Welcome to the Birmingham Book Festival 2008 and to what we hope will be our fullest and most fascinating programme yet. The box office is now open and tickets are on sale for all events.

This year we’ve got a new ‘Young BBF’ strand featuring events for children, young people and families, plus the usual fiction, non-fiction, poetry, performance, discussion and workshops plus a few things out of the ordinary!

If you are an avid reader, check out our ‘Open Reading Group’(8th October), our Readers’ Evening (14th October) or A C Grayling’s lecture (23rd October), ‘Why Reading Matters’.  If your interest is in writing, our workshop day will surely meet your needs (11th October), as will our ‘Writers’ Toolkit’ (18th October) – this is an industry day for all those writing or working in related fields.

For poetry lovers, look out for Carol Ann Duffy (21st October), David Hart (15th October) and our night of poetry in translation on 14th October, plus much more.

There is a great array of non fiction events, including Mark Thomas (14th October), Kenan Malik (16th October) and Kate Adie (24th October) as well as the fiction strand which includes Will Self (16th October), Malorie Blackman (8th October) and Michael Frayn (7th October).

You can search for events by category or keyword, to help you find what you are looking for, view our entire brochure and book your tickets all from this site. You can also leave your details for our mailing list or get in touch with us via the contact form. If you would like a paper copy of the brochure, use this form to send us your address and a note and we will send one out. Don’t forget to ask your friends to register too so they can learn about this year’s programme.

We would like to take this opportunity to issue a warm welcome to you, whether you are a seasoned Festival attender or joining us for the very first time – we are sure you will find something to satisfy your appetite for reading, writing and thinking.

This site is new and still experiencing the odd ‘teething problem’. If you are unable to find what you are looking for or have problems booking, please call the Festival office who will be more than happy to help you. We can be contacted on 0121 246 2770.

The Festival Team.