Tam is living the dream

After leaving school with no qualifications, Tam Samson has now had his first book published. The English teacher told Jack McKeown about his academic renaissance . . .

TO SA Y that becoming a published author is the last thing Tam Samson expected to happen to him would not be an understatement. The 44-year-old grew up in Dundee and left school without much in the way of prospects.

“I was more interested in being a mod and playing in a band than I was in studying,” he says. “I really didn’t do very well at school.”

A fter leaving, he joined a YTS government training scheme. “A lthough you only earned a pittance — around £20 a week I think — I did get a lot out of that,” he continues.

For most of his 20s, Tam worked in a textile mill and then in a printer’s. A ged 29 he decided it was time he caught up on the education he had missed at school.

“I went to college and took Highers in English, history and art,” he says. “I studied music for a while. A nd then I went to study computer arts atA bertay. God knows why I did that — I didn’t even know how to switch a computer on back then.”

Tam’s academic compass was swinging, however: it just had to find true north.

That came when he attended Dundee University, graduating with a degree in English Literature in 2005.

He followed that up with a postgraduate qualification in community education.

“I got a job working for the Community Family Support Project in St Mary’s. It was my first non-industrial job, which was something that at one point I never thought I’d get.”

Tam was then taken on as an English teacher at Dundee College, working part time alongside his community education job.

He completed his second postgraduate qualification, in teaching and further education, and took a creative writing course under Dundee University’s professor of creative writing, Kirsty Gunn.

His first published novel was released earlier this year.

“It’s actually the second book I’ve written,” he clarifies. “But I think that’s quite common. Your first book is your apprenticeship, where you get all the mistakes out of your system.”

My Name is Paul Belardo tells the story of a bipolar sufferer who agrees to an experimental medical trial to treat his disorder.

The resulting schism sees his personality split in two as one part of his psyche detaches and begins its own fractured narrative.

“It’s in the gothic tradition,” explains Tam, who suffers from cyclothymia — a mild form of bipolar disorder. “I kept thinking about Jekyll and Hyde. I’m a big fan of Stevenson and the book also draws from Virginia Woolf.”

Online reviews have drawn comparisons with Irvine Welsh’s classic Trainspotting.

Ta m was invited to read from his book at the Dundee Literary Festival and has started writing a follow-up novel.

My Name is Tom Belardo is published by Legend Press under the name T. J. Samson and available in book shops and on A mazon.

“Sometimes I do have to give myself a shake and check I haven’t dreamed all this,” Tam admits.