Posts by Judith
Whither the Children’s Book? From the Vault: Wednesday, June 15 2011
This post was first published in June 2011, but it’s as relevant as the day I wrote it. Just this weekend, in fact, I read a review which described Neil Gaiman‘s Fortunately, The Milk, as being for ‘the younger end of the YA readership’. Um, no. That would be CHILDREN. Remember them? They’re not mini-teenagers.…
Read MoreMissing Drafts: Four novels for older children
First published in Australian Book Review September 2003 Justin D’Ath Infamous, Archimedes Fusillo An Earful of Static, Sue Lawson Ferret Boy, Kierin Meehan Night Singing Kierin Meehan’s Hannah’s Winter was one of the most promising débuts in some time. Her second novel, the ambitious Night Singing, attests to Meehan’s importance as a new writer for the…
Read MoreRemote Man by Elizabeth Honey
I’ve always thought of the years between nine and twelve to be a kind of “golden age” of reading, and yet for at least the past decade, some of the loudest grumblings about contemporary Australian children’s publishing have been about the dearth of substantial, complex and challenging literature for this readership. Program notes for a…
Read MoreSecret Scribbled Notebooks by Joanne Horniman
Secret Scribbled Notebooks by Joanne Horniman Published in Viewpoint: On Books for Young Adults vol. 12 no. 3 Spring 2004 The title of Joanne Horniman’s Secret Scribbled Notebooks comes from Jack Kerouac ‘s “Rules of Modern Prose” from Good Blonde and Others. The full quote refers to “secret scribbled notebooks and wild typewritten pages, for your…
Read MoreThrilled Me, Silenced Me, Stilled Me
Sinead O’Connor has been in the press again today (October 2013), kicking up a stink, alienating people left, right and centre, as she is wont to do. It put me in mind of this piece I wrote back when I saw her in concert in Sydney in 2008. I’m not ashamed to say I wept…
Read MoreWe can’t all be Miss Honey and maybe we shouldn’t even try.
I got a little bit cranky on Twitter tonight. Oh, that’s nothing unusual. Twitter is kind of designed to make you cranky—indeed, that’s why many people, it seems to me, seek it out. Me, I usually retreat when I start to feel my blood pressure rise. Emotional equilibrium is pretty precious to me, and I’m…
Read MoreNotes from the Teenage Underground by Simmone Howell
From the Vault: Originally published on October 23 2006 at the old Misrule /s9y blog site (here). Note that not all the links from the original post remain live. Simmone has just published her third novel, Girl Defective, which I also really loved, and there’s a a recent interview with her here. My review copy…
Read MoreCensor or suck it up? Racism and children’s books.
There’s a story on the Huffington Post today about a young girl, Ishema Kane, in Germany who wrote to the newspaper, outraged at their defence of racist language in children’s books—specifically, Pippi Longstocking. As letters of outrage go, it’s pretty fabulous. I especially love this bit: “I find it totally shit that this word would…
Read MoreIt’s up!
My 2012 round-up of Australian children’s books by women writers, at the Australian Women Writers Challenge website. Read it here. Thanks!
Read MoreAustralian Women Writers’ Challenge 2013
Happy New Year! If you’ve been reading Misrule over the years, you will know that I have frequently written about the imbalance in awards for women writers of young adult fiction in this country. I’ve not been alone in this concern—mostly focusing on the remarkable consistency with which the CBCA Older Readers Awards have recognised…
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