Black and white illustration featuring a forest setting with central hippo like creature, hedgehog in the foreground and birds flying overhead
Illustration from Tove Jansson's book 'The Moomins and the Great Flood' (1945) #Womensart
One of the things I loved about Hamnet was that a 17th-century woman's life was at the centre of it.
Now, thanks to the Voicesproject.ie we can walk beside the Irishwomen alive at the same time.
Meet the Dung Queen of Ireland, and so many others...
www.irishexaminer.com/opinion/colu...
A painting of an owl carrying two fairies. The dresses the fairies wear reflect the fashion of the 1820s. One is seated, the other is standing and holding a wand. There is a full moon top right of the scene, and some clouds at the bottom.
Fairies travelling in style for today's #OwlishMonday
The artist is Amelia Jane Murray (1800-1896)
Today we're celebrating #EllenHutchins, Ireland's first female field botanist, for Intl Day of Women & Girls in Science! She began to study plants in her early 20s, gathering more than 1,100 plant specimens over several years before passing away age 29. #CrawfordArtGallery #WomenInSTEM #GirlsInSTEM
#NewIllustrationOfTheDay by Lydia Corry. Detail of a spread from A Little Slice of Sky, about a boy who grows a tree from seed in a city & a community that comes together to defend it when it’s threatened. A retro look in a pleasingly composed scene. Bloomsbury 12 Feb @bloomsburybooksuk.bsky.social
”It was the best of times; it was the worst of times...”
Charles Dickens, Victorian novelist born #OTD 1812; George Orwell noted “no English writer has written better about childhood...”
Portrait by Daniel Maclise, 1839, National Portrait Gallery, London | Cartoon Tom Gauld
@tomgauld.bsky.social
#NewIllustrationOfTheDay unveiled yesterday. Axel Scheffler’s green-eyed, grey-furred, blunt-toothed character Gruffalo Granny, with her notebook, pencil, bag and walking stick, from the third Gruffalo collaboration with Julia Donaldson, to be published on 10 September. @panmacmillan.bsky.social
Photograph a bird standing in a whiteout scape
To hear, one must be silent.
Ursula Le Guin
I’m supporting #ReadItForward2026!
If you buy my books Black Gables, The Midnight House or Welcome to Dead Town Raven McKay during February bookshop.org will donate 10% to @booktrust.org.uk and @scottishbooktrust.bsky.social
#KidLitUk
#supportindiebookshops
In honour of #HolocaustMemorialDay here is an extract from "A Sofa in the Forties" which Heaney read at a memorial service on this day in 2008.
The poem is set during WW2 when Heaney and his siblings are playing, and imagining their sofa is a train.
Original Post: Seamus Heaney: Listen Now Again
I’m supporting #ReadItForward2026! Buy Inspire Me! (by me, from @nosycrow) during February and @bookshop_org_uk will donate 10% to @BookTrust & @scottishbktrust to fund early reading support for disadvantaged UK families. And every sale benefits independent bookshops. uk.bookshop.org/p/books/insp...
Remembering Ann Lovett who tragically died 42 years ago today after giving birth alone in a grotto in Granard.
The Statue of the Virgin at Granard Speaks -Paula Meehan
"and though she cried out to me in extremis
I did not move,
I didn’t lift a finger to help her,
I didn’t intercede with heaven
Lovely #kidlituk #ukkidlit review roundup to brighten up your January!
#yearofreading #kidlit
www.theguardian.com/books/2026/j...
Painting. A garden at sunset. Flower bushes, trees, classical statues. A young woman with long, dark brown hair stands at the edge of a pond, gazing down at the water. She wears a long red/orange gown.
'My childhood from my life is parted,
My footstep from the moss which drew
Its fairy circle round: anew
The garden is deserted.'
~Elizabeth Barrett Browning
🎨Eugène Grasset
#BookWormSat
Illustration. House. Dark sky.
'The old church tower and garden wall
Are black with autumn rain,
And dreary winds foreboding call
The darkness down again.'
-Emily Brontë
🎨Júlia Sardà
#BookWormSat
Out now, middle grade The Night I Borrowed Time by @ihussainwriter.bsky.social is a brilliant time-travel adventure that also looks at the effects of parental separation and Partition.
@puffinbooksuk.bsky.social
#KidlitUK #UKKidlit
worldssmallestlibrary.wordpress.com/2026/01/18/t...
#NewIllustrationOfTheDay by Cambridge-based Peruvian illustrator Fatima Ordinola from her picturebook Our Dreams. A cosy bedtime book about sleeping animals. The images, such as these pandas made with chalk pastels, ink & watercolour, induce relaxation. Post Wave 29 Jan @postwavebooks.bsky.social
Great list! Congratulations @sairaswrites.bsky.social 🎉💖✨
And here they are in all their glory... Picture Fiction for Early Readers Shortlist 2026! ✨📚🏆 #Spark6Shortlist
I'll be chatting with Phil Errington, expert on John Masefield and author of Opening the Box of Delights, and @pierstorday.bsky.social who adapted the book for the stage.
I'll feature the best of your thoughts on the show too, so make sure to give permission when you email your recordings
Breaking news - from the past!
There's so much of it & I had the immense privilege of sharing some of it with @deshocks.bsky.social in a mini-series on her fantastic podcast. Here's a flavour of it. Thank you Eoghan O'Sullivan
Https://www.irishexaminer.com/lifestyle/artsandculture/arid-41778443.html
Wishing trees are an Irish tradition, often hawthorn trees on which people hang ribbons or other small offerings in the hopes that their wishes will be answered. Heaney beautifully weaves the imagery of the wishing tree into a moving vision of remembrance.
#NewIllustrationOfTheDay by Pete Williamson from the 8 Jan tie-in edition of Guy Bass’s gothic, Frankenstein-inspired Stitch Head, first published in 2011. The animated movie is out on 13 Feb and looks its best when it most resembles Williamson’s Goreyesque illustrations. @littletigeruk.bsky.social
Photo of Yayoi Kusama sitting, with red bob hairstyle, and wearing a yellow and black garment with curved lines and dots which matches the background design
'I wanted to start a revolution, using art to build the sort of society I myself envisioned'
-Yayoi Kusama
The ARC of my new novel is now out on netgalley for any advance readers out there who are interested.
Publication date 7th May 26.
Unsolicited writing advice, no. 14:
There is no *right way* to write a book.
There's only the way that's right for you.
Painting of a woman playing the violin in a snow-covered forest.
Winter Music, Léon Spilliaert (1881-1946).
British cover of The Terrible Trio: The Day the Mac ‘n’ Cheese Ran Out illustrated by Minky Stapleton
The Terrible Trio: The Day the Mac ‘n’ Cheese Ran Out is landing in bookshops around the world over the next few weeks starting with the UK TODAY!!
If you spot a copy in the wild, let me know!
Happy reading, everyone 🦓🐧🦝🦁
#kidlitUK #GNkidlit
@scholasticuk.bsky.social
ANNOUNCEMENT: 2026 is the National Year of Reading and that’s why I’m introducing my ONE MINUTE INTERVIEW series.
I thought about how I might encourage reading and engage readers and how to make the process more fun. More below: 1/
We are delighted that the first Southword Poetry Podcast of 2026 is out now with Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin and is available to listen to on our website - southword.buzzsprout.com/share
#podcast
