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Lockdown Librarian

2020-07-21T21:28:27+00:00

Our resident blogger Emma O’Brien reflects on the similarities between lockdown and military family life, AND shares the best books to escape with, books for a good cry and a good laugh, and comfort reads… Hello Reading Force families! I’m Emma, a Pad Brat and school librarian and I write a regular blog here about reading and Forces life. What a unique year 2020 has been so far! Currently I, like so many others, am still in lockdown working from home in my role as school librarian, planning for our adaptation to our ‘new normal’ [...]

Lockdown Librarian 2020-07-21T21:28:27+00:00

Brave New World

2020-07-01T15:11:00+00:00

Ahead of a seminar on the lives and experiences  of Forces partners, taking place on 8th July, Alison Baverstock, Reading Force founder and military wife for 30 years reflects on lockdown and deploymets. Talking to a young friend over the weekend, her experience of returning to work after self-isolating at home really chimed with me. At the time, I couldn’t put my finger on why. Later I realised she had been describing how I always felt at the end of a deployment. All of a sudden your world changes, and things are back to normal – except they are not. The end-date [...]

Brave New World 2020-07-01T15:11:00+00:00

Military Wives

2020-03-11T13:57:20+00:00

Have you seen Military Wives yet? Founder and director of Reading Force, Alison Baverstock, gives her thoughts on the film here, what the makers got wrong, and what they got so right…   Military Wives Military wives are mostly invisible. Partly through inclination – we just tend to get on with it – and partly because wider society has not, until now, appeared particularly interested in us. Joining the military is both a heritable and regionally-specific activity, so there are some families/parts of the country that know all about the Forces, and others that are almost entirely ignorant. So a film [...]

Military Wives 2020-03-11T13:57:20+00:00

An epic adventure to the Arctic Circle

2020-03-11T14:30:37+00:00

Alison Allmand-Smith is about to embark on an epic adventure to the Arctic Circle to fundraise for Reading Force – WOW! We’d like to say a very BIG thank you to Alison! In this blog she talks about why she’s going on this survival expedition and why Reading Force is close to her heart…   Hello, on 6th March I’m setting off to Kiruna in the Arctic Circle to raise money for Reading Force. The expedition has been organised by a group of former Elite British and Swedish soldiers, headed up by Military Cross holder Steve Heaney of adventure and survival [...]

An epic adventure to the Arctic Circle 2020-03-11T14:30:37+00:00

The Brightstorm twins are back for more adventure on the sky-ship Aurora…

2020-02-06T10:00:48+00:00

We’re thrilled Vashti Hardy, the author of Brightstorm and Wildspark – both nominated for the Blue Peter Book Award! – has written our latest guest blog to mark a very exciting day… Darkwhispers, the sequel to Brightstorm, is out TODAY!!! In this blog Vashti shares the books and stories she loved as a child, the moment she knew she wanted to create stories, and what inspired her to write the brilliant Brightstorm… As a child, I was always drawn to stories with an element of fantasy, science fiction and magic. The first longer book read to me by a teacher in [...]

The Brightstorm twins are back for more adventure on the sky-ship Aurora… 2020-02-06T10:00:48+00:00

Booking the chance to say thank you

2020-02-03T10:01:33+00:00

Running a charity, and ensuring there is enough money to keep going, is much harder than it looks.   Charities rely on donations. Company budgets and funds that give charitable grants are increasingly under pressure. Plus there is a natural reluctance for any organisation to find a charity over-dependent on their contribution, and hence – should they be unable to continue funding – to become the reason someone loses their job. Most company donors feel comfortable if they see a range of sponsors listed – but finding new sources of sponsorship can be really difficult. In the current climate, with so [...]

Booking the chance to say thank you 2020-02-03T10:01:33+00:00

Let’s hear it for the girls…

2019-11-20T11:37:36+00:00

A lucky Reading Force family recently won a copy of Holly Webb’s exciting new book The Runaways. Holly is the author of 128 books, and we’re thrilled Holly has written our guest blog on her favourite books with standout girl characters… I’ve always loved books with a historical setting, so starting to write books set in the past has been so exciting for me over the last few years. My new book, The Runaways, has a determined girl at its centre, a child who’s determined to save the animals she loves. Here are some of the historical novels whose amazing girl [...]

Let’s hear it for the girls… 2019-11-20T11:37:36+00:00

A Secret Diary of The First World War

2019-11-11T22:31:55+00:00

Our guest blogger, Gill Arbuthnott, author of A Secret Diary of The First World War, shares what it was like to write about real Scottish soldiers... I always buy a poppy in November, but until a couple of years ago, it was a rather impersonal act on my part. Not any more: in September 2016 I started writing a children’s book about the First World War, based on the trench diary of James Marchbank, a boy from Dalkeith, near Edinburgh, who went to war aged 14, in August 1914 and basically grew up on the Western Front. Suddenly, what I read about [...]

A Secret Diary of The First World War 2019-11-11T22:31:55+00:00

Reading Force summer reading top picks!

2019-08-13T17:29:58+00:00

Whether you’re on the beach or at home, you can travel everywhere with a good book! Here are some of our favourite new releases…. Babies and toddlers             Swarm Of Bees by Lemony Snicket and Rilla Alexander It can feel good to be angry. It can feel better to stop. Swarm of Bees! Swarm of Bees! You are SO angry! What will you do? Watch out! A mischievous boy has unleashed an angry swarm of bees! The result is a zany gallop through a charming town where readers will encounter evidence of some bad behaviour, some [...]

Reading Force summer reading top picks! 2019-08-13T17:29:58+00:00