CBI Pride Reading Guide

Back in September 2021 I recommended the new Children’s Books Ireland publication Free To Be Me: the Diversity, Inclusion and Representation Reading Guide, which importantly fills in a gap in advice available to parents, teachers and children in Ireland.

Now CBI have followed that up with the Pride Reading Guide: 100 great reads for ages 0-18 (admittedly, a pretty wide spectrum of readers), a 15-page booklet marking Pride Month 2022.

The books range from Baby’s First Words by Christiane Engel for toddlers, ‘packed with a wide range of vocabulary for little ones’, in which the baby’s parents are a same-sex interracial couple, to Allies (editors Shakirah Brown and Dana Alison Levy), a collection of essays on allyship for young adults. It’s stating the obvious that not so long ago such books were not being produced, but it’s also cheering to witness such broadening of the publishing spectrum now.

In Irish terms, two notable recent books here are Our Big Day by Bob Johnston of the excellent Gutter Bookshop in Temple Bar for 3-7 year olds (‘a celebration of love, of family and of a commitment to marriage equality’) and, for an older readership, Let’s Talk: about relationships, sex and intimacy by Richie Sadlier (the kind of guide that I certainly couldn’t access as a 12-14 year-old boy). I also noticed several books in the Little People, Big Dreams series from Frances Lincoln Books; attractively designed, we have some in our own household (such as the ones on Audrey Hepburn, Frida Kahlo and Maya Angelou) ; these ones feature Elton John, Megan Rapinoe, RuPaul and Alan Turing.

As with the longer Free To Be Me, this guide will really help children, their parents and their teachers find more books which truly speak to them.