Do Goalkeepers Wear Tiaras?

Writers love nothing more than receiving a review. It doesn’t even have to be a fantastic review - just a few lines in a magazine will do. It makes their day and any writer who says they don’t care whether they get reviewed or not is a big fat fibber.

At one time writers were a bit fussy about where the review came from. A positive review in one of the broadsheet newspapers such as the Times or Guardian was a VERY GOOD THING that deserved cutting out, enlarging to A4 size, laminating and /or being made into placemats.

Next came magazines. For children’s authors we’re talking the quarterlies such as Books for Keeps, Carousel, The School Librarian and Peter’s publication TkB. Better still are reviews in comics and magazines such as Girl Talk and Bliss because actual kids read these.

What the writer is looking for in a review is that succinct little soundbite that is usually found in the very last sentence. These are really useful for quoting on marketing material and websites. A ‘gripping’ is always a bonus. Ditto ‘a real page turner’ ‘better than Harry Potter’ and ‘laugh out loud hilarious.’ And if the review includes a picture of the cover… yabadabadoo!

However, there seems to be a shift these days. Newspapers are dropping their book reviewers and book pages faster than a Yorkshireman drops his aitches.  Writers are having to seek out new sources and are turning to - where else - the internet. Amazon is one of the most influential book sites. It accounts for something as crazy as 15% of all books sold in the UK (maybe more?). Once upon a time writers were really sniffy about an Amazon review. Even the five star ones they wrote for themselves under a fake name were seen as somewhat second-rate. Now Amazon is where it’s at, baby.  So are all other review websites such as bookbag and chicklish (see my links page). Publishers are falling over themselves to send proof copies of new books to these people to be read.  Individual bloggers who happen to love reading have now got real clout, too. Book Witch, for example. Her billy bookshelves must be groaning with free copies. She must be, too.  So many books… so little time.

I’ve never fancied being a reviewer myself. I have a lot of friends who review books but I’ve always steered clear. I’ve never enjoyed being told which books to read. That’s why I could never join a book club - that and my lack of Boden knitwear. I like reading books I’ve chosen and then, if I am moved by the story, I’ll rave about it until the cows come home.

So far, I’ve never had a scathing review from a bone fide reviewer, touch wood. I’ve had reviews where I’ve seriously wondered if the reviewer has actually read the book and I’ve had reviews from a couple of kids who thought ‘Accidental Friends’ was ‘crap’ but that was from the KS3 Chills Book Award so I guess AF was ‘crap’ if they were looking for ‘chills’ because it wasn’t a ‘chiller’, dudes.

Anyway, two recent reviews of ‘Do Goalkeepers Wear Tiaras?’ by people who have taste have recently surfaced. In the first, from Janet Fisher in the School Librarian, I seem to have acquired accents over my surname for some reason. I have become Helena Piélicháty. I quite like the accents. Très chic. I’d keep them but I reckon my name’s complicated enough. My quote-y bits from Ms Fisher’s review come, as expected, in the final paragraph. ‘There is real enthusiasm for football on every page - dot-dot-dot - football mad girls of eight and up will love this series I am sure and in this time of trying to get children off couches and onto the sports field these stories will help no end!’

Now, if I wanted to make the series have a broader appeal (and I do) I would be highly selective in my quotation and edit it down to ‘Girls of eight and up will love this series…”

See what I did there?

Same goes for this second review from Philomena Manson (INIS, Ireland) I’m not sure what INIS stands for but I’m sure its a prestigious imprint of the highest repute that everyone in Ireland from the bishop to the bishop’s dog turns to on a daily basis. Again, it’s the final sentence of the review we find the quote-y bit.

‘For any class teacher with female footballers and fans in their midst this book is a must for the class library.’

This is obviously going to become ‘… a must for the class library’ next time I make some bookmarks.

Enough already. I’ll leave you with this quotation from Danielle Steele about getting a bad review:

‘It’s like baking a cake with all the best ingredients and having someone sit on it.’

Indeed.

In case you can’t read the text on Posy Simmonds’ clever cartoon, the little girl is bringing her fellow train passengers up to speed with her Harry Potter book:  ‘… but see, they aren’t really them…they’ve just changed into them, cos they took the magic Polyjuice potion… so Harry becomes Crabbe, Ron becomes Goyle and then…’

sketch from Posy Simmonds’ A Literary Life’ ©Posy Simmonds 2003

The joke is that  the passengers look as if they want to wring the precocious girl’s neck but my first thought was ‘if only ‘. The kids I see on trains are more likely to be kicking the hell out of the seat in front of them or whingeing that they’re bored. The few I do see absorbed in something are usually holding a Nintendo DS or similar gadget. I actually can’t remember the last time I saw a child reading a book on a train.  How sad is that?

I have nothing against Nintendo, Playstation, X-box etc. These things are great. They’re valid, exciting forms of entertainment that I accept are as much a part of today’s childhood as Sindy dolls and Johnny 7s were to mine. But Sindy dolls and Johnny 7s (a huge replica gun with which you could do politically incorrect things like pretend to kill people without being told off) didn’t replace books when I was 9 or 10. They were something you played with when you weren’t reading.

It sometimes feels as if the digital age is determined to undermine anything paper based. Books with pages and covers and all them long words - woah, they’re so last season, dude.  Why else would Borders bookshops, alongside hundreds of independent small bookshops, have gone into liquidation recently?  Why else would the chartered librarian be the first member of staff to be made redundant when cuts are called for in larger schools?*  Why else would town and city libraries have spent thousands of pounds on sweeping away acre after acre of bookshelves to make way for computer suites and coffee bars?  The message is: if it doesn’t flash and ping and have ‘apps’ and start with a little i then it’s too uncool for school.

Only books aren’t uncool. They’re really not.  And for every school head who gets rid of a librarian and every town that loses a bookshop and every library that tries to ‘keep up with trends’ I say: STOP IT YOU MYOPIC MUPPETS!!

What? You genuinely are that myopic and want evidence that limiting access to books is damaging?  OK, buster, I’ll give you evidence.

A recent survey carried out by the Sutton Trust has found that young children who are read to daily and taken to libraries more regularly are more advanced in their language skills than those who are not.  Note it says read to. Not plonked in front of the telly. Not given a handset. Read to. From books. Big books, little books, picture books and pop-up books. Fact and fiction and any-and-all-books.  Books found when the children are taken to libraries.  Not taken to libraries to sit at computers BTW. Taken to libraries to choose books to take home to read. It’s not exactly rocket science is it?  And there’s no excuse for parents who say they can’t afford it. Books are  FREE to borrow. F.R.E.E. They cost nowt - nada - zero euro. Yes, nothing - even if little Loretta loses them or puts them in the washing machine/tumble drier/microwave by mistake. Some libraries lend up to 12 in one hit.

As for parents who ‘don’t have time’ to read to their kids. Well make time!  Find it! Half an hour a night  isn’t beyond anyone, especially when you think of the pay-back you’ll get. For: ‘more advanced language skills’ read: ‘a child better at communicating with other children and less likely to go off the rails and demand your attention for all the wrong reasons.’ For: ‘more advanced language skills’ read: ‘better job prospects’ For: ‘more advanced language skills’ read: ‘informed, rounded, interesting person.’

Why am I even writing this?  I don’t need to convince you, do I? You guys already read. You know what it feels like when you go into a library or a bookshop and your heart starts singing. You know how you get goosebumps when you read an opening page that draws you in and you think ‘this is going to be good…’ You know how a well written story stays with you forever. You know that and more.

All we can do is spread the word and pass those feelings on. Well, what are you waiting for?  Go show someone a copy of Are All Brothers Foul and tell them how wonderful it is. You know it makes sense.

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*for more information on the drive to make libraries statutory in all secondary schools go to Alan Gibbons’ blog about the CAMPAIGN FOR THE BOOK (www.alangibbons.co.uk)

As you might have guessed by now, I support Huddersfield Town AFC, as does Patrick (Star Trek) Stewart and David (The Damned United) Peace. Michael Hardcastle MBE, one of the earliest children’s authors to write football stories, is also a Town fan.

To be honest - and this is a daring revelation - it would have been more natural for me to follow our arch enemies, Leeds United. When I was little I lived near Leeds and everyone knew the names of all the players. Paul Lorimer was my favourite but I can remember my grandma being delighted when the Leeds centre-half, Jackie Charlton, once bought fish and chips from her fish shop in Garforth.  However, my family never attended matches so I never experienced a live match until many years later. Maybe if I had been taken to Elland Road as a child I’d be a die-hard United fan today but it was not to be. We moved from Leeds when I was 11 and the connection was broken. I do still have a soft spot for them, said she bravely.

As a teenager I was more interested in music than football (from Lindisfarne to David Bowie). I remember when I went to college one of the girls was a Manchester United fan and everyone thought she was odd! Girls just didn’t go to matches then, or so I presumed.

It wasn’t until I met my future husband that I began going to games. A Huddersfield Town supporter all his life, if I wanted to see Pete on Saturdays, it would have to be at Leeds Road. And so, almost 30 years ago, it began.

Here’s a list of teams some other children’s writers support:

Neil Arksey - Arsenal

Allan Ahlberg - West Bromwich Albion

Adele Geras - Manchester United

Paul Cookson (poet in residence at the National Football Museum) - Everton

James Riordan - Portsmouth

Dennis Hamley - Portsmouth

Alan Gibbons -Manchester United

Bali Rai - Liverpool

Chris D’Lacey - Leicester City

Korky Paul - Liverpool

Tom Palmer - Leeds United

Echo Freer - Leeds United

Malcolm Rose - Coventry City

Sandra Glover - Manchester United

Anne Cassidy - West Ham

Alan MacDonald - Watford

Mal Peet - Norwich City

Sue Mongredien - Aston Villa

Steve Smallman - Aston Villa

Andy Seed - Manchester United

Narinder Dhami - Wolverhampton Wanderers

Keren David - Manchester United

Cindy Jeffreries - Cheltenham Town

Damian Harvey - Blackpool Town

Malachy Doyle - Tottenham Hotspur

Mary Hooper - Brentford Town

Jennie Walters - Tottenham Hotspur

Fiona Dunbar - Arsenal

Seb Goffe - Manchester United and Cheltenham Town

Kathryn Langrish - Hereford United