Tuesday 22 October 2013 With all the tickets snapped up for the Wimpy Kid Show at Ilkley Playhouse, two young super fans thought they would miss out on one of the main attractions for kids at Ilkley Literature Festival. In a streak of good luck however, the two seven year olds from Ilkley were the winners of tickets given away by The Grammar School at Leeds (GSAL), the main sponsor of the Children’s Festival, in a competition on Stray FM. Arul Midgley and Madeline Greig got to see their favourite book character Greg Heffley and friends brought to life at the show, performed by actor Alistair Watson with a cartoon class via video from the author Jeff Kinney. During the show the youngsters in the packed audience of 150 had a go at drawing their own cartoons. Arul said: “I was very excited when I won tickets and got to see the show after all. The books are funny, I like all of them and Greg is a good character.” Another treat for young readers at the main children’s weekend was a session with ‘The Chocolate Box Girls’ author Cathy Cassidy. Ella Freeman, 10, said: “It was exciting to meet a real author; she was like a book character herself. We learned how she uses a mood board to visualise each character and she said that the main part of writing a book is day dreaming!” There were over 30 events in a packed programme for children at this year’s Festival. Rachel Feldberg, director of the Ilkley Literature Festival, said: “The Children’s Festival has been a key part of the Festival since 2003. Our partnership with GSAL is now in its second year and has helped us to develop an exciting programme of events which have proved extremely popular with schools and families.” General News
