City-wide celebration of stories with more than 50 talks, workshops, signings and family events across Norwich.
The Norwich Book Festival returns to The Forum from Saturday 24 to Friday 30 October, with more than 50 events spread across the week. It's a city-wide celebration of stories for every kind of reader, and while The Forum is the main hub, the programme reaches across Norwich, with further events at The Enterprise Centre UEA, St Peter Mancroft, Octagon Chapel, Jarrolds and The Nick Rayns LCR at UEA. It runs alongside the National Year of Reading and the 'Go All In' campaign.
The line-up is a long one. Adele Parks MBE opens the festival with a talk on crime fiction; her twenty-five bestsellers have been translated into thirty-one languages. She's joined over the week by Kate Mosse, Louise Doughty, Jill Dawson, Joanne Harris, Irenosen Okojie, Emma Glass, Rosie Hewlett, Sophie Hannah, Harriet Tyce, JM Dalgliesh, Lewis Buxton, David Larbi, Greg Jenner, Dr Kate Lister, Jonn Elledge, Iain Dale, Mary Portas, Hannah Murray, Louise O'Neill, Jacqueline Wilson, Rob Biddulph, Jarvis and Sharon King-Chai. There's a lot of ground covered here, from crime and literary fiction to non-fiction and children's writing.
It's not all talks, either. The opening day features a free Norwich Independent Book & Zine Fair and a Human Library, and there are four days of family fun at The Imaginarium in The Forum's Atrium. The festival was created by The Forum alongside the National Centre for Writing, Norfolk Libraries and the University of East Anglia, with booksellers including Waterstones and independents The Book Hive and Bookbugs & Dragon Tales. It draws on Norwich's status as a UNESCO City of Literature and the city's literary heritage, and producer Ailsa McKay has noted how much it's grown since its pilot year in 2024.
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With over 50 events to pick from, you can build your own week around the authors and topics that actually interest you. The full programme is live at norwichbookfestival.co.uk, where you can see the dates and venues for each session.
