As our state’s signature literary event, the NC Book Festival provides a wide variety of audiences access to a diverse slate of local, national, and international writers and artists.
Formerly hosted on a rotating basis by the libraries at NC State, UNC-CH, and Duke, the festival will now take place at venues throughout Raleigh, including Kings, Neptunes, HQ Raleigh, NC State University’s Hunt Library, Quail Ridge Books, So & So Books, and others.
Co-directors Jason Jefferies, event coordinator for the most recent 2014 iteration of the Festival, and Chris Tonelli carry the festival forward as both an annual event and a quarterly Arts & Lecture series, beginning February 21-24 2019.
Featuring readings, panels, demonstrations, and lectures from award winning presenters and performers, the festival will showcase both traditional and non-traditional genres such as comic books and graphic novels. Last year’s exciting lineup includes National Book Award winner William T. Vollmann, Sandra Cisneros, Hanif Abdurraqib, and many others.
Another core element to this year’s festival is the book fair. A platform for local presses, authors, and vendors, the book fair will foster an appreciation for, and a familiarity with, the people and organizations who advocate for the authors and artists we love and produce and distribute the work that is so important to our cultural lives.
Jason Jefferies is the host of the podcast Bookin’, which features interviews with local, award-winning and bestselling authors. He is the General Manager for Quail Ridge Books, and was previously the Event Coordinator for the North Carolina Literary Festival at the NC State University Libraries. He lives in Raleigh, NC with his wife Claire and his son Van.
Chris Tonelli is a founding editor of the independent poetry press, Birds, LLC, and he curates the So & So Series and edits So & So Magazine. He is the author of five chapbooks and two full- length collections, most recently Whatever Stasis (Barrelhouse Books). He works in the Libraries at NC State and co-owns So & So Books in Raleigh, NC where he lives with his wife, Allison, and their two kids, Miles and Vera.
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