The late 1980’s in Ireland was a challenging place. It was hard to find employment and opportunities were few and far between. So it was, that like so many of my generation, immediately on graduation I emigrated in search of work and opportunities.
 
I found them aplenty in London – my teaching experience opened the door to my first job in educational publishing and the rest, as they say, is history*…
 
Then a few years ago, after almost 30 years living and working in the UK,
I decided to return to Ireland.

We had lived next door to our wonderful neighbours, the Rehman family,  for almost 16 years, so we told them about our intended move. We had known Atif and Shamila since they were children.

Atif was now married to the lovely Safra and they had two wonderful children. Afif said the family would like to buy our house so he and his family could continue to live in the neighbourhood, and right next to his mother and sister.

That made everything SO easy and the family were exceptionally kind to us in the weeks coming up to our move. Safra and Atif’s mom, Rubina, cooked for us, which was both delicious and so helpful.

The local council, on the other hand – argh!!!
Our houses as you can see, are right on the street, so we had to get a permit for the removal van to park on the street outside for a few hours as it would restrict the street to one lane.

Reader, we woke up the morning of the move to discover that the council had ALSO given a permit to the development opposite to connect utilities that same day – and they’d gotten the upper hand by putting out bollards and signs, restricting the road to one lane (the one we had permission to park in - we needed to park in the area marked with the x).

They even had a sign directing traffic to use the (only) lane outside!

Rescheduling for another day was not an option as the movers had already booked a place on the ship to Ireland!
 
As Tom Waites wisely says,
 ‘the large print giveth and the small print taketh away’

and we were extraordinarily blessed with the young man who drove the enormous removals van. I have never seen anything like it, so readers, I present to you Hunts – who parked on a  dime and saved the day!

Snug!!!!!

There was something poetic about coming back by ship… though our little cat didn’t like the journey one bit and howled from a few miles outside Slough for the 18 hours it took us to drive through England, Wales and across Ireland to Kerry. (There's a whole separate blog about her journey!)

The contrast could not have been more stark – here’s our removals van arriving (our stuff was in storage for a few months while we renovated our new home) and parking in a huge place where locals stored their boats in winter!

Then we started the process of settling in...
I revelled in the abundant berry harvest from the hedgerows around the house - perfect for with my morning yoghurt!

And the journey to the first conference I attended was a little different too - no more M4... which is not to say no more conjestion - but traffic calming measures in Waterville are furrier!

I also set up my office and got back to work...

I learned quite a lot from the move and it's all gone into my new book.
Click on the cover to find out more, and here for moving tips.

So, when I was VERY little (I was riding my little trike in the kitchen, so I'm guessing about 2), my mother had a very simple game she used to play with me.
I say 'game' but I suspect it was a way to get five minute's peace (I seem to have spent my early years talking, singing constantly and asking questions).

So my mother's game was to pretend to give me money and send me shopping.

I would then cycle off down the hall and go in one or more of the bedrooms 'buying' whatever it was I'd been sent off to get.
​
I would then return and reel off the various messages I'd 'bought' (we pretended they were on the back of my trike) and I would be asked for the change - which I would count out into Mammy's hand.

I was telling my friends David and Levy about this at the weekend and they sent me the lovely photos of their little Huxley not just playing the original game, but developing it into imagining a little mouse!

Shoppies
I moved on to have a small 'shop' in a corner of the kitchen. Again, not with bought toys (though I know you can get every conceivable thing in toy form now) but with the packaging of anything we were finished with. My mother would wash out old washing up liquid bottles, keep old cereal boxes, salt containers, boxes that tea bags came in... and give them to me for my shop.
Looking back, with more professional EY knowledge now, I can see that one of the reasons I loved this was that the items were so familiar to me from our family using them and so felt real.

By then (I guess I was maybe 3) my mum would come shopping to my little shop and I can just about remember that I don't think we had any money for this game either (not even toy money or buttons). I suspect that since everything was 'real' then imitation or pretend money wouldn't have cut it for me! My grandad had a little shop that sold sweeties, biscuits and ice-cream, so I guess that also influenced things, but I just loved this game.

Learning
I remembered this while writing Zeki Goes to the Market and it made me think about all the learning that was possible with this simple game (especially the first one which needed no props at all). There is so much language still going on - naming the items on the shopping list; counting out the 'money'; and of course, all the imagining...
the work that needs to happen for 2 people to 'pretend' – soooo important for language acquisition which in essence is agreeing that this 'symbolic' word (which bears no relationship to that thing) will mean this thing to us.

So - I encourage you - play shoppies! Play it at the most basic imaginary level...
collect bits and bobs to make a shop... you'll love it!

For more ideas of things to do alongside reading Zeki Goes to the Market, click here.

I think most people are aware of the increase in 'banned books' in the US, but when I say that my Lola books are banned there, people are (understandably) surprised.
So I've written a longer piece with my understanding of what is going on and why ordinary little books like Lola at the Library are being 'banned'*

To read more about Banned Books Week and various campaigns against book banning, click my general piece here. Or to read my personal statement, click here.
Below is more a general background information (as I understand it) and it particularly explains that books are often not so much banned as challenged - that's why I've used * above.

Firstly, I should explain to people less familiar with this whole area, that the Lola books are not banned by the government or any national censorship or similar body… I don’t know if there even is such a thing in the US.
 
What there is, is actually quite a democratic system…
 
The Process
 
1. The Challenge
Firstly, as I understand it, anyone can challenge whether a particular book is appropriate in a particular school or library (or school/library district) setting.
People can challenge whether a book is appropriate for a particular age group of children, for unsupervised reading or at all.
Different locations have different rules: sometimes you have to be attending a school, or be a parent of a pupil attending a school to challenge a book being used in that school, sometimes you just have to live in the locality. Ditto public libraries.
Almost 60 percent of the recent book challenges involved school libraries or curricula, and about 40 percent targeted public libraries, according to the American Library Association (ALA) numbers.
Caught up in these challenges were 550 unique children’s titles and 1,604 young adult titles, making up 86 percent of all challenges throughout the year, ALA found.
 
There are general rules around these ‘challenges’ – again they vary in how they are implemented but the advice is that the challenger has to have read the book in whole (not just a passage they are objecting to) and they have to say why they think it’s inappropriate for that age group / classroom / collection…
 
The American Library Association has template forms and advice – these are sometimes used as they are, sometimes modified by particular districts.

 
2. The Review
When a person submits a challenge to a school / school district or library, that school or school district or library area has to review the book and the challenge. School Principals form committees or take the book to a school board for review.
 
This worked in the past when a handful of books were challenged in any one year. What has changed recently is the volume of challenges and the fact that challenges are being organised (so groups are sharing thoughts on books, sending template complaints and giving page and line numbers for examples). An ALA report identified at least 50 different groups involved in local and state-level efforts to ban books, some with hundreds of chapters, that have sprung up in 2021.
This increase in volume is overwhelming schools’ and libraries’ ability to process the challenges – some are removing all copies of challenged books while the review is underway, but because of the volume of challenges, reviews are taking a long time, and that leads to books being out of circulation for a long time following a challenge.


The ALA’s advice is not to remove challenged books until after review, but they say that’s rarely being done. One school’s official told local media, for example, that the educational resources were not banned, rather “frozen” while the board vetted them. The situation continued for almost a year.
 
 
3. The Outcome
The review group may decide to disagree with the challenge and return the book to circulation. The ALA is arguing for new rules around challenges so that, for example, a book can’t be challenged again by someone else immediately after being returned to the shelves.
 
The review group may agree with part or all of the challenge.
In response, they can arrange for a book to be redacted, with certain passages marked out, or restricted (available only with a permission slip, for example). A book may also be relocated (for example, moved from the young adult section to the adult section).
 
Or the review group can agree with the challenge and remove the book. Only when a previously available book is removed from the library or school curriculum based on its content, is it considered to be banned.
 
 
So, you can see that for every ‘banned book’, there are books being removed from shelves because of challenges, and the system for reviewing is often overwhelmed. That in itself can lead to self-censorship or simple hesitancy among professionals.

Critical Race Theory

While many challenged books are eventually returned to circulation, many remain banned – including incredibly, Lola at the Library (and others in the series). For clarity I should point out that it’s not banned everywhere – but in lots of states. You can see that, sadly, the Lola books dominate the list of books by my publisher in the US, Charlesbridge.

Any of us who work around children’s books will understand (even if they don’t agree) that some parents can be uncomfortable with and can seek to challenge some books (especially those dealing with sex and sexuality). However, over and over again, people express incredulity when I say the bans extend to apparently innocent picture books.
 
Enter what is referred to as Critical Race Theory… you can read more here, but, if you’ll forgive me for simplifying a very complex and nuanced subject, here’s a quick overview.
 
 
Critical Race Theory is an academic concept that is more than 40 years old.
The core idea is that race is a social construct, and that racism is not merely the product of individual bias or prejudice, but also something embedded in legal systems and policies.
Scholars who study critical race theory in education look at how policies and practices in K-12 (Primary) education contribute to persistent racial inequalities in education, and advocate for ways to change them.
On the ground, teachers try to be more aware and sensitive in their daily practice. As one teacher-educator quoted in the linked article above put it: “The way we usually see any of this in a classroom is: ‘Have I thought about how my Black kids feel? And made a space for them, so that they can be successful?’ That is the level I think it stays at, for most teachers.”
Critics however see CRT very differently. They argue that the theory leads to negative dynamics, such as a focus on group identity over universal, shared traits and that it divides people into “oppressed” and “oppressor” groups and urges intolerance.
Some critics claim that CRT leads to schools teaching that “white people are inherently privileged, while Black and other people of colour are inherently oppressed and victimized”. They argue that “achieving racial justice and equality between racial groups requires discriminating against people based on their whiteness”; and that CRT teaches that “the United States was founded on racism.”
 
 
Positive representation (whether of black children, other minority groups, disabled children or LGBTQ topics) has become conflated with CRT. When framed this way, books with positive representations of black children become something else entirely – to quote one mother who spoke at one of the review sessions: “I don’t want my daughter growing up feeling guilty because she’s white.”
 
So, I think you can begin to see that what we would describe as inclusive stories – about very ordinary topics, have become a kind of lightning rod for bigger political issues in the US.

Responses to Banned Books

The responses to bans have been varied.
 
Organised Responses
There has been push back and increased organisation against challenges and bans. Professional groups of teachers and librarians share strategies.
The American Library Association for one has put together resources (and I have links to many on my website here)
 
Groups of parents have got together and begun attending review sessions to argue (for example) that while a parent might not want their child to read a particular book, they should not have the right to make that book unavailable to other children (whose parents don’t have a problem with it).
 
In some instances, students (usually older/teen) themselves have mobilised and had challenges and bans overturned.

 
Donations and Buy-Lists
Some communities respond by doing various things to make the banned books available elsewhere in communities where they are banned.
People will set up little free libraries and ask for people to buy and donate challenged and banned books.
 
Others simply put lists together and encourage communities to order them at their local bookstore.
 

Wider groups who feel affected by bans sometimes set up more general (i.e. not local) groups to advocate for banned books or books they feel might be under general threat. LGBTQ groups for example, put lists together or simply call on people to support writers by buying their books (see more below). Reviewers, influencers etc call for people to, for example, buy books by black authors – generally or as part of special book drives.
 
Bookstores are not included in bans and many create identified sections of the store, shelves or a table, of ‘banned books’ for people to buy.
 
Publicity
The publicity surrounding a challenged book often results in a sales boost. Sales for Kobabe’s oft-challenged “Gender Queer,” for example, grew 120 percent in 2021, compared with 2020, according to NPD BookScan, which tracks book sales.
 
So it’s not all bad then?
Not only would I not agree that it’s not all bad, I actually think there is no upside to any of this. The increased publicity and sales figures quoted above often makes the headlines. However, this is really only a gain for a limited number of titles and a particular genre of title. So, while some books (especially those regarded as edgy or provocative) will gain a certain notoriety and exposure from being banned (as in the example above) and people can feel cool and brave by going to the banned table or buying a banned book and donating it to a little library etc… the overall effect on the majority of books is just awful.

For most picture books, for example, notoriety (however undeserved) is rarely a badge of honour and most likely it leads to a fall off in sales. Possibly because I would categorise my own books this way, I really feel that particularly for ordinary, midlist, not-so-famous authors and books, it is really disastrous.

Why?
First off, even if there are what I’ll call ‘supportive’ purchases, these in no way compensate for the loss of sales to schools and libraries.

This in particular affects the ordinary, midlist, not-so-famous authors and books.
So simple picture books like my Lola books or non-fiction (think for example of non-fiction biographies that are fiercely important for children to learn about their own and other communities’ historical figures, inventors etc) are really threatened.
Many of these titles are not hot sellers in bookshops in the first place (I mean aside from bans), so are unlikely to be stocked, let alone make it onto the cool/banned table. If you look at the York County banned list (I link to it because it was one of the first big controversial lists) you can see the range or books affected (and it makes me almost cry to see the whole Lola Reads series on the list).

Does this effect who or what gets published?

For now, I get the sense that bans are not overtly affecting how publishers commission. BUT (and it’s a big but), publishing is a risky and expensive business, so it seems unlikely to me that editors and publishers are not worried and thinking about these issues as they make decisions about what to publish.

I certainly worry about books that are seen as taking risks being more rigorously scrutinised; books by new authors / from minority communities especially on topics that publishers are less sure about or have less confident sales projections; books where publishers may feel they are growing new audiences…

A personal note…
I feel very lucky with the continued support of my amazing publishers, but I am beginning to hear little rumblings about pushback.
The book banners of course don’t care in the slightest about the author, they just want Lola, a little positive African American character, on the banned list.
However, the corollary doesn’t follow and the Lola books sadly (though understandably) often do not make it onto the lists of banned books championed by anti-ban activists (usually since those lists focus on books authored by black or other minority groups - see the UK's Guardian newspaper headline here for how this is often presented).
 
I’m not whining about this – I’m just describing it to illustrate how ordinary authors and illustrators (including authors and illustrators of colour) and books can so easily fall between stools – making it onto the banned list, but not the ‘championed’ list.

 
The first Lola book (Lola at the Library) was published in 2006, so there are almost 20 years of loyal fans (most especially librarians along with families with young children) who love the series which now extends to 11. But if I was just starting out, I wonder whether a publishers would have to be very brave to get behind such ordinary little stories as Lola Gets a Cat or Lola’s Sleepover, or Lola Meets the Bees (especially with me as a white author of a *black main character).
 
Wonderful titles like Sulwe will always find a publisher, and the same goes for edgy stories like Julian is a Mermaid… but I feel that many publishers still need substantial reasons to make black and other global minority children the main characters in a story*. Often, for that to happen, the story needs to be important, substantial or self-consciously about their ethnicity or some part of their culture.
So, I worry that having black main characters in ordinary, gentle, everyday stories could become a more challenging thing for publishers to consider.

It seems to me that this would lead to a much more limited range of stories featuring black and other minoritised children and that would be awful. ALL children not only need to see themselves and their world reflected in the stories they read, but they have the right to the same diverse range of books as any other child. Books for black and other minoritised children should not be limited to grand themes or challenging oppression (however important these books are). Surely they deserve as much as any child to also see themselves in funny stories, and gentle stories about the everyday - the kind of reassuring stories to read before going to sleep. Surely that's what having 'diverse' books means - bring included in all kinds of stories and celebrating the rich range of human experience?

I regularly quote from Rumaan Alam's wonderful essay, We Don’t Only Need More Diverse Books. We Need More Diverse Books Like The Snowy Day. He says everything I've every wanted to say on the subject, just more eloqently - so I'll quote him again here:

For me, I didn’t see many pet stories, for example, featuring a black child, so I wrote Lola Gets a Cat. The same goes for environmental stories – they are sometimes treated as somehow a separate 'issue' to ‘inclusive books’, so I feel quite passionate about Lola Plants a Garden and even more so about Lola Meets the Bees (since not only is Lola's friend Zora an African American beekeeper – something we don't often see in picture books – but also because Zora keeps her bees in an urban setting and so includes children who live in towns and cities (and who can sometimes feel excluded from environmental or nature stories when they are set in the countryside).

Lola has a positive almost 20-year track record and I am so lucky to have a wonderful, long and trusting relationship with my publishers, Charlesbridge (who have a tremendous committment to publishing inclusive and diverse books, and minoritised voices). But I wonder if I were starting out, would a publisher ask why I want to feature a black main character in an environmental story or, say, one about preparing to adopt a cat or going on a sleepover? And yet, isn't it important for little kids to see positive representation in ordinary, everyday stories like these?

​Wider and long-term impacts?
I feel that range and variety and diversity in inclusive picture books is really important and I worry about the longterm impacts - and not just in the US but in the UK and Ireland and the wider publishing world. Picture books are expensive to produce and most UK publishers need the support of a US publisher before they can commit to publishing. So, even though there isn't the same organised effort at book banning in the UK (though there has been a rash of protests in Irish libraries in recent times:
there could be a knock-on effect on which books get supported by US publishers and are therefore published in the UK.
 
Action!
So, it behoves us to be informed and vigilant – and to continue to support those wonderful publishers who continue to publish inclusively. I also want to put in a word for the gentle books that don’t appear to be about very much – they are the little stories I fear for.
 
Thanks,
Anna

To read more about organised efforts to fight book bans, see my page here.
To read my personal statement, see here.

*I've used the word black here - uncapitalised - as influenced primarily by Emma Dabiri's amazing book, What White People can do Next where she writes very persuasively on the topic (there's a short reel on IG for anyone interested here quoting Toni Morrison and of course bell hooks).

Older pieces on my site use capital Bs (as someone who lived most of my adult life in London, I tend to use Black/black as opposed to African American - except when I'm writing specifically about Lola /the US) but moving forward this is where I'm at.
Watch this space, I'm planning a piece on language - and explaining the terms I use and why - it's shifting all the time as I read and learn.

Further reading

Here is a link to the list of books banned by the Central York school board state in Pennsylvania (the first large scale ban to hit the headlines - the one mentioned in the Guardian article):

Read some industry-specific comments from Publishers Weekly:

To read the National Coalition Against Censorship's advice to schools, read here.

More about Critical Race Theory here.

Updates
• April 2025 - Review of the Numbers - SLJ's analysis of the ALA Libraries Report
• April 10 2025 -North Carolina Bill Aims To Charge Librarians for Exposing Minors to “Harmful Materials or Performances” | Censorship News
• April 2025 -Nevada bill would prevent book bans in public and school libraries

World Bee Day celebrates ALL bees, not just honey bees.

My photo shows a bumblebee enjoying a forrage in a fuscia - most likely this was in August. In May, there are not so many flowers out, so there are some things you can do to help bees at this time and celebrate World Bee Day with them

Plant early flowering plants so they have something to forrage on in the early months as they emerge from the hives. The bees around me just love my Hellibores and spring bulbs... You don't have to have a big garden - I grow these in pots.

No mow May
Leave what little flowers that grow alone!
For example, despite the fact that dandelions are commonly perceived as a weed by the gardeners, theyare  an important source of nectar and pollen not only for bees but also for butterflies, moths and other pollinators - particularly before the full flush of summer flowers appear.
See the links below for more information.

Links
Click here for LOTS more information about bees. My new book also has LOTS of info.

Read about No Mow May here

Find out about which flowers help bees...
Did you know that bees can see the colour purple more clearly than any other colour... Or that tubular-shaped flowers are an important source of food for long-tongued bees such as the garden bumblebee. Read more here.

For the best flowers to plant in the USA, see here and here
For Ireland and the UK, there's information about Spring flowers here
and general informaiton about flowers here
and this No Mow piece has great advice about wildflowers for bees

I sat David down and told him that we were going to a restaurant but we were not sure Dan would be able to behave. I asked David if he would take charge of Dan, explain to him that he would have to sit nicely while we waited for food; that he was not to play with the cutlery, the plates OR the food; but that we would bring along some toys. It wasn't quite a play opportunity, but it was close and David seemed keen to take responsibility!

We were lucky to have a wonderful elderly waiter, just like Bruno.
Not only did he get a suitable chair for David, but he got one for Dan too AND put a napkin on both their laps - exactly as he did for the adults.

I can report that Dan did really well, and only had to be called to attention once or twice by David! And we all had a wonderful meal and evening together.

So when I came to write this story of course I had to chanel this experience almost exactly (except that Zeki has his own Mr. Seahorse).

Just this weekend - a few weeks before publication, I welcomed David to my home.
He was accompanied by his wife Levi and his young son, Huxley, as well as his brother Dylan. We didn't go out to lunch, but I can report that Huxley behaved beautifully at the table at lunch and David, Levi and Dylan enjoyed my old story - and my new one!

For more tips for taking toddlers to eat out, click here.

I'd always thought that imaginative play came naturally to small children but then I had an experience when I worked as a Sure Start Community Librarian.

As part of the Family Support Team, I helped out at Stay & Play sessions - we had sand play, water play, sit-on cars and tractors, as well as dressing-up boxes, a play kitchen, dollies and soft toys and small cars and animals.

One day I noticed two small boys pushing small cars around - they just pushed and bashed them off each other and pushed again, looking to me at a loss as to what to do next. So, I got a little play bus and people and 'drove' up to them. I made a little queue of the people and had them go on the bus one by one, 'asking' each one where they were going (Morrisons, the swimming pool and the library apparently!).
Then I drove the bus around and dropped them off...

The boys watched intently, then when I left, began to play the same game.
What interested me most was when I returned the next week I saw the little boys involved in a complex imaginary game with the bus, the people and their cars.
They were making the play people say, "hello" and were obviously pretending that there were other people in the cars.

It really struck me that they had seemed to need that small prompt from me to get them going (though likely they would have done this at some stage off their own bat).

It did make me think about my own childhood (which was FULL of imaginative play and story-making - whether I was the hero or my dolly was). Had I had such prompts?

Well definately I had - I could even remember them...

My mammy used to send me on 'errands'. She would touch my outstreached palm with her fingers to 'give me money' then send me off down the hall on my little tricycle to buy things. It probably gave her a few minute's rest from my constant chattering! I would 'get' the things on my bike and then report back.

This certainly informed my play when I was older/outside - I was always 'someone' on my bike - some drama was playing out in my head (even if I only drove up and down the path from the gate to the back door. Reader, I was often McClowd -  (weirdly on horseback) off to solve some crime!!

My mother's other game with me was 'shoppies'. It may have been possible at that time to buy play stuff (and I think I remember having a little toy cash register at a later stage) but at this point Mammy just washed out used tins, cereal packets, washing-up liquid containers etc to set me up with stuff to sell.

I can just about remember her coming to my shop (again with the imaginary money). I don't think we even bothered with small coins or anything at this stage - possibly I was so young it would have been dangerous. Certainly I remember using ludo tokens in my cash register later on when I was  alittle older).

I DID have an tiny old cupboard of my grandfather's - it had a small drawer that was perfect for the 'money' and a little door inside of which I kept purties (old lipsticks, odd earings, little shiney things I'd collected). Though all the stuff for sale was real size and didn't fit in so was displayed on a shelf nearby.

I suspect that my mother set me off and then I played away by myself with pretend customers - and I possibly combined it with tricycle journeys...

And speaking of journeys - a final game I remember from when I was very small, was my mother lining up the kitchen chairs (and possibly my own small pink chair) to make a bus. She would sit my teddies and dollies on the chairs and I would be both bus driver and conductor. I'm sure she asked the various 'passengers' where they were going - but it's so long ago my memories are vague. All I remember is that it took time to sort everything before I sat into the driver's seat and 'took off'.

These memories definitely suggest that even if I didn't need a prompt as such, my mother started me off and that set me up for hours of imaginary fun.

My childhood experiences, along with my love of reading (which in time infomed so much of my play) definately informed the thinking behind Lulu Loves Stories.

Lulu brings quite a haul of books from the library, then reads one each night.
Each story prompts her play next day - she is a fairy, a pilot, a mummy, a tiger, a farmer and a builder. Then she takes a leap - her Daddy makes up a story about a girl with magic shoes and Lulu believes that her shoes are magic too.

My own Dad was an expert in making up stories. While I loved his stories of the Fianna and their heroics (especially the Bodach of the Grey Cloak for some reason - though it's very brutal), and the tales of his own childhood, what I loved was the stories he made up... about our cat, about the crows that lived in the trees opposite.

And when he tired of my demands for 'just one more', he would start, "Once upon a time there was a little girl called Anna..." These I did NOT like - the little girl was very very well behaved and did what she was told and went to sleep after only one story!

But these along with the tales of his own childhood must have instilled in me the idea that anyone - even little ordinary me - could be the hero of a story, most especially their own story. And that's why Lulu Loves Stories is dedicated to him (along with Martha, an old friend from WGARCR days who first suggested I work at Sure Start).

I remember clearly my first play date (though we didn’t call them that) to a classmate for an hour or two after school. They had stairs (which was exciting because we didn’t) and her mother seemed to me even at that young age obsessed with cleaning! The house was more like a hospital ward and I remember being afraid to touch anything! My other friend was the opposite – her house was totally chaotic with lots of children and laundry piled up everywhere.
 
I don’t remember eating at either house – that was for later, longer visits (I was only about 4). And it was really on these longer play dates (and especially sleepovers) that I began to realize that how my family lived was not universal – I began to realize that what, how, when and even where we ate was not universal across families.

Looking back, I think this is a big realization for young children – a next step of separation and differentiation not unlike the developmental stage when a very young child begins to realize they are a separate person from their mother.
 
And so I wonder whether that is also at the root of the clothes swapping that went on at these sleepovers…
My grandmother’s house was near my school and I usually went there rather than home at the end of my school day. My mother would usually be there and we would wait there for my Dad to pick us up on his way from the school where he taught. My mother was good friends with a family across the street and I would often play on the street outside their house while I waited.
 
Even here (it wasn't a proper play date – we didn't go in the house and just played together on the street) I remember we would swap shoes while we played tag or hopscotch on the street. I was always keen for this game as I most often had sensible laced brown shoes (tough and suitable for passing on to my younger brothers!). I longed for the likes of the Mary-Janes most of my friends wore and delighted in wearing them even if only for an hour or two – though they were understandably reluctant to wear mine!

On a proper sleepover, of course you could completely swap clothes.

Like Lulu, my first sleepovers were at cousins’ houses. When I was very young, they were mostly with my cousin Cathy - the daughter of my mother's sister. Like me, Cathy was an only girl – we both had three brothers (Cathy’s were all older than her, mine were all younger than me! Our families crossed over in the middle with us) and so sleepovers afforded each of us the chance to gain a sister.

I was probably wearing those brown ones and shorts and T and was very envious of Cathy and her strawberry dress and silver sandals!

So of course I had to have some clothes swapping, some experimenting with other possible identities at the core of my sleepover story.
 
I found it funny when I sent the text to Yolanda at Charlesbridge and to the illustrator, Ros Beardshaw, both mentioned that their daughters were totally into swapping – and like my child self I began to realize that this was not an experience unique to me!

That set me thinking – if sleepovers are an occasion to realize that how your family is, is not universal, could the clothes swapping thing a way of further exploring that? Exploring other possible identities perhaps? I’ve not been able to find any writings on this, but the more I think, the more I’m convinced that that urge to try on another child’s clothes while on a sleepover is really experimenting with other possible versions of yourself – yourself imagined as part of this family, perhaps.

Ros Beardshaw really rose to the challenge and we planned that not only would Lulu and Hani swap clothes completely at the centre of the story (below), but from the first moment they are alone together, Hani puts on Lulu’s red and blue bracelets and Lulu wears Hani’s yellow one.

When they wake up in the morning, they manage to have swapped PJs during the night!

And in completely self-indulgent moment, I asked Ros to do a special thing for me. So, in a lovely secret moment, if you look carefully at the final scene (right) Lulu is going home in Hani’s yellow strappy sandals!

50 years on but who cares - I finally got my wish vicariously through Lulu!!

It traces the 'civilizing' of manners in Western Europe since the Middle ages, looking especially at books of manners.

I read sections of this book again last week and wanted to share. The level of detail with which advice is given on intimate bodily functions is surprising - to say the least!

This, from 1619 is rather lovely:

There is plenty for us to take note of when it comes to sneezing and coughing. (Handkerchiefs were unknown at this time and in later years, a luxury of the richest only. In 1599, after her death, the inventory of Henry IV's mistress was found to include five handkerchiefs.) In the absense of a handkerchief, people usually blew their noses into their hands or their sleeve.

So, thirteenth century advice from Bonvesin de la Riva, in (De la zinquanta cortexie da tavola) includes:

My personal favourite from Ein spruch der ze tische kert in the fifteenth century is this:

Our ideas of Medieval banquets often look like this:

in fact this was a time of privation by our modern Western standards - people generally had their own knives, but shared not only bowls and plates, but often spoons. And, of course, there was no concept of germs.

Dishes of meat were generally brought to the table, usually everyone cut themselves a piece and took it in their hand or put it on a plate or slice of bread, then passed it on. Stews or soup however meant that in many cases, people took a mounthfull then passed on the bowl AND the spoon.

A whole raft of manners were needed to cope with this situation. Tannhauser's thirteenth century poem says:

I should think so!

And from De civilitate morum puerilium by Erasmus of Rotterdam in 1530:

OK, so what has this got to do with Covid 19 I hear you ask.

Well, it's when you read these extracts that you appreciate Elias's comment on communal eating: "this necessitated special precepts at table - politeness required that one blow one's nose with the left hand if one took meat in the right." We still have the expression today, 'cack-handed' - to mean awkwardly done / done as if with the left hand. The left hand was the 'cack hand' (from the Latin cacare or the French caque) - the hand used for (as modern dictionaries more sensitively phrase it) 'ablutions'.

So, thinking about that, I've taken a Medieval approach to my shopping - I go with a 'clean hand' and a 'cack hand'. Somtimes I put a disposable glove on the cack hand - if only to remind myself of my method AND to stop me touching my face - but usually I don't bother.

So setting out, I leave my hand bag, phone, purse etc at home or in the car. I put my paper list and credit card in my clean-hand pocket. When I arrive at the grocery, it's basket (or trolly handle) in the cack hand: list in the clean hand.

I park the trolly or set down the basket when I come to what I need. Then I open any refrigerator doors/touch handles, take my item and put it in the basket/trolly with my cack-hand, pick up the basket with the cack-hand and continue onwards until I come to the till.

Clean hand in pocket (out of the way), I use my cack-hand to place all the items from the basket onto the belt/counter. If I can, I also place them in my shopping bag with my cack hand (it helps if you have a bag that sits square).
I take my creadit card out of my pocket with my clean hand, tap it and put it back in my pocket.

Then off I go. If I'm wearing a glove, I remove it carefully and put it inside out in my cack-hand pocket - recently I've not bothered (see below).

Once home, I go straight to the bathroom (having left the door open so I don't have to touch the handle) and wash my hands. Then I put away the shopping. Then I wash my hands again.

So, I'm quite serious about this for a few reasons...

First, I understand that the virus has to get from inside an infected person to inside me. It's all about person-to-person transfer and it has to get inside via my mouth, eyes or nose - it can't get in through my skin which is actually an amazing barrier. The virus is not really in the air except in the few feet in front of an infected person - so keeping physical distance and reducing the time spent near others is the most important thing.

After that, everything else is just an extra precaution.

Generally, surfaces have only tiny traces and not enough to infect me (someone would have to be infected, then cough all over a surface and then I would have to lick it for me to pick it up from a surface). But the viral load may build on some surfaces like the handle to the fridge. It can't get in through the skin in my hands (skin is AMAZING) but I do need to try not to touch the handle and then my face.

So most of this is about keeping me super conscious so I don't touch my face thereby getting any trace I pick up near my mouth.

You see, I see ladies with gloves and masks get to the till then rooting around inside their handbags (with their gloves) for their wallet. I see them get the wallet out and then take out a credit card, pay and return the credit card to the wallet with the gloved hand. Then they put the wallet back into the bag - next to their lipstick/sanitiser/hand cream and PHONE... all the time feeling super secure because they are wearing gloves...

I see men (being the brave hunter-gatherers) wandering around with gloves on, then pulling out their phones, putting them TO THEIR FACES to check with their wives and girlfriends which brand of xxx they meant... putting the phones back in their pockets (for later!) but feeling OK because they are wearing gloves.

It makes me want to scream!
So take the Medieval approach I prithee, cack-hand/clean hand... with my apologies to my left-handed friends.

Anna

P.S. I am trying to use this time to update my website and especially to copy articles I've written for others and group them so they are easily accessible. At the moment it's chaotic, but do come back another time when it's all slick and wonderful and working and have a browse. (You'll have to refresh the page - I did not know that!)

First published by IBBY for IBBYLink 37

I learned to read very early and was a voracious reader – I don’t know what age I was exactly, but I must have been quite young to be such a fan of Enid Blyton’s collections of short stories about Mr Pinkwhistle! I was given The Naughtiest Girl in the School as a present and, because I didn’t know how such books worked. I read it the same way as I did Mr Pinkwhistle – choosing a random chapter to start off with then another… It was incredibly confusing and the ‘stories’ didn’t make any sense and were all about a girl called Elizabeth, but I couldn’t work out what was going on! I must have read about four chapters before I realised that it was one long story and had to start at the beginning and read all the way through – which was rather spoiled by the fact that I’d already read the penultimate chapter!
 
Once I got my head around it, I really enjoyed this new format and getting my teeth into longer stories – more Naughtiest Girl stories followed, then the St Clare’s series, Malory Towers, the Five Find-Outers, the Adventure of Spiggyholes, the Famous Five and Mr Galliano’s Circus[i]. I just ate them up.
 
The books were full of girls called Felicity and Gwendoline and Penelope playing lacrosse, eating cress sandwiches and drinking ginger beer. Growing up in rural Ireland in the 1970s, I had never met anyone called Gwendoline or Penelope and I had no idea what cress was. I was shocked that the children were allowed drink Ginger Beer as I assumed it was alcoholic… but I adored the books anyway and read and re-read them endlessly.

Then I was given a book called Flight of the Doves (1968). It’s about a boy called Finn and a girl called Derval. The children run away from an abusive uncle to find their granny in Galway. Well, when I came to that bit, I was so excited. Galway! I’d heard of Galway - it was real. I might even have been there. To this day I remember how the world shifted on its axis as I read this book. Suddenly the world inside the book was real and tangible and meaningful. Children like me were IN it. I read the book more than 40 years ago - I’d even had to search Google to get the title - but I can still remember clearly that the girl cut her hair and pretended to be a boy so people looking for the children wouldn’t recognise her and take her back. I remember a bit where they were helped by a Traveller family and how kind they were. I remember it like it happened to me. Suddenly books were something I was IN!
 
Flight of the Doves was written by Walter Macken and it began a voyage of discovery for me. This was an era before ‘teen’ (and even more so, before ‘tween’) literature. It can still be a tough time for readers – outgrowing their childhood favourites but not ready for adult themes quite yet. Back then it was nigh on impossible to find material for an avid and very able reader in her teens. I went on to read Macken’s The Silent People – a moving adult novel set during Ireland’s Famine. This led to Famine – a magnificent book by Liam O Flaherty and then O Flaherty’s short stories both in English and in Irish.

My journey continued with Across the Bitter Sea, by Eilís Dillon then onto Quiet Flows the Don (Aleksandrovich Sholokov) and a raft of Russian writers.
 

It’s amazing how these early experiences influence and shape your life. I continued to have a passion for Russian fiction and it was my major at University College Cork, studying Chekov, Dostoevsky and Turgenev before I turned away to specialise in the Gothic Novel.
 
This in turn initiated my interest in the publishing industry itself and on graduating I emigrated to the UK in search of work in publishing. I never thought I would end up spending all my working life in Children’s publishing – as an editor, publisher and writer. Now, once more, I find myself back under the influence of that first reading of Flight of the Doves – reliving that feeling of discovering someone like me in a book.
 
It’s a feeling I nurture and keep at the centre of my publishing philosophy as I try to make books that include a range of children. So when I write or publish books with little assertive girls or black boys or naughty frogs or grumpy bears, it’s not to fight racism or strike a blow for feminism or counter disabled stereotypes or promote empathy - though, of course, I hope it will do all those things. My driving force is to make sure all children see themselves IN books. Books show children the world and they need to see themselves in books to know they have a right to be in the world. I know that – Walter Macken taught me.

Woke to glorious sunshine on Saturday - you could be in Greece! Had lunch out the back:

Then off to pick some blackberries - sméara dubha.

Made some home-made granola based on my good friend Suzanne Bloom's recipe and some blackberry compote as developed in this very kitchen by Marijn Woudstra - ready for the morning!

tBut the weather is always changing in Kerry, especially here in Glenmore - close to sea and mountains... we often get this eerie mix of brigh sunshine and ominous clouds. It was enough to make me turn for home...

though not before I'd got my perfect photo of a Fuscia - a native of South American but growing wild here since it was introduced (due to the Gulf Stream). Think I'll use it as my Twitter avatar for a bit...