Let me finish

‘A rare insight into living with a lifelong stammer’

“…this easily digestible account is an authentic insight into the day to day reality of being a regular person, wanting a regular life, but with speech that is ‘quirky by design’…”

- RCSLT Bulletin book review (4 out of 5 stars)

More than 70 million people worldwide stammer and Paul is one of these people.

Stammering can be all encompassing. It can effect your self esteem, education and career prospects, and Let me finish offers a rare insight into a stammerer’s world.

Paul recounts his life experiences. The highs and the lows, battling other people’s preconceptions, while explaining the intricate and tailored techniques that he applies every day to speak more fluently.

His story is told with a cocktail of sincerity, struggle and joviality. It will make you think, laugh and ultimately change your perspective on what it means to live with a stammer.

Extract from Let me finish:

“… my twenty-year younger self would have collapsed already, thrown that towel in, dripping with resignation, but not me. I pulled on every sinew of my determination, but even that was not enough.

I struggled through, sweaty palms and face; where there was skin, there was sweat.

The four walls of the classroom were closing in and even Indiana Jones would have struggled to escape, and this caused pressure to build throughout my whole body. Some of the words I forced out were unrecognisable, it was that bad. This was not stammering on a word; if a word had two or three syllables it was stammering on every, single, one. I had reached a new personal and deplorable nadir.

After what seemed to be like an eternity, it was over; I even missed bits out, damage limitation came calling. But it mattered not, I passed redemption upon arrival. There would be no curtain call, no encore – not even my worst enemy deserved that - and, in fairness, the remaining time spent in that room was extracted from my memory as soon as I ran for home. Extracted like a surgeon removing a bullet shell from a gunshot victim.”

Let me finish is available on Amazon (paperback or eBook)