Like many immigrants, I thought I was extremely privileged to be growing up in two cultures. I thought I could take the best of each, unfortunately, I often experienced the worst of both. Growing up being called names, graffiti on the walls of our house overnight telling us to go back home, being spat on in the street, with the police unwilling to take action back in the 1960’s and ’70s meant I felt the unfairness of it all and an alien from a very young age. I discovered Science Fiction whilst at school and it was wonderful. Growing up with aliens, ‘others’ in the worlds of Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Philip K. Dick, Ursula K. Le Guin, kept me going. Other Severed Souls far from home, just trying to survive. I identify as a British Asian, but it doesn’t matter how I identify myself, I am othered by my own community as too westernised and othered by the host community as the wrong colour to belong. Not British enough… However, what keeps me going is that there some really good and accepting souls in all communities, right across the world. Surely there will be good souls across other worlds too? Since then the excitement and joy of discovering ethnic minority Sci-Fi writers such as as Kazuo Ishiguro and Liu Cixin and so many others still to discover and read.

Abida Akram

This constant feeling like an alien wherever I was has informed my writing and career choices, I have always wanted a better, more inclusive and fairer world.

Writing poetry since I was a child, and short stories more recently, has allowed me to express myself, assert my identity and hopefully take others with me on my journey in this strange and fruitful life.

Check out Abida’s Author’s Page here.