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The Central Arkansas Library System (CALS) presents the eighteenth annual Six Bridges Book Festival, October 21–31. The Festival features more than 70 award-winning and bestselling authors representing genres from history to graphic novels, from fantasy to romance, from children’s books to thrillers. Most events are free and virtual, accessible via Zoom. The full list of authors and events is available at SixBridgesBookFestival.org.
Presenters include Jacqueline Woodson, a 2020 MacArthur Fellow, a four-time Newbery Honor winner, a three-time National Book Award finalist, and a two-time Coretta Scott King Award winner (Brown Girl Dreaming, Before the Ever After); Charles Yu, National Book Award winner (Interior Chinatown); bestselling popular science writer Mary Roach (Fuzz, Packing for Mars); the internationally acclaimed Sandra Cisneros (The House on Mango Street, Martita, I Remember You, Martita Te Recuerdo); Vashti Harrison, a #1 bestselling children’s author and illustrator (Little Leaders: Bold Women in Black History); TJ Klune, New York Times and USA Today bestselling, Lambda Literary Award–winning author (The House in the Cerulean Sea, Under the Whispering Door); PEN Open Book Award winner Helen Oyeyemi (Peaces, What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours); Jean Hanff Korelitz (The Plot), whose previous book was adapted into HBO’s The Undoing; Edgar Award–winning author Kate Milford; Karla Cornejo Villavicenci, the first undocumented finalist for a National Book Award (The Undocumented Americans); National Book Award winner and Arkansas native Nate Powell (March, Save it for Later); and debut young adult fiction author Ayana Gray (Beasts of Prey), who was recently featured on the cover of O, Oprah Magazine.
This year’s Festival authors have been featured on the New York Times bestseller list and lauded by Time, the School Library Journal, NPR, the L.A. Times, Book Riot, and others. Presenters have also received many distinguished awards and honors, including the National Book Award, the Edgar Award, the James Beard Award, the Booker Worthen Literary Prize, the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Fiction, the San Francisco Book Festival Award, and the National Medal of the Arts.
The Festival will bring back fan favorites, such as the Tasty Reads edible book contest; Pub or Perish, presented by the Arkansas Times; the Junior League of Little Rock's Little Readers Rock events for children and families; and Classic in Context, highlighting The Princess Bride. Several presenters will also make virtual presentations for Pulaski County elementary, middle, and senior high schools, and for area colleges through the Writers in the Schools (WITS) initiative.
Festival Sponsors, Partners, and Supporters include: Broadway Bridge level: Arkansas Humanities Council, CALS Dr. Elizabeth Fletcher Dishongh Charitable Trust; Main Street Bridge level: Arkansas Times; Rock Island Bridge level: Arkansas Department of Parks, Heritage & Tourism, CALS Library System Foundation, KUAR FM 89.1, Pro Smart Print & Promo, Rebsamen Fund, WordsWorth Books, Wright, Lindsey & Jennings LLP; Junction Bridge level: Arkansas State Library, CALS Adult Programming, Friends of CALS, Phillip Huddleston, Meadors, Adams & Lee, Oxford American, UA Little Rock Department of English; Baring Cross Bridge level: Boyette Strategic Advisors, Christ Episcopal Church, Interfaith Center Arkansas, UAMS (Departments of Dermatology and Medical Humanities & Bioethics); I-30 Bridge level: Arkansas PBS, Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts, Trinity Cathedral, Saint Mark’s Episcopal Church & Betty Rowland Wittenberg Foundation, Bill & Cathy Spivey, Stickyz Rock ’N’ Roll Chicken Shack; Partner: Junior League of Little Rock/Little Readers Rock. There is also generous support from Book Club Campaign and Individual Donors.
About the Six Bridges Book Festival
The Six Bridges Book Festival, a project of the Central Arkansas Library System, is supported in part by the Arkansas Humanities Council and made possible in part by the Arkansas State Library and the Institute of Museum and Library Services. The Junior League of Little Rock/Little Readers Rock is a partner for the Festival’s family events.
For more information about the 2021 Six Bridges Book Festival, visit SixBridgesBookFestival.org.
At ACS, we believe that if we provide filmmakers an arena to exhibit their talents, and film enthusiasts a healthy diet of quality programming, we can inspire more Arkansans to make and watch more films. By supporting filmmakers, festivals, theaters and young people interested in filmmaking throughout the state, we hope to create statewide network, pool Arkansas’s resources and be an umbrella organization that feeds all things film. We believe a rising tide lifts all boats.
To be a filmmaker, we have to connect to create. A painter needs a brush, paint and a canvas. A director needs a writer, a cinematographer, a sound mixer, production designer, editor, actors, distributors, and an audience. We cannot do it alone. This art form forces one to collaborate and thus, creates jobs. Filmmaking is unique in the arts in this way. It takes an army.
