Annual Louisiana Book Festival set Oct. 31

The 12th annual Louisiana Book Festival, a celebration of readers, writers and their books, will be held from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Oct. 31 in downtown Baton Rouge’s Capitol Park.
The festival will feature presentations by local and national bestselling authors, panel discussions, activities for children and teens, live music, food and a Halloween costume contest.
Author presentations include “Between You & Me: Confessions of a Comma Queen” by Mary Norris, “My Southern Journey” by Rick Bragg, “Capital Dames: The Civil War and the Women of Washington, 1848-1868” by Cokie Roberts and the children’s book “Bayou Magic” by Coretta Scott King Honor Book-winning Jewell Parker Rhodes.
Other participating authors and poets include Louisiana Writer Award recipient Tom Piazza, Louisiana Poet Laureate Peter Cooley, Ellen Gilchrist, Ravi Howard, James Grissom, Alice Friman, Kent Wascom, Tom Cooper, Kimberley Griffiths Little, M.O. Walsh, Adam Rothman, Kim Boykin, Yusef Komunyakaa and many others.
The One Book, One Festival discussion group selection is “Go Set a Watchman” by Harper Lee. The cooking tent includes demonstrations by chefs and cookbook authors such as Cynthia LeJeune Nobles with her “A Confederacy of Dunces Cookbook.”
A variety of writing WordShops are scheduled for the day before the festival, including a discussion about telling a story in fiction or memoir by authors Molly Antopol and Skip Horack. Detailed descriptions of all WordShops and registration information are available at the festival website.
For more information or to volunteer, visit the website LouisianaBookFestival.org.