Where to go and what to know

Ashley Bell is swapping horror for romantic comedy.

Maurice Sendak, author of Where the Wild Things Are, one of the most influential and best-loved children's books of the past 50 years, has died at the age of 83. The writer and illustrator, whose books entranced generations of children, died at a hospital close to his home in Connecticut. He had suffered complications after having a stroke on Friday.

From an early age, Maurice Sendak knew where the wild things were. His Brooklyn upbringing, he once recalled, was overshadowed by the death of his extended family in the Holocaust. "My childhood was about thinking about the kids over there... My burden is living for those who didn't."

Notebook

Intensely combative from her earliest years, Leila Berg, who has died aged 94, galvanised attitudes towards young readers in the UK.

Of all the presents that the Queen is doubtless looking forward to when she celebrates her 60 years on the throne this summer, surely the best will be the special new Diamond Jubilee edition of Nicholas Allan's The Queen's Knickers.

This holiday from hell gives a crafty and funny spin to the confusions of family life today.

JK Rowling's first book for adults will be a "blackly comic" tale about an idyllic town ripped apart by a parish council election.

Tackling The Issues

One publisher has nearly three-quarters of its titles stolen at the industry's leading event in Italy

Enid Blyton's novels are to be updated, re-illustrated and digitised now Hachette has the world rights. By Nick Clark

Cripes! The Secret Seven are off on a new adventure. They are shelving the jolly japes and following the Famous Five into the digital age, taking modern dialogue with them on their travels.

The Royal Ballet’s Alice has sensational production design and an overstuffed storyline. Putting Lewis Carroll’s Alice books on stage, choreographer Christopher Wheeldon wants to include all the famous bits. He and his design team conjure dazzling illusions, from shrinking Alice to a marvellous Cheshire Cat, but the dancing can get squeezed to the sidelines.