5th Annual Brooklyn Book Festival: Fairytales, Films, and Fun

The renowned Brooklyn Book Festival is celebrating its fifth anniversary with three days of events that celebrate the art of literature.

   The festival showcases more than 200 national and international authors in readings and panel discussions as well as 175 booksellers, publishers, presses, and organizations in an outdoor literary marketplace. A premier literary event in New York City, the festival expects to draw more than 30,000 attendees from around the world.

   The Target Children’s Area, for 2- to 9-year-olds, will feature book readings, a performance of children’s classics by the Troupe Theatre, and author signings. Top children’s booksellers such as Bank Street Books as well as independent presses and self-published authors will be selling a large array of children and young adult books at the festival’s Literary Marketplace.

   Some of the events preceding the festival include Making Books Sing, which will give kids an opportunity to learn about New York’s first Puerto Rican librarian, Pura Belpré, who in 1929 transformed her East Harlem library into a welcoming community center for all. Through a blend of storytelling, music, and puppetry, kids will learn about Puerto Rican folklore and the library’s important role in the community, plus sing along and become puppeteers as Pura’s stories unfold. The performance will be followed by a bookmaking workshop.

   Books to Film, for ages 2-6, will showcase a series of short films based on children’s books followed by a Q&A with some of the authors, including Jon Scieszka (The True Story of the Three Little Pigs), and Chris Raschka (Yo! Yes?). Mainspring Collective and the Irondale Center present a new children’s theater series, Monster Literature during Robin Hood: Prince of…MONSTERS. Written and conceived by Daniel John Kelley, the show is part of a series of action-packed and comedic live theater productions that celebrates great works of children’s literature that kids can read today.