life, and because she came to this knowledge so late in life, many of Clare Smith’s poems focus not so much on what it means to be autistic, but on what it means to be human.Throughout her life, as she struggled to fit into a world that to her was utterly strange, she poured her hopes, her joys and at times her despair into words.She trained as a journalist, taught to cut out all emotion from her reporting, but her private writing is different – she created poetry that spoke to her deepest needs. There, exposed in her writing, is her yearning to belong, her astonishment at the physical world, her knowledge – decades before the doctors confirmed it – that she is different.She’s spent a lifetime trying to make sense of her life – a journey that many of us, whether autistic or neurotypical, are on, and one in which we all face the same questions.

Fiction

Fiction

Coming Soon...

Fiction

Coming Soon...

Fiction

Coming Soon...

Short Stories

Species Extinction

The creature – part flier, part nymph – and, being a singular child of its parents, wholly unique, skimmed a short distance along the shore. It stumbled awkwardly as it landed. It was still trying ........

Marmaduke the Multi-coloured Dragon

Jennifer sat up in bed. Something had made a noise. A scratchy, squeezy noise. It was dark and she pulled the duvet a little bit closer under her chin. Mum always told her that nothing – nothing ........

Forever a Stranger*

Once upon a time, long ago and in a land far, far away… There was a young girl who lived in the mansion on the hill, just at the edge of town. Her mother had lived there since before most of the ........

news

BBC Interview

I will be appearing on BBC Radio Norfolk and BBC Radio Suffolk on Saturday 16th April during their 6.00pm- 8.00pm slot. I used to work for the BBC, so I hope this’ll feel like coming home. But bein ........

Poetry open mic night

Thursday 31st March, from 7.00pm onwards. Emma Brookes, AKA The Norfolk Dumpling, is hosting the inaugural open mic night at The Centurion, Ormesby Road, Caister-on-Sea, Norfolk. The pub will host ........

The World Storytelling Cafe Launch

This Sunday, 14th March, The World Storytelling Cafe is hosting an event to tell people about Outside Looking In. If you go to https://worldstorytellingcafe.com/ just before 7.00pm GMT, and click ........

blogs

The ‘life-altering’ diagnosis

The blurb on the back of ‘Outside Looking In’ says “What if you were given a life-altering diagnosis at 57? One that meant you aren’t who you thought you were? But one that explained everything?” ........

The Fear of the Blank Page

Every poet, every author knows this. They may not admit to it – or not in public – but if they’re human they’ll suffer from time to time. Either they’ve got what’s usually called writers’ block, o ........

Where’s the Poet? Or: to ‘be autistic’ or to ‘have autism’?

The first question may sound daft and the second rather pedantic, but they go to the heart of an issue many autistic people and their families wrestle with. If you say ‘I have autism’, it means t ........

contact

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