Q: Hello RK And Reb, how are you today?

Strangely nervous and nervously strange.

Q: Thank you for joining us and sharing a little more about yourself with the Wattpad universe. First off, shall we talk about you and writing? When did you first start writing?

RK:  I wrote some stories for my daughter lets call her Trixy, The Clockwork princess and Captain Kitty Hawk & the Sky Pirates. Then couple of false starts but it was really never before the workshop.

Reb: Before the workshop, never so August 2015.

Q: Workshop?

RK: Yeh we both attended a workshop for adults with dyslexia.

Reb: I don't think I would call me an adult.

RK: But you could play one on television.

RK: The workshop was where we met. It was partly about checking out dyslexic technology and partly about gaining confidence. They showed us Wattpad in the workshop - you can hack it to get the machine to read to you. . As a kid I had spent two summers reading Lord of the Rings it took me about 18 months. I read for as long as I could every day. I was really disappointed in the end. I'm like 18 months of my life for that? Wattpad was a liberation for me. I'm able to read stories using assistive technology I love 'reading' I can't get enough.

So we started cyborg's pet as an exercise I don't think either of us could even dream of writing a book before the workshop. We write and let our imaginations run free, on wattpad,we are equal to other people, which when it comes to writing is a new experience for us. I don't have to apologise or feel terrified, or rely on others to 'sanction' my writing, so writing with out guilt is a kind of wonderful existence, it's like floating.

Reb: Yeh wattpad for me is like being let out of jail.

Q: What are your writer's best practices – doing character profiles, maps, visualization, tai chi, anything?

Reb: We don't know anything about best practices, we don't know anything about how to write properly.

RK: People ask about our collaborative process.

Reb: We wrote the first four chapters out in the lesson. We use all sorts of accessibility software so it was quite quick. When people started to read the book we took a piece of A3 paper drew what should happen on it. Each chapter begins with RK sketching out what should happen by the end of the chapter - Jenny goes for a job interview and get's shot. Then I (Reb) take over and start writing. We let Jenny do the talking.

RK: Then I get Reb's word document and get rid of all the smut, swearing, we call that the de-minxed version. It's normally pretty funny. I add in the science fiction stuff, special effects, add some more jokes.

Reb: I get the de-minxed version and then add all the stuff RK deleted back in. I get rid of RK's jokes, add some more jokes in.

RK: We then read it to each other over skype: If it's doesn't get a laugh it get's deleted. I add in references to other Scifi as we go.

Reb: We let it sit for a week - you get ideas so you can go and add them in.

RK: Then I re-read, check for consistency and stuff. Basically if it isn't funny or doesn't push the plot forward it goes. We run it through a battery of spelling and grammar checkers then read it before pressing the publish button. The minutes before publishing are when some of the best jokes come.

Q: When and in what setting do you write best?

Reb: In bed on a sunday morning. I can't write with people around I feel self conscious dictating to a machine with other people around.

Q: Is there anything in particular you find difficult to write about?

Reb: School, Suffering, dyslexia, spelling tests.

Q: What piece of advice has been most helpful to you since you started?

RK: Definitely #Justwrite it. Stop worrying. Run, be free let the page take you were it want's. You have to balance that with a little light planning. Know your ending and be able to answer the question how does what I write push to the end.

Reb: Don't be precious. It might take a couple of hours to write but if it's wrong its OK to delete it. Try something different. We did the torture sequence a few ways to get it right (i.e funny).

Q: What do you enjoy writing of having written?

Reb: Writing it's very funny. We laugh most at what we write.

Q: That's cool! And what about reading? What three genres do you read the most?

Comix, Science fiction, Teen. Depends if I'm reading reading or getting the machine to read to me and following along. One of the problems for most dyslexic readers is the difference between reading and interest age. Very little is pitched right, Harry potter was good.

Q: Is there anything you think of that you would love to read, only it hasn't been written yet?

Well there is a lot I would like to read but there are no speech enabled versions of it. To answer the question literally - it would have to be some thing which was written for someone with a reading age of an 8 year old but with an intreats age of a 28 year old, but with lots of plot twists.

Q: What book could you not put down under any circumstances?

RK: Possibly one which said 'if you put this book down it will detonate'. Most non fiction is pretty page turning. There was a book on lambda calculus which was pretty good. I know - From Hell by Alan Moore. There is a scene where the central evil character uses the city to seduce this man into being his evil minion.

Reb: Empowered by Adam Warren. It's funny and sexy.

Q: And, I know the readers would really appreciate this, tell us what inspired you to write your book on Wattpad?

Well it was the workshop supervisor. He said 'write something on Wattpad. Never never never reveal your identity. This is not you who is writing. It's OK not to be your self. Don't worry about the spelling and the grammar, let the hardware and software handle that.

Q: Can you describe it in three words ( and don't be modest)?

RK: The workshop? Life changing disenthrallment.

Q: Which character is the total fan favourite? Why do you think that is?

Jenny Banks/5642 she clearly the fan favourite - she's sassy and uncrushable. She's like a sassy version of Voltaire's Candied

Q: Talk about fan, can you quote one comment on your book which you will never forget? Please include *SPOILER* if it contains amor revelations from the story line.

RK We do have a lot of cool comments the 'This story is basically word cocaine' worked for me.

Reb: For me it had to be "I have been enjoying this book so much I use the words in my normal everyday life. Today, I stubbed my toe and screamed kcuf."

Kcuf is one of the swear words we invented in the book.

Q: What is your favourite thing about being active on Wattpad?

RK: That's so easy. Talking to fellow followers. Talking with people who are new. The comments people make are so funny or so insightful and make you think about your own book in a new way.

Reb: The jokes are very funny, I so love the way people get the idea.

Q: If you had to mention one Undiscovered Gem of a story or writer on Wattpd, who would it be and why?

RK: There are so so many. I'm going to pick my favourite @KaranSeraph she's a genius. The Iron Man is ludicrously inventive.

Reb: @BannedBook Candide it's actually by Voltaire. I listened to that on Wattpad and thought that's what writing should be about pushing your pedal to the floor and roll you book full speed at a wall and see who blinks first you or the brick wall. If I could get a book banned "because it contained religious blasphemy, political sedition and intellectual hostility" then I would write it.

Q: How do you work on your writing style and how do you develop it?

Reb: We start by ignoring the rules. If someone does invent a rule we like to bend it or break it.

RK: So for example someone said the problem with first person fiction is you can't have an element of danger your character is unaware of. You can't have your character quietly standing by a bomb unaware while it ticks, because your reader only knows what the character knows.

Reb: So in cyborg's pet, we have these packets of soylent green. Anyone who knows any Science fiction or has access to google or comments knows Soylent green is people meat. Jenny our main character doesn't know this so she can go 'oh soylent green that meat looks lovely I'll have that later', rule broken.

Secondly we look at the numbers very closely. Pages with low reads indicate that something needs to be done. We change it and if the reads improves we learn, if not we undo it and try again until it changes. For example we got someone to proof read the first few chapters. From this we discovered that good spelling and grammar get's you about 10% extra reads. So the number of people who give up after chapter 1 for bad spelling is tiny unlike what the classic writing advice tells you. The good news is if you proof the first 7 chapters the really picky grammar/spelling natzis KEEP reading the non proofed chapters. Oh we laughed when we found that out.

Reb: We do feel very sorry for them we have a few very dedicated fan's who have gone through the whole book to point out every error. We are going through the book correcting when we can.

RK: Yeh if anyone said either of us could take criticism of our spelling/grammar like this before the workshop I wouldn't have believed it.

Reb: Yeh in real life I've punched people who did that. I've lost friends that way.

Q: Is coming up with a title a difficult task?

For cyborg's pet no - when we noticed I'm a Vampire's pet, I'm a Werewolf's pet, I'm a Billionaire's pet, I'm the devil's pet, were all high in the charts but nothing in SciFi.

Our next book 'Skype girl: Murder in the ashes of new York' started with the title as did The Cyborg's daughter which is a teen compatible version of cyborg's pet.

Q: Whats has been you favourite part of any of your projects to write?

Reb: Chapter 67/Him/A Game of Drones or Truculent pets at Stellavista

We got started and it got funnier and funnier. In the end we had to stop the skype call or just die laughing. God knows what my mum thought I was doing.

RK: Yeh if that chapter got any funnier it would have to be banned under the geneva convention. For me it was Chapter 66/Him/Sorry my aircraft flew into your brain and set it on fire.

Reb: Yeh that was classic Jenny. Starts with a big feminist statement, a boy get's attacked by a robot and saved by another robot who then blames the boy victim for being dressed so provocatively. Which was a nice rosie the riveter statement then main character takes his revenge, you get to see Rockwood's mean evil/sarcastic side which is hilarious.

RK:Yeh your right. Everyone loves that chapter. I want to change my answer.

Reb: It's my answer keep off.

Q: Where are you from ?

RK: The United Kingdom

Reb: Not saying - you'all

Q: Did either of you ever feel like writing wasn't for you anymore and wanted to stop?

Reb: Not yet, perhaps when the fan's realise a book got to number #1 in the SciFi hot and stated in The top 10 for 9 weeks was written by a couple of people who's average reading age doesn't hit double digits we fully expect them to revolt.

RK: Well our life experience teaches us to expect that. I think people on wattpad are different. I'm fully convinced that when they find out they will think hey if a couple of people from the remedial education unit can do this then heck so can I. I think they will find it quite liberating and empowering.

Reb: you hold people in optimistically high regard RK.

RK: Not people Reb, wattpad people, I think they are smarter, less judgemental people than people classic. Our readers on wattpad always come over as witty, insightful, I could throw in another bunch of words here but I won't. We were waiting until the book ends before coming out about the whole dyslexia thing. I'm fairly sure our readership won't drop. If it does then I'm not sure I want dyslexic hating gramma nazi's reading our work.

Q: What was your hardest chapter to write and why?

RK: Chapter 3 of cyborg's pet: we began were 1984 left off with the main character being tortured. A funny torture sequence required a lot of work. It was in, was out then in and out then we made it funny enough and it was in.

Reb: what he said.

Q: How can you start a story well so that it pulls the reader in and keeps them hooked till the end?

This is our first book, that could be a fluke. Come back if we have a second successful book. I'm not sure what to do but I know what not to do - don't use a cliff hanger they are toxic, we found that putting the main character in jeopardy between chapters was a real kiss of death.

Q: What is one thing about writing nobody told you about?

That grammar and spelling don't make a story. People make a story.

Q: Is there anything that you wish you could go back in your story and change?

Reb: Most people decided that when the two main characters finally got up to admitting they actually like each other people would think the book was over. Actually it was just a high point. Getting the momentum back has been hard work.

RK: chapter 45 safe word. We had to delete it. It was really really funny but only 50% of people get the joke. A book should never talk down to its readers to it had to go. More importantly it was out of step with the characters. We learnt a huge amount from that chapter. We also learnt what is wonderful about Wattpad is how forgiving the readers can be.

Q: Have you considered publishing paper copies of your books?

Reb: My mum would swell with pride and explode. All those years wiping the vomit off me the day of a spelling test at school vindicated.

RK: The cognitive dissidence for your boss/doctors would kill them. Still most dyslexic authors don't come out until they die. Agatha Christie, F Scott Fitzgerald.

Reb: What about Richard Branson?

RK: Yeh he's out but the word is he's not an author.

Reb: that would explain it.

RK: The problem is we wrote Cyborg's pet from day 1 as a wattpad novel. Weekly publishing, responding to comments, small chapters, POVs. We wanted readers input all along. If it was a book we would edit down, it would be like doing a film of cyborg's pet. It would be cyborg's pet but just an image of it. People would be going well the printed book is OK but the original wattpad novel is better.

Reb: On the plus side may be the publishers would give us the $3,000 dollars you were quoted to proof the whole book. Which would be quite cool. Could we have a printed version with a selection of the best comments in ? I like the comments some are really funny.

RK: I like the notion of doing a radio/pod cast play. Like in the nightvale. That would work.

Q: How did you start off your stories ? Did they end up turning out to be different from what you originally expected and had in store of them?

RK: How to start off a story, I guess it's very easy, start with the ending. Then keep going backwards in time until you reach a character on his or her own, then stop. We don't know what will happen precisely in a chapter. We drop the main character Jenny in the situation at the beginning and see how it develops. So in one respect the book ends up exactly the way we intended. On the other hand we are constantly being surprised by whats happening.

Q: What's your guilty pleasure TV Show?

Reb: Highlander, well it was on TV I think. I'm not sure the last time I watched television.

RK: I will confess a certain weakness for Ted talks. It's not quite TV, I know Horizon, Doctor Who, The Clangers.

Q: And to finish off, I am going to ask you two more personal questions, but don't worry I won't dig too deep:

1. If you had to get and do one of these three things right now, which would you go for?

Bungee jumping,

singing in front of 1000 people

running a marathon

RK: Well for me it would have to be singing in front of 1000 people. I have sung in front of 1000 people, well more than thousand at University. I did music once, err shall we say before an incident, let's say, meaning I had to stop. I composed and performed the piano music on chapter 38 Breakfast at his feet. Probably too Michel Nyman for most people. Not to sure I would like to play 'Breakfast at his feet' right now without a week to practice.

2. If you had to live one year without one of the three things below, which would you pick?


a. Chocolate


b. Ice-Cream


c. Coffee

Reb: Not Chocolate that for sure. Ice-Cream probably. Ice Cream was my goto substance for retreating from a particularly bad day at school with to many red underlines on my writing. Recently I printed out 11 pages of some of the great comments people have left on Cyborg's pet in a tiny book form. I have it hidden in my bag. Instead of retreating to a ladies and crying in a stall if someone one says something cutting about my spelling or handwriting. I retreat to the ladies pull out my book and read everything people have said. It's better than ice-cream, it gives me the fight to carry on. Oh this is getting too emotional, I have to stop now.