Tower and Town, September 2020 (view the full edition)Events For ChildrenA key part of Marlborough LitFest are the free events we provide for local school children. Since 2010 we have been able to invite schools to join us at the Town Hall so their ten and eleven-year-old pupils can hear wonderful authors talk about their books and how to write stories. In the past we've had Abi Elphinstone, Jane Hardcastle and, last year, the very funny John Dougherty. The teacher feedback we get from these talks is brilliant, and it's lovely to hear the children buzzing with inspiration when they head back to their schools. Since 2015 with the help of St John's School we've also been able to provide The Big School Read for secondary school pupils, who have heard Tamsyn Murray, Matt Dickinson and Geraldine McCaughrean amongst others. For our tenth festival last year we were very happy to be able to extend our free events to primary schools in the Calne area, and this year we were going to cover not only Marlborough and Calne, but Pewsey too! Whilst we cannot provide any group events this year, we are going to offer schools live Zoom calls with the authors we had booked for September, so that they can talk about their writing and books and then have an interactive question & answer session with the children in the classroom. All these authors are worth discovering, so here is a little bit about them all. Gareth P Jones is an award winning author whose Dragon Detective books have been republished this year. In Catnapped, the first in the series, detective Dirk Dilly is asked to find a missing cat belonging to a young girl called Holly. Can Dirk & Holly discover who is taking all the pets? Will Dirk be able to stop setting fire to things? And can they prevent a dragon invasion and further cat-as-trophe?! Suitable for 6-9 year olds. Older readers will enjoy Gareth's The Considine Curse, an exciting family mystery story which won the 2012 Blue Peter Book Award. Maz Evans' fantastic four book series starts with Who Let the Gods Out?, a brilliant and funny read for 8-11 year olds. Elliot Hooper is having a tough time looking after his mum, whilst avoiding trouble at school. Suddenly, teen-goddess Virgo is sent from the Heavens to take care of captured death-daemon Thanatos, and Elliot's involvement means that Thanatos escapes. Virgo and Elliot need to get him back before Zeus and the rest of the gods find out; can they do it and how will Virgo manage the modern world? Ross Montgomery is a Costa shortlisted author, with wonderfully written books suitable for 9-12 year olds. His new book, out in September, is The Midnight Guardians, a story set in World War II at the time of the Blitz. Following the death of his father, Col has been evacuated from London to live with his aunt in the Malverns, but he misses his older sister Rose and wants to be with her for Christmas. When he runs away to see her he is amazed to find his old imaginary friends have come to life and need his help. Together they set off on a quest to beat the Midnight King who is bringing darkness and horror to the whole world. This is a must read - one of the best children's books since The Explorer. In the meantime try Max and the Millions, an exciting, funny and adventurous story about a miniature civilisation at war and the real-size boy who discovers them. Finally, Mimi Thebo is a Carnegie nominated American author who is currently Reader in Creative Writing at the University of Bristol. Her young adult books are often on the theme of recovery from trauma and the power of the natural world to heal. 12 year olds and older will find messages of hope and resilience in her lyrical books, try Hospital High or Coyote Summer. Kate Fry |