Author: Joanna Olney

#FeminismFriday

Posted on June 12, 2015 by - Journal

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If you follow Holly on Twitter, or read any of her books, you’ll know that feminism is a topic she is PASSIONATE about. So every Friday Holly, myself and Hannah will be posting something to do with feminism – whether that’s Holly’s thoughts on a particular topic, her top 5 feminist websites or just some fun articles and features we’ve come across on the web and want to share with you. To kick off, we had a few questions we wanted to ask Holly:

What does feminism mean to you?
Equality for everyone, regardless of their gender. IT REALLY IS THAT SIMPLE. I know some people (wrongly) think feminists want to win power from the guys, lock them in cages, and then walk them around on leashes made from our plaited grown-out armpit hair. But that’s not it. Feminism is for all genders. Feminism benefits all genders.

What first got you interested in feminism?
I’ve always had this feeling growing up that something was…wrong… but couldn’t quite work out why I was feeling so icky. I had this constant conflict inside of me, between feeling something was wasn’t right, but then also wanting to partake in the wrongness. I remember, one rainy day at school, the boys decided to spend their lunch-hour lining all us girls up in order of who had the nicest arse. Half of me thought, “this is disgusting” and the other half thought, “I hope I win”.

It was only in my twenties, when the fourth wave of feminism hit, that I was like – hang on – I LIKE THIS. I LIKE WHAT YOU’RE SAYING VERY MUCH. And, How To Be A Woman by Caitlin Moran really did change my life. It made feminism FUNNY, and approachable, and it was like a big fat fire was lit inside of me. I really think humour is the best gateway drug into feminism. Start with the ridiculous, like, “I know, I’ll spend forty quid painfully waxing off all my pubes, even though no-one ever sees them”…then build-up to the big stuff – rape culture, abuse, female genital mutilation, rights to education…

Thanks Holly!

What first got you interested in feminism and what does it mean to you? Let us know by posting your thoughts using the hashtag #100DaysofNormal. We can’t wait to hear from you!

Myths about OCD

Posted on June 11, 2015 by - Journal

I think anyone whose experienced OCD wants to throttle people who say, ‘Ooo, I’m soooo OCD’ if they like their bedroom tidy. It’s such a misunderstood condition, and, as a word, has really found it’s way into our lexicons. But we’re using the word wrong! OCD is not just being tidy and clean. The correct words for these personality quirks are… umm…well ‘tidy’ and ‘clean’. They are NOT ‘OCD’.

My MC, Evie, has contamination OCD. Yes, she washes her hands a lot… But part of my desire to write Am I Normal Yet? was to show it’s so much more than this, and to help readers understand what it’s like to live in a brain that never leaves you alone.

I found this Ted video, debunking common myths about OCD, and I wanted to share it with you.

Holly x

Win ‘Am I Normal Yet?’ – an amazingly Goodread.

Posted on June 10, 2015 by - Journal

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We’re celebrating Day 10 of #100DaysofNormal by giving you the chance to win one of 10 copies of Am I Normal Yet? with Goodreads. Head over to Goodreads to enter: http://bit.ly/1GrIrPm

And don’t forget to add Am I Normal Yet? to your Goodreads bookshelf!

Good luck everyone 🙂

We all want to be normal… or do we?

Posted on June 9, 2015 by - Journal

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When you work for a
youth charity, like I do, you get used to the same phrase cropping up over and
over.

Am I normal?
Is this normal?
Can you let me know if this is normal?

It doesn’t matter whether people are talking about
their relationship, their sex lives, their various dangly body parts, their
family situations, their reactions to taking a certain ‘extra-curricular’
drug…they all want to hear the same thing.

This is normal.
You are normal.
It’s OK.
Normal normal normal.

In fact, lots of our most popular articles over at
the website I work for – TheSite.org – all have ‘normal’ in the title. But what
does it even mean? And why are we so concerned with being like everyone else?

In my book, Am
I Normal Yet? my protagonist Evie is struggling with the label of OCD she
was given when she was just 14 and how that impacts her opinion of herself. She
sees her mental health diagnosis as confirmation of her ‘abnormality’ and keeps
it a secret from all her new friends at college. All the wants is to just be
like everybody else, but throughout the book she learns she’s chasing a ghost.

So, what is normal?

In language terms, it means conforming to a
standard, In mathmatics, it’s being on the boring bit of a graph with everyone
else. It throws up words and phrases like, ‘average’ or ‘like everybody else’.
And though, in some contexts, the word  is a very comforting thing to hear – say, like
at the doctor’s when you go there with something embarrassing – I worry we
cling to it in other parts of our lives, compare ourselves to others and make
ourselves feel generally…well…crap.

Here’s the thing – we can’t
be normal in every part of our lives. It’s impossible. All of us have unique quirks that others don’t. We’re all special-yet-totally-oddball
snowflakes, smashing into each other, muddling and guessing our way through life. Chasing normality is a bit like whack-a-mole – your individual bits
are always going to pop up no matter how much you suppress them. Why not try
embracing them? See them as positive things, rather than things to hide away?

My own abnormals

I have mildly-webbed
hands. TOTALLY GROSS – I know. (I have to
say, they’re only slightly webbed, but there is still enough of a webbage for
me to show people at dull parties to spruce things up a bit). I have a
phobia of buttons. I have low blood pressure and faint if I stand up for too
long. I hate travelling and
literally have to be drugged before I’m put on a plane. My feet turn blue when I’m
cold. I can do the most accurate impression of Ronan Keating the world has ever
known… Essentially guys, I’m a freak! A total nutter. And I could focus on my ‘abnormalities’
and wish I could be more like you…but then you’re a freak too. You really are. And I’m mighty glad for it – and hope you can be too. 

10 Things You Didn’t Know about Holly Bourne

Posted on June 8, 2015 by - Journal

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Here at usbornepublishing towers we’ve put our heads together and gathered up10 facts that you MAY or MAY NOT know about the lovely Holly Bourne:

  1. Holly’s Grandfather, Larz Bourne, was a famous animator and created the Deputy Dawg series.
  2. She has an irrational phobia of buttons and can’t wear them. Ever. Or get close to people wearing them. Buying a winter coat is therefore always a nightmare
  3. Holly once fainted at a Bryan Adams concert. When she came round backstage, the first thing the medic said to her, was: “Bryan Adams? Really?”
  4. She was once shortlisted as ‘Best Sexual Health Journalist of the Year"
  5. For Holly’s Journalism dissertation, she went undercover as a mistress on an infidelity website to see why men cheat on their wives. This process won her a writing award, but also damaged her belief in relationships for a good couple of years.
  6. She’s a reluctant Ravenclaw. “I’M NOT A RAVENCLAW, THE HAT IS BROKEN,” she yelled, when she was sorted on Pottermore. Later that week, she had to sort through old stuff at her parents house and found her school exercise books. In them, she had written, after several homework assignments: “I didn’t find this homework challenging enough, so I’ve done some extra…” … The hat never lies.
  7. Her life philosophy is stolen from the Bill & Ted movie. “Be excellent to each other”.
  8. She once almost broke the door of the Great Hall off it’s hinges on a VIP trip to the Harry Potter tour by slamming through it and screaming, “There’s a troll in the dungeon”. She had to convince seven security men she was allowed to stay on the rest of the tour.  There’s video evidence here.
  9. She dropped out of Art College after a class assignment to do a five minute presentation on the “beauty of a Magic 8 ball”.
  10. Holly writes almost all her books on her daily commute into London.

Let’s celebrate all-things-cheesy

Posted on June 7, 2015 by - Journal

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Do you know what week it is?

It’s British Cheese Week! I know what you’re thinking…how did I go my entire life without knowing such a hugely important fact? But now you do. YOU’RE WELCOME.

Cheese is a major character in Am I Normal Yet? Evie, Lottie and Amber find they need many a cheesy snack to stay nourished enough to fight The Patriachy. So, what cheesy snack are you? Let us know your go-to snack using #100DaysOfNormal.

HAPPY BRITISH CHEESE WEEK. Now, go eat some wotsits and kick some feminist ass!

#FF

Posted on June 5, 2015 by - Journal

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Make sure you never miss out on any #100DaysOfNormal by following all my social media-type stuff. I don’t always talk about books you know. You can be delighted by my feminist rants, complaints that I’ve eaten too much, and academically-sound commentary on Made In Chelsea:

Twitter

Instagram

Facebook

Read the first chapter of ‘Am I Normal Yet?’

Posted on June 4, 2015 by - Journal

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“It started with a house party. This wasn’t just any house party. It was also My First Date. Like first EVER date. In my entire life. Because, finally, following all the crap that had gone down, I was ready for boys.
 His name was Ethan and he liked the Smashing Pumpkins (whatever that is) and he’d managed to grow real stubble already. And he liked me enough to ask me out after sociology. And he was funny. And he had really small, but cute, dark eyes, like a ferret or something. But a sexy ferret. And he played the drums and the violin. Both! Even though they’re, like, totally different instruments. And and…
…and – oh, Christ – what the HELL was I going to wear?

Okay, so I was stressing. And obsessing. “Obstressing” times a million. In an utterly deplorable way. But this was a big deal to me. I was doing something NORMAL for once. And I reckoned I could just about pull it off. And I did know what I was wearing. I’d run through every possible clothing combination in existence before opting for tight jeans, black top and a red necklace, i.e. what I reckoned to be the safest date outfit ever. I was going to be normal again. But I was going to step back into it safely...”

This is just a tiny taste of Am I Normal Yet?, which is out in the UK on 1st August 2015.

Read the ENTIRE first chapter now at:

                             www.usborne.com/readAmINormalYet

We’d love to hear your thoughts – let us know what you think of the first chapter by using the hashtag #100DaysofNormal.

Only 100 in the ENTIRE universe

Posted on June 3, 2015 by - Journal

Guys – I have the BEST news. My supersonic publisher Usborne have printed 100 LIMITED EDITION copies of Am I Normal Yet?. And THEY’RE THE MOST YELLOW THINGS YOUR EYEBALLS WILL EVER HAVE SEEN. There are just 100 in the entire universe. They’re so exclusive even *I’ve* only been given ONE – and it was my brain what wrote the book!

The best part? We’re going to be giving them away to YOU as part of #100DaysofNormal. 

Here I am at Usborne Towers signing ALL of the limited edition copies in all their neon glory! 

Each limited edition copy is numbered and signed by ME! (Obvs) I’ve even spelled my own name right in each one (which has been an issue in the past)!

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Don’t they look A-MAZ-ING? You need an eye-shield to protect you from it’s neon powers.

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“HOW DO I GET MY GRUBBY HANDS ON ONE?” I hear (hope) you ask. Just stay tuned to the #100DaysOfNormal hashtag for giveaways and exciting challenges. 

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Am I Normal Yet? is out on 1st August 2015.