More Brighton Children's Book Festival coverage

The fantastic Candy Gourlay of Notes from the Slush Pile has blogged many excellent photos from the festival. Read all about it here.

Candy gave a very entertaining talk about using the internet to promote yourself as an author/illustrator. It was abbreviated, and I would definitely think about bringing her back for the whole session. If this is something you are thinking about, she's got a really in-depth and useful flyer she's put together on her blog. Look in the right-hand panel where it says 'Freebie Alert!'

I still haven't written about the people who spoke after the workshops. Or the fabulous 'decorating dragon cakes' session run by Momma Cherri of Gordon Ramsey fame. We have to get pictures of her since the children were very proud of their creations. We had an impressive performance from Feather Boy, the musical, which you can see a bit of through the ITV link listed below.

Dakota Blue Richards was charming and shy, and very generous in answering questions from the audience. She spoke about being in The Golden Compass film, what it was like to act against nothing/no one since so much was done with CGI, and gave some taster information about the film version of The Little White Horse which she stars in and is coming out in August. You can see a very brief bit of her talk in the ITV clip below as well.

David Almond was, as always, totally inspiring. He speaks in such a thoughtful and soft way, making you feel like you could be a writer too. There's a lovely quote in the ITV clip where he talk about how children are, in fact, writers, and the importance of festivals like this one. 

We had a few technical difficulties getting the sound up to speed, but then we got to see the TV adaptation of David Almond's Clay. Peter Tabern wrote the screen play and produced it. This is a darker story that explores children, madness and morality, with many stellar performances, including one by Imelda Staunton (if I'm spelling that right) of Vera Drake fame.

Must finish - but I did get the real pleasure of going for dinner with my husband (a charming man, he), Nicky Singer, David Almond, his partner Sara Jane and their daughter Freya, and Peter Tabern. Who could have asked for more interesting company. I was at the end of the table with Peter and Freya, and we discussed which books would be good to consider for TV adaptation. I suggested A Swift Pure Cry by Siobhan Dowd, though that would be another dark one. But I think it's one of the most powerfully-written children's books that I've read in a very long time.

OK, enough for now. I'll try to got more down later...