Another author of pro trans YA books turns out to be a creep

NotBadConsidering · 16/03/2026 06:15

Also a 68 year old woman charged with producing and distributing child exploitation material with Silvey. Given the content of Jasper Jones, I’ll be interested to hear confirmation that this is indeed a woman.

Well, that's everybody's first thought, these days. Is it a woman, or did "she" used to be called Kevin?

I bought Honeybee as a gift for my SIL on the recommendation of the bookshop owner. OMG, I'm horrified, I had no idea what it was about. Funnily enough, SIL didn't give me any feedback on my top choice. Lesson learned, make sure to double check recommendations.

Absolutely correct @Bertiebiscuit .

Because these creepy men only have to say "trans" or "drag" & suddenly everyone who should know better forgets everything they ever knew about safeguarding and red flags, this sainted caste of untouchable males cannot be scrutinised apparently,they can do anything they like and anyone, especially a woman, says hang on, is he safe? is witch hunted, cancelled and eternally punished by the wokerati. Big fake boobs? No problem,it's just how University is! Big fake phallus poking out of a frilly dress? No problem, he's an Artist! Playing piano on t v with his dick? Just good clean fun! Male Perverts in plain sight are given a free pass until they seriously harm someone , and then everyone pretends they couldn't possibly have seen it coming

Well well well. Is anyone surprised? Not me. Creepy blokes are creepy! Duh. 🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩

Craig Silvey pleads guilty to possessing and distributing child exploitation material

www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cg7pz2xj4l3o

Who'd have guessed? But a shocking illustration of how captured publishing is.

Oh interesting, that hadn't crossed my mind. I have just done some googling and she does appear to be a woman. Very active in the community which shouldn't be a red flag but sadly often is.

Honeybee sounded grim, I didn't go near it. Had to read Runt for school curriculum reasons and it was a painful experience. I'm glad he's been arrested because a) children, including his own, are a tiny bit safer and b) I won't have to deal with that bloody book again because it's been banned from all school lists.

There is a lot of talking in Jasper Jones. The main male characters discuss everything in unbelievable detail - nothing is left for the reader to infer. But - I felt the characters were interesting, it’s fairly fast-paced and the story is compelling, even if the dialogue is overblown.

Whereas, for me, honeybee was unreadable,

interesting that both of his main characters in his teen books are boys aged 13/14.

Jasper Jones is a poor man's To Kill a Mockingbird in the same way that A Little Life is a poor man's Lolita.

And the scene when the young boyfriend pulls up the dead girl's dress and inspects her to confirm that she's also been raped is gross and gratuitous and just basic trauma porn.

A good writer is far more subtle and has the confidence to leave things off the page. He's about suited to Runt level middle grade fiction where everything is literal.

In my opinion, obviously.

I liked Jasper Jones. I don’t think it was the literary masterpiece it was feted as, but it was good, IMO. I liked the Jeffrey Lu character and the cricket game. However, as noted upthread I hated Honeybee.

Fair enough, he's not a good writer in my opinion. Certainly not deserving of the all the gushing and he's received over the years. I get that Runt was popular with kids though.

Personally I wouldn't be buying books by an alleged child abuser when there are so many other talented authors out there who don't see children as prey.

But each to their own.

I’m not sure about this statement that he’s not a good writer. I haven’t read Runt, bought it because my lovely friend who’s a children’s librarian highly recommended it, and my kids are good readers who can be fussy, and they devoured it. I have been planning to get them the sequel. I’ll read runt and decide if I need to come back and retract this.

At the time the book was written it’s odd that for a successful author he didn’t have a home office for his desk/computer and he was using his bedroom instead. Clearly at the time of his arrest he did have his own office space but IIRC he was using a section of the garage as his writing space.

That article is so gushy 🤮

I think it's that he's a manipulative predator and he was grooming kids, parents, teachers, librarians, and booklovers from the start.

Ugh.
He is from my hometown. I've never read his books but been vaguely curious about why they're so popular and why he is so high-profile, as they sound pretty run of the mill.

This fawning piece has some flaming red flags

1. How he was insistent on being involved with choosing the model (teenage boy) and design of the cover of Honeybee
2. How he researched "tucking" for the book. FFS.

archive.is/mnavq
'You’re never content': how 'the captain' changed course after Jasper Jones

Orange flags - weird stuff about his bedroom and his wife (she's very pretty and accomplished and reading between the lines he decided he needed a wife because being a single childless male children's author is weird?),but maybe that's just hindsight.
Definitely comes across as massively narcissistic but I guess if we locked up writers for that, they'd all be doing time.

His facebook page has petitions promoting Medicare funding of children's gender treatment; glowing pics of drag queen story hour including a pic of a drag queen with a baby; quite a few photos of the Honeybee cover model; and countless photos of young children dressed as characters from his books.

His brother is in jail for massive financial fraud. I read on another forum that the brother gets a thanks in the acknowledgements for Jasper Jones, for financially supporting CS during the writing of the book. Hmm.

This explains it,
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5246429-5246429-bbc-radio-4-series-this-week-about-pie-in-dark-corners?flipped=1&page=1

You maybe can download it

Paedophile Information Exchange

A campaign group of Paedophiles in the 1970s

I read Honeybee long before trans was on my radar. I was very open to learning as a friend’s child was having gender issues. I hated the book. It was just a bad book but it was probably also the first time I really thought about drag and recognised how uncomfortable it made me. Which was the start of changing my view on all of this. I also find myself wondering whether the research for this book is what dragged Craig down the rabbit hole. We will probably never know which came first.

And I shudder to think of how many confused young children would have DMd him as a "much loved children's author."

He's apparently refusing to give up all his passwords and his lawyer argued that he needs internet access as he's self employed.

He is a classic case of the Emperor's New Clothes. Not a very good writer, but on every school curriculum, adored by all, automatically given good reviews. He also would have made a lot of money given he's sold millions yet couldn't raise the bail surety so is still locked up. I do feel for his partner and his very young daughters but his books were full of red flags, misogyny and sexual content yet because they were a bit edgy and wrote about trans issues and he's a white bloke he got a free pass from everyone.

sorry, what's PIE?