Keynote and Brunch Speakers Announced, Plus a New Celebrating Eudora Tribute Concert
Keynote Speech
Friday, February 5, 2010, 5:30 pm
Sponsored by Mr. and Mrs. Dick Eckburg
The Savannah Book Festival is proud to announce that internationally renowned and bestselling thriller writer Vince Flynn will kick-off the 2010 Festival with a Keynote Speech on Friday, February 5th, 2010 at 5:30pm. Sponsored by Mr. and Mrs. Dick Eckburg and hosted by Trinity United Methodist Church and free and open to the public, this exciting talk will feature a presentation by Vince Flynn, author of several New York Times bestselling novels, including his latest, Pursuit of Honor. Flynn’s novels feature counterterrorism operative Mitch Rapp, who proves himself to be a hero unafraid “to walk the fine line between the moral high ground and violence” (The Salt Lake Tribune) for our country’s safety, for the sake of freedom, for the pursuit of honor.
Mr. Flynn will also appear during the Festival itself on Saturday, February 6th, 2010, again in the sanctuary of Trinity Church, to talk about his life in letters and his eleven novels, several of which are a part of the beloved Mitch Rapp series. Mr. Flynn, who overcame dyslexia and went on to fame and fortune as a writer, supports many worthy charities, including Tee it Up for the Troops and the Marine Corps-Law Enforcement Foundation.
Celebrating Eudora Tribute Concert
Saturday, February 6, 2010, 8:00 pm
with Kate Campbell, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Caroline Herring and Claire Holley
Presented in collaboration with the Savannah Music Festival
Co-sponsored by Carolyn Luck, & by John and Stephanie Duttenhaver
Breaking News: Celebrating Eudora concert to go on despite cancellation by Mary Chapin Carpenter…
The Savannah Book Festival is also offering a new ticketed musical event at this year’s Festival: five-time Grammy Award-winner Mary Chapin Carpenter and three other renowned singer-songwriters–Kate Campbell, Caroline Herring and Claire Holley–will perform a unique tribute to the late Pulitzer Prize-winning Southern writer Eudora Welty in a tribute concert the evening after the Savannah Book Festival on Saturday, February 6th, 2010, in Trinity Church.
Presented in collaboration with the world-renowned, award-winning Savannah Music Festival, this exciting addition to the Festival schedule will feature Carpenter, Campbell, Herring and Holley singing their own songs chosen specifically for and inspired by the literary legacy of Mississippi writer Eudora Welty, whose 100th birthday would have been April 13th, 2009. The concert, which debuted at the centennial celebration for Welty earlier this year, received rave reviews, and it is in perfect keeping with the Savannah Book Festival’s mission to promote the written word, particularly the work of Southern authors.
Taking place in historic Trinity United Methodist Church at 8 pm on Saturday, February 6th, 2010, the concert will be a ticketed fundraising event for the Festival. Tickets for $50 are on sale now through the Savannah Box Office.
Sunday Brunch Talk, February 7, 2010
11:30 am - 2:00 pm
Sponsored by 
The Festival is also thrilled to welcome back Festival favorite Julia Reed as our Sunday Brunch Speaker. Ms. Reed is the author of Queen of the Turtle Derby and Other Southern Phenomena; Ham Biscuits, Hostess Gowns and Other Southern Specialties: An Entertaining Life (with Recipes), a collection of her essays on food for the New York Times Magazine and The House on First Street: My New Orleans Story, a memoir. The fundraising Sunday Brunch and talk by Ms. Reed, a much-anticipated event in Savannah’s social calendar, will be held in Jepson Center for the Arts on Telfair Square from 11:30 am to 2:00 pm. Ms. Reed will be introduced by Savannah College of Art & Design President Paula Wallace. Tickets for $75 are on sale now through the Savannah Box Office.
The Savannah Book Festival, which will take place February 5-7, 2010 in and around Telfair Square, is an annual, free and open to the public celebration of the written word and its role in improving the human experience. Our mission is to promote, reading, writing and civil conversation. For each of the past two years, the Festival has attracted dozens of popular and critically acclaimed authors and thousands of readers from all over America to Savannah’s Telfair Square, and the culturally significant buildings that surround it—Telfair Academy, Trinity Church and Jepson Center for the Arts. Within this beautiful venue, the Festival’s authors and their readers experience the intimacy and hospitality for which Savannah is famous.
As renowned historian Charles Bracelen Flood, observed, after the 2009 Savannah Book Festival:
As the author of 12 books and a former president of the American PEN Center, I have attended every kind of book-related gathering here and abroad. In recent years I have appeared at the Texas Book Festival and the LA Times Book Festival, as well as giving talks at the Smithsonian and the National Archives. The Savannah Book Festival is as good a forum for an author as any to which I’ve been. My wife and I were treated royally. My own talk was attended by perhaps 150 people in an attractive hall that had excellent acoustics. The introduction was informed and gracious, the questions were all knowledgeable, and the atmosphere was stimulating. The signing of my books after my talk and at one of the general welcoming parties was very well handled.
No one can be blasé about the beauty of Savannah [and] its synthesis of history and architecture. Charles Bracelen Flood
For the last two years, booksales have been handled by Ex Libris, the bookseller of the Savannah College of Art & Design and a valued collaborator in the 2010 Savannah Book Festival. To order books by any of our authors in advance, please click here.
Parking at the 2010 Savannah Book Festival
Downtown parking for the Festival will be easy and inexpensive this year. On Festival day itself, Saturday, February 6th, 2010, our guests will be able to park all day in the Robinson Street parking garage on the corner of York and Montgomery Streets all day for $5 in advance at garage entrance (cash only-exact change appreciated). There will be no delays in exiting, which will make attending the Savannah Book Festival Saturday from 10 am to 4 pm and the Celebrating Eudora concert at 8 pm on Saturday evening a hassle-free experience.
Please note that this special Savannah Book Festival offer is for Saturday, February 6th, 2010 ONLY. The normal parking rules will apply during our Keynote Address with Vince Flynn on Friday, February 5th, 2010.
For those coming to the much-awaited Sunday Brunch Talk with Festival-favorite Julia Reed on Sunday, February 7th, 2010, our guests will be able to park in the Robinson Street parking garage for the usual Sunday fee of $3 (cash only-exact change appreciated), with payment at the garage exit.
Recycling at the Festival by Green Life Space
Green Life Space is providing recycling for the 2010 Festival, with recycling bins placed in and around Telfair Square for our guests. Please help us green this event by placing your aluminum cans and plastic bottles in the appropriate bins!
2010 Savannah Book Festival Schedule
Friday, February 5, 2010
9:00 am - 4:00 pm
Imaginative Storm Writing Workshop taught by acclaimed memoirist Allegra Huston and renowned poet and spoken word artist James Navé
Location: Trinity Church Fellowship Hall
5:30 - 7:00 pm
Keynote Speech: best-selling novelist Vince Flynn
Location: Trinity Church Sanctuary, Telfair Square
Saturday, February 6, 2010
10:00 am – 5:00 pm
Genres:
Fiction Authors – Sanctuary, Trinity Church
History & Biography Authors – Rotunda, Telfair Academy
Contemporary Issues Authors – Sculpture Gallery, Telfair Museum
Poets – Fellowship Hall, Trinity Church
Lifestyle Authors – Neises Auditorium, Jepson Center for the Arts
Free Speech Authors – Free Speech Tent, Telfair Square
8:00 pm
Tribute Concert to Eudora Welty with Mary Chapin Carpenter, Kate Campbell, Caroline Herring and Claire Holley
Location: Trinity Church Sanctuary, Telfair Square
Tickets: $50 at the Savannah Box Office; by phone at 912-525-5050; at the Savannah Box Office window, 216 E. Broughton St.; or at the door 1 hour prior to the event.
Sunday, February 7, 2010
11:30 am - 2:00 pm
Sunday Brunch Talk: acclaimed memoirist and food writer, Julia Reed
Location: Jepson Center for the Arts, Telfair Square
Tickets: $75 at the Savannah Box Office; by phone at 912-525-5050; at the Savannah Box Office window, 216 E. Broughton St.; or at the door 1 hour prior to the event.
For more information about the Savannah Book Festival, please contact Katherine Oxnard at 912-358-0575 or katherineoxnard@savannahbookfestival.org.
