Girl Up by Laura Bates is an extraordinary book. It’s a book I wish had existed when I was a teenager. It’s a book I want to buy for all the teenagers I know. It’s a book I want to give out to my colleagues at school, especially those with a direct responsibility for the welfare of our girls. It’s powerful, necessary and insightful.
It’s also bloody funny. In amongst educating her reader about media representation of women, the female anatomy and the evils of social media, Bates made me laugh out loud repeatedly. If the dancing vaginas in the inside cover aren’t hilarious enough, there’s brilliant commentary on the women who have made waves in the past; from eighteenth century Frenchwoman Emilie du Chatelet “having zero fucks to give” for Voltaire’s childishness, to Hillary Rodham “having not one solitary fuck to give” when she was told that NASA was not interested in recruiting female astronauts, Bates uses historical detail and one of my favourite phrases to move the reader in a number of ways. Sometimes even the chapter headings felt like things I should have tattooed on my body: “It’s My Face and I’ll Smile If I Want To,” I’m looking at you.
Although Girl Up is ostensibly aimed at younger women, it’s a book that will resonate with all of us. Unless, somehow, you are a woman who has never been catcalled, or patronised, or suffered mansplaining, or been told you shouldn’t do something because you’re a girl, or critiqued for what you’re wearing. As founder of the Everyday Sexism project (and author of the excellent book of the same name), Laura Bates is well placed to tap into the universal experiences of being a woman. She writes in a way that embraces the reader rather than alienating, even if they happen to be male; I’d love to think that men would read this book and find out something they didn’t know or hadn’t realised.
I was impressed by Bates on paper, but I was blown away by her in person. I was lucky enough to get a ticket to hear her talk about Girl Up at the Ilkley Literature Festival in a sold-out room packed with women from the age of 11 all the way up to their grandmothers. I also spotted at least three men in the room.
Bates began by talking about how she came to set up the Everyday Sexism project and how this ultimately led to the writing of Girl Up; in a position of influence after the project attracted comments from over 100,000 women worldwide, she found herself invited to visit schools and shocked by what she heard on those visits. What I find most inspiring about Laura Bates is that she saw something that she felt needed to change and she’s trying to enact that change; from lobbying the government to add sex and relationships education to the curriculum, to supporting the establishing of feminist societies in schools, she’s a wonderful advocate for human rights. Yes, a lot of those rights apply specifically to women, but she does not neglect men in her discussion. When asked what three changes she’d make if she replaced Theresa May as PM, she responded that she’d ratify the Istanbul convention (something I’d never heard of before she spoke about it), enact the legislation on sex and relationships education and, crucially, change the law on paternal leave and flexible working, to protect and advance the rights of fathers who wish to take time off work after the birth of a child.
In addition to my own, much Post-It-ed copy of Girl Up, I have bought and already lent out another copy to keep at school. I feel really strongly that this is a book which needs to find its way into the hands of all humans, starting with teenage girls who need to hear Bates’ voice.
Ryan Graudin’s Blood for Blood gave me no such angst, because it’s the second in a duology; while I still maintain that this is not actually a word, it is a concept I approve of, because my legendary impatience means trilogies (or worse) give me nightmares. Blood for Blood is the sequel to the superlative Wolf by Wolf, which the author pitched as “The Man in the High Castle meets X-Men,” and if that doesn’t make you want to read it then we can’t be friends. I’m teaching Wolf by Wolf at the moment and I think it’s even better the second time around. Blood for Blood carries on right where its predecessor left off; I won’t actually elaborate on that in case you haven’t read Wolf by Wolf but, seriously, if this is the case, what is wrong with you? I read Blood for Blood in two sittings and was emotionally scarred by the end; it’s a really excellent book with plenty of action and, excitingly, a lot more character development. I loved it.
I also read A Torch Against the Night, Sabaa Tahir’s sequel to An Ember in the Ashes, in September: a large chunk of this reading took place when I was struck down with a massive cold and it was a weirdly suitable literary companion to my suffering. It’s funny how reading about people being tortured and killed makes you feel better about sneezing a lot. As with Graudin’s books, these follow straight on from each other, with Torch focusing on Laia’s mission to save her brother (I don’t think this is a spoiler because this comes from pretty much the first chapter of Ember). All the hideous villains are back and they’re even more villainous than before, and, in the absence of Ember’s superbly creepy setting, many more sinister locations add a sense of horror to Tahir’s writing. I really like this series but have one serious complaint; there are two more books to come (YAY) but the next won’t be out until 2018. Unless I have slept for a year – and it doesn’t feel like that – this involves me waiting and remembering a plot for over a year and I just can’t even talk about how sad that makes me.
A hugely anticipated sequel and the conclusion to another duology, Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo, the follow-up to the magnificent Six of Crows, came out at the end of September. This involved the most intense Google-assisted revision as it turned out I remembered about 8% of what happened in the first book. So that was fun. What struck me about Crooked Kingdom was that it was bloody hilarious; I was chuckling and, at times, guffawing, until things got serious towards the end. Was Six of Crows this funny? I can’t remember, but I’m inclined to say ‘no.’ Interestingly, I’ve read Shadow and Bone in between Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom and am astounded by the difference; the earlier books seem positively adolescent compared to the duology. Also, warning: if you’re planning on reading the original Grisha trilogy and don’t want to be spoiled, be aware that Crooked Kingdom drops some serious spoilers which have made me feel like I probably don’t need to bother with the second half of Ruin and Rising or Siege and Storm. Crooked Kingdom is excellent; it gave me several emotions, sometimes all at the same time, and I was actually quite sad to think that there isn;t another book to come.
Obviously, I can’t avoid mentioning Empire of Storms, the millionth book in Sarah J. Maas’ Throne of Glass series. It was really long. Nothing really happened for about 600 pages and then suddenly it was ACTION THINGS HAPPENING OH LOOK SOME MORE CHARACTERS YOU DON’T REMEMBER. I haven’t read the novellas so there were a few moments when I felt like I was meant to be excited about the appearance of some random person but actually I had no idea who they were. In other news, this was the first time I have cared about Manon, so well done, S.J.M. Still hate Rowan. Glad that thing they’ve been talking about since the dawn of time finally happened. Felt slightly uncomfortable reading about it. You know what I mean. Also where was you-kn0w-who-I-mean-if-you’ve-read-it? That was not okay with me. How many more of these books do I have to read? Please tell me it’s one. And that it’s 8 pages long.
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