Daleks, monsters and pirates at children's book festival

It happened on Saturday though as one kindly accompanied Dr Who author Simon Messingham during his appearance in the Children's Book Festival.

Seeing this potent symbol of pure evil was just one of the highlights of a popular event which included appearances by four top authors '“ apart from Simon, there was Mini Grey, Ali Sparkes and Jeremy Strong who all talked with an audience of children and their parents about creative writing and answered questions about the books.

The Children's Book Festival was opened by Town Mayor Councillor Patrick Douart who said: "Judging by the programme it is going to be a fun day. I am sure that like me, you are looking forward to meeting with your favourite authors...let's have fun."

The event was organised by a group of volunteers who are Jean Burke, Sue Dale, Wendy Morton, Pauline Crouch and Jean Scotcher, assisted by a small team of helpers.

Jean said: "It has been brilliant '“ a really good day. We have had lots of parents and children come. Jeremy Strong obviously had a large audience and he was just so funny, then we had Mini Grey '“ called Mini because she was born in a Mini '“ and she talked about her books, and one of them was screened with music.

"It is really about bringing authors to children, because I myself like meeting the authors of books I have enjoyed reading. It enhances children's enthusiasm perhaps for reading if they can have some interaction with the author."

During the lunch break there was a pirate party with a pirate feast, with plenty of opportunity to get expressive with arts and crafts.

The afternoon then started with Ali Sparkes who engaged her audience in the auditiorium with questions about monsters and writing stories '“ she has created Electrotaur, Slashermite, Stinkermite and lastly Bashertaur who are all creatures which take young readers to the depths of their fear and terror.

The event ended with a session from Simon Messingham with his exterminating friend who joined him on stage as he talked about writing about Time Lords, intergallactic baddies and time travel.

Simon, who lives in Worthing, was ready to talk about his Dr Who books of which he has written eight '“ the last one "The Doctor Trap" was published at the beginning of September. He writes each book in just three months and says the trick is to keep the storyline innovative and fresh. He began writing in the late 1980's having worked in television and achieved success at first with short story writing. He was asked to write his first Dr Who book in 1993.Jean commented of the festival: "It is really about bringing authors to children because I so enjoy meeting the authors of books I have enjoyed reading. It enhances children's enthusiasm perhaps for reading if they can have some interaction with the author."

Simon said: "How do you make Dr Who interesting again? Otherwise people get the same thing over and over again. A while back the people who run television decided there was no audience for this kind of programme year after year, and it took Russell T.Davies to come in and then it was as if Dr Who had never gone away, it was such a new and exciting series."

"When I talk to youngsters they ask my questions such as who is your favourite monster, who is your favourite doctor? What my job is really putting a face to Dr Who.

"My favourite monster though has to be the daleks '“ they are just completely horrible in every way, and have no redeeming feature whatsoever. They just want to kill you."

The Book Festival committee would like to thank the De La Warr Pavilion, McPherson and Partners, Rother District Council, Bexhill schools consortium, Cooden Beach Hotel, East Sussex County Libraries and Information Services, Bexhill Rotary club, and the publishers.