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For the love of books: Festival brings passionate readers together
Thousands of readers filled the USC campus on April 18-19 for a weekend full of books, conversations and bookish merchandise.
Festival goers travel through the USC campus visiting small book themed businesses. Photo by Annette Quijada
Los Angels, Calif.— Rubi Pacheco, 27, has three signed books in hand, with dozens of vinyl stickers, enamel pins, bookmarks, tote bags and book themed apparel during day one of the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books.
“I’ve just been swiping my card, not caring about how much I’m spending. That’s a problem for future me,” Pacheco said.
Known as the biggest literary event in the country, the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books was first founded in 1996 by Narda Zacchino and Lisa Cleri Reale. The free two day event has hundreds of exhibitors, booksignings, food trucks, panel discussions and musical performances.
The festival tends to take place in mid April, this year it fell during the April 17-18 weekend at the USC campus. This year the festival celebrated its 31st year as a festival.
Pacheco said she enjoyed last year’s festival more than due to the lack of authors that were present this time around. Pacheco was one of 165,000 attendees.
“I wish the festival had booked more authors I enjoy, but all in all the festival has been fun,” Pacheco said. “I think my favorite part is always the shopping of goodies because a lot of these shops tend to be online, so it’s fun being able to shop in person.”
Pacheco said she’s also excited to see the growth in the reading community over the years.
Several notable authors attended the festival, from Rebecca Serle, Hannah Brown, Cleo Wade, Roxanne Gay and many more.
One popular aspect of the festival that readers enjoy are the themed author panels. A stand out panel of the festival this year was a joint Saturday panel between Sarah Jessica Parker and Alexandra Olivia, who came together to discuss Olivia’s new SJP literary novel, “The Radiant Dark.”
A few celebrities also made appearances such as Lionel Richie and Larry David.
The festival had over 300 exhibitors including booths for independent bookstores, book merchandise shops, author pop-ups and publishing houses.
One booth that drew a crowd through the whole weekend was Annabelle’s Book Club LA, an independent bookstore in Studio City founded by 19-year-old Annabelle Chang.
Emily Armstrong, 26, the store manager at Annabelle’s, said they’ve been prepping for the festival since early January.
Armstrong said they had a record breaking sales day on the first day of the festival and we’re hoping to have a successful last day.
Camryn Selyandia, 27, is a bookseller at Annabelle’s, who worked at the festival for the first time this year.
She said she was having fun helping run the booth and felt great being part of the community of vendors to promote and share the love for reading and storytelling.
“My favorite part of the festival, I think, is looking out at the sea of people knowing they are all here for the same reason, a love for reading and books,” Selyandia said. “It truly warmed my heart to see the community come together like this, it’s very special.”
Tags: #LATIMES #LATIMESFESTIVALOFBOOKS #BOOKS #READERS #LOSANGELES #INDEPENDENTBOOKSTORES
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