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Link to: All about the 2025 Festival

MAY 31 – JUNE 1, 2025

We are delighted to be starting preparations for our 2025 Festival. Save these dates and be on the lookout for exciting news!

Follow a manual added link

Upcoming Events

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May 31 – June 1

11th Annual Bay Area Book Festival

Some of our 2025 speakers

Check out the Sneak Peek here. 

 
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Viet Thanh Nguyen

Tara Dorabji

Greg Sarris

Carolina Ixta

Judith Butler

MK Chavez

Roxane Gay

micha cárdenas

Huda Fahmy

Clare Osongco

Gene Luen Yang

Garrett Felber

john a powell

David Jay

Bernadette Atuahene

Obi Kaufmann

Zack Beauchamp

Emily Flitter

Daniel Oberhaus

Bärí A. Williams

Kim Shuck

Kinsale Drake

Rosa Kwon Easton

Tomas Moniz

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“It was perfect. Couldn’t have been better. Thanks so much for giving me the opportunity.”

Robert Reich, Author

“My experience was unbelievable. Each of the panels I attended exceeded my expectations. This Festival was the high point of my year.”

Attendee

“My best festival experience ever.”

Pulitzer finalist Hernan Diaz

“I was incredibly inspired by how this Festival provides so many writers and artists with the opportunity to share their work with such a vibrant community in the Bay Area.”

Attendee

“I was truly impressed by the scope and diversity of the panels, participants, and overall programming.”

Maw Shein Win, Author

“The panelists were clearly selected with care, and in all cases I could have listened to them speak all day.”

Attendee

“All the writers I spoke to expressed their love and admiration for the Festival. I do mean all the writers – every single one.”

Marie Mockett, Author

“I’m pretty sure that everyone who attended will agree that they will be forever changed.”

Elizabeth Rosner, Author
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2025 Festival Sponsors

 
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baybookfest

We’re so excited to see everyone soon at the Bay We’re so excited to see everyone soon at the Bay Area Book Festival on May 31 - June 1. 

Please enjoy this comprehensive guide to the different panels, activities, and programming we’ll be having during the festival weekend! 

We’re creating spaces for conversation, connection, and all kinds of learning/unlearning. 

83+ different events to choose from and 240+ invited speakers: legends and emerging voices alike. 

Whether you’re seeking your next read, a writing community in the Bay Area, new ideas, or just something to do outside your comfort zone… we hope to see you soon.

We’d love if you could help us share the word to your different communities. Everyone is invited!

📚🤍
Every year, we collaborate with a dedicated commit Every year, we collaborate with a dedicated committee of community members who assist us in curating our festival programming. We are thrilled to introduce our Literary Advisory Committee for the 2025 Festival. These individuals have a rooted understanding of both authors and their various communities that we may not be as familiar with, bringing invaluable experience and wisdom to the table.

Throughout the festival, many of these committee members will be joining us as moderators, workshop leaders, or panelists—so be sure to give them some love and support!

The book recommendations we have listed here come from a recent meeting where the prompt was to recommend a book to our audience.

Lots of love and gratitude for our Bay Area Book Festival 2025 LAC!
Why do we need grassroots publishing? Innosanto N Why do we need grassroots publishing?

Innosanto Nagara @innosantonagara, author of A is for Activist, speaks on the power of independent publishing and representation in children’s books. 

We need books for all ages that reflect the realities people actually feel seen in and resonate with. 

Stop by Family Day with the Bay Area Book Festival and Social Justice Children’s Book Fair on May 31st at the Berkeley Public Library! 

Check out the whole conversation between Laura Atkins @laura.atkins.creative (co-director of Social Justice Children’s Book Fair), Innosanto Nagara @innosantonagara, author of A is for Activist, and J. K. Fowler @jk_fowler (Executive Director of the Bay Area Book Festival) 

Family Day 
Saturday May 31st (10:30 am - 5 pm)
Berkeley Public Library (2090 Kittredge St)

Learn more about Family Day: baybookfest.org/family-day/ 
Tickets + full lineup at baybookfest.org/headliners/
🌟🎫
Bay Area, you ready for this? Our 2025 headliners Bay Area, you ready for this?

Our 2025 headliners are bringing the brilliance, the heat, and the heart. Four unprecedented conversations, two nights only, all at the iconic Freight & Salvage theater in downtown Berkeley. 

We need more real talk, bold ideas, and shared third spaces. These are the kinds of conversations that remind us why we gather. 

Tickets are moving fast, so get yours while you can! Links to every headliner can be found in our bio.
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