Oct 26–27 is the Texas Book Festival
The Forrest Four-Cast: October 16, 2019
With the simple and potentially transformative mission to inspire Lone Star residents of all ages to love reading, the 24th annual Texas Book Festival brings in topline talent to appeal to a vast range of ages and interests. This free event takes place at the Texas State Capitol and surrounding grounds in downtown Austin from 10 am to 5 pm on Saturday, October 26, and 11 am to 5 pm Sunday, on Sunday, October 27. For complete details, see the Texas Book Festival schedule here.
Malcolm Gladwell, who’s been named one of the 100 most influential people in the world, is among the many bestselling authors scheduled to appear. He’ll read from his newest, timely work, Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know About the People We Don’t Know. Other notable authors include prolific legal thriller creator John Grisham, who’s just released The Guardian, and local favorite Elizabeth McCracken, who currently holds the James Michener Chair for Fiction at the University of Texas at Austin, and who will read from her latest, Bowlaway.
Other authors participating in this year’s event include New York Times reporters Julie Hirschfeld Davis and Michael Shear who collaborated on Border Wars: Inside Trump’s Assault on Immigration; Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor with Just Ask! Be Different, Be Brave, Be You, a picture book designed to inspire all ages to celebrate diversity; and former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power, who won a Pulitzer Prize for A Problem From Hell: America and the Age of Genocide and has recently released a memoir, The Education of an Idealist.
If the lineup at the 2019 Texas Book Festival whets your appetite for more literary-focused content, then be sure to check out the extensive Book Reading program at SXSW 2020. Many of the sessions for this program will be announced on Tuesday, October 22 via the SXSW website.
Hugh Forrest serves as Chief Programming Officer at SXSW, the world’s most unique gathering of creative professionals. He also tries to write at least four paragraphs per day on Medium. These posts often cover tech-related trends; other times they focus on books, pop culture, sports and other current events.
