Books and Bites Bingo Published the year you were born: Pigs Might Fly by Emily Rodda

Two of my challenges this year, including this one, were to read a book published the year, or decade, I was born. At first, I found this a challenge, as I struggled to find a book that appealed to me, and with libraries shutting down or working to limited services during COVID, this became a bigger challenge, as I wasn’t sure what I would do.

Then when exploring the back catalogue of well-known Australian author, Emily Rodda, I found a book called Pigs Might Fly, which was published in 1986, and this also ticked off another challenge that asked for a book published the decade I was born – many books this year have helped me fill out several challenges.

This was a gem of a book, and I wish I’d found it years ago, though I think Emily Rodda was one of those authors who I recall always being out of the library, and that everyone seemed to enjoy. This gentle magical realism adventure evokes a sense of loneliness, something we have all been feeling lately, and the reignition of imagination that we have in some ways lost with all the access to constant technology and imagination, but COVID has been a time where people have reignited their imaginations whilst in lockdown, and I hope this book can give people a sense of what imagination can do for us when things are hard or boring.

I’m nearly finished this book bingo – a few more to go and hopefully I can check them all off by the end of December!