July 14th was the first memorial day for victims of honour based violence in Britain. The memorial day was secured by the charity Karma Nirvana, in conjunction with Cosmopolitan magazine and the Henry Jackson Society, and is officially called The Day of Memory for Britain’s Lost Women. It occurs on the birthday of Shafilea Ahmed […]
The Coral Strand
Passion. Deceit. Revenge. From English winters to Indian summers. From the cold streets of modern Britain to the glamorous, turbulent and impassioned world of 1940’s Mumbai. Each year, Sita makes a mysterious journey to the Mausoleum, the place of dark memories and warped beginnings. She goes to spy on Emily and Champa, the strange ‘guardians’ […]
Bloggers, Floggers and the Magna Carta
Bloggers, Floggers and the Magna Carta 15th June 2015 is the 800th anniversary of the sealing of the Magna Carta. 17th June 2015 is the 3rd anniversary of the arrest of Raif Badawi. A mighty 800 years separate these two events and yet they are intrinsically and fundamentally linked. Both are to do with the […]
May 2015 Blog Tour
I am excited to announce this week (May 25th to 31st) I will be doing a blog tour, guest-posting, having reviews or interviews on a different blog every day. Thank you to all the brilliant bloggers for hosting the tour. Monday 25th May Blog Tour kicks off: http://anawfullotofreading.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/blog-tour-ravinder-randhawa-guest-post.html Tuesday 26th May http://anawfullotofreading.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/blog-tour-ravinder-randhawa-guest-post.html Wednesday 27th […]
In Praise of Doubt
‘I tell you, the first duty of manhood and womanhood is a Declaration of Independence.’ (Man and Superman by George Bernard Shaw) ‘I don’t know’ ‘I’m not sure,’ are often received as statements of weakness, vacillation or lacking intellectual rigour. I beg to disagree. I believe they are two of the strongest statements a person […]
Complicity With Barbarism
The most terrible things hit our computer screens every day: injustice, suffering, calamity, wars, violence, and a hundred other cruelties and degradations. We choose which ones we’ll watch and which ones we won’t. In general we exercise a reasoned approach and self-restraint based on our ethics, politics and beliefs; we don’t want to be colluding […]
Letter to an Unknown Soldier
Letter to an Unknown Soldier was a project initiated by Kate Pullinger and Neil Bartlett to create a memorial of words. For me, the best kind of memorial. I felt a need to write my letter, not because I celebrate war, but because I empathised with the suffering of individuals amidst that carnage and wondered […]
Beauty and the Beast
Enemies. Romance. Fireworks. YA novel. Top Twenty Feminist Bookfair. ‘Problems? Confusions? Contradictions? I got them all and if you’ve got them, then FLAUNT them is my motto.’ Meet Harjinder (aka Hari-jan): ‘A’ level student, supermarket worker and desperate journalist. Feisty and impulsive, Hari-jan can’t refuse a dare and to make matters worse has fallen in […]