History
Sacramento has had several general book festivals in the past. In the ’90’s and early 2000’s, Tower Books ran an annual literary festival in the park next to the Crocker Art Museum.
In 2014, the California Capital Book Festival took over the Sacramento convention center for a weekend, but wasn’t able to make a go of it.
And the Sacramento Book Fair (later the Sacramento Antiquarian Book Fair) ran for decades starting in the 90’s, but specialized in rare and valuable books.
In the spring of 2024, a few folks from the California Writers Club – Sacramento Branch got together with an idea to do something amazing – to bring a new book festival to the greater Sacramento Valley. We held the first annual Sacramento Book Festival at the farmer’s market in McKinley Park in East Sacramento.
Though it was put together in less than two months and the crowds were thin, the 20 authors who participated sold an average of 17 books in four hours – it was clear that Sacramento was hungry for this kind of literary event.
The organizers got to work almost immediately planning a larger event, and on May 31st, 2025 – the hottest May 31st in a hundred years they held a six hour festival at the Shepard Garden and Arts Center at the northeastern end of McKinley Park with 130+ local authors. And despite the heat and cramped location, it was a huge success, with close to 5,000 people, brisk sales, and big crowds for the panels held in the Center’s entry hall.
Flash forward to 2026, and we’re planning for our biggest festival yet, with 230+ authors, food trucks, three panel tracks, and much more. Stay tuned as we write the next chapter in Sacramento Book Festival history.