Some of the authors scheduled to appear this year are Dayton natives Erin Flanagan and Katrina Kittle, plus Keturah Bobo, Margaret Peterson Haddix, Sarah Stankorb, David Giffels and more.
Credit: CONTRIBUTED
Credit: CONTRIBUTED
Each year, the festival is put on by the Ohioana Library Association, a non-profit organization that aims to preserve and promote Ohio literature.
According to David Weaver, executive director of the Ohioana Library Association, Ohioana has “over 80,000 items in our collection.”
“In 2007, we started with 10 authors and a few hundred attendees,” he said of the festival. “Today it is the single largest one-day event in Ohio that celebrates Ohio books and authors.”
According to Weaver, the event had more than 5,100 attendees in 2023.
Panels for the event will feature notable authors discussing various topics like the writing process, food history, popular book genres, podcast recordings and more.
“People will go to a panel and they’ll hear an author, and it might be an author they were never familiar with before,” Weaver said. “And so people will buy a copy of the book that they just heard about and go to the authors’ table and get it signed. So that’s one of the exciting things about it, you know, you get to be up close and personal with the authors.”
Due to time and space restrictions, there will be different panels occurring at the same time. The schedule can be found on the Ohioana website.
Weaver emphasized how the festival is a “come as you are event.”
“It’s fun for the whole family, its free and open to the public,” he said. “There’s no admission charge, no tickets required and no advanced registration. So we would just love to see people come out to the event.”
How to go
What: Ohioana Book Festival 2024
Where: Columbus Metropolitan Library Main Library, 96 S. Grant Ave., Columbus
When: 10:30 a.m.- 5 p.m. April 20
More info: www.ohioana.org or call 614-466-3831
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