Wallowing in my Bath (Kids Lit Festival) again

I am currently having a calm and relaxing day after a 10 day session helping out at Bath.  I can only be in awe of John and Gill McLay and all the amazing work they put into putting the programme together and then being so totally hands on during the festival  I hope they are having a well deserved break, together with all the others who were there every day.  This year I managed to pace myself, although this meant that I occasionally missed out on events and despite my best attempts my ‘time turner’ does not actually function, so I cannot be in two places at the same time.

Lauren Child and Gill McLay

Events started off  on Friday 28th September with an event by the current Children’s Laureate, Lauren Child, in which she combined a general discussion about her books with talking about her new work “Hubert Horatio”.  It is based a round a character she created several years ago in a picture book, but now he is appearing in a work for ‘middle grade’ readers.  Hubert Horatio is a very serious and extremely intelligent little boy; unfortunately he has two very frivolous and spendthrift parents, so it is lucky that they are millionaires and they have their son to keep them out of trouble.  This book is published on 18th October, so I look forward to reading it and then talking about it; it sounds as if it is going to be great fun. The evening was finished off with a launch party at Waterstones, where it was lovely to meet up with friends and authors.

Sebastien de Castell

The festival began in earnest on the Saturday morning but because of other commitments, namely  a trip to London to hear Sebastien de Castell and Alexandra Christo and I was not able to start my stewarding until the Monday, but what a fantastic way to start.  The first event was with the so talented and charming Joseph Coelho, who is known for both his poetry and his picture books.  He focused on reading  “Luna Loves Library Day” and had the book on a large screen, so that the children could fully participate in the reading.  This is an absolute must for all parents to read to their children and for nurseries and schools to use as an introduction to visiting the library. It was also very appropriate as we have just had Libraries Week, where we hopefully celebrate the importance of these places in our lives.  The second event was the ever fabulous Sarah McIntyre and Philip Reeve  wowing the audience with the “Adventures of Kevin”, the story of a custard cream loving flying pony.  The duo are famous for their songs about the characters in their books and this was no exception.  we all came away with the ear-worm chorus going around our brains – “He’s the one, the one and only, roly poly flying pony”

M G Leonard

Tuesday saw me back in Bath for another round of sessions.  The first one was the delightful Chitra Soundar who I had the pleasure of hearing for the first time.  She is a writer and storyteller who captivated her audience with several of her stories.  the first was “Pattan’s Pumpkin“, an Indian version of a Flood story; she used slides of the pages to reinforce the images.  After this she told the story “You’re safe with me” which is about overcoming fear of the unknown, in the garb of a torrential tropical storm.  Although she did not read from the book, we were also able to see and purchase her new book “You’re snug with me”, the story of a polar bear and her two cubs as they survive winter.  I really have to mention her illustrator Poonam Mistry who has produced the most stunning illustrations for the last two titles.  The complexity of the style is really magical and I think that anyone, child or adult, could spend hours just looking at these wonderful pictures.  My morning was completed by the lovely M G Leonard talking about her trilogy “Battle of the Beetles“.  I was lucky enough to be able to take her out to a couple of schools when the first book “Beetle Boy” was issued, so I have always had a special interest in seeing her success.  Her audience of over 200 pupils were absolutely fascinated by her pictures of beetles and understanding the importance of these creatures to our world.  Whilst I am not sure I will ever want to get ‘up close and personal’ with beetles, I do have a greater understanding of their importance.  However the most important thing about these books is that they are really great adventures with a truly evil villain and some fantastic heroes, both human and animal, so I thoroughly recommend them for KS2 pupils and beyond.

Steven Butler and Steven Lenton

I actually managed to take a break on Wednesday and Thursday but on Friday I once again found myself driving over to Bath for an early start.  the first event was one that my grandson would have absolutely loved as it was about some of his favourite books.  The adventures of “Supertato” are loved by millions of small people and the 340+ who were in the Guildhall were certainly very vocal in their appreciation of the creators, Sue Hendra and Paul Linnet.  It was totally amazing how these youngsters became so involved in the adventures of vegetables in a supermarket but it also shows the power of the imagination and the pleasure that children get from listening to stories.  The final session of the morning was for a slightly older audience and  was about “The Nothing to see here Hotel” and its follow up “You ain’t see nothing Yeti!”  These are written and illustrated by Steven Butler and Steve Lenton and are hysterically funny adventures in a hotel for non-human guests.  So you are likely to meet ogres, trolls, elves, goblins and all sorts of wonderful creatures, but it is never quiet and adventures are always waiting to happen.  The two ‘Steves’ (not the original version, that was Steve Barlow and Steve Skidmore) are also great entertainers, so we had a truly funny and fascinating event.  They worked brilliantly with their audience and would be an excellent choice to invite into schools.

David Roberts and Julian Clary

David Roberts and Jo Nadin

The final day of the festival was the Sunday and I had a double whammy of David Roberts,  but the morning started out with a show dedicated to the hero that is “The Gruffalo”.  This consisted of a partial retelling of the story, using musical instruments to represent the different animals and the forest was created with children, holding  small branches with leaves.  As a finale the Gruffalo made a visit and it was wonderful to see how many wanted their photos taken with this icon of children’s literature.  The first David Robert’s event was about the amazing “Suffragette”, which has really caused quite a stir in this centenary year since the first women in the UK got the vote.  The information is well researched and accurate as David has been fascinated by the subject since he was a child.  The illustrations are superb and use the palette of colours that we often associate with the suffrage movements.  This was an event that attracted a wide audience, many of them adults, which was great to see, but there were also numbers of younger readers who are fascinated by the history that this depicts.  Later that day I went down to another venue called Komedia, where David and Julian Clary were talking about “The Bolds in Trouble“,  the latest of their books featuring the incredible Bold family, a family of hyenas living as humans in suburban Teddington. I am a complete fan of these books because the whole concept is so ridiculous,  The characters are a sublime combination of animal and human traits and the books are full of subversive humour.

Looking back on this wonderful week I can only be thankful for having the opportunity to be involved with some amazing people.  The children who attended with their schools during the week have an incredible experience and their enthusiasm for books and reading will have benefited from seeing the artists at work.  I can’t believe that next year will be the 13th festival, but I am really looking forward to seeing what is in store for all of us.

 

Bath time again!

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An expectant audience

Can it really be a whole year since the last Bath Festival of Children’s Literature, well yes it can.  This year sees the return of John and Gill McLay as the artistic directors.  They founded the festival and nurtured it during the first 6 years of its life, now they are back for year 9.

The events started off with a wonderful talk by the iconic Judith Kerr (pronounced Carr, so we2015-10-01 15.50.43 were informed?) in conversation with Julia Eccleshare.  She spoke about her childhood but also about her many books and in particular her new work “Mr Cleghorn’s Seal” which is based on an event in her father’s earlier life.  After this many of us transferred over to Waterstones for the launch party which was full of lovely authors, illustrators, supporters volunteers and friends of the festival.

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Mamillan, 9781447277897

the next day saw me reporting for duty in my first volunteer session of the year.  I was lucky enough to work on a session by Kristina Stephenson for her “Sir Charlie Stinky Socks and the Pirate’s Curse” which was full of music activity and a wealth of energy.  The children absolutely loved it.  I then had the great pleasure of seeing the Children’s Laureate Chris Riddell talk about his latest book “Goth Girl and the Wuthering Fright” as well as watching his amazing talent as an illustrator.  The queue for book signing was enormous and I was unable to get my book signed as I was booked to go and listen to the amazing Patrick Ness talking about “The rest of us just live here”.  A book that I have written about before.

2015-09-28 15.17.33I must admit to then having a day off in order to catch up on the more mundane things of life, as well as doing a bit of reading.  However on Monday I was off again, this time it was attending a school visit with the lovely Bali Rai.  I have heard him do a short talk at a conference in the past, but this was the first time that I had the pleasure of hearing him work with a young audience.  He absolutely held all of them spellbound, something that is quite difficult with over 100 year 9s and year 11s.  He spoke about writing in general, his background, the influences he finds and also about racism and extremism across a wide spectrum.  I would recommend any school to have him talk to their older pupils.

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Corgi, 9780552570749

2015-10-03 11.13.21The second weekend of the festival I was working on both days, but only half a day on each.  Saturday I worked the morning shift at the Guildhall and was able to see Elen Caldecott and Robin Stevens talking about writing crime for younger audiences.  Elen is a local author and and her latest book is the second in a series ‘Marsh road Mysteries’ and is called “Crowns and Codebreakers”.  Robin has really hit the spot with her wonderful series about the two schoolgirl sleuths Daisy Wells and Hazel Wong and she was talking about the third in the series “A first class Murder” which is a homage to “Murder on the Orient Express”  I also spent some of the morning learning how to draw “Wookies and Droids”, which might come in useful when my grandson is older.  With the next Star Wars film coming to the big screen in 2015-10-03 09.33.19 2015-10-06 21.25.41November this was very well times. I also saw the amazing duo of Sarah McIntyre and Philip Reeve in the green room as they were about to go to their “Pugs of the Frozen north” event.  I then met them later when they were off to their individual events for “Railhead” and “Dinosaur Police”.

 

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Andersen, 9781783443642

Sunday was the last day of the festival and there were so many events that I would have loved to attend, however I did steward the events for Julian Clary and David Roberts, talking about their book “The Bolds”, which is a great read for those younger confident readers.  they shared the speaking and then David also produced illustrations so that the audience could see how a character is developed.  I then worked on the session with the poet John Hegley – he is 2015-10-04 16.33.05-1really brilliant and it is a major ‘experience’ to hear him speak, play his ukulele  and generally entertain his audience.

The final bit of icing on the cake was meeting Jennifer Donnelly in the Green Room and getting her to sign copies of 2015-10-04 16.59.01her books “Rogue Wave” and “Dark Tide”, the second and third titles in her series about a world with Mer nations and wars for power.

Of course all of this was just the tip of the iceberg and there were so many other fantastic events going on at other venues.  The programme is so varied that there is something for everyone.  For small children there were some favourite authors and illustrators, such as Michael Rosen,  Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler and for teens there was Joe Suggs and Jacqueline Wilson.  If you haven’t been to Bath before, then I suggest you book the dates for next year.

Festivals and more

 

I have been reminded recently that we are now in the middle of Festival season.  There have been some great posts on Facebook about the fun at Edinburgh and I am so envious of all you lucky people who were able to attend, both as visitors and as participants.  We have just had the stewarding schedules put out for the Bath Kids Lit Festival and I look forward to seeing lots of great friends there at the end of September.  I also heard on the TV this morning that booking has started for Cheltenham Festival which begins on the 3rd October with Michael Rosen and then Henry Winkler.  I think it is the first time that Bath and Cheltenham have overlapped in this way and it will be interesting to see if it will affect ticket sales over the first weekend in October.  For those who cannot attend any of these events then there is the Children’s Roadshow which is touring the country, visiting 15 cities,  from the end of September until the end of November.  There are some great names and with any luck lots of schools will be taking their children to meet and hear some amazing authors and illustrators.children_bookshow_leaflet[1]

This year I am not doing quite as much at Bath, but I am looking forward to the events I am doing, which include a debate on the future of teaching, Michael Rosen and the ‘Big, Big, Bath Book Quiz with Andy Stanton.  During that week we also have the local Centurion Book Award ceremony and the national ‘Information Book Award’, in association with the School Library Association.

Before all of this activity I have two other book related events that I am attending.  Next week we have the launch of the new book by Lauren Child, which is being hosted at Daunt’s on Marylebone High Street; it is a fabulous book that looks at the issues of having a new baby in the house. The following weekend is the Nosy Crow Conference and the following Saturday is the Cilip Members day, thankfully that is being held in Bristol, so on my home turf.  It’s only when you write all of this down that you see what a hectic month this is going to be and that is before I add in my school governor training.  I will definitely need a holiday after all of that.

Something I will still manage to fit in among all of these activities is my reading.  I have got some really great books in the pipeline and I look forward to talking about them in the near future; they include authors such as Michael Morpurgo, Holly Black and Garth Nix.  There are also some superb picture books at the moment and lots more coming in our direction in time for Christmas.  Why are there only 24 hours in the day, I need more?