Photo: © F.Hardy
I didn’t give a talk at Bournemouth Writing Festival – but it was one of the most enjoyable and interesting literary festivals I’ve been to. I bumped into a couple of people I knew from Frome and Warminster, but otherwise I didn’t know anyone else there. I needn’t have worried as I wasn’t on my own for long. Almost everyone there, it seemed, had come on their own, having booked back-to-back talks and workshops to go to. Between times, there were author lunches and dinners everyone was welcome to join.
I hosted a breakfast with the theme of ‘memoir.’ At the same time as my ‘genre breakfast’ was going on, there were others with themes such as Sci-Fi, Young Adult, Historical Fiction and Nature Writing. Two of them I could easily have hosted myself: Travel Writing and Creative Non-Fiction. Anyway, we met, pre Sunday events, at South Coast Coffee, a friendly place that just so happened to be a short walk from my B&B accommodation in the town centre.
Felice, at the head of the table with other memoir writers. Photo: © Solid Imagery
Bournemouth is an easy place to get around. I came by train from Warminster, changing at Southampton Central. Then I caught a bus from outside Bournemouth station straight into the centre. Thanks to Google Maps, I quickly found the Pavilion, where most of the events were held.
The only drawback was that there were so many events to choose from, some of them free of charge and others costing around £10. Pre-booking was advised, although I managed to book talk one the evening before. I would have loved to go to more, but found myself running between the Pavilion where the paid events were held and The Writer’s Hive inside a former department store called Bobby’s, where the free events took place. There were also ‘meet-the-agent’ sessions in a hotel that was a bit of a walk away. Other free events included Writing on the Beach, and myriad poetry events in the Poetry Marquee. The talks I went to included How to Write Unlikeable Characters and Make Them Irresistible (paid) and Getting to Grips with Historical Fiction (free).
Lush landscape outside the Pavilion Theatre. Photo: © F.Hardy
