On Wednesday 30 September, we were thrilled to host an awe-inspiring talk by acclaimed author Katherine Rundell. Katherine is a multi-million-bestselling author whose accolades include Waterstones Book of the Year, the Blue Peter Book Award and the Costa Children’s Book Award, among many others. In 2024 she was named the British Book Awards Author of the Year, and the first Impossible Creatures book won the Children’s Fiction Book of the Year. Her mesmerising stories take readers across the globe and through history, from the rooftops of Oxford to a fantastical parallel world, accompanied by adventurous, unforgettable characters.
Nearly 500 students from Wimbledon High Junior School and local partnership schools – Wimbledon Chase, Harris Academy and The Study – gathered in the Auditorium to hear Katherine speak about her latest book The Neverfear, the third instalment in the immensely popular Impossible Creatures series, and how she is currently adapting it into a script for a film series by Disney. Katherine shared some of the inspirations behind her books and her own adventures, before answering students’ eager questions and signing many, many books.
Katherine told the children to read everything and anything they could, to try lots of different books, even ones they didn’t enjoy as it would make them so much more certain about what they loved. She recommended keeping a diary every day but just writing one great line to sum up the day, to build up a collection of excellent sentences.
Katherine asked who found it hard to start writing when all you have is a blank page. Her top tip was that it is far easier to start writing if you answer a question – ask yourself ‘what if?’ and see where it takes you..
This event is just one of the activities organised for the 2026 Year of Reading throughout the Junior School. Last week, four Y6 girls represented WHS in the regional round of the first National Reading Champions Quiz – a very challenging quiz on book knowledge open to primary aged pupils. They did brilliantly and came in third place with only four points separating the top three teams.
Thank you to Wimbledon Books for supporting the event and for our local partners schools for attending. Thrilling!
