How meeting Clare Balding got me published

Watch any reality TV show and you’ll see a familiar theme. From Britain’s Got Talent to The Voice and Greatest Dancer, all the contestants have one thing in common: they’re all pursuing their dream. Roll the VT and there’s often an emotional montage of the hopeful competitor before their audition. The camera zooms in as they say ‘This has been my dream since I was a child’ followed by a look of determination and optimistic eyes. It’s a line I know all too well. But unlike the faces on the screen, my dream doesn’t involve singing, fame or a record contract. Mine, like many writers, is the dream of being published. Of seeing my words printed in a book. On a shelf. With my name on the spine. A cracked spine that’s been opened again and again, loved and worn out. And more importantly, to see people smile as they read it.

As a copywriter, my work has been published hundreds of times commercially: brochures, websites, scripts and ghost-written articles in magazines and the press. Yet the doors to publishing my children’s stories have always been firmly locked and the rejection letters from editors and agents usually an automated response. Each rejection letter printed and stuck to form a wallpaper collage on my office walls – to spur on my determination. For years I’ve gone to writers’ conferences, to workshops, agent 121s in the hope of a publishing opportunity…where the glimmer of life as an author was in my grasp but still so far away.

So, when the chance to chat to Clare Balding, albeit briefly, at the Leicester Tigers Business Club presented itself – I couldn’t miss it. A respected author, broadcasting legend and advocate of positivity, she was as wonderful in person as she is on screen. Completely genuine, down to earth and approachable – so approach I did. During a 2-minute window for a selfie I asked her if she had any publishing tips for an aspiring children’s author. And her reply was beyond generous. It was life-changing. She gave me the name of a company launching new technology to help children read and mentioned they were looking for children’s writers. I had a name and it fuelled my hope.

As soon as I got back to my office I headed straight to Google. I tracked down the company, emailed the contact and made my introduction. A few emails later and manuscripts were submitted. This time there were no rejections – they wanted to publish my work. Not in a traditional sense of a paperback picture book but as part of a revolutionary digital library supporting schools across the country to help children learn to read. Its name is Fonetti. And it’s the world’s first listening bookshop. Think karaoke with pronunciation more important than pitch, and pictures instead of music and, for me, a greater buzz.

How it works: Schools or individual homes download the Fonetti app to subscribe. Children choose a story from a digital library. The book opens and presents the words like a traditional story…but as the reader pronounces each word, they change colour and one page turns to reveal the next. Readers gain fanfares, badges and rewards as encouragement for completing their books.

Here’s how it helps: One in eleven children in the UK don’t own a book. Shocking statistic isn’t it? But for those with access to a phone or tablet, those figures can shrink.

Contracts were signed, fees were paid and Fonetti’s illustrators brought my words to life. My dream was finally achieved and I was commissioned to write a further story. Playing a small part in a phenomenon that will potentially ignite a love of reading in hundreds of children’s lives is a privilege. But by far the greatest achievement was reading my stories to my little boy, hearing him laugh and ask to ‘read it again mummy’, then telling him mummy wrote it.

I’ll be forever grateful to Clare for her generosity, to Tigers for giving me that chance opportunity and to Fonetti for their library and a platform that a reality show can’t provide (but let’s not give Simon Cowell any ideas!).

And if you’d like to know more about Fonetti – hear it from the lady herself.