Strange creatures were spotted lurking in the woods around St John’s on Saturday afternoon, when the children’s author and illustrator Chris Riddell hosted a family day at the Garey ny Cloie gardens, based around his new book, Once Upon a Wild Wood.

Featuring a range of fairy tale characters, including Rapunzel, Red Riding Hood, Thumbelina, Rapunzel, Beauty and the Beast, Cinderella, the three bears, and more, along with faces in the trees and a big, bad wolf lurking ion the bushes, hundreds of families joined in the fun and activities, including a draw-along session, hosted by Chris, and fairy story reading in amongst the trees.

Children also made their own mini wild woods.

John Quirk, the organiser of the Manx Litfest, said that Chris, who was the main guest of the festival, also appeared at more events throughout the weekend.

’Chris was only in the island for 26 hours, but gave us three great events,’ said John.

’The Family Day was a great success, and he followed that with ’Poems to Live Your Life By’ at Noa Bakehouse on Saturday night, where he live illustrated to a packed house accompanied by local poets Annie Kissack, the Manx Bard, Jackie Morrey-Grace and Helen Jessopp.’

Chris also appeared at the Castletown Civic Centre on Sunday morning, where he was accompanied by string quartet Manx Camerata for a presentation of his young teen fiction novel Goth Girl and the Sinister Symphony.

Many of the Litfest activities were well attended, with sell-outs for several of the events, including the storyteller Ben Haggarty, who performed his version of Frankenstein, accompanied by musician Sianed Jones, at the Gaeity Theatre.

’The team would like to thank all of our authors, illustrators, poets and storytellers, both those who came to visit, and those who are based in the Isle of Man,’ said John.

’We started and finished with small, intimate events, like in Introduction to bibliotherapy with the Mobile Library at Conrod’s in Ramsey, and the beautiful Moonbrella at Peel Cathedral, with our new patron Thommie Gillow.

’In between were six days of talks, live illustrating, workshops, children’s events, school visits, the poetry and short story slams, gothic storytelling and dark folk tales.’

John gave his thanks to the Litfest volunteers and the many corporate and private sponsors, including new sponsors Estera, the Isle of Man Arts Council and Culture Vannin.