Mary K Gilbert

My little girls (now big girls!), adopted from foster care, arrived with few possessions - but each had been given a box of books by @booktrust.org.uk. These books, read together, became our first shared memories.
Spread the joy of reading with a donation:
donate.booktrust.org.uk/Xmas3/~my-do...

Brilliant - and so well deserved.

😁😊

Get to know the amazing, brave Mary Bruce, ABC journalist, directly confronting both a sexual abuser and murderer to their faces. #PiggyPOTUS 47 is vile, evil, disgusting. You can judge him by the company he keeps. 🐷💩🤬🤮

We need more journalists like Mary. We need fewer pigs masquerading as humans.

“Quiet, piggy.”

What an asshole…

Cover of Old Baggage by Lissa Evans showing a drawing of a woman in a red coat and hat with a bag beside her, standing on what must be Hampstead Heath.

I hope that the 115th anniversary of Black Friday is a suitable day to say how much I am enjoying reading my third book by @lissakevans.bsky.social.

Smashed windows and graffiti at the FiLiA conference.
FiliA aims to amplify the voices of women, particularly those who are silenced or unheard, and to defend women's human rights. But clearly, they shouldn't be allowed to discuss anything at all without the prior approval of trans activists.

Cambridge students launch single-sex Society for Women “We’re now at a point where I no longer can see inaction as just inaction. I now see a lot of it as just cowardice, and I’m not interested in it anymore.” – Maeve Hall…

Cambridge students launch single-sex Society for Women:
“We’re now at a point where I no longer can see inaction as just inaction. I now see a lot of it as just cowardice, and I’m not interested in it anymore.” – Maeve Halligan, CUSW President and Co-Founder.
genderblog.net/cambridge-st...

As is traditional on October 31st, I present my greatest ever Halloween costume triumph: Watson as Cardinal Woofsley.

The White House is asking people not to share pictures of the East Wing because it’s even worse today.

I knew that Granny’s Flag - a picture book with a lovely rhyming text by Rachel Rooney and witty & detailed illustrations by Ros Asquith - would be a delight, but I didn’t expect that it would also bring tears to my eyes! ❤️❤️

A beautiful city to walk in...

Apologies for publishing self praise, but when I saw this piece by India Knight in today's @thetimes.com , I thought I might burst with happiness.

Johann Frederick of Saxony, aka the Magnanimous, painted in 1509 at age 6 in totally fab outfit (especially the hat!) by Lucas Cranach the Elder. Whose day is today.

Totally thrilled to be on the Gold Crown shortlist 😁😁😁

There used to be a wonderful second hand bookshop in Lichfield just below the cathedral. Nicknamed 'The Nutty Bookshop' by my family because of the odd way the two owners designed each section by amateurish drawings of planets. Thus 'Jupiter' room and 'Venus' room. Superb books at knock down prices

Smashed windows and graffiti at the Brighton Conference Centre, where women have come from all over the world to talk about male violence and women's human rights. This is trans activism, and it's misogyny in action.

Dean: The president is unhinged

Johnson: A lot of folks on your side are too. I don’t control him

Dean: Oh my god, please. That performance in front of the generals.

Johnson: I didn’t see it.

Dean: Our allies are looking elsewhere. Our enemies are laughing.

This book is actually available for a mere 99p on Kindle - but only for another 12 hours!!

Reform UK's ex-Wales leader Nathan Gill admits pro-Russia bribery Nathan Gill admits eight charges of bribery while being a Member of the European Parliament.

Nathan Gill is no fringe politician.

He was the leader of the Reform Party and before that UKIP in Wales.

A Brexit Party MEP.

A friend and ally of Nigel Farage, who in 2016 called him:

"terrific," and "as honest as the day is long."

This is a MASSIVE story

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Van Hollen: I will just say that anybody who thinks we're on the way to authoritarianism is wrong. We are there

'About the law, the British anti-self ID movement has been proved right. Gender identity does not trump biological sex in the Equality Act. Trans people’s rights and protections coexist with sex-based ones, rooted in the reality that biology shapes us all.'
Thank you @susannajrustin.bsky.social

Could we please stop pretending that the flags being hung from streetlamps or painted on roundabouts are innocent expressions of patriotic pride? This is the far right marking out its territory. It uses these flags to intimidate its traditional victims and opponents. 🧵1/3

He's always tetchy if anyone questions him closely. The phoney grinning bonhomie slips rapidly into snarling defensiveness. That's why he needs to be called out. Well done Beth Rigby!

No fear. No favour. Our new podcast. Journalism should be fearless — and free of favour. This podcast is about holding the line.

'In Episode One, former BBC journalists reflect on what it means to cover sex and gender with impartiality, what happens when stories are quietly shelved, the issue of safeguarding, and why trust in journalism is under strain.'
seeninjournalism.substack.com/p/no-fear-no...

Exactly what I needed. Just a perfect gem of a book - great characters, nicely balanced, and properly funny. A bit like reading an Ealing Studios classic film

It’s wonderful as is @lissakevans.bsky.social

The Martyrdom of Saint Lucy The right is desperately seeking to make a martyr out of Lucy Connolly in order to distract from the real victims of the hate she helped to spread, argues Otto English

Lucy Connolly was convicted of inciting racial hatred, and her tweet was part of the tinder that lit violence, intimidation, looting, and thuggery across England last year.

The fact Reform conference gave her a standing ovation says everything about that movement.

bylinetimes.com/2025/08/27/l...

Well, that's my day made! For any TV commissioners reading this, it contains starring roles that span the generations - may I suggest Helena Bonham-Carter, Toby Jones, Florence Pugh & Jack Lowden, for starters...

I’m trying to imagine a situation in which I phoned the Metropolitan Police to report three tweets, & they not only phoned me back, gave me a crime number & took me seriously, but dispatched five officers to arrest the Tweeter.
It’s fantastical, unimaginable.
Who gave the order, and why?