Books Archives | Concrete

Books, Venue / 04/08/2020 Favourite Black character: Brooke Bayoude in Ali Smith’s There but for the

If an adult walked up to their white, middle class neighbours and asked them, “Have you just not met any or very many black people before or are you just living in a different universe?” they would be met with a certain level of anger. However, Brooke Bayoude in Ali Smith’s There but for the...

Books, Venue / 04/08/2020 Angie Thomas: unapologetic and utterly brilliant

Angie Thomas, one of the most prominent authors of the last few years, has skyrocketed to fame and recognition in the literary world, following the publication of her 2017 debut novel The Hate U Give. Spending a grand total of 50 weeks at the top of The New York Times Best Sellers list, Thomas’s masterpiece...

Books, Venue / 04/08/2020 Leaving a fictional character’s identity ambiguous: harmful or helpful?

Genuine representation in literature has been a debated topic for a while now. We all (hopefully) agree representation is important for the voices of minority groups to be acknowledged, heard, and related to, but the technicalities of carrying this out are often contested. When it comes to the explicit representation of identities, readers tend to...

Books, Venue / 04/08/2020 Do awards really matter?

Whether a book has won an award or not has never determined whether I’ll buy or read it, and many of the stories I love the most cannot boast an award. It’s also worth noting that, like awards for film and TV, Black authors, particularly Black women, have significantly less recognition for their work. It...

Books, Venue / 04/08/2020 Diversity in children’s literature

Children’s literature is full of freedom. It explores worlds of fantasy, magic, loss, joy, and absolutely everything in between. Young minds are so creative, and so eager to learn; children are crucially influenced by what they read and are affected by this as they grow up and form opinions about the world around them. So,...

Books, Venue / 01/08/2020 UEA award winner amongst Booker Prize nominees

The recently released longlist for the 2020 Booker Prize has been markedly different from previous years. From Covid-19 changing the ways in which the judges have interacted with each other, to the unusually high number of debut novels, this year’s Booker Prize winner is likely to have a great impact on the literary world. In...

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