Jugglers, Musicians and Authors join Arthur’s Court

This summer I’m involved in an exciting travelling literary festival run by the guys from PopUp (you can find their website here).  We’ve just done our first event at Ironbridge Gorge (hello, people of Telford!) and are travelling on to Essex (near Brentwood 3rd May) and London (Swiss Cottage 12th July ).  If you live near any of the venues, please do come along – it is free and really fun so well worth a visit.  There are lots of craft activities, story tellers, plays and book-themed spaces to keep you busy.  Also great for younger brothers and sisters.

I have to admit I was a little anxious before the weekend as this is far more complicated than the usual literary festival.  Have you ever been to one?  Normally these are a series of author talks – can be entertaining but it depends on the person talking.  Rather than do that, Pop Up ask their authors to curate a tent along a theme of one of their books.  I chose King Arthur and a medieval feast because it is a) colourful b) fun c) gives me a chance to hire a juggler and d) connects to the theme of my series Young Knights of the Round Table.

Here are some photos of what we did.  

We made shields for ourselves sitting at Arthur’s Round Table.

Launched a holy grail reject chalice!

Juggled with knives – and yes the boy from the audience really was involved in the act!

And played medieval music.

We also played a game but as I ran that I don’t have a photo.  The point was to say to the audience that if they like knights, dragons, magic and things about King Arthur, they might like to try my Young Knights series – all three parts now out.  It had great girl characters as well as boys – my round table is definitely equal opportunities!