EBacc-wards

This is my personal opinion-not that of LeedsBookClub. Sometimes you just need to get a rant off your chest!

In a world where a one in five adults cannot find a plumber in a phone book, teaching the elite to remember is not the way to raise standards.

The proposed reforms to the Key Stage 4 qualification are yet another example of this government selling a generation short. By divided people (not only children take GCSEs, despite what the majority of sub editors seem to think) into those who can sit for three hours and perform at their best on one day in one year and the rest of us, Gove is turning students into show ponies.

We don’t need a generation where 9 out of 10 are made to feel failures; we need a nation confident in using recognisable tools to live their lives; research, the ability to compare and contrast and in depth analysis of problems. Exams don’t always do this.

Again, this is an example of where the knowledge of what librarians can bring to education would be useful. Librarians can offer students a chance to learn real life skills needed to succeed in more than just one exam. We can teach them to find, evaluate, and use information in a way that is suitable to them. Yet again, the role of librarians in education is side-lined in favour of headline grabbing reforms that ignore our worth and belittle our experiences.

The Baccalaureate might be the buzz word on the continent, but right now we have people coming into education again, often after years, to be told that their aspirations and achievements are useless. This is not only a backwards step, it is also a dangerous one.

Twilight- a gateway book

This blog is going to read heavily of my blowing my own trumpet, but it's feeling like a pretty big bloody trumpet so I wanted to blow it quite loudly, and the Internet is looking like it would appreciate some sweet trumpet based sounds today...

In November, I started a reading challenge at work, which I'm not going to talk about, needless to say one of the girl's on it joined saying she would read four books as it was a good excuse to read the Twilight Saga. Inwardly, I groaned a bit, I'm going to be honest, but hell it's reading for pleasure, right, onwards and upwards.

So yeah, she read Twilight, and Eclipse. And then we didn't have New Moon in, but she wanted to read something else...

...so I recommended The Help by Kathryn Stockett, which I'd read a couple of summers ago and enjoyed. I knew the film was out, and was planning on going to see it, and she was going with her mum so it all worked out pretty well.

She LOVED it, and it made her cry. We had this really long chat about the themes within it, which was fascinating as we came from totally different walks of life and she got a totally different aspect on it to me. She wanted to read 'something like it, really sad', and I recommended My Sister's Keeper, again because I know she'd seen the film, and she was keen.

She loved that as well, but said 'it wasn't as good to read as The Help'. She was appreciating the way that the language use was different, that the structure and the pace of The Help was more satisfying to read. So I had a little think and gave her Beloved by Toni Morrison.

Toni Morrison has won a Pulitzer Prize. And a Nobel Prize. Beloved was the New York Times Book Review best book of the past twenty five years. And this girl loved it. Loved it. Came in demanding more books like it. Because the story was really sad, and relatable, and she understood it.

So I lent her Push by Sapphire, more commonly known as Precious, the film that made everyone weep in 2009 and won a bunch of Oscars.

I've just had a twenty minute conversation was a sixteen year old about lyrical writing, and how emotion can be conveyed though descriptive prose. She doesn't have a GCSE in English and Twilight was the first book she'd ever read all the way through on her own bat.

And this is why having a library in a school, staffed by someone who knows about books, who cares about books and is confident in recommending books, also know as a librarian, is so incredibly important. How many children are there not reading who haven't ever had a conversation with an adult about books? How many more times must we say this! The reason that the literacy levels in this country are so shocking is because people do not have the skills to pass down to promote reading and a love of reading to their children, and people who do love reading are not given the opportunity to talk to children about this unless they are terrifyingly middle class.

If every single secondary school had a decent library staffed by someone who knew what they were doing then at least these students would have to opportunity to talk about books, to know that it was OK to talk about books with adults, that it didn't make you sad, or a geek. Imagine what that would do for young people, and for their reading.

This girl has gone from a non-reader to an avid one in four months because she finally goes to a place that has a library in it and for that alone I'm thankful. When are at least one of the main political parties going to wake up to what school libraries can do and support them in their manifestos?

Is Literacy a Necessity?

Today is World Book Day. Children up and down the land are dressing up as their favourite characters; the second thing down on Google is 'World Book Day Costumes' leading to visions of frantic parents recycling Shepard's costumes from the nativity whilst their Yummy Mummy counterparts order Matilda costumes for forty quid of the t'internets...
I went on Cif and asked if the Graun could do a piece on World Book Day and literacy and someone responded asking the very interesting question 'what do we use literacy for?' This person is apparently a reader and would feel adrift without books, but questions the relevance of literacy for everyone.

Here is my answer

Every single time you read a road sign, think about the people who can't. Every time you need to find a number, think about the 5 MILLION adults in this country who cannot use a phone book. Every time you flick through a newspaper, think about the fact that there are no left wing publications in this country that cater for a reading level below Level 3. This means that a THIRD of people in this country cannot read information that is not right wing is bias, owned and produced by rich people with an agenda. One in six people, one in six people, do not have a functional level of literacy. That means a sixth of the adults in this country do not have the skills to have a life that they are supposed to aspire to.

Almost half of people in prison have a reading of Level 1 or below (D at GCSE). Children are leaving school not being able to read and 1/20 of those children go home to a house with no books in it. A tenth of children have never owned their own book.

We NEED literacy because we live in a world that has grown to rely on it. Six hundred years after the birth of printing, the Information Society is firmly established. Without the means of effective participation then how does someone know if they need literacy or not?

Happy World Book Day, enjoy your books, and feel thankful that you are one of the so few who can read them.

BookElf xxx

Errrrrr Libraries Much?

I am fuming.

Wikipedia is down. This is because they believe in freedom of information which apparently this new law in the US, which I don't know anything about, will restrict. Fair enough, I too believe in open content and lack of censorship.

This isn't what is making me angry.

I've just had a morning from hell. Not being able to quickly get an overview from a topic that might have only just been introduced that morning means more work for me, trying to figure out what the hell desquamation of the skin involves, or what the 2005 Children's Act prevented. But that doesn't make me angry either. That's my job.

It's the Guardian. The bloody Guardian; my rock, my home-from-home, my oracle of everything that is good in the world.

The Guardian have a fair bit of stuff on the blackout, that I first heard about in yesterday's Metro. They have this handy guide to getting around it using a smartphone or an Internet cheat. Then they is the Guardipedia, a tongue in cheek liveblog involving a journalist and a stack on encyclopedias. It's quite funny, and a good newspaper-as-social-media idea. But only in a link to the Washington Post does it suggest the one thing that should be bloody obvious; why not use a library?

Libraries are threatened with closure all over the country. In a months time is the inaugural National Libraries Day, celebrating libraries in all sectors. It has never been cooler to be a librarian, we even got mentioned in Private Eye last week! This day is a perfect opportunity for us to show our skills, to show the value of reference libraries, of professional librarians who DON'T find research, or using indexes, or any of the other plethora of actual skills we should be teaching our children, (and that journalists really should know) 'a nightmare' because it is our job...

This could have been a day where librarians really shook their tail feathers, and The Guardian, who was all over last year's Save Libraries day, should have been supporting them doing just that, not taking the mick out of research skills, no matter how lightheartedly.

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Libraries Table of Contents

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Review Table of Contents

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Full Table of Contents 

A Discovery of Nonsense (sorry, Witches, sorry)

****SPOILERS, SO MANY SPOILERS. AND SWEARS. LOADS AND LOADS OF SWEARS***

What an utterly ridiculous book this is.

Firstly, a background as to why I read a paranormal romance book during the week before Christmas; the cover. We bought it for work because I'd seen it *everywhere*, the cover looked really pretty, and I just got a bit excited about it. Then I come home and my sister eyes it up (and may I remind you this is the sister who slept in Team Jacob sheets for years) and says possibly the wisest thing that's ever come out of her mouth. "That's not a real blurb, is it?".

And that's when I should have known! Because if a book is any good, if it has a decent story arch or thematic device or some sort of brilliant character holding the whole thing together it has a shitting blurb. This DOESN'T. It has what is later revealed to be a QUOTE from the book, and three incomplete sentences that would have my GCSE English teacher reaching for her big red pen. I KNOW this. I CATALOGED this nonsense, for fuck's sake! I had to make the abstract up! When will I bloody learn!

It's also really thick, like 700 pages thick, and I read a really thick book last Christmas and figured, sure, that'll keep me going over the Seasonal Festive Time. But noooooooo. Because it's bollocks. Great big fat, dialogue heavy bollocks.

Think the worst parts of Laurell K Hamilton (including the phrase 'training shoes completed the outfit' which made me just howl with laughter), combined with the crappyness of Twishite combined with The Historian. Then take out The Historian and beat yourself soundly for even beginning to compare by what is in comparison a masterpiece of modern fiction with this tripe.

And what pisses me off so much is how much I enjoyed it! Seriously, I know I'm going to do my usual rip-to-shreds now, but I had proper good fun reading this book!

A good first third of it is set in a library, The Bodleian Library for good measure. Diana is this scholar researching the history of alchemy calling up ancient manuscripts in one of the most respected and beautiful libraries in the world. This is relevant to my interests, yes. Then on the third page, half way down it turns out she's a witch. And the book doesn't start with some big reveal, she just drops that in there real subtle like, oh it made me tingle. I was absolutely hooked, proper loving it, excited about the mysteries of the manuscript, about a heroine who was mature and therefore relate-able, about the prospect of a bit of romance later as promised to me by the non-blurb on the gorgeous cover.

And then we meet Matthew.

Matthew is the hero, and a vampire. Though he's not just a vampire, he's a Manpire. Manpires are like regular vampires but their machismo is just SO GINORMOUS that they have to have is shoved roughly down the reader's throats. Edward is not a Manpire, Jean Claude might be a little bit. But there is no bigger Manpire than Matthew.

I fucking hate Matthew. He's a bellend. A patronising, selfish, big-headed, difficult, Heathclifftion cosy jumpered bellend. As anyone who saw my utter utter rage on Twitter the other night will testify to-I don't like bellends. Especially ones who get away with it.

Diana, who starts off well, suddenly turns into this utter wimp like emopausal bintette, falls in love with Matthew after knowing his for a week and not sleeping with him (but more of that later). The word 'irrevocably' isn't used, Thank Christ (every time I see that word in YA all I can think of is Inigo going 'I do not think it means what you think it means'), but you get the general idea.

And of course he falls in love with her, showing this love by stalking her, watching her sleep, taking her to yoga to a place where he knows she'll feel uncomfortable and not really letting her walk any where without his clutching her to his Massive Manpire Chest. Honest to God Diana spends the majority of time she is with Matthew either under his arm, or in his arms, or with him nuzzling her in some totally inappropriate manor infront of at least one of their relatives. Including his mother, Ysabeau, who could be a Strong Independent Woman character but turns out to be a pathetic as the rest of them proclaiming her beloved twatty son to be the head of the family and therefore some kind of Great God despite being an incredibly powerful and resourceful vampire herself.

Anyway, Diana calls up this manuscript and for some reason, which never actually gets fully explained, vampires and witches (who all descend from the same women who got deaded at Salem but are still run by a MAN) and daemons, who are genetic bloopers descended from actual humans as opposed to an inherited creature like witches, or created like vampires, all want at this manuscript, but, oh no, it's disappeared, and Diana is nearly killed a couple of times and massively threatened loads and so Matthew must clasp her to his Manly Manpire chest AGAIN and cart her off TO FRANCE where she will be safe, with his mother.

Loads of shit happens, most of which I can't remember, but this book would massively appeal to people who like books with lots of MINUTE DETAIL in it because that really is all it is. It's not well written in the slightest, but I could tell you every single thing about the world she's created because everything is so minutely explained. Oh and Diana brushes her hair a lot. And likes tea. See, I remember that. Couldn't tell you the plot, but I remember the important bits.

Parts of the book are fascinating, and the best written parts are the bit that Harkness knows well; scholarly works and history and science. I loved the idea of the Knights of Lazarus and all that went with that, it just didn't need the sloppy shit that went with it. The library, the university and all that world was so well realised and the 'creatures' all made sense and were a brilliant and well executed part of the book.

But Matthew is by far the star of the show. I've Goodreads it (this is the sort of book you have to, just for the comedy gold it brings up) and one reader said they were into him because they would welcome 'the challenge of loving him'. Now I know as someone who has been single since 2008 I'm not the biggest expert in this whole relationship thang but I always thought a challenge was something like climbing a mountain, or running a marathon, or getting a Masters or something. Not, you know, loving someone. What would be the point of that. 'Oh but for the brief few hours he clasps me to his Manly Chest it's worth the years of emotional pain and torment and self-sacrifice.' Yeah, course it is...

Here is my list of Massively Douchey Things That Matthew Does

I only started taking notes from about page 289, so there may be many, many more utterly shit things Matthew does that made me want to punch the book in the face, but these are my particular favourites.

1) They are going riding. Diana is a competent and practiced horse rider, and she examines the horse, puts the relevant horse riding equipment on the horse, and talks about how much she knows what she is doing with the horse. Matthew then still lifts her up and puts her on the horse.

"'Will you never wit until I help you?' he growled into my ear.

'I can get on a horse myself' I said hotly.

'But you don't need to.' Matthew's hands...." etc etc ad naseum.

See, you don't need to do anything strenuous anymore now you have Big Strong Manpire to carry you. GAAAAAAAAAAH.

And this is what modern women aspire to meet. The world has failed somewhere, I swear down.

2) Diana is trapped down what is basically a fuck off hole in a castle, except it's got some bollocksy scholarly name in French. She is visited by the ghosts of her mother and father who tell her the stories they told her as a child to encourage her to 'stay strong' (the worst phrase in the English language) also known as waiting for the Big String Manpire to come and rescue her. (You know that bit in Kill Bill Vol. 2 where Una is buried alive and she gets herself out using her fingertips? That). Anyway, so Diana, having been dragged about a bit and tortured in a way that I couldn't really imagine the description being as banal and un-involved as the descriptions of her making a cup of tea, or having water pouring out of her cheeks (they're called similes and metaphors, they're really cool, you should learn how to fucking use them) and she starts being told about how her prince will come and rescue her (GAAAAAAAH ONE INCH PUNCH MATE, ONE INCH PUNCH) and she thinks

"Why would anyone want to be with a useless witch".

THIS is my main problem; Diana has such ridiculously low self esteem that she can't believe that someone as mannish and handsome and wordly etc etc etc as Twatthew would want to be with someone like her. But instead of the book being Diana turning around and thinking "I'm awesome" all you get is Diana having her face cupped in his manly hands as he strokes her bottom lip and tells her "you're awesome to me". Great. Nice one, Twatthew, way to make a woman constantly dependent on you as her one source of approval. That's not massively psychologically abusive/manipulative AT ALL NOW IS IT???? Grrrrrr twat.

3) Diana is always, always referred to as "Matthew's". Matthew says she is "mine!" like a spoilt two year old on his first day in nursery too many times for it to just be a one-time drunken "get in my bed, woman, mine" thing, which is the ONLY time claiming ownership is acceptable and must immediately be followed by an apology the next day. You can't own a person, that's illegal. AND DIANA ACCEPTS THIS. When she is 'marked' as his by having his crest burnt into her back, she is more worried that some harm will come to her precious Mafffou than angry that she has basically been branded like a slave.

4) The line that made me throw the book at the wall...

" Matthew took my hands in his, 'That's enough bravery for one day, ma lionne'."

Might as well have patted her on the fucking head. Twat.

5) Oh, and then a whole PAGE later, when Diana magically discovers she has another in a seemingly limitless list of plot-enhancing powers, he tells her she isn't going to use it in the same way you'd tell of a child who's just discovered swearing. AND SHE ACCEPTS THIS.

6) Oh shit, turns out, despite never having sex because Matthew has decided that Diana doesn't have body autonomy and instead should just let him finger her occasionally on demand, they could have babies. Diana tells him she shall take some magic contraceptive tea. Matthew tells her 'You'll do a damn sight more than that'. He NEVER offers to take precautions himself, he TELLS her what she will do with her own body and then PRESUMES that it will be her fault anyway if they do get pregnant because she is so much 'stronger' than him.

And the sex thing? The sex thing really pissed me off. 'We have all the time in the world' (so?), 'We don't have to rush' (it's not like it's making a fucking pastry, mate, it's just sex), 'I want to get to know you're body'(and learn how to control it). I think @prototypecube, who was good enough to hear out my twitter rant put it best. "Hey bellend I want a good fu* bellend crams shushy finger onto her lips* "sssh my sweet, we do not need to rush, rest now". This perfect 140chars sums up the entirety of Diana and Matthew's relationship, and to be honest most of the plot.

There is a term from what Matthew does to Diana throughout the book; gaslighting. If this was my mate I'd have her out of this relationship a long time ago. Only, wait a minute, this entire book covers A MONTH OF THEIR LIVES???? THEY MAKE ALL THESE DECISIONS ABOUT THE FUTURE OF THE ENTIRE SHITTING WORLD IN A MONTH??? SHE TAKES 688 PAGES TO COVER A MONTH???? GONE WITH THE WIND COVERED FIFTEEN YEARS IN THAT TIME!!!!

A LOT happens in the book, but to be honest I was so fixated with anger on how much of a massive bellend Matthew was I kind of forgot how much I enjoyed the rest of it. It's very every silly, and things magically happen to move the plot along so much it's like she was making it up as she went along. And you know what the worst thing is? I can't wait to read the next one...

Honest to God, this is how they get you...

Happy Christmas!

BookElf xxx

Dear Santa....

Dear Santa,

I've not been a particularly good girl this year. I've smoked and drank too much, and done naughty things. I know that as a Naughty Girl, I should be receiving nothing more than a lump of coal, but I also know that probably won't be the case and I will, in fact, be getting more lovely books for Christmas.

But, Santa, I know a lot of very good boys and girls, almost four million of them, and they won't be getting books for Christmas this year. Quite a lot of them won't be celebrating Christmas at all, which you and I know is fine, and doesn't mean that we have to do Wintervil or not say words like 'snow' like some people like to to "joke" we do, but, Santa, shouldn't they have books anyway? Because you know how important books are, Santa, I know you do. You know that if a child reads for pleasure they do better at school, that they feel better about themselves, that they will have better prospects in the future. You know this Santa, and yet, you don't seem to send a lot of children books.

Santa, I don't really think it's fair that one in three children in this country don't have a book of their very own when the Prime Minister's family use a knife that cost £20 to spread their butter with. I know there are a lot of unfair things in this country. I know that a lot of people are angry, and scared about the future. I know a lot of people don't have places where they can live safely, or money to buy fuel. I know there are an awful lot of things to write to you for...

....but Santa, one in three children in this country do not own a book. A book. And I know that a third of the grown ups in this country don't feel that great about books. I know that even people my age, who are my friends, find the idea of reading a bit weird. That it must be 'geeky' or 'strange'. That there must be something wrong with someone wanting to read. Don't you think, Santa, that the two things might be, you know, connected?

Santa I'm not sure what to do. I can't afford to buy a book for four million children, and I don't know how I would give them to them if I could-I can't fly around the world in a night like you. I wish I could make books, and give them away from free, like the World Book Night and World Book Day people do, but I'm only one Elf, and I'm a bit stuck.

Santa, do you have any room in your sack for a book for every child? And if not, do you know anyone who does?

Thank you Santa, I shall make sure to leave you a mince pie and a tot of Port (and carrots for the reindeer, obviously!)

BookElf xxx

Oh and PS, Santa, I know that I deserve nothing but coal (especially after this twee bit of heart string pinging nonsense) but I would really really like Christmas at Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons. Thank you xx

WHY ARE YOU NOT WRITING AWARD WINNING DRAMA, EH?

Where are all the working class women writers?

1) They are EVERYWHERE. Seriously, go to a spoken word event! Go to one shitting spoken word event in Sheffield, or Bradford, or Manchester, or Leeds and LISTEN to these women’s voices. Listen to the stories of single-motherhood, forced prostitution, being different, being alone. Go to women's events like the Ladyfests, or Feminist Networks, or conferences like Women Up North and TALK to the women there about their experiences. Read the zines. Seriously. Get yourself a cup of tea, sit near the display table and READ THE ZINES. Some of the funniest, most knowing writing I've read this year has been in zines. Read the blogs, Jesus there are some AMAZING blogs by working class women out there, they might not be all about how dreadful everything is, but they are there. Look at tumblr, LOOK AT TUMBLR, and tell me we don't have working class women writers par excellence. They might not be making lots of MONEY and PRESS, but they are THERE!
2) PLEASE stop silencing middle class women. We might have parents that went to university, and we might have grown up with certain aspirations taken as a given, but that doesn't mean we don't know pain! We don't know poverty, or neglect, or abuse! I am getting INCREASINGLY FED UP with feeling not 'working class hero' enough to be deemed acceptable, just because I happen to have had a parent who was a teacher. Yes, I am aware that MASSIVE FUCK OFF PRIVILEGES come with my being middle class, but that doesn't mean my writing has no cultural value! (Yeah, I know, I'm a massive privileged cow bag. I should just go throw myself in the sea. I KNOW.)
3) Stop saying that things working class people actually like to do don't count! Why is it only deemed star worthy if a working class woman writes something that is as good a a middle class woman's writing? Why does everything have to have literary merit? Why take the piss out of Jordan's books, if people enjoy them, and working class women read them, and they therefore get pushed up the best seller's lists, why is that such a MASSIVELY BAD THING? Why is it only remarkable if a working class woman writes something that middle class people (or middle class people who are the children of working class people, like me) can appreciate? Oh, but we must have more work that tells us what it is like to be working class! Really? How about reading one of those misery memoirs you love to scorn? Or is that too real for you? Not enough long words? Too many references to a defunct and abusive system that is RUN BY MIDDLE CLASS PEOPLE?

Grrrrrr
Honestly, sometimes if I didn't blog I would explode.