Tucson Festival of Books


The Tucson Festival of Books was a free annual book fair held in Tucson, Arizona during the second weekend in March. It was established in 2009 by Bill Viner, Frank Farias, John M. Humenik, Bruce Beach, and Brenda Viner.

History

The first annual festival featured around 450 authors and welcomed over 50,000 regional visitors. For most recent Festival in 2017, attendance reached over 135,000. The event typically includes special programming for children and teens, panels by best-selling and emerging authors, a literary circus, culturally diverse programs, a poetry venue, exhibitor booths and two food courts. The Festival's mission is to improve literacy rates among children and adults in Southern Arizona. Since its creation, the Festival has donated over $1.65 million to agencies that improve literacy in the community such as Reading Seed, Literacy Connects, and University of Arizona Literacy Outreach Programs. In addition to aiding the fight against illiteracy, the festival also helps the local community tremendously. In a study by a students at the Eller College of Management at the University of Arizona, the festival was found to pump an estimated $4 million into Tucson’s economy annually. The festival has also been covered by C-SPAN in the past, with over 120 videos in the C-SPAN Video Library.
The 2020 edition of the event was cancelled due to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. While event organizers say they will return in 2021, no confirmed plans have been announced.

Festival Founders Award

In 2011, the Festival Founders Award was established to recognize exceptional literary achievement. Below is a list of past winners:
YearAuthorNote
2011Elmore Leonard
2012Larry McMurtry & Diana Ossana
2013R.L. Stine
2014Richard Russo
2015Mitch Albom, Dave Barry, Sam Barry, Greg Isles, Ridley Pearson, Amy Tan & Scott Turow
- The Rock Bottom Remainders
2016J.A. Jance
2017T.C. Boyle
2018Billy Collins
2019Luís Alberto Urrea
2020Lisa See

Gallery