In both of the books Julian and I have made together, there are no human or animal characters (with the possible exception of the reader, who plays an active part in the proceedings). The first book consists of an all-microbe cast, the second features only aliens. If it were up to us, we’d dispense with the notion of the characters’ sex/gender altogether. It plays no role in the stories we wanted to tell.

However, linguistic conventions sometimes forced us to assign a pronoun to a character. We didn’t want to go down the “they” or “it” routes, as they might well have confused a young reader who’s already tasked with accepting non-traditional protagonists. So we decided that when the issue arises, our main character would be referred to as a female. Because why not.

and here’s the thing: several reviewers of these books – all of them adults, most of them female – referred to these characters as male. What is it about a green blob named Quog, or a blue blip named Min, that signifies maleness to a reader, in the face of repeated instances of being referred to as ‘she’ and ‘her’?

If it’d happened once I wouldn’t have noticed, but the repeated instances bespeak of something ingrained in our thinking. I hope it gets outgrained soon.