Spend a portion of the Labor Day Weekend with The Chattahoochee Review (TCR) at the annual AJC-Decatur Book Festival (AJC-DBF). This year marks the 13th running of the largest independent book festival in the country that features a gathering of all-star authors, illustrators, editors, publishers, and booksellers. The festival kicks off at Emory’s Schwartz Center on Friday August. 31 at 8 p.m. with its keynote event that features internationally acclaimed director and actor of stage, film, and television, Kenny Leon. Leon is releasing his memoir, Take You Wherever You Go.
As in year’s past, TCR editors, along with faculty members from Perimeter College at Georgia State University’s English Department, will be participating in the following programs throughout the weekend festival:
THE BOOK MARKET & STREET FAIR
Saturday, Sept. 1 and Sunday, Sept. 2: The Chattahoochee Review Booth
Time: Saturday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.; Sunday, Noon to 6 p.m.
Location: The Square in Downtown Decatur, Booth No. 516
LOCAL POETRY STAGE
Sunday, Sept. 2: Perimeter College on the Local Poetry Stage
Time: 12:50 p.m.
Presenters: Michael Diebert, Frank Holt, Gregg Murray, and Chani Zwibel
Location: Java Monkey, Downtown Decatur
Other institutions participating in the festival’s poetry track include: Agnes Scott College (12 p.m.); Georgia Institute of Technology (12:35 p.m.); Clayton State University (1:25 p.m.); Georgia State University’s Atlanta campus (2 p.m.); Kennesaw State University (3:05 p.m.); Spelman College (3:45 p.m.) and Emory University (4:40 p.m.).
AUTHOR DISCUSSIONS & READINGS
Saturday, Sept. 1: Who Protects the Invisible? Stories from the Border
Time: 3 p.m.
Authors: Michel Stone (Border Child) and Natalia Sylvester (Everyone Knows You Go Home)
Moderator: Anna Schachner, TCR editor and Professor of English, Perimeter College
Location: The Decatur Library
Sunday, Sept. 2: Gulf Breezes: Fiction from a Shared Landscape
Time: 2:30 p.m.
Authors: Nathaniel Rich (King Zeno) and Kent Wascom (The Blood of Heaven)
Moderator: Andy Rogers, Associate Dean of English, Perimeter College
Location: Carreker Hall, First Baptist Church of Decatur
Information about all of the free events taking place at this year’s festival—at which all are welcome—can be found on the AJC-DBF’s events schedule.