Phil McMullen, event director, writes:

The idea of holding a festival for fans of Jasper Fforde's work first popped into my head during a particularly hilarious rendition of Shakespeare's 'Richard III' one evening at the Beehive pub in Swindon in May 2004. Chatting to people who had travelled from far and wide to cram into the tiny public bar, and watching how easily Jasper interacted with the people gathered there, I thought it might be fun to try and step things up a gear, maybe take on 'Hamlet' or something.

My own background is in organising concerts and music festivals, which in a way are simply gatherings of like-minded people when it comes down to it - so I carefully avoided the word "convention" and all the perhaps unfortunate science fiction and caravanning connotations associated with that word, and instead set about launching something really quite unambitious: a reading, a buffet and some entertainment, plus perhaps a trade bookstall or two. A festival of Jasper Fforde's work, in other words. The most important aspect to me was the opportunity for Fforde fans to get together and meet one another in an informal setting, to put faces to names, and to renew the acquaintances made in the queues to meet the author at the various signings that so many of us attend on a regular basis.

To a certain extent that still holds true to this day: spending time amongst like-minded people in a relaxed, informal and unhurried setting remains the single most important aspect of what's become the Fforde Ffiesta. What I’d seriously underestimated however was just how much the sense of fun which permeates all of Jasper Fforde's books spills over into almost every aspect of the lives of his fans! At the very first Fforde Ffestival (as it was then called), which took place in Swindon Old Town during September 2005, the “buffet” quickly became a major outdoor event in itself, complete with extreme croquet match and Italianate sunken garden; the “bookstall” turned into a village fête, complete with games and sideshows; and the "entertainment" became, amongst other things, a guided open-topped bus tour of Swindon and a "Celebrity Name That Fruit" quiz!

Such was the runaway international success of the Ffestival that it took myself and the extremely hard-working committee who had made it all happen something by surprise. A fun auction at the end of the event, initially intended solely to help offset the cost of staging the undertaking, made a profit of several hundred pounds, all of which was donated to local Swindon-based charities, including one helping children with reading difficulties. Content with having done a good job, the exhausted Ffestival committee retired gracefully in September 2005, with no intention of ever doing anything as crazy as that again. Ever.

We held out for one whole year. Around Christmas 2006, the same committee (give or take a person or two), met again and started laying down plans for what was to become The Fforde Ffiesta. It was to be bigger, even more ambitious and if anything even crazier than the Ffestival which had gone before it. Based on feedback received the first time round, the Ffiesta relocated to premises on the outskirts of Swindon which were better geared up to staging a convention - by now I had given in gracefully to the inevitable and accepted that what we were striving to achieve was in fact a convention in all but name.

The Fforde Ffiesta took place in May 2008 and was, if the numbers attending and positive feedback received is anything to go by, even more successful than we dared hope. Once again it featured stalls, games, entertainments and a guided tour of Swindon, this time in a vintage bus. Another auction was held to offset costs, and thanks to some extremely generous donations a four-figure sum was this time sent to Alzheimer's research charities once the bills had been paid.

Planning for the 2010 Fforde Ffiesta started shortly afterwards. The Committee - by now dubbed "The Fforganisers" was expanded in order to achieve the ambitions set out by Jasper, to take the Ffiesta to the next level again, and someday perhaps beyond even the boundary of Swindon.