Life stories, poetry, and football will be featured in headliner events for the 2015 Virginia Festival of the Book, recently announced by Festival program director Jane Kulow.
Stories in Our Lives, to be held Saturday night, March 21 at 8:00 PM at The Paramount, will feature Blake Bailey, author of The Splendid Things We Planned: A Family Portrait, as well as biographies of John Cheever, Charles Jackson, and Richard Yates, and the designated biographer for Philip Roth, Maureen Corrigan, author of So We Read On: How The Great Gatsby Came to Be and Why It Endures, and NPR book critic for Fresh Air, Edwidge Danticat, author of Claire of the Sea Light most recently, and the memoir, Brother, I’m Dying, and Katherine Paterson, author of The Stories of My Life as well as dozens of children’s books, including Newbery Award winning Bridge to Terabithia and National Book Award winning The Great Gilly Hopkins..
On Friday night, March 20 at 6:00 PM at the U.Va. Culbreth Theatre, the Festival of the Book continues its strong commitment to poetry (and U.S. Poets Laureate) with Shrines to Longing: The Poetry of Charles Wright and Mary Szybist, which will feature readings by the U.S. Poet Laureate Wright, and his former U.Va. student, National Book Award-recipient Szybist.
And on Wednesday, March 18, 2015 at 8:00 PM at the U.Va. Culbreth Theater, Football in the Red Zone: Perspectives from the Player, Coach, and Fan will feature Bill Curry, author of The Ten Men You Meet in the Huddle: Lessons From A Football Life and former NFL player, college football coach and ESPN football analyst; Mark Edmundson, author of Why Football Matters: My Education in the Game; and Steve Almond, author of Against Football: One Fan’s Reluctant Manifesto.
Tickets for Stories in our Lives are available to purchase via The Paramount Box Office; tickets for Shrines to Longing and Football in the Red Zone are available through the U.Va. Arts Box Office.
Children’s author Megan McDonald (author of the Judy Moody series) will bring her Stink series Tenth Anniversary Tour to Charlottesville during the Festival.
In addition, authors who have confirmed their participation in the 21st Annual Virginia Festival of the Book include: Historians: Karen Abbott (Liar, Temptress, Soldier, Spy), William C. Davis (Crucible of Command: Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee—The War They Fought, The Peace They Forged) and Robert O’Connell (Fierce Patriot: The Tangled Lives of William Tecumseh Sherman) Veterans: Rory Fanning (Worth Fighting For: An Army Ranger’s Journey Out of the Military and Across America) and Robert Timberg (Blue Eyed Boy: A Memoir), Environment: Orrin Pilkey (The Last Beach), Brian Richter, (Chasing Water), and Steve Nash (Virginia Climate Fever: How Global Warming Will Transform Our Cities, Shorelines, and Forests); Travis Koshko (Newsplex meteorologist), Jerry Stenger (state climatologist), and Kim Cross (What Stands in a Storm: Three Days in the Worst Superstorm to Hit the South’s Tornado Alley)
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