Alexia Casale had been in charge of organising the event and it is part of a year long thing they're doing in the borough. She introduced the first panel in the nice main room, and off we went!
The YA stuff all happened in the main room, the Middle Grade stuff in a different venue, and other talks dotted around. There were loads of volunteers to ask if you had any questions though, all very polite and up to speed.
Firstly we listened to the panel on "Surviving high school", where R J Morgan made me laugh a lot, and then we went to listen to the Diverse Labels panel chaired by the lovely Sarah Benwell (I'm a bit biased, because they're the flatmate of my BFF Lucinda). We left the venue to get some lunch, and then I snuck into the Crime and Punishment panel back in the main venue.
Other panels had used microphones, but this one didn't, which made everyone very hard to hear. Please do use the mics!
The next panel was called "Trigger Warning: exploring sensitive issues in ethical ways" and it was by far the best panel I saw. The four panellists - Alexia Casale, Holly Bourner, Tanya Byrne and Louisa Reid were all really interesting and very sensitive.
The last panel we saw was about dystopia and horror. There was events after that, but unfortunately Sam and I had to leave to get home to my cousin!
After each panel I went and bought at least one book by a featured panellist, and then was lucky enough to be able to get them all signed! I had a nice conversation with Holly Bourne, and a long conversation with Alexia, who was asking everyone what they thought. I was lucky to have budgeted to be able to spend quite a bit on books.
For an inaugaral event it was really great. The signing and book buying area could have been bigger, and it would have been good to have a break-out space, but it was excellent none the less.
On the way in we got a tote bag with a programme, some stickers, and some freebies inside:
And here's what I bought!
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