The St Austell Festival of Children’s Literature took place at the end of June. There were so many author and illustrator events on offer over the weekend that it was hard to choose who to see!
The most amazing thing about this particular literary festival though is that tickets to each event were just £1 each. Yes, you read that right, £1.
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St Austell Festival of Children’s Literature was set up in 2023 by Simon Pollard, a local head teacher. He is passionate about the power of reading and wanted to make meeting authors accessible for children in his local community to help them fall in love with books.
Simon was joined this year by a bigger committee and together they put on an amazing three-day literary festival just for children which included a day at local schools on the Friday.
There were over 25 authors and illustrators who travelled from all over the country to put on a range of workshops for children of all ages.
I took my boys, aged 7 and 9, to see Rob Biddulph (who sat and signed books for over four hours after his event), festival patron A.F. Steadman who wrote the bestselling Skandar series, Jenny McClachan author of Land of Roar, Neill Cameron who also illustrates for The Phoenix magazine (which my kids love) and Onjali Q Rauf who wrote The Boy at the Back of the Class who gave the most inspiring author talk I’ve ever been to.
There were so many other authors I’d have loved to go and see from Louie Stowell to Hannah Gold, Sam Copeland, Phillip Reeve, Sarah McIntyre, Katie Kirby and Tola Okogwu. But as well as taking my kids to events and book signings, I was also running my own events based on my picture books.
The festival was held in the heart of St Austell and the venues included the local cinema, empty shops, a church and dance studio. There was a real buzz in the air and everyone I met, from the volunteers to the families seemed to be enjoying themselves.
St Austell is in Cornwall, not far from the Eden Project. There is plenty of parking or the town can be accessed by a train station of the same name which is just a ten minute walk away from the centre.
There was a huge pop-up bookshop in the festival hub which featured books by all the authors and you could also go there after each event to get books signed. There was even an area of second hand books in the hub which were free to a good home so that no one left empty handed.
I’ve read so many reports into the benefits that children get from both reading and writing for pleasure – it improves everything from mental health to academic success. Yet I’ve never been to a festival which is as accessible or inclusive as this one.
The committee are already planning next year’s literary festival which will be at the end of June 2025. Do follow the festival on social media and follow their website for updates.
If you live in the South West and are keen to bring books to life for your kids by going to an affordable, fun, friendly literary festival then I highly recommend checking out the St Austell Festival of Children’s Literature in 2025.
In the meantime, if you’re looking to get your children excited about books this summer, the Summer Reading Challenge is now live and completely free for kids to take part in. You can find out more about it here or at your local library.
All views and opinions are my own.
Naomi Jones is an award-winning author and mum of two. You can find out more about her on her website and read more of her writing here.
