Bookmarks annual Festival of Books and Authors kicks off Friday in Winston-Salem.
Saturday’s free events will take place across five different venues downtown.
Families can sing along to a storytime with Anika Noni Rose, who voices Tiana in Disney’s The Princess and the Frog. Or they can watch a live performance of the kids’ podcast Greeking Out.
There will be a panel of bestselling young adult authors at Calvary Moravian Church, including Angie Thomas, author of The Hate U Give.
Other notable guests include southern fiction writers Sarah Addison Allen and Kristy Woodson Harvey. Along with Emily Wilson, who was the first woman to translate The Odyssey into English.
Bookmarks Executive Director Jamie Rogers Southern says there’s something for everyone, whether you consider yourself a reader or not.
“I think there's something really magical about being surrounded by 20,000 people who all care about stories and the power that stories have to connect us and bring us together," Southern says.
The festival opens and closes with keynote speeches from John Green and Jodi Picoult.