5 Books on my To Be Read Pile | February 2017

My blog has become a lot more book-themed recently, completely by accident! But I have been reading a lot recently, and I do enjoy it so I guess it makes sense to transfer that into writing on my blog! I love reading posts about what other people want to read, or have read and I love writing about my own too, so that's what I'm going to do for this post. So here is a list of just 5 of the books that are quite high up on my TBR list:

Eleanor and Park, by Rainbow Rowell

My friend lent me her copy of this book as I’ve wanted to read it for so long – and she's been wanting me to read it for ages too! (We do love a good book discussion haha). Now that I finally have a copy in my possession (for a while, at least) I’m much more likely to get around to reading it! I adored Fangirl when I read that, and loved the way that Rainbow writes, so I’m sure I’ll enjoy this book too!

If I Stay and Where She Went, by Gayle Foreman

Again, these are two books that my friend lent me. I wasn’t too bothered about reading them, but then I read I Was Here by the same author which after thoroughly enjoying, made me so excited to read these two books!

The Good Immigrant, edited by Nikesh Shukla

I’d heard about this book a while ago, but didn’t really know much about it. I became aware of it again more recently after hearing about Nikesh's second project which will focus on politics written by Britain’s youth. The Good Immigrant, as I understand it, is a collection of essays contributed to by 21 writers exploring “what it means to be black, Asian & minority ethnic in Britain today”. It’ll be very different to anything I’ve ever read before but I know it’ll be such an insightful important book, especially with the political and cultural issues going on around the world today. I’m very much looking forward to reading it.

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them – The Original Screenplay, by J.K. Rowling

If you don’t know, I love Harry Potter and anything to do with J.K. Rowling’s wonderful wizarding world. On the opening night of the Fantastic Beasts film, I was at the cinema, wearing my Hufflepuff scarf with pride. I found the film so beautiful and Newt was as fantastic as the Beasts were. I want to read the screenplay to re-cap over the story and immerse myself in 1920s magical New York because let’s face it; why wouldn’t you want to? :)

A Quiet Kind of Thunder, by Sara Barnard

I follow a lot of book-blogs and book-YouTube channels and so I’ve heard so many good things about this book already! It hasn’t even been out for that long! I do have my own copy of this book, and just as a quick side note: the cover is stunning. It sounds fantastic from the blurb and what I’ve heard from other people, and I’m pretty sure that this is the book I’m going to read next after I finish my current one! 

So those are just 5 (or 6 I guess, but I counted the two Gayle Foreman books as one, since they’re the same series) of the books I can’t wait to read!

What are some books you can’t wait to read?

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Female Football Fans

Source: Norwich City Football Club

If you didn’t know, I’m a football fan. I support Norwich City and it’s a hugely important part of my life. I know that football is ‘traditionally’ a more male-dominated sport, but it is definitely even-ing out and becoming more popular among women too. One thing that does get me a bit annoyed sometimes is that I receive a subtly different treatment as a female football fan than I know my male counterparts do.

Take this recent example; I was at a University applicant day a while ago and for one of the hour sessions, we had a taster seminar, and for one task we were working in groups. I was sat at a table with 3 males. Part of the conversation went something like this (forgive me for paraphrasing slightly, the essence of the convo will be the same):

Person 1 to the whole table: So where are you all from then?

I answer, Person 2 answers,  

Person 3: I live near (insert geographical location name).

Person 2: Ah, so are you a (insert name of relevant geographic football club) fan then?

Person 3: Nah, I’m actually (insert other football club name).

Person 1: Oohh, I’m (insert said football club’s rival club).

Laughter amongst the table, and joking about how Person 2 should swap seats so the rivals don’t have to sit next to each other.

Person 1 to Person 2: So, which team do you support then?

Person 2: (Insert name of different football club).

After that, I would have loved to join in and mention that I was, also a football fan, and that my team was Norwich. Unfortunately, I didn’t get the chance because the person leading the session resumed talking to the room meaning the individual conversations had to conclude. Because of this, I can’t be sure, but I got the impression that, had we had the chance to talk for longer, I wouldn’t have been asked what my team was anyway. The conversation felt directed amongst the 3 males and not inclusive of myself. They weren’t rude about it at all, but I did feel very subtly excluded. Sometimes, I just want nothing more than for someone to actually ask me which team I support. I feel like a lot of the time, nobody will know unless I forcibly mention it. “Did you know guys, I support Norwich? I’m actually a huge fan and love going to games whenever I can!” Perhaps it’s because of other reasons, but a lot of the time I can’t help but feel that nobody will strike up a football conversation with me because I’m a female whereas they wouldn’t think twice about it if they were talking to another male.

It’s a small thing, but I just want someone to ask me as an equal and be genuinely interested in my answer.

I by no means am claiming to know everything about football as a lot of fans effortlessly do; however this has nothing to do with me being female – my sister knows loads about football. I mean loads. Transfer rumours? Ask her. Which team a player was bought from, and what that team’s fans thought of them? Ask her. Fans’ opinions of games on Twitter? Ask her. She doesn’t even have Twitter. Her knowledge is definitely not limited to Norwich – she’ll have a pretty all round knowledge of most teams so don’t ever doubt her just because of her gender – she probably knows more than most adult male football fans.

One thing she told me quite a while ago which I found really funny was that in one of her lessons two boys she sits next to were discussing football, specifically Marcus Rashford, the young Manchester United player. They said he was 17 years old. To which my sister thought “18. He’s 18.”* She didn’t say this out-loud but it was funny to think that she just knew it when they probably thought she didn’t have a clue about football.

*He’s now 19, but as I said, she told me of this happening a while ago, when he was still 18.

Anyway, it’s more common nowadays for women to like football and support their own teams instead of just adopting the teams their partner supports. I’m not saying that every woman has to support football, just like all men don’t have to, but I like that it’s becoming more common. I know for sure, that when I’m older, if any partner I may have goes off to matches with friends, I’ll be off to one with mine. I mean, hopefully we’ll be mutual supporters of Norwich City but we can’t have it all can we?!

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