Sara & Cariad's Weirdos Book Club - Human Rites by Juno Dawson with Juno Dawson

Episode Date: August 14, 2025

This week's book guest is Human Rites by Juno Dawson.Sara and Cariad are joined by best selling author, Juno Dawson.In this episode they discuss Dawson's Creek, Sex and the City, Buffy, Doctor Who and Howard's dreadlocks.Thank you for reading with us. We like reading with you!Human Rites and the other books in the HMRC trilogy are available to buy here.Tickets for Sara's tour show I Am A Strange Gloop are available to buy from sarapascoe.co.ukCariad’s children's book Where Did She Go? is available to buy now.Follow Sara & Cariad’s Weirdos Book Club on Instagram @saraandcariadsweirdosbookclub and Twitter @weirdosbookclub Recorded and edited by Aniya Das for Plosive.Artwork by Welcome Studio.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sarah Pasco. And I'm Carriead Lloyd. And we're weird about books. We love to read. We read too much. We talk too much. About the too much that we've read. Which is why we created The Weirdo's Book Club. A space for the lonely outsider to feel accepted and appreciated. Each week we're joined by amazing comedian guests and writer guests to discuss some wonderfully and crucially weird books, writing, reading and just generally being a weirdo. You don't even need to have read the books to join in. It will be a really interesting, wide-ranging conversation and maybe you'll want to read the book afterwards. We will share all the upcoming books we're going to be discussing on our Instagram, Sarah and Carriads, Weirdo's Book Club. Thank you for reading with us. We like reading with you. This week's book guest is Human Rights by Juno Dawson.

What's it about? It's the third instalment in the incredible best-selling HMRC series, which is about a group of witches in a secret government department known as Her Majesty's Royal Coven. What qualifies it for the Weirdo's Book Club? Well, witches are weird. Isn't that why we used to dunk them? In this episode, we discuss Dawson's Creek, Sex and the City, Buffy, Doctor Who, and Howard's dreadlocks. And joining us this week is Juno Dawson. Juno is an award-winning author of an incredible amount of books, and the HMRC trilogy was her first books for adults, and each one of them has been a Sunday Times bestseller. We are so excited today to be joined by the amazing Sunday Times bestseller three times, three times a charm, Juno Dawson. Yeah, I'm going to clap three times Sunday Times.

That's like Hilary Mantell and the booker. Yes, nuts. Very like that. Just the same, basically, we are one. We are one. We are talking about human rights, which is the third part of the HMRC trilogy. That's what I'm calling it.

HMRC, just to... Her Majesty's Royal Commonwealth. Yeah, yeah. Because you have to pay next year's tax. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was thinking, Juneau. It's not a book about tax, I should say to everyone. Yeah, it's not about tax.

No. A knowing wink. A knowing wing. If you're British, Americans, no idea what's about. You must just think it's genuinely called Her Majesty's Royal Cover. No kind of like... That I invented H-MRC, basically.

I don't have to pay my N-I at the end of it. Beautiful covers as well, lovely colours. Very satisfied. They must look nice in a pile, the three of them. They do, yeah. And if you dig yourself to Waterstones, this is one with a beautiful sprayed edge as well. Oh, a sprayed edge.

I love a sprayed edge. Spridge. It's all about the spedges. I feel upset at how much I love them. Like, I know it's pathetic marketing, but you see the sprayed edge? Yes. But I just fucking love it.

But I was sort of my, I was taken about it because I don't think it's pathetic marketing. I think it's making something that we fetishize already, slightly more special and beautiful. I felt a bit embarrassed that it was like selling me so bad. Oh. Okay, good, because I felt like it was like someone put like a diamond on a top and I'm like, oh, look. I like it when they bring a book back out, but they make it look like someone's covered it in wallpaper. And I'm like, 25 pounds for a book of boarding cart. Come on then.

I love it when they do, yeah, 25 years edition. I just like collectors. It's all about collections and vinyl. And books, I think people want beautiful objé for their lounge. And also investment in things that you do care about. There are so many flimsy things in the world that we don't want. I can't wait to see what the 25th anniversary of these covers. They're going to be sprayed.

I love the idea that there will be around in 25 years. I'm sure. I mean, it's becoming like almost cult classic, not even cult. Yes. Because it's too mainstream to be not cold. It has been quite mainstream. Definitely for my novels. Success-wise, yeah.

Success-wise. It's reached the largest audience. But, you know, like, how every person, pop star in the world has like tried to coin a little fan base and it's a bit cringe. Well quite naturally there has become like this little group that call themselves the Coven. The people who have discovered these books, they have meant a lot to them. And that was kind of what I always wanted. I wanted something that felt like a little, I don't want to say safe space because that's a bit

a bit cringe, isn't it? No, but we can be kind of cringy because you cover so many issues in these books. So that must have been your starting point is there are people who are. served by a lot of the stories they get told. So what sort of came first for you as a route for this trilogy? It was the pandemic and I was contracted to write a young adult novel. I think I will say now it was supposed to be called cuckoo. It wasn't very good. So you started a different story? Oh, I was well into it. Yeah, it was about 25,000 words in. And it gasps. It had nothing going to go for it except a really banging twist, which I'm not going to say because I reserve the right

to use it again. Yeah. Yeah. And then the pandemic hit and obviously everybody went a different kind of insane during the pandemic. I thought that COVID was going to be like the monkey virus from outbreak. I thought we were done for. Well, they did tell us to be worse. Yeah, like that was the message. That was on the news. And so I was finding it really, really hard to write this novel I was supposed to be writing.

And so every day I would take myself to sit at the laptop and would just kind of like doom scroll the latest viral numbers. and I was married at the time. I'm not anymore, but I was made at the time and my husband was like, well, look, if we're all going to die, you might as well just write whatever it is you want to write. And I'd been kind of mulling this idea since 2018 of like, desperate housewives, but their witches, kind of meets the spice girls, meets the craft.

Ladies and feathers, stiff as a board, sorry. Very that. Every time someone mentions the crafters. Correct, that is the correct. My husband was like, well, why don't you do? do that because you don't know if there will ever be a publishing industry ever again. So you really might as well just write a book that you would love. That you want to read.

And so off I went. And so it was one measure spies girls, one measure witchiness, a bit of X men thrown in for good measure. And off I went. And that was kind of where it started. Did you know it was going to be a trilogy? Did you have that sort of all plotted out? Yes.

That's amazing. And that's the weird thing because I dug out my age. agent found the original pitch document that she had taken out on submission. But then there was a very detailed synopsis of book two and book three. Wow. And it's evolved surprisingly little. The main plot beats like the cliffhangers have been very controversial, but I planned all the cliffhangers. I planned all the big reveals and the twists. But what I didn't plan for was the relationship between these five women. And that was the bit that just kind of developed as the pandemic went along because of course I was spending all my time on Zooms or in my WhatsApp

group chat and the dynamics of my girl group chat were being really sorely strained by the pandemic and so the relationships between the five main characters who are also women in their 30s and 40s that was where I didn't see this trilogy going it was never meant to be a study of female friendship in your 30s but that's kind of what it's ended up being as much as about witches. It's so interesting that, obviously, we talk a lot about writing on the show, that you can be someone that can write 25,000 words of story, and know that that is not where your heart is.

But I think, isn't it sort of amazing that the pandemic, I guess, gave you permission to kind of open your heart and go, well, what would I want to read? Like, you vary that. And I've decided now that this is going to be the only rule, which is unless it feels as fun as Her Majesty's Royal Covenant did, I'm going to back off. I'm going to leave it. And there was a struggle. There was a bit of a gap after I'd finished human rights, the third book. And I was like, well, what next? And it does

feel like there's some pressure, you know, when you've had three best-seller. And a novella, we should say. And a novella, yeah, prequel. Three and a half. But which have all done really well, what do I do next? And I was a bit frozen on the ledge. And that was when Simon & Schuster came to me and were like, what could we do to tempt you back to Y.A? And all of a sudden this new idea came along that I felt just as passionate about. I also hate referring to books as passionate, but, and that I felt just as excited to write as I did Her Majesty's Royal Coven.

So I found it. I was worried I might never get it back. Yeah. But I did. Oh, yeah. Well, that's good. And also, sometimes you do need to go fallow for a bit to let ideas actually. We say that all the time.

And we're not working. Yeah. I say that. Sarah's always working. I'm like, I'm just like fallow. I'm having a fallow time. It's enriching. Your brain's always sort of going in the background, isn't it?

So the first. The first book, or like the origin of the trilogy, the sort of the prequel, involved Amber Lynn. Correct. Yes. And so was she a historical figure that you were already interested in? Yeah. So I, we're going way back now. I used to be primary school teacher.

That was my job straight out of university. And I taught year six. And in year six you do do, there was a very, every teacher listing will be like, oh, I know it well. The module, The Sixth, 10 with the 8th. And kids loved it because it's so spicy. It's gory. headings, adultery, you know, there's so much going on. And Dan did stand out, obviously, is perhaps of the six of them.

She's the one that has the most law around her, or at least the best known law, I think. So when I was writing the first one, again, one of those very unscheduled moments, there's a scene in book one where the main character, Neve, is delivering some exposition to the teenage characters. I was like, da, da, ha, ha, ha. The first coven was founded by Anne Boleyn. And I just kind of threw it in as like, because obviously everybody, one of the rumors was that Ambellin was a witch. I kind of tracked.

And then in book two, there's a moment where evil twin, Kira and Eve's sister goes to this sort of like convent where some of the witches live in. There's this big portrait of Anne and it's, I called it the Lothalbine. And I was, it blew my mind, there is, there is no portrait of Ambelin. Those portraits that we think of Anbelin were commissioned posthumously. once Elizabeth was on the throne. Oh, and she was like, bring my mum back. Bring my mum back. So they revised her history.

She was no longer a bitch-haer hell demon. She was the queen mother. And so none of the portraits of Anne Boleyn are necessarily... It's not like they had a photo to work off. And I found that really mad. And Henry had all the actual living portraits of Anne destroyed. And so I became obsessed with this idea that a group of witches had spared a Hans Holbein portrait

and had looked after it for all these centuries. And so as soon as I included that scene, both my editor and I were like, you've got to do the story of who were these women who saved this portrait. And so, yeah, so that was a fun little diversion. So I did that because there was no way. I was tied up on Doctor Who.

I wrote an episode of Doctor Who. And so I knew human rights was never going to be published for the year it was meant to be. So my publisher was like, do you think you could do a little novella? Do you know, just knock out a Sunday Times best sell a novella in the middle of your also Sunday Times by selling TV writing

and your Chile, that's incredible. Yeah, it's been mad. Yeah, that was a lot of fun. Yeah, sort of I wrote Queen Bee around Doctor Who. Wow. Were you a Doctor Who fan? Yeah. Like lifelong Doctor Who fan.

Yeah. Carrie has married to one. I knew. Huvian, are they called? Huvian, correct. Yeah. Well, he has left, shall we say. He's left the Havian, yeah.

Did you watch my one? He hasn't watched him for some years. Oh, I didn't know any of this. Big, big, big, huge. Tom Baker's, that's his fave. Oh, okay. He's that era. Yeah, a bit older.

And then when it came back, he did watch for a bit. So I'm talking, so Christopher Eccleston. Tick. Yeah. And then Tennon, I think, is when, yeah, he just, I don't know. Something, he's not for the golden years. Is this like when a band gets back together? Yeah.

And they don't, and their album, you go, that's not who you are. You and take that. Yeah, I'm trying to imagine. But they've never let me down, I'm trying to imagine what it would be like. Sarah's a... If they released a reggae album. And they...

No, rap. Gary's got white dreadlocks. Yeah, that would be... Well, I mean, Howard used to have white dreadlocks. Oh, that's true. But that's back of the day when we didn't know. You, good point. We didn't know how bad that was.

Yeah, I don't know. I feel like I can't speak for him, but yeah, he just slowly moved away from it. He is pretty bad when everyone starts liking something. Oh, it was like... Interesting. No one liked it. And then it became this thing. And it was like, what? How come is it? And at that point, everybody liked it. It was getting like 14 million viewers an episode.

But we actually went back for Jody. That's when we back. She's so good. She's good. Was she your doctor? Shootie Gowah. Although we did write. So my intro into the Who Universe was I wrote a podcast for BBC sounds, which did have Jody in it. The day that I was in a recording studio with Jody Whitaker was, because I'm one of those people who never stops to really think about what I've done. And I'm always like, well, what am I doing next? But being in a booth with Jurydi was like, is this unhinged? Yeah.

I mean, because I'm sure that's common with lots of very successful people, but that you don't get many periods to stop and appreciate. Yeah, yeah. How much you've done, how much you've achieved. And how successful these books have been considering, they are, you know, about witches, which is not always like, I guess, a common Sunday Times bestseller topic. You know, that.

Well, you see at the moment, fantasy is where it's at. I was going to say, it's having a huge. In fact, although what I quite like, like about HMRC, again, which is not taxed, is that it's not very on trend. Because what is on trend at the moment is what the kids are calling Romantacy, which I would not so, sexy wolves. I thought, I was listening to a podcast the other day. Obviously, I'm so out of touch with anything rationality. They were talking about fairies, sucking and fucking. Yeah, it's, it's

correct. It is like hardcore, spying. And you actually do hate fantasy generally. You're not keen if there's elves or stuff in the same. Do you know, I was thinking about this on the way here about why I don't really like being alive at this period of time. It's a sci-fi because it feels like sci-fi now and I think that is... It's dystopian. Well, it feels like sci-fi, but we're all reading fantasy. But even though it's the root of truth, isn't it? Everything that's successful is using, you know, the world's slightly different.

People are the same. Yeah. Whether they're magic people. Which is what you've done so brilliantly of these witches and the female friends. Do you want to know my hot hair come romanty? Yeah. I'm going to get cancelled for this. We've never had anyone cancelled on the podcast.

I killed you. This is massive for us. dating as a recently single person, dating has become so horrific that people would rather mind fuck a fairy. I do think that's not cancelable. I think that's very astute because it's become so difficult and so removed and so on your phone and people are just... And have you watched Love Island this year? The men on Love Island this year. If that's what men are like, I'm going to go wank to a fairy. And what are they like? Oh, it's been toxic this year. It was toxic when it started. I couldn't watch the first one? Is it because the red flags are more obvious?

Or are men becoming more confident in what they're saying? I think the show... They stopped hiding because they hid it for like five years. The show was getting boring. So this year they chose violence in the casting part. And they cast men. They must have said, do you enjoy treating women badly? Oh, okay, sorry, you're not applicable.

Oh, you do enjoy treating women badly. Here's a plane to Mallorca. Oh, no. And the way they talk about the girls behind their backs. But he'll become famous. Women's aid had to get involved at one point as well. Oh my God. I wonder two things.

I wonder, one, did they used to edit people to have less of it? Well, actually they were always... Oh, maybe. Especially like talking about women in a certain way, and now they just want the bad press, so they're just going to hang out to dry. Because there's two sort of ways we go, it's not just the women that there should be a duty of care to.

He'll become famous, and then he'll be thrown to the dogs after everyone's bored with him. Oh, he'll be back on all styles in January. I have no doubt in my life. They do love Ireland or stars. They really do in the January. Drag race. has a lot to answer for, doesn't it?

Like, come on. Has witches always been, like, an interest of yours? Like, obviously, you mentioned the craft, which is one of the greatest films ever. Have you watched it recently? How old were you when you watched the craft? So it's very formative for me. I must have been about 14, 15.

Perfect. Yeah, and I was a goth. And so the craft was like, oh, my God, I just couldn't believe. Because it was hard to be a goth. In those days, you couldn't have the internet, guys. You couldn't easily order black and white striped tights, okay? You had to go and look for them in Camden.

And the Palace Palace in Manchester. You had to go to Camden and people would shout and laugh at you on the way. I was shouting and laughing. Yeah, yeah. Essex was very much not into golf. And the craft, I rewatched it recently with a friend. They did like, they showed it again. And I was like, God, this film is dark.

Like, they don't like a girl. And they just make a hex on her that all her hair falls out. And she's like, there's a scene in the shower with her, like, weeping is this blonde hair? Yeah, but she's a horrible racist. Don't feel bad for her. No, but like they, to the point where then isn't she like suicidal? And they're like, good, kill yourself. Like, it's really, it goes to a place that you would, obviously.

It overcorrects. I was a bit shocked at like, yeah, it is a bleak film. So did you watch it at that age? God, it's a good one. Same age. I remember going to the pictures with some friends. So good. And weirdly, anything witchy was the best way to see a woman on screen in the ages or 90s.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. In that it was a weird time for women on screen. Obviously, we had Dana Scully and we had Ellen Ripley in the alien films. But all the best women. seemed to be witches. He had Willow in Buffy, the craft, charmed. And the other brilliant one. Shera witch and something? No, you're thinking of mermaid. She was just a single one. She was in the... Witch of Eastwick. Which of Eastwick?

Oh, which of Eastwick. Yes, you are, which of Eastwick. Yes, you are, Richard Vichwit. Death becomes her, also had a little bit of that aspect of that. And, um, oh my God. Hocus, pocus. No, also brilliant. Nicole Kidman. Oh, practical magic. Practical magic. Which is the lime and the lime and the cook. Oh, my God. Practical magic. Huge genre then. There was a big genre of like 90s witches. Acceptable. So like they did tarot.

They wore long skirts. Like they play guitar. It was kind of like grunge light. You called yourself wicker, not a witch. Yeah. At that point you weren't calling yourself a witch. I got my first tarot cards after seeing the craft, went to common garden. So this is deep seated.

Why haven't you written a book about witches? I would love to write a book about witches. No, I would love it. I think I think I still have that teenage thing. Perhaps you look like just loving it so much. Just like anything. You know, I love fantasy. I love Lord the Rings.

I'm a big. Like, if there's magic in it, I'm fucking happy. We queued up for Harry Potter when we were at university and far too old to be going to queue at a bookshop. I queued at a bookshop. Wouldn't now. But you were very... I remember when you were talking,

like, you did not like anything that had goblins and al-in. I'm just one of those people that's really annoying because I say I don't like things and actually then I could think of a lot of exemptions to the role. Yeah, but did you watch the craft? I didn't watch the craft, but I haven't watched anything.

That's true. I just got big holes in my cultural knowledge. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But the craft was... I didn't avoid it. The craft was a big... And I guess they were like, teenage witches.

That was the thing. All the other witches we saw were like older or like getting divorced. Which is a recent week. But they were like cool teenage witches. Like they were using magic for bullies. So this is a fantasy really in sort of finding out something about yourself. But finding out you do have... You're special.

Everyone thinks you're weird anyway. You're already being bullied for being weird. But it turns out you're actually fucking magic guys. There's one of the witches in your book who can heal animals. And that would be, I would like... Imagine you just finding out one day. Oh, I can just make all the animals better. You just be walking around.

Yes. Pigeon. Yes. Have a new foot. Exactly. How sad is it when you see a little hobbly way now? And you know, it's where someone's put out spikes and it's not the pigeon's fault he wants to be alive.

Is that what happens to them? Yeah. I just hadn't put that two and two together. Yeah. Although I do have a seagull on my roof at the moment. And if it did fall to its death, I wouldn't mourn. It shrieks all through the night. How long the sea girls live for, do you know?

Well, presumably once it's able to fly, It will be there anymore. It's a baby one. And also that is the Brighton law. That is, that you have a seagull that is bothering you. They're so big in Brighton. Yeah.

Like pyridact hills. Yeah. I think there are a different level to any other sea gods I've seen. It must be a special breed, mustn't it? I don't know what they're feeding them. Well, this is it.

They go down the bins. They feed themselves. To a lot of fish and cherubs. And sort of like good quality, vegan, down the back in the lanes. It's a delicious bit of falafels. That's it.

Yeah. So you said you worked as a primary school teacher and obviously work with young kids and stuff and have written kids and YAA staff. Do you feel like it's the best training that could have been granted you in a way for for adult fiction because kids give up fucking easy with a book? Although weirdly I think the last two of the last YA books I wrote were way darker than Her Majesty's Wild Coven in some ways and that one was about addiction and one was about the fashion industry. It's like a true horror story kind of. But I knew from

YA that unless you really grip or shock or surprise readers, they'll just give up on it. And there's so much competition from TV and phones and games that, you know, a YA novel really does have to grab the attention.

When I was writing Her Majesty's Royal Coving, it was kind of like if I like it, maybe someone else will like it. Yeah, yeah. And it was such a weird book in that I think people thought, and I know, because editors kept asking me to write it, they wanted me to do like a trans queenie. They wanted me to like write like the great trans British novel.

Yeah. And I was like, I don't want to do it. It sounds a bit worthy. And I realized that's not necessarily a book I would buy. Yeah. Not actually as it turns out, I have read that book and it was Detransition Baby by Tori Peters. And I'm so glad that Tori wrote that book because it's a marvel. but I'm especially happy that I don't have to write the great trans novel now because it was an unbearable kind of pressure that I didn't like. I mean, there's an expectation then of whether it's true or not of someone, a character being you. And so you could write a completely different character,

but just from the characters being trans, there would be, and that pressure, I don't know how you'd sit down to a computer and keep going. What am I telling my story? Am I imagining someone else? What is someone else going to read into this? It's so interesting, isn't it? Because, like, if you like witchy, Doctor Who,

like you've got this kind of sci-fi fantasy vibe. But then everyone's like, no, you have to tell this truth. And you're like, that's not my truth. That's not what I enjoy. I don't enjoy those, necessarily those, that's not what I would go for my entertainment. It's a real burden that someone owes a subversion of their story. Like, okay, why don't you drill down more into that?

Yeah. Open a vein for us. That would be lovely. Yeah, because that's what you are known for talking about. But this was 2020, and he did, and I've said this many times of it, It blew my mind that in the middle of a once, hopefully, once in a lifetime global pandemic, the British press still found so much time to talk about trans people and especially trans youth. And I felt everybody kind of wanted my hot take on it.

But I was like, well, if I'm going to give you my hot take on trans lives in the UK, I want to do it in a way that I would find exciting and fun. And I think you're right. I think people had got me wrong. I'm weird. I'm a genre reader. She liked the craft, guys. I like Doctor Who and The Craft and X-Men and Buffy.

And so I was like, right, here we go then. And I don't think anybody was crying out for a fantasy trilogy for my adult debut. But I think, and this sounds, maybe this is good advice, but just be true to yourself. And it will all work out. How perfect. Because, and again, if you're someone who did grow up loving, I love genre stuff. I love genre stuff. And if that's where you love when the whole world exists,

you know, the characters and the costume and the magic, all of this, then like, yeah, that's the book that you want to run awry. It makes sense, but it's, like you said, it's this burden that, well, because you're this, therefore you have to write truthfully and what they mean is depressingly. Also, the publishing industry can sometimes be a little bit, well, obviously they have to sell books. So they are going, I think Carriad and I once had an experience, which is not equivalent, but someone asked me,

They said, the easiest sell for you as a novel would be a book about friendship, like two best friends based on you in Carriad. And I said, I have no idea. And I couldn't write in that prescriptive way. So I said no. And then they sent the same book pitch to Carriad. Just changed it. And when Carriot mentioned it, I was like, they are so cheeky.

And I was like, oh, I don't really, again, I write genre. I don't really think I won't write that. They were coming from a commercial thing of like, what could we sell first? What's the most one plus one equals two? This is the book that person. They're also thinking, I think, about the PR. Yeah. So it's like, oh, that would be good.

You know who'd book Sarah and Carrie out together? Oh, they could get up the one show if it was a book about that. Oh, they'd get the Observer magazine. Yeah, yeah. And it's like, you can't start art from there. Like, you have to start art from here. We all know it's soulless. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, it's interesting because when I was promoting the gender games, which was my book of essays, which got a show out in your book. Yes, I did. Yeah. I was everywhere, everywhere, wheeling stories of my trauma about, sexual assault and harassment and of my family, just awful things, trying to promote this book, Crickets. Like the only, I think, especially if you are a woman

and even better, a woman from a minority group, they would really love you to talk about your trauma. Yeah. And little else. Yeah. Or even if you're trying to sell something that's nothing to do with it, that's still what the interview would be about. Yeah.

And I wanted to talk to you as well, because the book you wrote a long time ago, this is... This book is gay. I was going to say, this is gay. I was like, that's not right. This is gay. I was like, she didn't call it that. This is a gay book.

This book is gay. Yeah, I wanted to talk to you about that because it's, and I hope this is okay to talk about. That it's become one of the most banned books in America. Yes, indeed. It is number three. Well, it was number nine. I read an old article and then I read a new article from you saying it was number three since Trump has come to power. And I was like, God, like, so most banned in libraries and sort of education.

Yeah, it's. It's a common-regated situation. It's a common-regated situation. So in America, they have a very definite system for tracking how books are challenged, where teachers, librarians and bookshops report data to the American Libraries Association, who each year publish a list of the most challenged or banned books. And this book is gay, has been troubling that list now, I think, since 2021. The problem is, once you appear on the list, it's almost like they've sent out a list of books to insane right-wing people.

the sort of censorious right, take the list almost to libraries and bookshops and just start scanning the shelves for the 10 titles that are on that list. And so once you're on the list, it does take a really long time to come off it is the problems. It creates a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy. But what I will say in a weird way,

at least America is tracking it. I know, anecdotally, that this book is gay and books like it are being challenged or being stolen from libraries and destroyed in the UK. as well, we just don't have any data on how often it's happening. That's such a British response to something.

It's like, well, it's happening, but we don't really know. No, no, no, I probably isn't happening. Probably in your head. And sort of denial so they don't have to deal with an issue. So your book was published in America, which is obviously an incredible achievement and amazing. Is there any silver lining where for some people who still need that book, they would be able to find it? But isn't there a weird thing as well? Like you said, the Wright can see that.

list, but other people can see that this. And it's hugely helped. So the last, since we have first appeared on that list, weeks, that's me and source books, who are the heroic American publishers who have been so supportive, the sales have gone up. And that's because America has a very

set pride month in June, every Barnes & Noble gets out its pride display. And so I can see when it sells. And basically I do all my sales in June. And that's because the industry, whether it, and the environment, the whole ecosystem, of course it's against censorship.

So libraries, bookshops, publishers, of course they're fighting censorship wherever it happens. Well, yeah, there's never been a good book censor. No. I mean, it's always the biggest red flag. Yeah. Oh, they're burning books. It's not always a bad thing. Who else?

Let's find out why. Let's hear them out. Hear them out, maybe the books aren't good. Yeah, but there must be a really strange feeling to know that it's... Shoulders. Yeah. It's what makes me sad is the message it sends to young LGBTQ people, which is that even in the year 2025, there is something really controversial about their existence.

Dangerous. This book is dangerous. The book is a totem for them. You know, that's what they're trying to ban. You can't ban being LGBTQ, but you can ban a book. And I think that's the message that young people are still getting. but I do think it also has energized Gen Z and Gen Alpha

and I think it's making a generation of fighters and activists so I mean maybe it's not all bad but truly this is the disturbia we're living in Fahrenheit we interviewed Graham Norton a few weeks ago and there's a character in his brilliant novel Frankie who's an older gay man

jealous of the younger people and the fun that they're having and we were talking about you know minority groups have fought so hard so that younger people could have a much easier time, that those people were having to fight all over again for the things that decades ago people thought they had achieved for them.

He said something like, you were fighting for the right, you never thought you'd have to fight, like, defend it again. It was like, we won, we did the thing, we moved the needle. Oh, that's what he said. He said it was more difficult to defend something that you think absolutely is a human right and someone's trying to take it away from,

it's harder to go, what? Yeah. It feels like, you know, like you always have this in you, even in your books, the trilogy, where you're dealing with fantasy and you could be as silly or as frivolous as you like, it always feels so important to you that you are looking from another person's point of view.

What are they dealing with? You deal with intersectionality and, you know, people struggle with other people saying, no, you can't speak for me or that's not right for me. Yeah, and that was, so I mean, the fun thing with book one, which was always meant to be about division between women, was, so I was like, right, let's see, Here we are in lockdown.

Let's see if I can work out why some women seem to have a problem with trans women. Because, again, the issues never with trans men ever, is it? So I thought, right, let's do it. So I created this trans youth, the character who's called Theo, which is a little bit of a spoiler, but it's very hard to talk about these books without talking about fear. So Theo is a young trans woman, and she comes to the coven. She is discovered by the coven way more powerful than she's meant to be. and this group of friends are very torn on how they should deal with Theo.

So you have Neve who believes that Theo is a teenager in crisis, she needs care and nurture because this is going to be really difficult for her. She's just discovered she's a witch, and she's just discovered she's trans. This is going to be a nightmare. But then you've got high priestess Helena who thinks that actually she is the heralding of the end of all witch kind, the solid child from a terrible prophecy. and that was my way of trying to work out this division because my life is full of cisgender, not trans women,

who have been nothing but... So I came out in 2013 to a woman, one of my friends, Sam, hi. And, you know, then I came out to my other female friends and my mum and my grandma and my aunties and my sister and my nieces. And, you know, my life is still largely just women. But then the press would have me believe that there was some sort of fundamental divide So I, through putting myself in hell in his shoes, I was like, right, let's see if I can get to the bottom of it.

And a lot of people have been like, well, was that hard to kind of try imagine why some people don't like trans people? But now it was actually going to be freeing because I was like, right, maybe it's this. Okay, well, that's just prejudice. Oh, no, no, maybe it's that. Well, no, because if you're saying, oh, all trans women are scary, that's just prejudice. And so I actually came away from that first lockdown feeling. actually kind of lighter than I had done in a long time

because I realised it's nothing I'm doing other than existing and I don't think it's on me to deal with that. No, if it was a person of colour saying I'm really trying to get under the skin to empathise with this racist point of view

you think that's okay if you want to do it but that's not what you owe the world you don't have to want and as you say because I was hoping that was going to be a fix Yeah, yeah, you'd be like, oh, it's this. I was like, done it, you guys have solved transphobia. Oh, I found the miscommunication. You think we're saying it.

You sent an email in 2007 when you said this, but that's not what you men. I found it. I found the text message. But now, so it turns out there isn't an easy answer. But I do think, I think one of the reasons why these books have gone down quite well because it was a bit like hiding the peas in the mash. Nobody knew. Do you know what this book could have sold three copies? Had we called it that one trans witch, it wouldn't have sold.

It just would not have felt. Transwitchie, trans witch. Oh my gosh, we should have called it Tituichi, Transwitchie. Oh my God. Missed opportunity. Like Sabrina of the teenage witch, but, yeah, Titchie Ritchie. The other transgender witch. But we wouldn't have sold any copies.

And I've noticed that, you know, when you look at these books that are released either, actually, Sean Faye's fantastic book is an exemption to this rule because it sold thousands of copies. But most books about trans people are most books, like the books which are about the trans myth or whatever they're called, they don't really sell, to be honest. And they're clearly selling to, like, a very small faction of highly motivated people.

Yeah, and to the converted as well. Yeah, very much preaching to their choirs on both sides, I think. So I just wanted to write a fantasy book about female, friendship and the way that a 25-year-long friendship is tested by an inciting incident, which just so happens to be the arrival of a trans kid. So let's talk about female friendship, because women are obviously hugely important to you in your life, whereas I'm a really bad friend, so I'm here to get secrets from you. I want to briefly say that I know both of you watch and just like that.

Oh, yeah. And we'd talk about female friendships. Oh, yeah, okay. So I wondered if we should talk about female friendships and sex in the city. also another group of events. So I never watched the original sex in the city and I think maybe it's easier to love or enjoy it and just like that.

She's this big gaps. If you have to lift the list of things. I cannot compute. I genuinely cannot compute. But she's starting with him just like that. And then I went back to Sex and the City and now I'm back to and just like that. I'll probably go back to university

and do a PhD on and just like that. Yeah. But this is why I think because you do, you do a podcast. A whole podcast. Yeah. I'll just listen to that and I won't do this to PhD. Yeah.

I'll just listen to the podcast. So talking of female friendships. Yeah, I mean, so, I mean, that was the other thing. I think, so yeah, for me, the most sort of important things for me growing up with Doctor Who, Buffy, sex in the city, scream, Kevin, the writing of Kevin Williams and I love the way he writes, young adults. Too scary, too scary. To Dawson's Creek as well. So you can watch Dawson's Creek.

Big Dawson's Creek said everyone recently that Katie Holmes and Joshua Jackson are filming again. Oh my God, literally it could have fucking out, guys. He ages like a fine wine. Oh, my. My God, Casey will never not be the dream. Oh, he's so sexy. I need to re-watch Dollars Street. I'd be up for re-watching Dawson's Creek.

But we were talking about that. Sorry, I'm just like that. Sorry, I didn't watch Dawson's Creek. Yes. So, yeah, I mean, now that I'm writing about adult characters and not teenagers, it finally felt like two decades worth of sex in the city fandom finally paid off. And there is one who's a little bit more like a Charla.

L is a bit more like a Charlotte. Yeah, so it's all in there. Sex and the City, but magic. I would be watching that. Do you think that those four friends, do you think that they were good friends? Did you believe in their friendship? In the show.

Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's why it's so sad to think that Kim Kachal and Sarah Jessica Parker didn't get on. I know, it is sad, isn't it? Because they were so good on screen. They're flawed as well.

Because when it started, I think I would have only been like 17 or 18. Yeah. And so I, and it's weird, because at the same time I was watching Ali McBeal. Alie McBeal! Which has aged so badly. I bet it has.

really badly. But I preferred it at the time because it gave me the warm, gooey feelings on the and they had a song at the end. Because they all had a lovely song at the end. Whereas I found the four women in sex in the city harder to love. Because they're more complicated because they sometimes were dickheads to each other kind of. And I think that was something that, you know, I've tried to carry into these books as well, which is women don't always have to be friends or love each other. It's not a Taylor Swift Girl Squad. But we have to back each other because ultimately, we are one sort of societal class, regardless of our backgrounds, kind of. And you have that very nuanced relationship between Neve and Keira,

between Neve and Kira as well, of like, yeah, a true sisterhood, you know, and of how it's difficult when your twin sister is evil. Yes, she is. I mean, most sisters, should we just say, are evil. That includes you, though. What's that? That includes you. Oh, not the eldest.

Oh, okay. I'm an eldest sister. And me and my sister have had ups and downs running up at the moment, so it's quite nice. But, yeah, God, our teenage years were really strained. You and Pascal could share some stories. Yeah. The gene story is still the worst thing. Yeah.

Also, I mean, if I, there's another timeline where I'm in prison for murder and the person I called Cheryl. Yeah. Because I've only ever had those feelings towards her. Yeah. Tell her the gene story. No, I won't. I'm saving you for Patreon. That is a good idea, Sarah.

save it for the Patreon. So sorry, guys, you're not going to hear that story. Unless you pay for it. They should put that and then just like that. There should be an episode when Miranda walked off. Well, they did just have one when Miranda and Carrie had to briefly live together and they did end up bickering like teenagers. She ate her last yoga.

Oh, she ate her last yoga. She couldn't imagine Sarah Michelle Geller eating a yoga. And I actually think that's a fair enough point. Sarah Jessica, you got your... You got your Sarah. You got Buffy and Carrie mixed up. Yes, Sarah, Jessica Parker. She couldn't imagine Sarah Jessica Parker.

eating a yogurt. I'm with her. She's never eaten a yogurt. She's never eaten a solid. She's not eaten, yeah. So come on, you're going to eat that last yogurt. Miranda's hungry. There was a cake as well. Just eat whatever is in the fridge, Miranda. But you think that they're purposely making it kind of hilariously bad. They're doing cringe moments on a little bit like Love Island putting horrible men in. They're leaning into what people are talking about online. The viral moments. Yeah, they're not trying to not do those anymore. Do you know, we could talk to you all bloody day. It's so nice to talk to you. The tantions we've I know.

We've ticked lots of boxes. We've ticked lots of boxes from elderly millennials. Human Rights is out now. It's the third part that all three of them are obviously absolutely brilliant. Go read book one. Start a book one. I have to say, because I was looking at all of your fans online and everyone is so happy with the ending. And so to satisfy people.

And then to go, every end of chapter was a plot twist, was a cliffhanger. And then to go, do you know, must have planned this years and years ago because it's so perfect. People never like an ending. And that's what, what was. It sounds down. Why we couldn't talk about it in any detail because there are so many brilliant moments

where you're like, oh my God, just right in the beginning. And your people's comfort reading, you're happy, the people are crying that it's finished, people are starting all over again. So honestly, couldn't be more love for your books. So if you haven't read this one, go and start reading book one. I'm so relieved. I just didn't want to fuck it up in the last chapter.

You didn't want to just like that? I didn't want to want just like that. I mean, Game of Thrones, the TV show. I mean, that was, I think everybody is, it's quite well accepted that that fluffed to the ending. So I just didn't want to do a Game of Thrones. I didn't want a Sexman City to the movie. It didn't happen.

It didn't happen. It didn't happen. Thank you so much, Juneau. Thank you. Thank you for listening to The Weirdos Book Club. Human Right is available to buy now. Carriad's new children's book, where did she go? Is out now.

And Sarah is on tour. Tickets for her amazing show. I am a strange gloop are on sale now from Sarah Pascoe. You can find out all about the upcoming books. We're going to be discussing this series. is on our Instagram at Sarah and Carriads Weirdo's Book Club. Let us know any recommendations that you've got. We've got some reading gaps.

Yep. And please do join us on Patreon, where are we having little bits from the show that you haven't heard before or extra spin-off episodes like we did one for the Salt Path recently. Hot goss we don't want getting into the Daily Mail. Yeah, hot goss that we can't say in public will also be there. Circle of Trust.

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