Chatterbox - still talking nonsense

I've gradually been getting more and more cross with the commentary on Heartstopper's lack of sexual content.  This comes up in all media, but I am particularly looking at Trixie and Katya's otherwise very entertaining review on Youtube, and the mainly glowing review from the podcast Chucky , as well as multiple print and online reviews which choose to excuse it, rather than consider why such choices might be made. I'm just going to have a mini rant to get it off my chest. The graphic novel series was conceived and has been delivered as a young teen suitable story about love, in itself a highly valuable exercise in providing a different kind of representation to young LGBTQ+ teens beyond the often quite sensationalised and graphic representation of teenage relationships in general. The scene in S2 Episode 6 of the tv series where Nick says he is not ready to do more than kissing, has caused the most amount of disbelief and in some cases scorn and so I am going to use t...

Judy Blume Forever, currently streaming on Prime, took me right back to discovering that there were actually books written for people like me who were dealing with real life stuff like growing up, relationships and bullying rather than what appeared to be going on in the jolly hockey-sticks school stories that were prevalent at the time.   I adored Judy’s work even though she was clearly American.  It felt like she understood what might be going on on my head despite what I looked like on the outside, and that it was ok to think that a lot of what was happening in the world was wrong and it was ok to say so. She found a unique and real children's voice.   My first job was working in a children’s library and I well remember the kerfuffle and debates around whether to stock ‘Forever’ which was a sensitive, but open and non-judgemental look at a first sexual relationship from a girl’s point of view.  It was lovely to read a story where the girl wasn’t pun...

The last week or two here’s been a bit of a post colonial civil war theme running through my reading and watching Funny boy Streaming on Netflix, this 2020 film is a coming of  age story for a Tamil boy in post colonial Sri Lanka during the civil war. and based on the novel by Shyam Selvadurai (now on my reading list!).  Arjie is already a boy who doesn’t fit and as the tensions begin to mount between the Singhalese and Tamils, he finds that more than one of his identities are under attack.  Played by two actors and jumping back and forward between the boy and young man this is both a sweet story about a boy finding out who he is alongside a pretty brutal story about bigotry, hatred and violence.  Shocking statistic at the final credits that over 1 million Tamils became refugees during this period. Definitely worth a watch.  The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak Another story about a civil war, dealing with love and loss, but this time in novel form, in pos...

Riffing off Animal Farm, this novel is a political satire set in a fictional post colonial African state 'Jidada... with a da and another da' and follows political machinations and personal struggles to maintain power versus those seeking freedom and democracy in a state populated by animals of all kinds.  When we join the story, the revolutionary government and its president, the Old Horse, is almost literally in its dog days, ruling over the worn out and poverty stricken country with an iron fist, enabled by the dog militia.  It could describe a number of regimes, but is particularly referencing the overthrow of Mugabe in 2017.  Mugabe is represented by Old Horse and his young wife is Marvellous the donkey.  The old guard is overthrown by a younger horse, the vice president Tuvius Delight Shasha and we follow the rising of hope of 'free fair & credible elections' and the brutal crushing of those hopes through the eyes of Destiny, a young goat who moves back to ...

On the Trans Day of Visibility , and given that trans rights has lately become one of the bleeding edges of the culture wars, I thought it would also be good to highlight some stuff I've enjoyed recently that is inclusive and (largely) positive, particularly for young people who are most likely to suffer from the latest drummed up moral panic.   SAP With perfect timing, Mae Martin is now streaming on Netflix with SAP, their new stand-up show and I watched it last night.  I loved their work in Feel Good and Dope, and this new sharing of their personal snow globe (you'll need to watch it to understand) was funny, thought-provoking and life affirming.   They lay their heart out open on the stage and have a good dig through it.  Although their life journey bears little resemblance to mine, Mae managed to take me with them every step of the way.  I loved the understated-ness of the structure and delivery despite the full forest on stage and the little ...

I read an awful lot of rubbish but these are the standouts from January and February The Wall by John Lanchester Dystopia novel set in the near future where the seas have risen catastrophically, there is huge migration as a result, and surprise surprise the UK has build a huge wall to keep out the sea and the 'Others'.  National Service keeps The Wall guarded, with a penalty of being put to sea for any failure.  A simple idea, brutally thinking through the implications, but as with all the best sci-fi, grounding it in the issues of today.  Are the Others any different to us, and what would we do?  Enjoyed it, but it came to a bit of a sudden stop for me. The Last Day by Andrew Hunter Murray   Another dystopia novel, this time after the earth has stopped spinning in space.  The details of how are sufficient to give a dubious credibility but aren’t really important. The ‘Stop’ means that half the world is in perpetual darkness, the other in perpetual day, wi...

It's been a strange year again, with not enough live performances in the mix yet.  I've already given my Awards for Film, Television and Theatre for 2022 here , so this is about other stuff that happened this year I didn't want to forget (and some things I maybe did).   The year started off with pretty low expectations and in many ways it managed to underdeliver, but there were some high spots too if you look hard enough. My fantasy children This was the year that I discovered mum-crushes.  I'm used to the usual sort, but I now follow more actors with a proud parent vibe than I do with any light lusting.  This is a worrying development and I fear it confirms that I have got old.  The main objects of my new affections this year have been the casts of Stranger Things and of course Heartstopper.  It's so exciting watching actors at the beginning of their career, when you can see all the potential starting to be realised.  For example, Joe Locke absol...

This was an unlikely impulse read, as I'm not usually that keen on romance novels as a genre, but I was really pleasantly surprised. I read it for two reasons,  Firstly I am still hoovering up the work of all of the Heartstopper alumni, and one of the actors will be playing the romantic lead in the film. But what sealed the deal was it was written by an American but the novel is based in Winchester and Hampshire (where I spend my time when not in London!)  Anyway,  it's a fairly standard set up for a coming of age journey, but it turned out to be a thinly disguised homage to the author's Cuban heritage full of lots of loving and rounded detail about food and culture and family.  And added to this were the locations, not just in Winchester but also accurate descriptions of one of my favourite walks along Basingstoke Canal to Odiham Castle which is not a location that tends to crop up often in bestselling novels.  Finally, the  characters were also well e...

This novel is on the Booker shortlist for 2022 and I can see why.   A Black comedy in every sense this tells the story of some mysterious murders centred on a town called Money, Mississippi.    Masquerading as an offbeat, horrific (and very funny) police procedural/murder mystery, this is a fast moving story about a family of rednecks and then an ever widening circle of white victims being murdered, with the common denominator being a dead Black man at every scene.  Using the real life lynching of Emmett Till in 1955 in the real Money, Mississippi this very quickly turns into an angry and sharp commentary on race in America today, with the caricatured rednecks as victims being a lot less real than the Black cops and suspects.   The references to the dead waking, and a whole chapter being taken up with listing the names of Black men lynched in America, together with the shocking statistics of how few of these crimes were ever investigated, let alone sol...

I am in love, that giddy sort where you want to tell everyone about your new love, and your heart leaps every time someone mentions them. One of the features of a crush is the need to mention them as often as possible to anyone who will listen. So, I am going to gush - look away if it is too painful.  My new love is Alice Oseman's Heartstopper series. I had read some of the graphic novels and webcomic and thought it was beautifully done, but missed the Netflix series when it first appeared. I've made up for it since.  The TV series is a real gem, a shining jewel which has unfrozen my cynical old heart. There have been a lot of reviews celebrating the inclusivity and importance of authentic casting and the representation of the LGBTQ+ teen experience in this series, and they absolutely are some of the reasons it is so successful but not the only ones.  Using fresh takes on romcom tropes, idealised and pure of heart it may be, but these feel like real 3D teens navigating...