Fall for the Book

 

The 14th annual Fall for the Book Festival at George Mason University starts tomorrow and lasts through Sunday, September 30th. As part of this year's event, the Mid-Atlantic Chapter of Mystery Writers of America is sponsoring the Mason Award presentation to Neil Gaiman, creator and writer of the DC Comics series Sandman and author of the bestselling novels American Gods, The Graveyard Book, and Coraline. In addition, Michael Chabon, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay and The Yiddish Policeman's Union, will receive this year’s Fairfax Prize honoring outstanding literary achievement.

Individual author events include sessions with crime fiction authors John Gilstrap, Will Lavender, and Laura Lippman. A Mid-Atlantic Chapter of Mystery Writers of America panel moderated by Alan Orloff will include authors Tracy Kiely, Thomas Kaufman, Sandra Parshall, and Joanna Campbell Slan. A trio of first-time novelists will take the stage to discuss their debut political thrillers, including defense anthropologist Alexandra Hamlet, U.S. Naval Academy grad Kathleen Toomey Jabs, and Mark Harril Saunders.

Another highlight of the festival for fans of crime fiction will be the panel "On Literary and Genre Fiction" on Sunday from 1:30 to 3:00 p.m.  The National Book Critics Circle hosts a discussion of literary fiction and genre fiction, asking the questions, What's the difference? What's the divide? Where's the overlap? Weighing in on these topics are novelist Julianna Baggott, whose latest novel, Pure, ventures into the realm of post-apocalyptic horror; Louis Bayard, whose literary mysteries include The School of Night; Alma Katsu, author of The Taker and The Reckoning; and journalist and critic Laura Miller, author of The Magician's Book: A Skeptic's Adventures in Narnia.