Redwings Horse Sanctuary is hosting the charity’s first ever Book Festival headlined by best-selling crime novelist Elly Griffiths.
The author, who writes the popular Ruth Galloway series, will be joined by TV presenter and English Master Saddle Maker Suzie Fletcher, who has recently published her memoir, and Joyce Dunbar, who has over 80 children’s books to her name including the Mouse and Mole series, at Redwings Caldecott, Great Yarmouth on Saturday 18th May.
The event is part of the biggest horse welfare charity in the UK’s Ruby celebration year and follows the publication of their special fundraising edition of Black Beauty, in partnership with the UEA. Redwings are the custodians of Anna Sewell House, where the author was born and lived in Great Yarmouth, which re-opens to the public after a winter closure in the spring.
Nicola Knight, Head of Communications and Campaigns at Redwings, said: “We are so excited to be organising this event, which will bring together some incredible authors from Norfolk and beyond, whose writing celebrates animals, nature and the environment.
“In our efforts to draw focus on the incredible legacy of Anna, our shared love of horses and desire to improve horse welfare, we’ve had so much support from the literature world of which we’re now, thrillingly, and thanks to the UEA, a part.
“We’re so pleased that this event takes place in our 40th anniversary year, as we look back at what we’ve already accomplished with the help of our amazing supporters, the Redwings angels, and to the future.
“We hope Redwings’ Book Festival will be the first of many!”
There will be both an adult and a children’s schedule on the day including book readings, talks and Q & As; a creative writing class; children’s crafts; all day food and refreshments and of course the opportunity to meet the horses, ponies, donkeys and mules who live at Redwings Caldecott. The centre is home to almost 100 of the charity’s rescued residents including several of its ‘Adoption Stars’ who supporters can sponsor and receive updates on their lives.
The full list of authors confirmed so far is: Elly Griffiths (the Ruth Galloway series and many others); Suzie Fletcher (The Sun Over the Mountains); Jenni Keer (The Secrets of Hawthorn Place and No 23 Burlington Square as well as others); Grace Olsen (The Yard: How a Horse Healed My Heart and Merlin Finds His Magic); Thomas Ruys Smith (Black Beauty and the upcoming Homely Ballads and Stories in Verse by Mary Sewell); Celia Brayfield (Writing Black Beauty: Anna Sewell and the Story of Animal Rights); Joyce Dunbar (the Mouse and Mole series and many others); Cressida Burton (the Ravensbay School series and many more); Sangu Mandanna (Kiki Kallira Breaks a Kingdom and others); P.A Staff (Casander Darkbloom and the Threads of Power). Hosts will include Professor Thomas Ruys Smith, Dr Hilary Emmett and Dr Daisy Henwood from the UEA and Nicola Knight from Redwings.
To find out more about Redwings’ work over the past 40 years and get involved in the events that are taking place to celebrate, please visit: https://www.redwings.org.uk/rubyanniversary
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