photo by Tereza Verenca
Kim Block of Burnaby, BC has appeared in the media recently promoting her delightful book about a young girl who stutters, "Stuttering Superhero". The local paper Burnaby Now features Kim in an article, where she says her main impetus for writing the book was due to the fact that “Stuttering is not talked about at all. There’s still so much misinformation out there.”
Earlier this year when Kim offered to read aloud to a group of Grade One students, they began asking her about her stuttering. A book seemed to her the best way to answer questions kids might have about the issue and encourage empathy towards other kids who stutter.
Block, who remembers going to speech therapy at the age of four, said her own childhood was stressful.
“You’re afraid of talking. You’re stressed out when you’re talking, and you’re stressed out when you’re not talking. … I felt very much like an observer and not a participant,” she explained.
Throughout high school, she recalls being convinced she was going to be homeless.
“It made no sense to me why I would go to a job interview. Let’s say five people apply to a job, four other people can talk absolutely fine. Why on earth would they hire me?” she said.
As well as being a published author, today Kim is a working mom who lives in Burnaby with her two kids and husband, David, who also stutters. Fun fact: they met through the Canadian Stuttering Association!
Kim was also recently interviewed by a local radio host, Kirk Lapointe, for Roundhouse Radio Vancouver. You can listen to it here. For more information about the book and to purchase, visit the Stuttering Superhero website.