We can’t all be Miss Honey and maybe we shouldn’t even try.

By Judith | June 1, 2013

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…

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Censor or suck it up? Racism and children’s books.

By Judith | January 30, 2013

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…

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Australian Women Writers’ Challenge 2013

By Judith | January 12, 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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