Authors announced for the ‘LA Times’ Festival


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In preparation for the 19th annual Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, the L.A. Times announced Tuesday the names of hundreds of the event’s participants.

The Festival of Books will be held April 12 and 13 on the USC campus for the fourth year, taking over theaters, classrooms and outdoor spaces for a variety of panels, signings, performances and demonstrations.

A variety of authors, artists and celebrities are slated to attend the festival, though a schedule will not be announced until March 17, when festival passes go on sale. Individual tickets to events will be available starting April 6.

Many USC faculty members, including Aimee Bender, T.C. Boyle, Josh Kun and Varun Soni, are scheduled to appear. USC student performers include Saved by Grace, SoCal Vocals and the Trojan Marching Band.

Among the authors scheduled to attend are young adult favorites Laurie Halse Anderson, John Green and Veronica Roth; critical darlings Stephen Chbosky and Sandra Cisneros, and actors-turned-novelists B.J. Novak, Alicia Silverstone and Henry Winkler. Daniel Handler, the man behind A Series of Unfortunate Events, is also slated to attend, following his popular appearance last year.

The weekend will begin with the 34th annual L.A. Times Book Prizes ceremony on April 11 in Bovard Auditorium. During the ceremony, John Green will be presented with the 2013 Innovator’s Award and Susan Straight will receive the 2013 Robert Kirsch Award.

Green’s best-selling novels have received numerous awards. The author has been experimenting with social media and technology to expand how people in and out of the literary world use the mediums to inspire and teach. According to the L.A. Times Festival of Books’ website, the Innovator’s Award “spotlights cutting-edge business models, technology or applications of narrative art.”

The Robert Kirsch Award recognizes a body of work by a writer living in or writing about the American West. Straight is a Riverside, Calif. native.

The best books of 2013 will also be recognized at the L.A. Times Book Prizes event. Best books will be selected in each of the 10 categories.

The Festival of Books is one of the largest literary festivals in the country. It generally brings more than 150,000 attendees to the event hosted at USC, according to the L.A. Times.