Amongst the highlights of the 2011 Festival

Sir Roy Strong, Mavis Cheek and Hilary Mantel were among the big names in the third Budleigh Salterton Literary Festival in September 2011.

Producer and broadcaster Sue MacGregor, best-selling children’s author Michael Morpurgo, explorer Robin Hanbury-Tenison, and BBC Spotlight reporter and crime writer Simon Hall  also appeared.  There were 25 events  including a Literary Walk in association with the Otter Valley Association and Fairlynch Museum.

Carol Ann Duffy, Britain’s first female Poet Laureate and Scottish poet and playwright, presented poems from her forthcoming collection The Bees, published in 2011.

National Poet for Wales, playwright and broadcaster, Gillian Clarke read from her latest collection of poetry A Recipe for Water, in which she explores water as memory and meaning.

Hilary Mantel, winner of the 2009 Man Booker prize for Wolf Hall, a penetrating novel about Thomas Cromwell and the court of Henry VIII, is now writing a sequel. She read from her new work in progress, The Mirror and the Light.

Michael Morpurgo, the most respected British children’s writer working today, gave an uproarious account about his feelings when seeing his books adapted for stage or screen.

Celebrated for her irony, originality and dead-pan wit,  A.L.Kennedy is a writer of novels, short stories and non-fiction, and a popular stand-up comedian, making regular appearances at comedy clubs and the Edinburgh Fringe.

Josceline Dimbleby’s Orchard in the Oasis scooped the prestigious Guild of Food Writers Award for Food and Travel Writing this summer. She has written a magical account of her awakening childhood passion for food in the spice markets of Syria and her lifelong love affair with food and flavourings.

The festival website has been redesigned by Creative Engine Room and people can gain priority booking by becoming a Friend of the festival at www.budlitfest.org.uk