Sunday Update: Life, &c

Good morning, everyone. I imagine some of you will be recovering from the Readathon today — sadly I couldn’t take part this time around, as it fell on a weekend when I had to work. I can’t really complain, though, because yesterday work involved hosting a visit from two brilliant authors who made the kids in my reading group extremely happy (and me as well). Also, there are other exciting work things happening that I’ll get to be directly involved in: school visits, a local picture book award ceremony, a children’s book festival, and a fancy dress event celebrating 150 years of Alice in Wonderland (I’ll get to be the Queen of Hearts!).

I always want to tell you about these things in as much detail as I tell you about all the bookish events I go to in a non-professional capacity, but at the same time, I want to keep the current disconnect between my library and blogging identities as it is. In a way this is a hindrance to my professional development, but experience has shown it to be necessary. You might have noticed that I’m always a bit vague even when I post pictures and the like — this is not to be annoyingly coy, but because there are well-documented drawbacks to how exposed you are as a woman working in a busy public space. Obviously I don’t think this is inevitable; it’s simply a result of how the world is currently organised. But for as long as it remains the case, I have to find ways to manage the vulnerabilities of having a visible online presence, especially in a space where I’ve been fairly open for over eight years now. Not using my last name and being vague about my location are not things that would necessarily hold up to close scrutiny, but they do give me some peace of mind. All this to say: it frustrates me not to tell you more about my library work, especially as it’s a big part of my life these days and it touches on things readers of this blog are likely to be interested in, but so far I haven’t found a way to do it and continue to feel safe online.

In other life news, I’ve been out and about quite a lot this month — my parents came to visit me and we had a really nice day out in London, which was when I took the picture above. The weather has been mostly good, I’m cycling to work again, and every day I’m reminded that as unlikely as this feels around mid-January, spring and summer do come again. Speaking of summer, much of last week was devoted to making travel plans. I’ve already mentioned that this year I’ll get to go back to Edinburgh and catch the last few days of the Fringe and Book festivals; in addition to that, at the end of September I’m going to Barcelona and Madrid for a week (a week split between the two places, that is; sadly not a week in each). I’ve never been before, so if you have any tips as to what to see, especially bookish places, I’d absolutely love to hear them.


Spring!
Reading-wise, I’m halfway through Elizabeth Wein’s Black Dove, White Raven and haven’t picked it up in a week — not because it’s not a good book but because my attention has been all over the place. But I look forward to going back to it, as well as to all the exciting book releases May has in store for us. Frances Hardinge’s The Lie Tree! Naomi Novik’s Uprooted! I can’t wait. May also marks the end of the TBR dare for me, which... I guess I’ll have to update you about that. Expect a post of shame in the near future.

The Wire progress report: still love it; kind of want to write about representations of masculinity in the series even though I’m sure there are already a million things out there much smarter and better written than anything I could come up with.

I’ll leave you with a few links I’ve been meaning to share:

A very good post on a topic forever close to my heart: How do we get more boys reading? (Clue: ‘boy books’ aren’t the answer.):

The idea that boys need gender specific books accepts and reinforces all the same old assumptions about boys and girls – that gender dictates personality and interests. How many examples of girls who love football or boys who love fashion do we need before people stop telling children that these are boys or girls things?
Would adding the words ‘For Boys’ to the front of a book really make a boy who’s interested in, say, robots, be any more likely to pick it up than if it said ‘for Roboteers’? Targeting by interest is surely a more logical approach that excludes no-one and also encourages children of different genders to appreciate shared interests.
(…)
Labelling a book ‘for boys’ doesn’t only exclude girls. There are many ways to be a boy. What about the reluctant boy reader who likes ballet? Where might he find a book that isn’t pink and sparkly and screams ‘for girls’? And as Mark Jennett asks, “Why don’t people worry more about the reluctant girl reader who is more interested in dinosaurs than princesses but is constantly informed by books in the library that dinosaurs are not for her?”

On the off chance you’re not tired of hearing me go on about Carol Danvers, I wrote a post for Book Bloggers International about my favourite female characters in comics. Guess who makes an appearance?

Last Carol link, I promise: Pre-Schoolers meet Captain Marvel. D’awwww.

Report finds UK books world has marginalised and pigeonholed ethnic minorities.

This year’s Tiptree Award winners, honour list, and long list have been announced! As you might remember, I adored My Real Children; I need to read The Girl on the Road soon.