{"id":296593,"date":"2026-07-15T14:24:24","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T14:24:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/296593\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T14:24:24","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T14:24:24","slug":"brooklyn-book-festival-takes-over-new-york-city-with-9-days-of-literary-events-in-all-5-boroughs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/296593\/","title":{"rendered":"Brooklyn Book Festival Takes Over New York City With 9 Days of Literary Events in All 5 Boroughs"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

\"BrooklynBrooklyn, NY (July 14, 2026) \u2014 The Brooklyn Book Festival\u00a0and\u00a0Brooklyn Literary Council\u00a0revealed a dynamic and international list of authors participating in this year\u2019s\u00a021st Festival Day\u00a0(Sunday, Sept. 27),\u00a0Children\u2019s Day\u00a0(Saturday, Sept. 26) and\u00a0Virtual Festival Day\u00a0(online Sunday, Sept. 20). The Festival additionally announced award-winning novelist\u00a0Amitav Ghosh\u00a0as the recipient of the 2026 Best of Brooklyn (BoBi) Award to be presented at the annual award ceremony in September. Mexican digital artist and illustrator\u00a0Jaque Jours\u00a0created the Festival\u2019s 2026 art poster.<\/p>\n

The announcement of authors took place at Littlefield in Gowanus, Brooklyn and playfully included authors announcing authors by video or in person. Picture book author\u00a0Loryn Brantz\u00a0performed as a mime to announce the names of her fellow children\u2019s book authors,\u00a0Jess Hannigan\u00a0envisioned fluffy clouds announcing the names of authors; novelist\u00a0Emma Copley Eisenberg\u00a0revealed the authors through a literal beach read and poet\u00a0Maya C. Popa\u00a0did a play on \u201cVogue\u2019s 73 Questions\u201d to introduce the poets attending the Festival this year. Other authors who lent their talents to the announcement were novelists\u00a0Emma Straub, Bobuq Sayed, Cleyvis Natera,\u00a0and\u00a0Deesha Philyaw; young adult author\u00a0Ashley Woodfolk, journalist\u00a0Manoush Zomorodi,\u00a0children\u2019s book authors\u00a0Sean Qualls\u00a0and\u00a0Bess Kalb,\u00a0cartoonist Bob Sikoryak\u00a0and French-Moroccan author\u00a0Leila Slimani.<\/p>\n

The 9-day festival will kick off with its online Virtual Festival Day (Sunday, September 20), a tradition that welcomes authors and audiences from around the world to participate in the Brooklyn Book Festival. Among this year\u2019s Virtual Festival authors are Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist\u00a0Maggie Haberman, Portuguese novelist and essayist\u00a0Djaimilia Pereira de Almeida, NYT bestselling author\u00a0Chloe Benjamin, among others. The Brooklyn Book Festival continues to embrace the transformative impact of bringing together authors from across the nation and globe to inform contemporary conversations.<\/p>\n

The flagship Festival Day & Literary Marketplace (Sunday, Sept. 27) will feature fan favorites\u00a0Marlon James, Joyce Carol Oates, Namwali Serpell, Douglas Stuart,\u00a0Pulitzer Prize-winning authors and journalists\u00a0Quiara Alegr\u00eda Hudes, Colson Whitehead, Tracy K. Smith, Cristina Rivera Garza, Julia Angwin,\u00a0and other award-winning and emerging authors. The flagship Festival Day takes place in venues and in the parks surrounding Downtown Brooklyn\u2019s Borough Hall, with eight indoor and outdoor stages at Brooklyn Borough Hall, the Brooklyn Law School, Center for Brooklyn History, St. Ann & the Holy Trinity Church, Columbus Park, and the Korean War Veteran\u2019s Park. Throughout the day from 10am – 6pm, the stages are filled with conversation and debates, as authors of fiction, poetry, non-fiction, comics, graphic novels, and young adult literature come together to converse, read, and sign books. By bringing together hundreds of authors\u2014from standout emerging voices to iconic writers\u2014 Festival Day becomes an opportunity for audiences to think through some of today\u2019s most urgent and complex issues, be uplifted and entertained by their favorite authors, and discover new favorites.<\/p>\n

Festival Day also stages the largest book market in the Northeast with more than 250 publishers, offering readers the possibility to discover new authors, independent publishers, and literary organizations in hundreds of tents set up outdoors in Columbus Park and Borough Hall Plaza. Downtown Brooklyn is transformed into a book lover\u2019s dream with a sea of books as far as the eye can see.<\/p>\n

Children\u2019s Day (Saturday, Sept. 26) will be held in Brooklyn Borough Hall and Plaza where families will enjoy a full day of readings, workshops, performances, book signings, and art projects with favorite children\u2019s and middle-grade authors and illustrators including\u00a0R.J. Palacio\u00a0of\u00a0Wonder\u00a0fame, #1 New York Times bestselling\u00a0Bess Kalb\u00a0of the Buffalo Fluffalo children’s book series; poet, organizer, and educator\u00a0Mahogany L. Browne; two-time Emmy-nominated writer and author\u00a0Jorge Aguirre,\u00a0and bestselling children\u2019s book author\u00a0Adam Gidwitz. Kids can get creative with their favorite writers and illustrators at workshops and even get their books signed. Plus, the whole family can find new favorite books at the Children\u2019s Marketplace of Books.<\/p>\n

As part of the Festival\u2019s 9-day literary celebration, 70+ Bookend Events, organized by dozens of cultural partners, will feature hundreds more authors reading and performing together across all five boroughs. The full schedule of these events will be announced later in August.<\/p>\n

Brooklyn Book Festival Producer Liz Koch\u00a0says, \u201cFor us, authors are the undisputed heroes of our culture. We are thrilled to present hundreds of authors in discussions about timely and relevant topics at the Festival, whether through fiction, poetry, children\u2019s books, graphic novels, or deeply researched journalism. We welcome all of New York City to come celebrate these incredible authors with us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Johnny Temple, co-chair of the Brooklyn Book Festival Literary Council adds, \u201cAt the dawn of the Brooklyn Book Festival\u2019s third decade, we have come to appreciate our significance in New York\u2019s cultural landscape, as the largest free book event in (arguably) the Greatest City on Earth. On the heels of the New York Knicks\u2019s historic championship victory, this city is on a roll, and BKBF will help keep it rolling with literary festivities, conversations, and trailblazers galore.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n <\/p>\n

BKBF 2026 Poster Artist Jaque Jours<\/p>\n


\n <\/p>\n

The Festival poster features the iconic marble stairs at Brooklyn Borough Hall where tens of thousands of readers have sat over the past 20 years to enjoy the programs presented on the Festival\u2019s Main Stage.<\/p>\n

Jaque Jours\u00a0is a Mexican author-illustrator who mostly works in traditional art mediums to tell stories centered on diverse experiences. She is the illustrator behind the books\u00a0Telepat\u00eda,\u00a0Las Fotos de Murci,\u00a0and\u00a0D\u00eda de Muertos. She has illustrated multiple articles and covers for Nexos, a monthly Mexican magazine. Jours said about her creative process:<\/p>\n

“When I found out I’d be making this year’s BKBF poster, it felt like a circle was closing: I first moved to New York City a few weeks before the 2023 festival, taking the train with my book project in hand. The festival opened the doors to the book publishing world, and near Borough Hall station began the journey that would lead to the publication of my first book.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor this poster, I wanted to capture what caught my eye that first time: the uncontainable diversity of the people of New York. I kept returning to what I always draw: people going about their lives\u2014a relaxed delivery guy, a well-read nun, an avid reader slash Knicks fan. I then decided to set them in one of New York\u2019s most important, yet largely unnoticed architectural features: big stairs. Living in the city made me think of stairs in new ways: as refuge, transportation device, sunbathing platform, and meeting place.\u201c<\/p>\n

Jours began as an architect but realized she was a storyteller, leading her to earn a master’s degree in literature. Since then, she has combined her love of art and literature to create stories that explore ordinary lives, family, cultural traditions, and diverse experiences.<\/p>\n

In 2023, she was awarded a FONCA (National Foundation for the Arts and Culture) fellowship by the Mexican Government to make her debut picture book: The Mu\u00e9ganos, which was released in June 2026 by Transit Children\u2019s Editions and will be presented at the Festival\u2019s Children\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n

2026 BoBi Award Honoree\u00a0Amitav Ghosh<\/p>\n

The Best of Brooklyn (BoBi) award, presented each year to an author from Brooklyn whose work best exemplifies or speaks to the spirit of Brooklyn, this year is conferred to award-winning novelist\u00a0Amitav Ghosh.<\/p>\n

Amitav Ghosh\u00a0is the author of the bestselling Ibis Trilogy, composed of\u00a0Sea of Poppies\u00a0(shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize),\u00a0River of Smoke, and\u00a0Flood of Fire.\u00a0His other novels include\u00a0The Circle of Reason, which won the Prix M\u00e9dicis \u00e9tranger, and\u00a0The Glass Palace.\u00a0He is the author of many works of nonfiction, including\u00a0The Great Derangement,\u00a0The Nutmeg\u2019s Curse,\u00a0and\u00a0Smoke and Ashes. In 2018, Ghosh became the first English-language writer to win the Jnanpith Award, India\u2019s highest literary honor. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.<\/p>\n

Ghosh will be celebrated at an awards ceremony in the fall. Other past BoBi winners have included Marlon James (2025), Roz Chast (2024), Hilton Als (2023), Esmerelda Santiago (2022), Toi Derricotte (2021), Lynn Nottage (2020), Mo Willems (2019), N.K. Jemisin (2018), Colson Whitehead (2017), Jacqueline Woodson (2016), Jonathan Lethem (2015), and others.<\/p>\n

The full list of authors participating in Festival Day, Virtual Festival Day, and Children\u2019s Day, announced during yesterday evening\u2019s virtual author reveal, includes:<\/p>\n

Festival Day Authors – Sunday, September 27:<\/p>\n

Fiction:

\n\u2018Pemi Aguda \/ Sinan Antoon \/ Sharmini Aphrodite \/ John Manuel Arias \/ Hannah Lillith Assadi \/ Andrea Bajani \/ Yu-Mei Balasingamchow \/ Bindu Bansinath \/ Sarah Blakley-Cartwright \/ Gina Chung \/ T Clark \/ Naima Coster \/ Patrick Cottrell \/ Edwidge Danticat \/ Kiran Desai \/ Emma Copley Eisenberg \/ Melissa Faliveno \/ Amitav Ghosh \/ Eduardo Halfon \/ Chen-Fu Hsu \/ Quiara Alegr\u00eda Hudes \/ Violaine Huisman \/ Marlon James \/ Jeyamohan \/Daniel Kehlmann \/ Rachel Khong \/ Grace Krilanovich \/ Hafeez Lakhani \/ Dimitry Elias L\u00e9ger \/ M Lin \/ Valeria Luiselli \/ T Kira Madden \/ Karan Mahajan \/ Megha Majumdar \/ Davin Malasarn \/ Courtney Maum \/ Cleyvis Natera \/ Emily Nemens \/ Sigrid Nunez \/ Joyce Carol Oates \/ T\u00e9a Obreht \/ Deesha Philyaw \/ Cristina Rivera Garza \/ Jordy Rosenberg \/ Bobuq Sayed\/ Giada Scodellaro \/ Avigayl Sharp \/ Le\u00efla Slimani \/ Emma Straub \/ Douglas Stuart \/ Brandon Taylor \/ Morgan Thomas \/ Stephanie Wambugu \/ Sarah Wang \/ Teddy Wayne \/ Jules Wernersbach \/ Kayla Rae Whitaker \/ Colson Whitehead \/ Katie Yee<\/p>\n

Non-Fiction:

\nJulia Angwin \/ Rachel Aviv \/ Ian Bogost \/ Tanya Bush \/Anelise Chen \/ Margena A. Christian \/ Jelani Cobb \/ Mechele Dickerson \/ Bruce Feiler \/ Ami Fields-Meyer \/ Jamie Fisher \/ Fab 5 Freddy \/ Anand Gopal \/ Joshua Jelly-Schapiro \/ Tom Junod \/ Ibram X. Kendi \/ Helene Landemere \/ Yotam Maron \/ Ed Park \/ Natasha Pickowicz \/ Chanda Prescod-Weinstein \/ Ashant\u00e9 M. Reese \/ Namwali Serpell \/ Zahra Tangorra \/ Ben Tarnoff \/ Brigid Washington \/ Dana A. Williams \/Manoush Zomorodi<\/p>\n

YA:

\nK. Ancrum \/ Katie Bernet \/ Libba Bray \/ Angelica Cheng \/ Mike Curato \/ Natasha D\u00edaz \/ Sarah Beth Durst \/ Stef Ferrari \/ Camryn Garrett \/ M.J. Hastings \/ Darcie Little Badger \/ Cindy Pham \/ Page Powars \/ Michael Ruhlman \/ E.L. Shen \/ Shannon J. Spann \/ Danielle Valentine \/ Am\u00e9lie Wen Zhao \/ Ashley Woodfolk<\/p>\n

Poetry:

\nWill Brewer \/ Tina Chang \/ Cornelius Eady \/ Diamond Forde \/ Haleh Liza Gafori \/ Adrian Matejka \/ Erika Meitner \/ John Murillo \/ Maya C. Popa \/ Peggy Robles-Alvarado \/ Yasmine Seale \/ Naomi Shihab Nye \/ Tracy K. Smith \/ R.A. Villanueva<\/p>\n

Comics\/Graphic Novels:

\nAndrea Chalupa \/ Jarrett Dapier \/ Jibola Fagbamiye \/ JD Glass \/ Danica Novgorodoff \/ Krystal Quiles\/ Angelique Roche \/ R. Sikoryak<\/p>\n

Virtual Festival Day Authors (Sunday\/ September 20):<\/p>\n

Fiction:

\nChloe Benjamin \/ Daniela Catrileo \/ Mahmud El Sayed \/ Elaine Hsieh Chou \/ Karim Kattan \/ M\u00f3nica Ojeda \/ Djaimilia Pereira de Almeida \/ Larissa Pham \/ De’Shawn Charles Winslow<\/p>\n

Graphics:

\nErnesto Saade \/ Mohammed Sabaaneh \/ Nadine Takvorian<\/p>\n

Nonfiction:

\nMaggie Haberman<\/p>\n

Children\u2019s Day Authors – Saturday, September 26:<\/p>\n

Jorge Aguirre \/ Stephen Barr \/ Kara Bodeg\u00f3n-Hikino \/ Loryn Brantz \/ Mahogany L. Browne \/ Meg Cabot \/ Tina Cho \/ Vikki Chu \/ Elisha Cooper \/ Nick Eliopulos \/ Debbie Fong \/ Adam Gidwitz \/ John Patrick Green \/ Jason Douglas Griffin \/ Jess Hannigan \/ Vashti Harrison \/ Corey Ann Haydu \/ Brett Helquist \/ Sam Ita \/ Vicki Johnson \/ Jaque Jours \/ Bess Kalb \/ Cindy Kang \/ Sarah Nicole Kennedy \/ Pooja Makhijani \/ Manuel Marsol \/ Kate Micucci \/ Kate Milford \/ Emma Mills \/ Rebecca Mock \/ Lorraine Nam \/ Yevgenia Nayberg \/ R. J. Palacio \/ Sean Qualls \/ Angela Quezada Padron \/ Gillian Reid \/ Dave Roman \/ Laura Sandoval Herrera \/ Stephen Savage \/ Steph Stilwell \/ Emily Sun Li \/ Kon Tan \/ Steve Teare \/ Millie von Platen \/ Sofia Warren \/ Rowboat Watkins \/ Sam Wedelich \/ Zach Weinersmith \/ Xindi Yan<\/p>\n

About the Brooklyn Book Festival<\/p>\n

The Brooklyn Book Festival was launched in 2006 to address the need for a major literary event that embraced the diverse constituencies of New York City. The Festival\u2019s mission is to celebrate published literature and support the literary community through free and low-cost programs that connect New York City readers with local, national, and international authors, publishers, and booksellers. To this end, the staff collaborates with the Brooklyn Book Festival Literary Council, co-chaired by Johnny Temple and Camille Rankine, to develop original programs that are hip, smart, diverse, and inclusive, including Festival Day & Literary Marketplace, citywide Bookend events, Virtual Festival Day and the BKBF Children\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n

BKBF is presented by the non-profit Brooklyn Book Festival, Inc. and the Brooklyn Book Festival Literary Council. The Festival is proud of its roster of supporters including the Amazon Literary Partnership, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Brooklyn Delegation to the City Council, the Office of the Brooklyn Borough President, Antonio Reynoso, CityPoint, Downtown Brooklyn Partnership, Hawthornden Foundation, the Kirby Family Foundation, Literary Arts Fund, the Mayor\u2019s Office of Media & Entertainment, National Grid, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, New York City Council Speaker Julie Menin and Council Members Darlene Mealy and Lincoln Restler, New York City Tourism Foundation, the New York Review of Books, the New York State Council on the Arts, NYU, State Senator Andrew Gounardes, Taipei Cultural Center, TD Charitable Foundation, the Tiger Baron Foundation.<\/p>\n


\n <\/p>\n

###<\/p>\n


\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Brooklyn, NY (July 14, 2026) \u2014 The Brooklyn Book Festival\u00a0and\u00a0Brooklyn Literary Council\u00a0revealed a dynamic and international list…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":296594,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,9,24,63],"class_list":["post-296593","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296593","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=296593"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296593\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/296594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=296593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=296593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=296593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}