ATX Book Festival

Many authors in Austin wish the book event scene was more vigorous and had a stronger presence. In Dallas there are multiple individuals or groups who run various book fairs across the city and there’s still enough books, authors and readers to go around. Austin has a book scene and the book stores are incredible but the event scene is growing.

The creators of Austin Artisan Market have created a separate branch call ATX Book Fair. The Austin Artisan Market has always been a roaring success and the ATX Book Fair is already hitting the ground running. I participated in the very first one at Ani’s Day and Night and I’m very pleased with the experience.

It was a morning market ( 9am-1pm) so the attendance did start off a little slower. Admittedly I was a littler nervous but once people came they were there to buy. The shoppers overall were very intentional. I did have one woman who came to the coffee shop and stumbled upon the market and said, “ She doesn’t really read”. And while I have lots of thoughts on that, instead said this was the perfect event to start.

In the end it was a great experience with 12 books sold. I will absolutely do another market with ATX Book Fair. The only thing I think I would do different would be to see how an evening market is in terms of foot traffic. If those shoppers are just as intentional and there’s more of them this could obviously result in more amazing readers walking away with their copy of In Stasis.