Take Flight in StoryMachine!

A Programme for Children, Families & Young Adults

ILFDublin invites you on a journey of exploration and discovery through a programme of stories, poetry, illustration, workshops and talks for Family, Children and Young Adults – StoryMachine. Over ten days, the online festival will present children’s books superstars such as Eoin Colfer, Angie Thomas, Dermot O’Leary and Cressida Cowell alongside international names from France, Germany, The Netherlands and more! Coming together in a celebration of kindness and friendships are some of the world’s best writers and illustrators for audiences of all ages.

From picture books to podcasts, and so many books in between, the festival explores what it means to be a young person in the world today: dealing with heartbreak and hardship, exploring the self and sexuality, learning how to grow up without falling down, and how to find happiness and the space just to have fun! The programme explores life, love and laughter and celebrates the wizardry of words to make sense of our worlds.

Whether it is activities and illustrating in the daily ‘Let’s Get Busy…’ with Patricia Forde and Chris Haughton giving power to your pencil or inspiring authors and activists such as Angie Thomas and Holly Bourne to empower your beliefs, the programme encourages you to participate and create, no matter what your age!

From hosting the KPMG Children’s Books Ireland Awards to the meeting of two literary masterminds and Laureates, Áine Ní Ghlinn and Cressida Cowell, ILFDublin champions the importance of writing for young people.

Empathy and hope carry through the festival: award-winning illustrator Barroux shares exclusive short films offering a story of compassion each day from his book Counting Kindnesses; David Almond inspires as he talks in a podcast about the power of youth as is explored in Bone Music and Frank Cottrell Boyce presents a funny and uplifting tale of friendship and power outage in Noah’s Gold.

And the festival celebrates the joy of great storytelling to bring us pure escapism, belly laughs and captivating adventures with Eoin Colfer talking about his latest series, The Fowl Twins, Dermot O’Leary sharing tales of his crime fighting ninja cat, and David O’Doherty and Chris Judge carrying us off on their latest madcap caper in The Summer I Robbed A Bank.

For those with ambitions to be creative then our Masterclass series explores the machinery of story creation with leading writers such as Hilary McKay and Emma Carroll, Jonathan Stroud, Laura Mucha, David Colmer and Sarah Ardizzone as they talk processes and techniques of writing historical fiction, dystopia, poetry and how to be a translator.

Families and Children’s Programmer, Janet Smyth said:

‘This is my first programme for ILFDublin and, as the last year has been particularly tough for children and young people, I felt this was an opportunity to come together to share stories of hope, friendship, laughter and community. I’m delighted that so many wonderful writers and illustrators will be ‘in Dublin’ for both our local and audiences from all around the world to enjoy.’

The full programme is available here and events will be available to view on demand for a limited time after initial broadcast.