It is a bit of a tradition for the first evening of the Festival of Words to begin with the ever-popular event Readception, where authors take the spotlight to share their own words in their own voices.
This year is no different, with six of the Festival’s guest authors joining together for the first live stream event of the virtual literary festival.
With executive director Sarah Simison providing the introductions for each author, Readception once again provided a small taste of what the Festival of Words has to offer throughout the following week.
Beginning with Nathan Ripley reading an excerpt from his latest suspenseful novel Your Life Is Mine, next followed a powerful reading from Amanda Leduc out of her novelistic deconstruction of modern fairy tales, Disfigured: On Fairy Tales, Disability, and Making Space.
Jay Ingram shared insight about science writing and how he approaches even the broadest of questions, such as “why is the sky blue?” For those wondering: there’s a million Google pages of answers, and Ingram is still researching the question in its entirety.
Lindsay Wong shared a section of her newest young adult novel My Summer of Love & Misfortune, followed by Steven Price with a reading from his novel Lampedusa — a fictionalization of the author Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s experience writing his book The Leopard.
The event concluded with a reading from Farah Heron’s romantic comedy-esque novel The Chai Factor, and a kind reminder from Simison that there is plenty more where all of that came from throughout the next six days of the Festival.
Although it’s hard to say exactly how many people tuned in to this year’s Readception — last year’s Festival gathered around 200 eager sets of ears — the chat portion of the live stream was full of compliments and interest from the most “vocal” of viewers.
With only a handful of minutes to impress, it's safe to say each of the authors included in the event certainly lived up to the task.
The Festival of Words continues until July 19, with a full schedule of events available here.
Stay tuned for coverage of the festival as it progresses through the coming week.
