By Faith Agbonson
A 28-year-old comic book writer has praised the work of a Leicester charity which helped her embark on her journey to gaining the confidence to achieve her dreams by publishing her first two stories.
Samantha Harris is an artist based in Leicestershire, who has been drawing since 2004, but has struggled with Asperger’s since a young age.
She said this made it difficult for her to socialise as well as to be able to hold down a job once she reached adulthood.
However, in 2017 she came into contact with Soft Touch Arts, a charity based in New Walk, Leicester, after being recommended to them by a friend.
Soft Touch is a charity that aims to educate young people in art, music and textiles by providing life-changing projects to hundreds of them each year.
Founded in 1986, Soft Touch has helped many young people, just like Samantha, who have significant challenges in their lives.
With the support of Soft Touch and The Yes Project, Samantha was able to gain the confidence to publish her comic Gerona Kingdom in 2018.
“If it wasn’t for Soft Touch, I probably wouldn’t be able to look you in the eye right now,” she said.
Samantha now has two comic book stories published, Gerona Kingdom, about a whole world of different cultures under one flag, showing the daily life and events of the different citizens of Gerona.
The other is Twiggle Pets, a story following Piiwy and her friend, Tierro, who go around their neighbourhood running errands for the residents and occasionally encountering trouble on their escapades.
Samantha attributed her inspiration to her various hobbies, such as dragons and playing fighting games.
In addition to creating comics, Samantha is also seeking to branch out into more media forms such as manga and she already produces pins, badges and stickers by hand at home.
You can buy from her shop at https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/skydragonarts and check out her products on her Instagram account at skydragon.arts.
