Get ready for a virtual celebration of all things books and storytelling.

Join this Zoom event for an online celebration of children’s literature and author highlights.

A fun-filled evening of readings, discussions, and interactive activities with your favourite authors, for 4-11 year olds.

Highlights include…

• Meet the Authors
• Storytelling
• Quizzes
• Competitions
• Prizes to be won
• Cooking and Illustration workshops

Friday 4th October 2024, 5:00 – 8:30pm
Tickets: Free, booking essential
Register via Eventbrite: https://bit.ly/4gJTKYG

Don’t miss out on this exciting opportunity for children to connect with fellow book lovers, and discover new stories. See you there!

The post A Galaxy of Culture and Curious Adventures appeared first on Essex Book Festival.

Essex Book Festival is hosting its 2nd Manifesto for Essex Youth Summit as part of EASUSTAIN: a new festival focusing on the Environment, Culture & Entrepreneurship, which is taking place at Firstite Gallery in Colchester, 14th & 15th January 2023.

EASUSTAIN’s mission is to increase knowledge and awareness of environmental issues via a series of talks and performances by leading environmentalists and environmental artists. It has a formidable line-up of speakers. These include Tony Juniper, Chair of Natural England; Costa Book Award Winner & Naturalist Helen MacDonald; Charles Clover, Writer & Director & Founder, Blue Marine Foundation; Veronika Sekules, Director of GroundWork Gallery specialising in contemporary art and environment; Lord Deben, Member House of Lords & Chairman of the UK’s independent Committee on Climate Change.

We are hugely excited to be part of this event. We are even more excited to invite young people living across Essex who are passionate about culture and the environment to help shape our 2nd Manifesto for Essex Youth Summit, which in turn will feed into next year’s Essex Book Festival programme of activities.

If you are interested in being involved or want to know more, please join our Hear My Voice zoom event at 6pm on Wednesday 16th November. Go to our eventbrite page to reserve your place on the zoom.

You may have an idea for a long table discussion about rising waters and flooding involving other festival speakers, an idea for a workshop based around re-wilding local habitats. You might like to take part in a panel discussion, stage a performance, or make a podcast/film of the day. This is your chance to lead the debate. For more information, email Ros ros@essexbookfestival.org.uk

We can’t wait to meet you and hear your ideas

#HearMyVoiceEssex

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A team of writers and artists, assisted by four curators, have each been invited to select ten objects from the County’s heritage collections that tell difficult ‘stories’. These objects will form the basis of four two-hour online writing/artist workshops.

Delaine Le Bas, British Multi-Media Artist explores life from a British Romany perspective using objects and archival material based within Southend Museum’s collection.

Tickets: £5 pp.  

The post Re-Writing the Archive with Southend Museums appeared first on Essex Book Festival.

 A Fistful of Shells: West Africa from the Rise of the Slave Trade to the Age of Revolution.

Described a s a book “that shakes history”, Winner of the Historical Writers Association Non-Fiction Crown, the Jerry Bentley Prize in World History and the Nayef Al-Rohdan Prize for Global Cultural Understanding amongst many many other accolades. Toby Green, historian joins the Essex Book Festival and African and Caribbean Book and Writers Group digital book club to discuss, share his outstanding book.

By the time of the ‘Scramble for Africa’ in the late nineteenth century, Africa had already been globally connected for many centuries. Its gold had fuelled the economies of Europe and Islamic world since around 1000, and its sophisticated kingdoms had traded with Europeans along the coasts from Senegal down to Angola since the fifteenth century. Until at least 1650, this was a trade of equals, using a variety of currencies – most importantly shells: the cowrie shells imported from the Maldives, and the nzimbu shells imported from Brazil. 
 
Toby Green‘s groundbreaking new book transforms our view of West and West-Central Africa. It reconstructs the world of kingdoms whose existence (like those of Europe) revolved around warfare, taxation, trade, diplomacy, complex religious beliefs, royal display and extravagance, and the production of art. 
 
Over time, the relationship between Africa and Europe revolved ever more around the trade in slaves, damaging Africa’s relative political and economic power as the terms of monetary exchange shifted drastically in Europe’s favour. In spite of these growing capital imbalances, longstanding contacts ensured remarkable connections between the Age of Revolution in Europe and America and the birth of a revolutionary nineteenth century in Africa. 
 
A Fistful of Shells draws not just on written histories, but on archival research in nine countries, on art, praise-singers, oral history, archaeology, letters, and the author’s personal experience to create a new perspective on the history of one of the world’s most important regions .Winner of the Historical Writers Association Non-Fiction Crown, the Jerry Bentley Prize in World History and the Nayef Al-Rohdan Prize for Global Cultural Understanding 
 
Shortlisted for the Cundill History Prize, the Fage and Oliver Prize, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for History, the PEN Hessell-Tiltman Prize, the Pius Adesanmi Memorial Award, and the Wolfson History Prize. 
 
Book of the Year in History Today, Observer, Prospect, and The Wall Street Journal. 
 
“Momentous…a work of staggering scholarship” Ben Okri, Daily Telegraph 
 
“this is a stunning work of research and argumentation. It has the potential to become a landmark in our understanding of the most misunderstood of continents.” David Olusoga, New Statesman 
 
“A very important book,” Richard J. Evans, fivebooks.com 
 
“A riveting new perspective on African history”, Rana Mitter, BBC History Magazine 

The African and Caribbean Books and Writers Group meets on the first Saturday of the month from 3pm – 4pm , online or when restrictions allow in Chelmsford Library, County Hall, Market Road, Chelmsford, CM1 1QH For further information about the Book Club, please contact acbwg.essex@gmail.com 

The post Essex Book Festival and the African and Caribbean Books and Writers Group present a digital book club with Toby Green – A Fistful of Shells appeared first on Essex Book Festival.

Join us as Ukamaka, author of Ogadinma shares more insights into her book – Ogadinma; or everything will be alright.

Described as a modern feminist classic, the book tells the story of the naïve and trusting teenager Ogadinma as she battles against Nigeria’s societal expectations in the 1980s, a time of coups, food shortages and religious extremism. 

With so many societal and cultural issues laced in this book, you will be enthralled by the exceptional character of Ogadinma.  

The book is beautiful but yet heartbreaking, it will leave you emotionally raw after reading this. 

The post Essex Book Festival (UK) in partnership with Roving Heights Book Club (Nigeria) presents Ukamaka Olisakwe appeared first on Essex Book Festival.

Join author Samantha Lee Howe at this online writing workshop and explore how to introduce tension to shock, thrill and captivate your audience in your opening paragraphs.

During the workshop you will have a chance to practice some writing and hear feedback from Samantha and other participants if you wish. There will also be a Q&A session at the end of the workshop.

This is a writing workshop so please have a pad and pen handy.

Pay What You Can
We invite you to Pay What You Can for this workshop. You may choose to pay any amount you wish. The standard price is £5 but if you are able to pay more for your ticket, you will help support Essex Book Festival and our efforts to make the festival accessible to those with limited means.

About the Author

Samantha Lee Howe began her professional writing career in 2007 and has been working as a freelance writer for small, medium and large publishers, predominately writing horror and fantasy under the pen name Sam Stone. This body of work includes 13 novels 5 novellas, 3 collections, over 40 short stories, an audio drama and a Doctor Who spin-off drama that went to DVD.

A former high school English and Drama teacher, Samantha has a BA (Hons) in English and Writing for Performance, an MA in Creative Writing and a PGCE in English.

Samantha lives in Lincolnshire with her husband David.

Find out more about Samantha and her writing at samanthaleehowe.co.uk

Samantha’s latest book, The Stranger in Our Bed is out now.

The post Creating a Compelling Opening – An Online Writing Workshop appeared first on Essex Book Festival.

Hosted in partnership with The African and Caribbean Books and Writers Group.

Louise Hare will be in conversation with Ros Green, Director of Essex Book Festival, discussing her debut novel This Lovely City, a poignant, conversation-starting story set around Brixton’s Windrush community, exploring themes of race, poverty and community in post-war London society.

This virtual event will be attended by members of The African and Caribbean Books and Writers Group and is also open to all to attend. You will have the chance to hear Louise Hare discuss her novel This Lovely City which is being hailed as the biggest debut of 2020 as well as listen to an interactive discussion about the book and the topics it covers.

A beautiful, soaring debut set in London in the aftermath of the Second World War, This Lovely City charts the course of a jazz musician newly arrived in London on the Empire Windrush, and the opportunity, excitement, prejudice and love he finds in the dizzying metropolis. Heart-breaking yet hopeful, This Lovely City heralds the arrival of a brilliant fresh voice in fiction.

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