CHILDREN'S reading charity BookTrust is holding training and mentoring sessions in Bradford, as part of a project supporting children's authors and illustrators of colour.

The charity's scheme BookTrust Represents is aimed at improving diversity and inclusion within the publishing industry.

For the next phase, BookTrust is launching a series of free taster training sessions in September, with speakers including award-winning author or Orangeboy, Patrice Lawrence, and Joy Francis from communications agency Words of Colour, discussing how creatives can build confidence. The event takes place at Mind the Gap's studio in the Silk Warehouse at Lister Mills on Saturday, September 21.

Other speakers and industry experts will include Elizabeth Bananuka, founder of BME PR Pros, which promotes diversity in public relations and communications; agents Davinia Andrew-Lynch and Penny Holroyde-Cartey and Sarah Baxter from the Society of Authors.

The Bradford session is the only one outside London and is aimed at giving aspiring creatives chance to learn about the publishing industry, and how to grow their profile, run a school visit, work with agents, source funding opportunities and sustain a career in children’s books. The taster sessions will be followed by free workshops for aspiring children’s authors and illustrators to be held over the next two years.

Jill Coleman, Director of Children’s Books at BookTrust, said: “These events are just the start for BookTrust Represents. There is a host of untapped emerging talent out there that we want to help harness and grow. We want aspiring authors and illustrators to learn and develop, and what better way to do that than from those who have come before them? These training and mentoring sessions will give them a much-needed insight into the industry and a taster of the in-depth workshops we will be offering over the next two years.”

BookTrust Represents is a three-year initiative led by the UK’s largest children’s reading charity to help authors and illustrators of colour promote their work. As well as giving them chance to reach more readers through events in bookshops, festivals and schools, the project offers training and mentoring. BookTrust’s aim is that by 2022, the number of authors and illustrators of colour in the UK will have increased from less than six per cent to 10per cent.

Elizabeth Bananuka, one of the workshop mentors, said: “BookTrust’s research earlier this year highlighted the shocking lack of published authors and illustrators of colour in the UK, which isn’t to say they don’t exist, just that they don’t necessarily have access to the industry. In fact, we’re overflowing with an enormous amount of homegrown talent in Britain which BookTrust’s training workshops will help to harness; offering aspiring and established creatives practical, tangible tips and advice for building connections, sourcing funding and developing and sustaining their careers as the children’s book creators of the future.

"I’m incredibly excited to be leading one of the sessions to help get them started on their next chapter.”

The Bradford programme includes: Publishing industry: A Case Study Start to Finish with Patrice Lawrence; Working with an agent: For Illustrators with Penny Holroyde-Cartey; Working with an agent: For Writers with Davinia Andrew-Lynch; Confidence Building for creatives with Claire Malcolm of New Writing North; Dealing with the Public and Growing Your Profile with Elizabeth Bananuka; Entrepreneurship: Funding Opportunities with Rhoda Baxter from Society of Authors; Introduction to School Visits with author Chitra Soundar; and The Publishing Industry: How To Stay Published with author Bali Rai.

* Visit booktrust.org.uk/booktrustrepresents

Emma Clayton