by Jo Franklin, children’s author

I was talking to someone the other day about all the different things I have been doing in preparation for the launch of Help I’m an Alien and I described myself as a multi-tasking author, but when I looked up multi-tasking I realised that it isn’t a totally accurate description. I do multi-tasking all the time – talking on the phone while typing an email etc. The frenetic activity over the last few weeks has been something on another level. Not only am I doing, but I am also learning as I go along.

I think I am a trainee polymath. I looked up polymath on vocabulary.com and this is what it said

A polymath is a person who knows a lot about a lot of subjects. If your friend is not only a brilliant physics student but has also published a poetry collection and won prizes at political debates, you can describe her as a polymath.

I’m not brilliant at anything, but I am giving it a go. Here are some things I have been doing over the last few weeks.

• Website designer – I’ve been jazzing up my website in case you hadn’t noticed
• Illustration consultant – I’m in the lucky position of being consulted on the cover and illustrations for Help I’m an Alien (not all authors are). I can’t draw at all. My stick people look like discarded false eyelashes. But I can imagine what something should look like that and I have been sharing those imaginings with the designer and illustrator for Help I’m an Alien.

• Film director – This is my first video. It has three parts : the alien jumping trailer, the main bit of me reading and the credits. Luckily I had some help from my children who have learned camera work at school.
• Camera operator – I didn’t do much of this but I need to operate the camera myself in future. (And edit the film. So much to learn.)
• Blogger – I’ve written loads of blog posts, for this site, for www.paperspenspoets.co.uk the stationery site Anita Loughrey and I set up recently, for Girls Heart Books (not only as a guest blogger but now as a regular monthly contributor) and for various other book bloggers including one in America who wanted me to talk about the US edition of Alien which is published by Clarion Books. I find it so boring  when an actor is promoting their new film and tells exactly the same stories to every chat show host. So I have tried to vary my blog posts as much as possible, which makes writing so many, even more challenging.
• Doing stuff with images  – don’t ask me what. I don’t have Photoshop. I don’t know what I am doing but I am trying to do things with images to make my website, twitter and instagram look interesting. I need to learn more about using images and graphics, I’m stumbling through a the moment and it is all a bit random. Because I am so hopeless I liaised with Lou Millar who designed these for me.

• Travel agent – have you ever tried booking multiple train tickets at a reasonable cost in this country? Total nightmare.
• Writer – yes I have been doing some of this too because even though I am deep in promotion for Help I’m an Alien, I am also writing another book. No one can publish it if it isn’t finished. It’s not even in the right state to show it to my agent yet. It’s a great book. I want to write it.

So while I’m not an expert at any of these things I am having a jolly good try at all of them and probably a few more that I have forgotten about in the frenzy of my day.

The other thing it says about polymath in vocabulary.com is

You can think of a polymath as a classic “Renaissance man.” Imagine Leonardo da Vinci, for example, who was not only an amazing artist, but also an engineer, inventor, mathematician, and much more. When a person’s knowledge covers many different areas, he or she is a polymath. The Greek word for it is polymathes, “having learned much,” with poly meaning “much,” and manthanein meaning “learn.

Here that author friends? We are the modern equivalent of Leonardo da Vinci!

I wonder what he would have made of Help I’m an Alien?

I’d probably have been burned at the stake in the 15^th Century for my crazy ideas.

Thank goodness I’m a 21^st Century author. I like learning new things. It’s a challenge, but brilliant.