Events for Children and Young People

Saving a friend from falling in with the wrong crowd; the importance of friendship, care and community; and the need for urban green spaces. Sita Brahmachari will talk about her powerful YA novel When Shadows Fall, a timely, lyrical and impactful story of disaffected youth and the vulnerability of teenage years. The book mixes forms, including verse, prose and illustrations from Natalie Sirett, exploring themes that will open wide-ranging conversations.

Sita Bramachari won the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize with her debut Artichoke Hearts and is Writer in Residence at Islington Centre for Refugees and Migrants. Natalie Sirett is a multimedia artist whose work explores issues of body image and the growing pains of adolescence.

Welcome back Daniel Morden, a Festival favourite. He’s a captivating teller of traditional stories and author of books including Dark Tales from the Woods and Secret Tales from Wales. In 2017 we awarded him the Hay Festival Medal for his services to storytelling. This year he brings a brace of creepy tales for older children and brave adults. Expect drama, danger, a sprinkling of gore and an oversharing squirrel…

Every child dreams of being the boss, and in Wallace’s latest hilarious adventure that’s just what happens to 10-year-old Joss. When her dad takes her to work and his boss calls a meeting and tells them he’s giving his job away to the person with the best idea for a company game-changer, Joss sticks her hand up. The next thing she knows, she’s the boss, and her dad is horrified. As Joss whips everyone into shape, maybe they can all learn a lesson or two…even Joss herself.

Calling all detectives! Robin Stevens, author of the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize winning Murder Most Unladylike series is coming to help you investigate The Ministry of Unladylike Activity (clue: it’s the start of a brand new series!) Robin will uncover her top writing tips, shed light on the tricks that can help you create the perfect murder mystery and unveil the inspiration behind her new team of detectives. You’ll also get the chance to put your own sleuthing skills to the test and ask your burning questions, like any good private eye.

Get ready for an energetic freestyle performance from wordsmith, hip hop artist and poet Karl Nova. He’ll bring to life pieces from his latest book, telling stories that are humorous, personal and inspirational.

The Curious Case of Karl Nova is Karl’s follow-up to his debut Rhythm and Poetry, which won the Centre for Literacy in Primary Poetry Award (CLiPPA) in 2018.

Join Artemis Fowl author Eoin Colfer and illustrator Celia Ivey as they share their children’s book, Little Big Sister. Eoin will read his beautiful story of a girl growing up with dwarfism, and Celia will provide a peek behind the scenes at how she brought the characters to life through art.

You Don't Know What War Is is the powerfully moving true story of a young girl fleeing the conflict in Ukraine. The gripping and urgent diary of refugee Yeva Skalietska, it follows twelve days that changed 12-year-old Yeva’s life forever.

She was woken in the early hours to the terrifying sounds of shelling. Russia had invaded Ukraine, and her beloved Kharkiv home was no longer the safe haven it should have been. It was while she and her granny were forced to seek shelter in a damp, cramped basement that Yeva decided to write down her story.

Yeva shares what is happening hour-by-hour as she seeks safety and travels from Kharkiv to Dublin, where she now lives. Giving a powerful insight into what conflict is like through the eyes of a child, this is an essential event for older children and adults alike. She talks to Claire Armitstead.

In this event, Connor Allen will announce the new Children’s Laureate Wales for 2023–25 and welcome them on stage for their first ever appearance as Children's Laureate Wales here at Hay Festival.

Join Connor, the current Children’s Laureate Wales, for a lively and interactive poetry event featuring poems from his upcoming new collection, Miracles.

Come on a powerful, hopeful and timely journey into the real effects of climate change with the authors and illustrator behind the Artemis Fowl and Illegal graphic novels as they present their new book Global. They’ll tell us how the graphic novel came to be, the real-life stories that inspired it, and what it takes to create a breathtaking story mixing words and illustrations.

Global follows two young people on different continents whose lives are changed by global warming. Yuki, who lives in an increasingly deserted Inuit township in Nova Scotia, is trying to protect a rare grolar bear (a terrifying crossbreed created by climate change). Sami lives in a fishing village on the Bay of Bengal but, because of the ever-rising ocean level, each day is a struggle to survive.

Take a whip-smart deep dive into what it would really be like to be internet famous at 17, with Bristolian author Amara Sage. Introducing her debut YA novel, Influential, and shooting straight to the heart of the modern day teenage experience – both online and offline – Amara will discuss themes of social media, cancel culture, online trolling, body image and more.

Meet Cressida Cowell, creator of the How to Train Your Dragon and Wizards of Once series (and Children’s Laureate 2019–22), as she talks about inspiration, daring rescue missions, terrible beasts and robot assassins – with live drawing.

If you’re a fan of this fantastically inventive author, don’t miss this introduction to her new book Which Way to Anywhere, the first in a thrilling new series about a group of children who find the crossing points to other dimensions. Discover a family with a magical secret; a child with a powerful gift and a story that is out of this world…

Travel through the natural world with amazing animals on epic adventures accompanied by wildlife expert and BBC Radio 4 World on the Move presenter Philippa Forrester.

Discover the wondrous journeys that animals make every day, no matter how big or small, and why they make them. From the record-breaking flight of the Arctic tern that travel from the Arctic to the Antarctic and back every year, to the plankton that rise and descend enormous distances from the ocean depths to the surface from night to day, and the fascinating migration of two grey wolves that take remarkably similar journeys despite being in different parts of the world, you’ll be awed by these surprising stories of migration in the animal kingdom.

An expert on natural history and author of On the Trail of Wolves, The River and The Halcyon River Diaries, Forrester is a presenter on the BBC’s Tomorrow’s World, Robot Wars and CBBC.

It’s time for Oti’s dance class! You’ll move to the beat and learn some steps with Strictly Come Dancing champion and CBeebies Boogie Beebies host Oti Mabuse. Her lively, participatory event will explore rhythm and dance, inspired by her books Dance with Oti: The Bird Jive and The Lion Samba. Bring your grown-ups and shake a tail feather.

Get your pencils at the ready! It’s doodling time. You can learn how to draw Tom Gates and a host of other characters with author and illustrator Liz Pichon. She’ll answer your questions about her books, doodling and more. You can also find out everything about the newest Tom Gates book, Happy to Help (Eventually)! The Brilliant World of Tom Gates is an award-winning series on Sky Kids.

Don’t stand us up for this very special in conversation event with Alice Oseman, creator of global smash-hit coming-of-age romance Heartstopper, and sensational book influencer and Hay Festival Thinker in Residence, Jack Edwards. We follow the story of Nick and Charlie, two teenage boys who meet at grammar school, quickly become friends and fall in love. The book navigates the ups and downs of first loves, friendships, coming out and mental health, beautifully framed by a warm cast of supporting characters.

Heartstopper started life as a webcomic, quickly becoming an online sensation with over 100 million views. The #1 Sunday Times and New York Times bestselling graphic novels that followed have brought this charming love story to even more readers. Now it’s a critically acclaimed major Netflix series, written by Oseman herself.

So come along to hear her talk about the incredible journey so far and maybe even get a special sneak peek at what’s to come in Heartstopper volume five…

Create your own Hay Castle knight with the Brothers McLeod! The Brothers McLeod are Myles and Greg, author and illustrator of the hilarious Knight Sir Louis series. Join them in the independent kingdom of ‘Hay-Wyre’ to help them create a brand new knight character based in Hay Castle in an event packed with drawing, comics and lots and lots of laughs.

This heart-warming family show, based on the much-loved novels by Tove Jansson, tells the story of a year in Moominvalley. Moomintroll wakes up in the middle of winter with a ‘something-wrong-feeling’. There’s no sign of his good friend Snufkin, or the note Snufkin left him. As winter turns to spring and Snufkin returns, the days lengthen into a lazy summer and ‘the sea brings them all the adventures they could wish for’.

Fabulously funny actor and author Stephen Mangan and tremendously talented illustrator Anita Mangan bring us laughter, games, drawing and sibling stories. The creators of Escape the Rooms and The Fart that Changed the World are back with their laugh-out-loud new book, The Unlikely Rise of Harry Sponge. Get ready to meet a grumpy king without an heir and five kids competing for the throne in the ‘Crown Duels’. Find out what it takes to be the greatest kid in the kingdom and discover how you should never underestimate the underdog.

This heart-warming family show, based on the much-loved novels by Tove Jansson, tells the story of a year in Moominvalley. Moomintroll wakes up in the middle of winter with a ‘something-wrong-feeling’. There’s no sign of his good friend Snufkin, or the note Snufkin left him. As winter turns to spring and Snufkin returns, the days lengthen into a lazy summer and ‘the sea brings them all the adventures they could wish for’.

Tim Peake was the first British astronaut to conduct a spacewalk at the International Space Station, and an inspiration for budding young scientists and astronauts everywhere. In this out-of-this-world event, Peake talks about his first non-fiction book for children, The Cosmic Diary of Our Incredible Universe, in which readers will discover everything from how stars are made, to which fruit can create antimatter. Peake is a former Apache pilot, flight instructor, test pilot and European Space Agency astronaut whose books include his memoir Limitless, and the photography collection Hello, is this Planet Earth?