Results tagged “Roy Blount” from book/daddy

Robert Caro

The Texas Book Festival, which ran over the weekend at the State Capitol in Austin, came directly out of politics -- thanks, in part to then-First Lady of Texas Laura Bush. And thanks, in part, to Austin itself and the Austin political-social types who continue to run it, the festival has always had a huge contingent of presidential biographers, state historians and political journalists, more than most literary shindigs, it seems. What can you say about a book festival that has seemingly had Texas Monthly political editor Paul Burka on some panel or other just about every year (not this time, thankfully)? it's a festival that always has sessions with titles (taken from this year's festival) like "Texas Political Giants" and "Memo to the President-Elect" and "Giants: The Parallel Lives of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln." Beyond the staples of any book festival -- popular novels, cookbooks, children's books, books on music and celebrities -- this has been the defining trait of the Austin fest.

So, initially, it was something of a surprise that on this weekend -- of all election-year weekends -- the Texas Book Festival definitely was not drawing the same size crowds, pulling the same political mojo, as in previous years.