All this week, the Hay children's festival, Hay Fever, has been running in parallel with the main programme. Today we're dedicating the whole of the Haycast to children's literature.
Festivalgoers Ethan and George take us on a tour of the site to show us what Hay Fever has to offer, while the Guardian's children's books editor, Julia Eccleshare, and Claire Armitstead talk us through the big-name authors appearing at this year's festival. They also discuss the longlist of this year's Guardian children's fiction prize, which launched at Hay.
Kjartan Poskitt, author of the Murderous Maths series, talks to Alok Jha about how to make maths fun, and sets a test for listeners.
Mal Peet won the 2009 Guardian children's fiction prize for his novel Exposure, an adaptation of Shakespeare's Othello set in a fictional South American country, that takes in everything from football and fame to betrayal, deprivation and the nature of evil. He talks about tackling Shakespeare, Posh and Becks, and how to persuade boys to pick up a book.
Finally, we hear from William Nicholson, whose teen novel Rich and Mad contains an explicit sex scene. He discusses the place of sex in young adult literature, while the historian Niall Ferguson voices his objections to the UK curriculum.
