The Dunedin Writers & Readers Festival 2019 programme is out! From 9-12 May we’ll throw you four days of terrific talk across 36 events, with a cast of over 60 participants.

We’re thrilled to welcome eight overseas guests ? bestselling Irish novelist John Boyne (pictured); BAFTA and MOBO award-winning UK hip-hop artist and author Akala; charisma-blessed English writer/performer Rebecca Vaughan (back for a third time, no less); two immensely talented picture book author-illustrators on loan from France, Eric Veillé and Clotilde Perrin; and three of Australia’s brightest minds, novelist Markus Zusak, feminist author Clementine Ford and Australian Children’s Laureate Morris Gleitzman.

Pair that vibrant lot with a bounty of top-shelf New Zealand talent and you’ve got yourself a line-up to tickle most fancies. Our range of topics includes feminism, villains and grannies, fake news, race, class, distraction, boydom, the Dunedin Sound, hip-hop, Shakespeare, poetry, off-grid living, te reo Maori, misbehaving costumes, gender bending, Scarfie flats, mental health, masculinity, humour, comics, Captain Cook’s one-handed cook, the writing process, comics, history’s scent and motherhood.

There are four workshops on offer this time (poetry, creative prose, kids writing and drama) and a cracking day of events designed to inspire our city’s secondary school students.

We’ve saved some of our best kid-delighting events for the weekend, and have resurrected the Story-Time Train event that was so popular at our first two festivals. We’ve also spread a selection of free, kind-on-the-wallet sessions throughout the programme.

Go to www.dunedinwritersfestival.co.nz for our full programme. Tickets available from TicketDirect