Independent bookshop launches children's festival

An independent bookshop has launched a children's literature festival, the first in its city, with every event being "pay as you feel".

Script Haven in Worcester will host the Curious Minds festival, which starts on Sunday and runs until Friday 18 April.

Owner of the bookshop and former Worcestershire poet laureate, Leena Batchelor, said the pay-as-you-feel option for the event was to make the festival as accessible as possible for families.

"It's really difficult sometimes when faced with the question of whether to spend money on bills or on a book. Books are seen as expensive options," she said.

Families can pay whatever they want for any of the events or pay nothing at all.

They include sessions with children's authors, illustrators, and poets, and attendees can also try their hand at creative writing.

Actor Jonathan Goodwin will also perform a one-man adaptation of the classic H.G. Wells time travel tale, The Time Machine.

Free books and gifts are also available for people at the festival.

And while there are age guidelines for the events, Ms Batchelor said: "It doesn't mean adults can't come - we're all young at heart."

She opened the independent bookshop in 2023 to promote independent authors and get the community to engage with literature.

While the shop is hosting other festivals and events, Ms Batchelor noticed that there were very few literary events for children and young people nationally, as well as in Worcester.

"Fewer than 10% of literature festivals are for young people," she said.

Addressing the importance of reading for children and young people, she added: "It's a brilliant way of escaping from every day and actually enhancing your life skills without realising it - communicating, nurturing empathy, educational benefits - purely just by loving and reading books."

Ms Batchelor said the festival was a safe place for children to express their own creative skills.

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