About 35,000 attend Texas Book Festival

About 35,000 attend Texas Book Festival, with new lit crawl
After months of organization, one gala, two days of programming, a brand-new lit crawl and about 35,000 attendees, the Texas Book Festival drew to a close Sunday with panels on genre fiction and American history, with a few cultural stars thrown in as anchors.

“Honestly, it’s not as difficult to draw a crowd to an event with Paula Deen or Molly Shannon as the star,” festival literary director Clay Smith said Sunday. “I measure success by seeing full panels by those lesser-known writers, and I think we had a good number of those this year.”