World Childless Week Ambassador Jody Day of Gateway Women will be hosting this webinar
You can go straight to her blog post and register for this webinar HERE
From fairy tales through to modern fiction, childless women are often portrayed as damaged, deranged and deviant. Whether it's Snow White's evil stepmother, the psychopathic puppy-killer Cruela de Vil, Glenn Close's bunny boiler in 'Fatal Attraction' or the unreliable and half-cut narrator of 'Girl on a Train', we never seem to come out well!
Unconsciously, it seems writers default to using women without children (both childless and childfree) as ciphers for the 'deviant' woman. And this is why it's so important that we find ways to challenge this narrative through writing fiction ourselves, through highlighting these lazy fictional tropes, and by championing those writers who are doing so in their work.
Join us for this fascinating discussion with World Childless Week Ambassadors Jody Day, Meriel Whale and Cristina Archetti (all of them writers too), along with authors Sue Fagalde Lick and Annie Kirby, and NoMo Book Club curator Rosalyn Scott, for a lively discussion of interest to writers, readers, bookstagrammers, publishers and critics alike.
DATE: Thursday 14th September
TIME: 7pm BST - Find your timezone HERE
REGISTER FOR THIS WEBINAR HERE
Please note: Whilst the panellists will be recorded, your camera and audio will be turned off. If you are unable to attend the webinar live, you DO NOT need to register to watch the replay on the website.
PANELLISTS
Jody Day - Ireland
Jody Day has been a World Childless Week Ambassador since its inception in 2017. She is the founder of Gateway Women and the author of what many professionals consider to be the ‘go-to’ book on the topic,
Living the Life Unexpected: How to Find Hope, Meaning and a Fulfilling Future Without Children (PanMac 2016/2020).
A psychotherapist, thought-leader and speaker, for the last five years, she's lived in rural Ireland, where she's completing her first novel, featuring a middle-aged, single, childless, menopausal heroine and nurturing her emerging 'Gateway Elderwomen' project.
Meriel Whale - UK
Meriel Whale is a World Childless Week Ambassador from the UK.
She is a counsellor, teacher and writer and identifies as queer and is neurodiverse, both of which are very important aspects of her identity.
Her novel in progress, featuring non-binary historical childless characters, has been longlisted for an award for unpublished fiction, and she is also working on another novel.
Cristina Archetti - Norway
Cristina Archetti is a World Childless Week Ambassador and Professor of Political Communication and Journalism at the University of Oslo, Norway and a psychotherapist specializing in the trauma of involuntary childlessness.
She is the author of Childlessness in the age of communication: Deconstructing silence
and the founder of the first Norwegian childless organization: Andre veier: Foreningen for permanent barnløse.
She is currently working on the book, 'The trauma of infertility: Understanding the experience of involuntary childlessness'.
Sue Fagalde Lick - US
Sue Fagalde Lick is the American author of the memoir & blog Childless by Marriage and most recently Love or Children: When You Can’t Have Both as well as the novels Up Beaver Creek and
Seal Rock Sound' both featuring her charming childless heroine 'PD'. (A third novel in the series is in progress).
A journalist, poet, musician and singer, she is widowed, childless by relationship and single.
Annie Kirby - UK
Annie Kirby lives on the south coast of England where she works as a research fellow in cybercrime and economic crime.
She has an MA in Creative Writing from the University of East Anglia and a PhD in American Studies.
Her short stories have been published in anthologies and broadcast on national radio and she is a winner of the Asham Award for short fiction. Her first novel The Hollow Sea, about childlessness and mythology, was published in 2022 by Penguin. She is currently writing her second novel.
Rosalyn Scott - UK
Rosalyn Scott is a UK-based editor who works in publishing and has experience of working across non-fiction and memoirs.
Most recently, she was the development editor for ‘I Always Wanted to be a Dad: Men Without Children’ by Robert Nurden.
She also runs the NoMo Book Club - where she reviews books with childless and childfree themes, supports NoMo authors and advocates for NoMo readers. It can be found on Instagram @thenomobookclub.
REGISTER FOR THIS WEBINAR HERE