With an estimated 400,000 new books published each year in the United States, San Antonio Book Festival Literary Director Anna Dobben had quite the task narrowing her selection down to 100 authors for this year’s one-day festival on April 13.
But she readily accepts the challenge of programming the annual festival, narrowing her focus by paying attention to local market preferences, Texas authors and which books and authors are spurring conversation nationwide.
“The beauty of San Antonio,” said Brooklyn-based Dobben, is that “there are so many people here who have different interests.”
Horror is big in San Antonio, she said, citing the existence of horror-focused book store Ghoulish Books in nearby Selma, as are memoirs, the romance genre and books for children.
“There’s books for everybody here,” Dobben said, recommending a choose your own adventure-style approach for festival patrons. She said she’s strategically mapped out the various panels so that a person focused on hard-hitting nonfiction or on young adult novels can attend multiple panels throughout the day.
And if an attendee is conflicted between two compelling panels happening at the same time, Dobben said she takes that quandary as a compliment to her programming and the range of interests of San Antonio readers.
And, she said, “you can always buy the book, so you don’t have to go to everything.”
Among festival highlights, Dobben said, are Texas and San Antonio authors including the prolific Lawrence Wright, weighing in this year with Mr. Texas, a satirical novel focused on Texas politics. Wright will be in conversation with fellow Texas authors Stephen Harrigan and Elizabeth Crook, who will appear with her new Old West novel The Madstone.
West Texas author LaToya Watkins will appear for her new short story collection Holler, Child: Stories, Tim O’Brien will speak about his biting new novel America Fantastica and children’s book author Xelena González and illustrator Adriana M. Garcia will present Remembering, about a child building a Día de los Muertos altar to honor the death of a beloved pet.
On the national level, NPR Morning Edition host Steve Inskeep will speak about Differ We Must: How Lincoln Succeeded in a Divided America, and particularly apt for a city facing another summer of record 100-degree days, Jeff Goodell will appear with The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet.
Horror fans will take note that Mexican Canadian author Silvia Moreno-Garcia will make an appearance to promote her novel Silver Nitrate, and National Book Award winner Justin Torres will visit to talk about his novel Blackouts.
For more information about featured authors and a schedule of events at the Central Library and UTSA Southwest Campus downtown, visit the San Antonio Book Festival website.
2024 San Antonio Book Festival Lineup
- Hanif Abdurraqib (There’s Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension)
- Becky Albertalli (Imogen, Obviously)
- Paul Alexander (Bitter Crop: The Heartache and Triumph of Billie Holiday’s Last Year)
- Isa Arsén (Shoot the Moon)
- Chris Barton (Glitter Everywhere!: Where It Came From, Where It’s Found & Where It’s Going)
- Jan Beatty (The Body Wars: Poems) (Texas, Being: A State of Poems)
- Kathleen Dorothy Blackburn (Loose of Earth: A Memoir)
- Richard Blanco (Homeland of My Body: New and Selected Poems)
- David Bowles (Secret of the Moon Conch) (The Prince and the Coyote)
- Matthew Bowman (The Abduction of Betty and Barney Hill: Alien Encounters, Civil Rights, and the New Age in America)
- H. W. Brands (Founding Partisans: Hamilton, Madison, Jefferson, Adams and the Brawling Birth of American Politics)
- Stephen Briseño (Queen of Leaves: The Story of Botanist Ynes Mexia)
- Jennifer Bristol (Cemetery Birding: An Unexpected Guide to Discovering Birds in Texas)
- Jenny Browne (Texas, Being: A State of Poems)
- Kevin Carey (Junior Miles and the Junkman)
- Daniel Chacón (The Last Philosopher in Texas: Fictions and Superstitions)
- e.E. Charlton-Trujillo (Lupe Lopez: Reading Rock Star!)
- Amanda Churchill (The Turtle House: A Novel)
- Cary Clack (More Finish Lines to Cross: Notes on Race, Redemption, and Hope)
- Vincent Cooper (Infidelis)
- Elizabeth Crook (The Madstone: A Novel)
- Jennine Capó Crucet (Say Hello to My Little Friend: A Novel)
- Rubén Degollado (A Night of Screams: Latino Horror Stories)
- Lisa Doggett (Up the Down Escalator: Medicine, Motherhood, and Multiple Sclerosis)
- Jennifer duBois (The Last Language)
- Gabriela Epstein (Danny Phantom: A Glitch in Time)
- Jesús Jesse Esparza (Raza Schools: The Fight for Latino Educational Autonomy in a West Texas Borderlands Town)
- Saadia Faruqi (Saving Sunshine)
- Paul Flahive (Worth Repeating: San Antonio Stories)
- Kathy Floyd (Pastures of the Empty Page: Fellow Writers on the Life and Legacy of Larry McMurtry)
- Ben Fountain (Devil Makes Three: A Novel)
- Susan Toomey Frost (Witness to War: Mexico in the Photographs of Walter Elias Hadsell)
- Matt Gallagher (Daybreak: A Novel)
- Adriana M. Garcia (Remembering)
- Guadalupe García McCall (Secret of the Moon Conch)
- Xavier Garza (Vincent Ventura and the Curse of the Dancing Devil / Vincent Ventura y la maldición del diablo bailarín)
- Jonny Garza Villa (Canto Contigo: A Novel)
- George Getschow (Pastures of the Empty Page: Fellow Writers on the Life and Legacy of Larry McMurtry)
- Sara Goetter (Cryptid Kids: The Bawk-ness Monster)
- Lorenzo Gomez III (The Bully in Your Pocket: Your #1 Playbook to Defeat Online Trolls)
- Xelena González (Remembering)
- Jeff Goodell (The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet)
- Lauren Groff (The Vaster Wilds: A Novel)
- Myriam Gurba (Creep: Accusations and Confessions)
- S.C. Gwynne (His Majesty’s Airship: The Life and Tragic Death of the World’s Largest Flying Machine)
- Cristina Henríquez (The Great Divide: A Novel)
- Saúl Hernández (How to Kill a Goat and Other Monsters)
- Joe Holley (Power: How the Electric Co-Op Movement Energized the Lone Star State)
- Celso Hurtado (The Devil’s Promise)
- Steve Inskeep (Differ We Must: How Lincoln Succeeded in a Divided America)
- Elizabeth Gonzalez James (The Bullet Swallower: A Novel)
- Joe Jiménez (Hot Boy Summer)
- Kazu Kibuishi (Waverider: A Graphic Novel – Amulet #9)
- Megan Kimble (City Limits: Infrastructure, Inequality, and the Future of America’s Highways)
- Naina Kumar (Say You’ll Be Mine)
- Darcie Little Badger (Sheine Lende: A Prequel to Elatsoe)
- Greg Marshall (Leg: The Story of a Limb and the Boy Who Grew from It)
- Pedro Martín (Mexikid)
- C.L. “Rooster” Martinez (Mexican Dinosaur)
- Matt Mendez (The Broke Hearts)
- Ana Raquel Minian (In the Shadow of Liberty: The Invisible History of Immigrant Detention in the United States)
- Silvia Moreno-Garcia (Silver Nitrate)
- Gary Paul Nabhan (Agave Spirits: The Past, Present, and Future of Mezcals)
- Aimee Nezhukumatathil (World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments)
- Tim O’Brien (America Fantastica: A Novel)
- Nishita Parekh (The Night of the Storm: A Novel)
- Elba Iris Pérez (The Things We Didn’t Know)
- Tori Pool (Worth Repeating: San Antonio Stories)
- Octavio Quintanilla (Texas, Being: A State of Poems)
- Rae Giana Rashad (The Blueprint: A Novel)
- Roger Reeves (Dark Days: Fugitive Essays)
- Al Rendón (Mi Cultura: Bringing Shadow into Light)
- Natalie Riess (Cryptid Kids: The Bawk-ness Monster)
- Roxana Robinson (Leaving: A Novel)
- Nikki Russell (Dork Diaries 15: Tales from a Not-So-Posh Paris Adventure)
- Rachel Renée Russell (Dork Diaries 15: Tales from a Not-So-Posh Paris Adventure)
- Richard Z. Santos (A Night of Screams: Latino Horror Stories)
- Peter L. Scamardo II (The Flyers)
- Liz Garton Scanlon (Everyone Starts Small)
- Katie Shepard (Sweeten the Deal)
- ire’ne lara silva (the eaters of flowers) (Texas, Being: A State of Poems)
- Burgin Streetman (Worth Repeating: San Antonio Stories)
- Deborah Jackson Taffa (Whiskey Tender: A Memoir)
- Carmen Tafolla (Warrior Girl)
- Don Tate (Jerry Changed the Game!: How Engineer Jerry Lawson Revolutionized Video Games Forever)
- Juan Tejeda (Mi Carnal Frank: A Family Memoir and Biography of U.S. Congressman Frank Mariano Tejeda, Jr., 1945 – 1997)
- R. Eric Thomas (Congratulations, The Best Is Over!: Essays)
- Amy Tintera (Listen for the Lie: A Novel)
- Héctor Tobar (Our Migrant Souls: A Meditation on Race and the Meanings and Myths of “Latino”)
- Denise Tolan (Italian Blood: A Memoir)
- Justin Torres (Blackouts: A Novel)
- Leticia Urieta (A Night of Screams: Latino Horror Stories)
- Edward Vidaurre (By Throat, By Miracle: New and Selected Poems)
- Ursula Villarreal-Moura (Like Happiness: A Novel)
- Sherry Kafka Wagner (Pastures of the Empty Page: Fellow Writers on the Life and Legacy of Larry McMurtry)
- LaToya Watkins (Holler, Child: Stories)
- Lawrence Wright (Mr. Texas: A novel)
