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Christopher Robin: The Boy Behind the Book

Christopher Robin: The Boy Behind the Book

The character was based on the real son of A A Milne, Christopher Robin Milne.  However, as he grew up, he started to hate his portrayal in the Winnie the Pooh books and resent his father.

August 21, 2017

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Kiran Millwood Hargrave interview

Kiran Millwood Hargrave interview

Kiran Millwood Hargrave is a poet, playwright and novelist. She's best know for her debut novel 'The Girl of Ink and Stars' and latest release 'The Island at the End of Everything'. Her books, while perhaps more aimed at children and teens, appeal to adults too, and her debut received multiple awards.

August 7, 2017

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Why I Treasure the Harry Potter Audiobooks

Why I Treasure the Harry Potter Audiobooks

Despite the growing technological panic at the cusp of the twenty-first century, my parents only owned one CD player. It was too big to move from the sitting room, so the audiobook was bought for me as six cassette tapes to listen to in my bedroom. At nine years old, I had already amassed an impressive collection of audiobooks on cassette - I've always struggled to fall asleep and need to be tricked into unconsciousness by distraction from overthinking and worrying. I had Roald Dahl’s Fantastic Mr Fox and The Giraffe, The Pelly and Me memorised, and had been forced to give up my Thomas the Tank Engine cassette to my sister, who was, in fairness, deserving; she's younger than me and suffers from the same problem sleeping.

June 26, 2017

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How Audiobooks Changed My Life

How Audiobooks Changed My Life

It sounds like a cliché, but I've always loved to read. My journey into personhood was guided less by those around me and more by the worlds I inhabited and the people I met on my fictional travels. I wanted to be Matilda for ages. I genuinely thought that if I read more books my brain would become so advanced I’d be able to close my curtains without leaving my bed.

June 23, 2017

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Speech from the Stars: Audiobook Recommendations

Speech from the Stars: Audiobook Recommendations

When I was thirteen and wishing that Orlando Bloom would read me the phonebook (it was 2003, that’s the only excuse I have), I could never have dreamt that there would be so many books read by celebrities to choose from.

June 20, 2017

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Interview: Vaseem Khan on elephants, India, and the fourth book in the Baby Ganesh Detective Agency series

Interview: Vaseem Khan on elephants, India, and the fourth book in the Baby Ganesh Detective Agency series

Vaseem Khan is author of the crime series Baby Ganesh Detective Agency. The novels are set in Mumbai, India and the detective on the case is accompanied by a baby elephant!

June 12, 2017

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Reading classic novels in an era of climate change

Reading classic novels in an era of climate change

There is a strange and troubled kind of intimacy between our own moment of climate change and 19th century Britain. It was there that a global, fossil fuel economy first took shape, through its coal-powered factories, railways, and steamships, which drove the emergence of modern consumer capitalism. 

May 30, 2017

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How robots can help us embrace a more human view of disability

How robots can help us embrace a more human view of disability

When dealing with the otherness of disability, the Victorians in their shame built huge out-of-sight asylums, and their legacy of “them” and “us” continues to this day. Two hundred years later, technologies offer us an alternative view. The digital age is shattering barriers, and what used to the norm is now being challenged.

May 22, 2017

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Local and Community History Month: Book recommendations

Local and Community History Month: Book recommendations

May is Local and Community History Month - a great time to find out a little more about how your village, town or city grew up into what it is today. The more you dig, the more you'll find that people, events and buildings all have fascinating pasts.

May 8, 2017

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#ThanksforTyping: the women behind famous male writers

#ThanksforTyping: the women behind famous male writers

It started when an American academic noticed how frequently the acknowledgements sections of weighty academic tomes featured a male author thanking his nameless wife for typing. 

May 2, 2017

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