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Eighth Annual Los Angeles Times Festival of Books To Feature Literary "Who’s Who" Apr. 26-27 at UCLA

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NOTE TO EDITORS: New media credential requirements and deadlines have been posted in the Media Center section of the festival’s Web site: www.latimes.com/festivalofbooks.

LOS ANGELES, April 2, 2003 – More than 325 of the country’s best-selling authors will join thousands of Southern California book lovers at the eighth annual Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, which will be held Saturday, April 26, and Sunday, April 27, on the UCLA campus.

Festival hours are 10 a.m. until 6 p.m. on Saturday and 10 a.m. until 5 p.m. on Sunday.

Admission is free to the public. However, tickets will be required to attend author panel discussions and lectures. Beginning April 20, tickets will be available free of charge at all participating Southern California Ticketmaster locations. A limited number of tickets also will be available on-site. On-campus parking is $7.

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General event information is available online at www.latimes.com/festivalofbooks or by calling 1-800-LA TIMES ext. 7BOOK. Detailed information on all festival activities will be published in the April 20 edition of The Times.

The Los Angeles Times Festival of Books – one of the nation’s premier public literary festivals and the largest of its kind on the West Coast – was created in 1996 by The Times to promote literacy, celebrate the written word, and bring together those who create books with the people who love to read them. It is presented in association with UCLA.

Festival Highlights

· more than 325 authors participating in 95 panels, readings and book signings

· seven stages showcasing book and poetry readings, cooking demonstrations, children’s storytelling and cartoon characters, and music, drama and dance performances

· 23rd annual Los Angeles Times Book Prize awards ceremony

· more than 300 exhibitors including specialty booksellers and major book publishers

Rock Bottom Remainders

Best-selling authors Dave Barry, Amy Tan and Scott Turow will be joined by Matt Groening, creator of the “Simpsons” television cartoon series, and Roger McGuinn, former member and founder of The Byrds, for a special concert appearance as The Rock Bottom Remainders. The rock band will perform on Saturday from 4-6 p.m. on the ETC. Stage.

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The concert is the last stop on the group’s first West Coast tour.

Billed as the “literary world’s answer to the Rolling Stones,” the Rock Bottom Remainders also features the musical talents of other top writers including Mitch Albom, Kathi Goldmark, Greg Iles, Stephen King and Ridley Pearson.

Literary “Who’s Who”

Authors scheduled to appear include Mitch Albom, David Baltimore, Peter Bart, Gioconda Belli, A. Scott Berg, Peter Biskind, Roy Blount, Mark Bowden, T. C. Boyle, Ray Bradbury, Po Bronson, Stephen J. Cannell, Carol Channing, Deepak Chopra, Sandra Cisneros, Mary Higgins Clark, Wanda Coleman, Robert Crais, Michael Crichton, Janet Fitch, Peter Guber, Edward Hirsch, Christopher Hitchens, Carol Muske-Dukes, James Ellroy, Daniel Ellsberg, David Halberstam, bell hooks, Arianna Huffington, Faye Kellerman and Jonathan Kellerman.

Also participating will be Elmore Leonard, John Lithgow, Cheech Marin, Yxta Maya Murray, Lynda Obst, T. Jefferson Parker, James Patterson, George Pelecanos, George Plimpton, Richard Reeves, Carl Reiner, Luis Rodriguez, Richard Rodriguez, Carolyn See, Dava Sobel, Susan Straight, Gay Talese, Scott Turow, Harry Turtledove, D.J. Waldie, Henry Winkler, Naomi Wolf, David Wolper and Paula Woods.

Panel Sessions

Panel sessions focusing on current affairs include “American Power and the War in Iraq,” “How We Fight Now: The American Way of War,” “Chronicles of War: The Life of the Soldier,” “Cauldron of Turmoil: the Middle East,” “War Crimes: Guilt and the Pursuit of Justice,” “Rants, Screeds and Other Manifestos of Our Time” and “The Boom and the Bust: America After Enron.”

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Other sessions will focus on:

· Los Angeles/Southern California – “La Vida Loca: The Gangs of L.A.,” “ Los Angeles Now: America’s Noir Capital,” “Crime in the Hills: L.A. Mayhem,” “Los Angeles: Playing it as it Lays,” “City of Night: L.A. and the Gay Imagination,” “Writing L.A.”

· Hollywood – “Celluloid and Greenbacks: Where are Movies Going?,” “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: Hollywood Today,” “Women in Hollywood,” “Page to Screen”

· Children/Young Adult – “Picture This: The Art of Children’s Books,” “Coming Into Their Own: Young Adult Fiction,” “Our Children, Our Future: Education in the 21st Century,” “Books for Kids”

· Women – “Family Affairs: Mothers and Daughters,” “Whatever Happened to Feminism?,” “Women Writing Science”

· Diversity – “Magical Realism: Latin American Writers Today,” “Cuba Agonistes,” “The Ties That Bind: Community in Black Fiction,” “Voices from the East: Asian American Fiction”

· Art and craft of writing – “Dregs and Low Lifes: The Underworld in Modern Fiction,” “First Novels,” “Haunted by the Past,” “Non-Traditional Storytelling,” “Get Real: Creative Nonfiction Now,” “Writing Science: The World Around Us,” “How to Get an Agent”

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· Journalism and publishing – “Are the Media Biased?,” “Celebrating the Paris Review and the New York Review of Books,” “Brit Lit Now: From the Pages of Granta,” “Publishing Today”

Seven Stages: Discussions, Readings, Family Entertainment

The Barnes & Noble Stage will feature authors Po Bronson “What Should I Do With My Life?;” Deepak Chopra, “Golf for Enlightenment: The Seven Lessons for the Game of Life;” Robert Crais, “The Last Detective;” John Lithgow, “I’m a Manatee;” James Patterson, “The Jester;” ;” Faye Kellerman, “Stone Kiss;” Jonathan Kellerman, “A Cold Heart;” and Jane Smiley, “Good Faith.”

The Cooking Stage will host live demonstrations by BBC-TV/Style Network show host Nigella Lawson; cable television Food Network celebrity chef Tyler Florence; Dr. Howard Shapiro, “Dr Shapiro’s Picture Perfect Weight Loss;” television and radio hosts Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger, “Cooking with Too Hot Tamales;” and chef and restaurateur Joachim Splichal.

The ETC. Stage will feature a variety of performers including the Rock Bottom Remainders and a Laguna Playhouse performance of “By the Great Horn Spoon.”

The Great Works Stage, a new venue for the festival, will feature continuous readings from “On the Road” by Jack Kerouac and “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee. Authors already scheduled to participate in the festival will conduct the readings.

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The Reading by 9 Storytelling Stage activities will include readings by Juan Felipe Herrera, “Grandma and Me at the Flea;” Alan Katz, “I’m Still Here in the Bathtub: Brand New Silly Dilly Songs;” Kathleen Krull, “Harvesting Hope: The Story of Cesar Chavez” and Susan Yost-Filgate and Leonard Filgate, “Rip Squeak and Friends;” as well as interactive reading programs conducted by the Los Angeles Children’s Museum.

The Target Stage, designed for the entire family, will feature guest appearances by authors R.L. Stine, “Goosebumps” series, and David Kirk, “Little Miss Spider” books. Children’s entertainment will include appearances by the popular children’s character, Barney, and School House Rocks, a stage production based on the popular television cartoon series.

Among the authors appearing on the Poetry Stage will be Marvin Bell, Gioconda Belli, Sandra Cisneros, Michael Datcher, Carol Muske-Dukes, Terrance Hayes, Edward Hirsch, James Ragan, Quincy Troupe and C.K. Williams.

Los Angeles Times Book Prize Awards Ceremony

Award-winning author A. Scott Berg will emcee the 23rd annual Los Angeles Times Book Prize awards ceremony, which will be held at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, April 26, at UCLA’s Royce Hall.

Berg is a winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award, and author of the highly-acclaimed biographies “Lindbergh,” “Max Perkins: Editor of Genius” and “Goldwyn.”

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The Los Angeles Times Book Prizes, established in 1980, recognize outstanding literary achievements in biography, current interest, history, poetry, science and technology, fiction, first fiction, mystery/thriller, and young adult fiction.

In addition, the Robert Kirsch Award annually recognizes the body of work of an author who resides in and/or whose work focuses on the Western United States. It is named after Robert Kirsch, who served as The Times’ book critic for more than 25 years prior to his death in 1980.

Presenting the nine category awards will be Gayle Anderson, Eric Lax, T. Jefferson Parker, George Plimpton, John Rechy, Dava Sobel, Ronald Steel, Susan Straight and Quincy Troupe. The Kirsch award will be presented by author Jonathan Kirsch, son of the late book critic.

Ticket prices are $14 per person. Tickets may be purchased through the UCLA Central Ticket Office at 310/825-2101 or online at www.tickets.ucla.edu and through Ticketmaster at 213/365-3500 or www.ticketmaster.com. Additional charges apply for online ticket orders.

Information about the Book Prize awards ceremony and awards program is available at www.latimes.com/bookprizes or by calling 1-800-LA TIMES, ext. 72366.

Since 1980, the Book Prizes have honored numerous internationally distinguished literary figures including Ray Bradbury, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginsberg, Christopher Isherwood, Milan Kundera, Ursula Le Guin, Frank McCourt, David McCullough, Tillie Olsen, Carl Sagan and W.G. Sebald.

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Festival of Books Sponsors

Presenting sponsors of the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books are Barnes & Noble and Target. Major sponsor are Borders and Ticketmaster. Contributing sponsors are Crown Books, HBO Films, Los Angeles Opera, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Odwalla and Starbucks Coffee.

Media sponsors are KTLA 5, ESPN Radio AM (710), KABC AM (790), KCRW FM (89.9), KFWB AM (980), KKJZ FM (88.1), K-MOZART FM (105.1), KPCC FM (89.3), KPFK FM (90.7), K-SURF AM (1260), Radio Disney AM (1110) and Los Angeles Magazine.

The Los Angeles Times, winner of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, is a Tribune Publishing newspaper. The largest metropolitan daily newspaper in the country, The Times publishes four daily regional editions covering the Los Angeles metropolitan area, the San Fernando Valley, and Orange and Ventura counties as well as an Inland Valley section and a National edition.

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