October 2022 has been a fairly quiet month in my personal life but in my work life, I secured myself a bit of a promotion and gained even more responsibilities. I also read several books and watched multiple TV series this month.
Disability Horizons
As well as all my usual work at Disability Horizons – writing news stories, featured articles, interviews, shop blogs and editing content – I’ve now been assigned to commission other writers’ work.
It’s crazy to think a decade ago, I was one of those contributing writers offering to write content and hoping I get commissioned. Now I’ve come full circle and I’m now the person commissioning the content.
Another milestone moment was I got to lead our monthly team meeting, which is usually led by our Editor-in-Chief but due to illness, she asked if I could lead instead. It was a daunting prospect but once we all started chatting and ideas started flowing, it was fine.
Here are the articles I published this month:
- Ralph & Katie: a love story about a married couple with Down’s syndrome
- 10 celebrities who live with dyslexia
- Less than 2% of characters in the top UK TV shows are disabled
- 7 accessible activities to enjoy this Halloween
- Deaf actor and advocate Rose Ayling-Ellis recognised as most influential disabled person in Power 100 list 2022
- 10 famous and successful people with Down’s syndrome (commissioned and edited by me)
All my Disability Horizons content is now available to view in one place on the Emma Purcell Author’s page. This link can also be accessed on the “Disability Horizons” button on the menu page on the left of this site.
My featured content, product articles and sponsored posts for Disability Horizons can be viewed in my Journo Portfolio.
To read my latest news stories, interviews and featured articles regularly, as well as browse other content from the rest of the amazing DH team, subscribe to the Disability Horizons newsletter.
Books
I’ve managed to read several books this month. You may remember me mentioning last month that I started reading Killing Eve. Sadly, I had to give in. The chapters were far too long and it kept switching between Villanelle and Eve halfway through the chapters, which was confusing.
Instead, I ended up reading former footballer and broadcaster Alex Scott’s autobiography How (Not) To Be Strong, which I saw her promoting on This Morning.
I felt this book to be the most powerful and moving memoir I have ever read. I learnt so much about Alex’s challenging upbringing and the barriers she faced in her football and media careers. I always thought she was an amazing person before reading her book but now I have even more admiration and love for her.
I was also buzzing to find she managed to squeeze in a final chapter celebrating the Lioness’s victorious win at Euro 2022.
I then read a book called Just By Looking At Him, a fictional story written by Ryan O’Connell, who wrote the Netflix series Special. The story is essentially about a gay guy with cerebral palsy called Elliott who has complicated relationships with men and turns to using a sex worker. He eventually ends up in love with another guy who has CP. I didn’t particularly enjoy this book and found it hard to follow.
The next book I read was How To Survive Family Holidays written by Jack Whitehall and his parents Michael and Hilary. It was full of very funny and awkward stories from their family holidays over the years.
My favourite story was when they had a meal in a Spanish restaurant and Jack went to the toilet for a poo only to find it wouldn’t flush. He decided to do the right thing and let the waiter know.
However, due to the language barrier, Jack mimed to follow him to the toilets, which wasn’t suspicious at all. Jack went to demonstrate the flush wasn’t working but instead it managed to flush. So it looked like Jack was simply showing the waiter that he’d done a poo and was a good boy flushing it – I was in hysterics reading this!
This led me to read Michael Whitehall’s autobiography Backing Into The Spotlight. In this book, he shares stories about his childhood in the 40s and 50s, his career as an agent and his later years on stage and screen with Jack.
The two most interesting things that came out of this book were that Jack was named after Michael’s father and the late Richard Griffiths – one of Michael’s clients and famously played Uncle Vernon in Harry Potter – was Jack’s godfather.
The final book I read this month was Solitaire by Alice Oseman. This book inspired the main characters in the Netflix hit Heartstopper. This is a coming-of-age story about teenage girl Tori who is trying to find purpose in life and maintain friendships.
As it was written by the creator of Heartstopper, I was expecting it to focus on identity and sexuality but it wasn’t totally like that. Despite that, it was a nice bittersweet story. I’m now going to read her next book, Radio Silence.
TV & film
This month I’ve watched several TV series and films. I saw the BBC comedy-drama Ralph & Katie, a story about a married couple with Down’s syndrome. It is a spin-off of the drama The A Word, in which the couple tied the knot in the third series.
Ralph & Katie is a heartwarming, beautiful and funny series. It highlights anyone, no matter their impairment, can fall in love and have fulfilling lives.
Next, I watched the Netflix drama The Midnight Club, which follows a group of eight terminally ill patients at Brightcliffe Hospice, who begin to gather together at midnight to share scary stories and try to unleash secrets behind the hospice. It was suspenseful, thrilling and spinetingling throughout.
The same can be said for the Netflix series Chambers, in which a woman survives a heart transplant and begins to develop different personality traits. She goes on to meet the family of the donor and uncovers the truth of their daughter’s death.
Sadly, there was a cliffhanger but when I searched to see if a second series would happen, I found out it had been axed.
I also watched a few films too. The first was Luckiest Girl Alive, a mystery drama that uncovers the truth about a school shooting in the 90s.
The second was Tick, Tick… BOOM!, a biopic of musical composer Jonathon Larson who wrote the Tony award-winning show Rent. I admit I’ve never heard of him and only ever heard of the show Rent but this was an interesting film and so sad to know he died at the age of 35 and never saw his musicals on Broadway.
Lastly, as it is Halloween weekend, I watched Disney’s Hocus Pocus for the first time ever. No idea why I’ve never seen it but since the sequel was released, I’ve seen lots of people rave about it. So, I decided to see what the fuss is all about.
To be honest, it was a nice family-friendly film and it was good for its time but I wasn’t ecstatic about it.
Audio Description petition
My campaign for audio description has continued throughout October 2022 and the petition has now gained an outstanding total of 3560 signatures, which is incredible!
But I’m eager to reach thousands. The more signatures we get, the more likely changes could be made within the TV & films industries. Please, please, PLEASE continue to sign & share my petition!
Guest Bloggers Wanted
I’m still eager to collaborate with even more bloggers in 2022. So, if you’re a lifestyle, disability and/or music blogger, send me your blog stories. Plus let me know if you’d like me to feature on your blog as a guest blogger.
I’m flexible with any type of blog post; life story, disability awareness, music event, musician promotion – basically anything to do with life, disability or music!
In addition, I have a guest blog series called “RFD Question Time with…” where I interview disabled people and/or bloggers. If you’d like to be interviewed in this series, please also contact me.
Blog post roundup
In case you missed any of my blog posts this month, here is a roundup of them:
- Music Interview: Cthulhu Dreamt
- Loneliness can be the greatest challenge with a disability
- 15 songs that motivate me
5 favourite blog posts
Here are my 5 favourite blog posts I’ve read this month:
- Disabled Expectations Among Other Things at From My Window
- Lost village 2022 Accessibility review at The Life Quadriplegic
- Reframing independence at Chloe Tear
- The Social Care System: Part 1 at Brains on Wheels
- How To Overcome Sadness at New Lune
