A National Public Radio journalist, Uyghur poet, and National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature are among the more than 70 authors, poets, and illustrators speaking at the 23rd annual Library of Congress National Book Festival.
The annual festival will be held in Washington, D.C. on Saturday, August 12, 2023 from 9:00am to 8:00pm Eastern Daylight Time (convert to your time zone).
Free and open to the public, no registration is required to attend the Festival.
While I’m not planning to attend in person, I was thrilled to discover a selection of programs from multiple stages will be livestreamed online.
In addition, C-SPAN’s Book TV will livestream select sessions and interview featured authors.
Videos of all presentations will be available after the Festival.
National Book Festival
With the theme of “Everyone Has a Story”, the Festival celebrates speakers sharing their lived experiences.
The Festival schedule is filled with a range of events, including:
- Author presentations
- Book launches
- Book signings
- Panels
- Partner events
Authors from almost a dozen genres are featured:
- Fiction
- Genre Fiction
- Fiction and Nonfiction
- Biography, History, and Memoir
- Nonfiction
- Poetry and Nonfiction
- Teen and Adults
- Young Adults
- Graphic Novels
- Middle Grade
- Picture Books
A few highlights from the schedule that caught my attention:
- Accidental Spies: The Scientist and the Socialite with John Lisle and Janet Wallach
- On “The Lincoln Highway”: Historical Fiction with Amor Towles
- The World Offers Itself to Your Imagination: Nature Poetry with Camille T. Dungy and Joy Harjo
- The Family You Need, the Family You Create: Literary Fiction with Esmeralda Santiago and Luis Alberto Urrea
- Dig In: What Food Says About Us with Cheuk Kwan and Anya von Bremzen
- Medicine and the New Human with Siddhartha Mukherjee
What to Know About the Festival
If you plan to attend the Festival in person, be sure to check out Festival Information for tips on planning your day, parking, safety, book sales, and Festival merchandise.
For folks like me attending online, a helpful virtual guide is available to help you plan your experience before, during, and after the Festival.
One recommendation stood out for me: you can watch featured authors interviews with PBS before the Festival .
From the virtual guide, I learned about the Great Reads from Great Places list.
Each year the local Center for the Book or state library selects a children’s and adult book to represent that state at the Festival in the Great Reads from Great Places list.
In 2022, Michigan chose R-E-S-P-E-C-T: Aretha Franklin, the Queen of Soul by Carol Boston Weatherford for their book.
The list of Great Reads from Great Places books for 2023 will be distributed during this year’s National Book Festival.
Wrapping Up
If you love reading and books, mark your calendar for the August 12, 2023 Library of Congress National Book Festival.
Stay current with Festival happenings by subscribing to their email alerts, reading the Bookmarked blog, and following the #NatBookFest hashtag on social media channels.
