The Savannah Book Festival (SBF) Board of Directors has announced that it is planning for the 2022 Savannah Book Festival to be held, in person, Presidents’ Day weekend February 17 – 20, 2022. 

Executive Director Erika Dongre shares that planning has begun for an in-person event, indicating that SBF will be incorporating recommendations from the CDC and state and local governments to make this in-person event as safe as possible for authors, volunteers, attendees, venue staff and SBF staff. “We are pleased about the success of our virtual event series. It has been a wonderful way to keep SBF connected with our community. Having evaluated the information from the CDC and state and local governments available to us at this time, SBF feels optimistic that an in-person event will be able to take place this February.”

SBF pivoted to all virtual events following the cancellation of the February 2021 festival due to the global pandemic. During the past year, SBF has hosted authors in live conversation with moderators discussing the authors’ latest release, including Dave Barry, Brad Thor, Sandra Brown, Michael Connelly, Ruth Ware, Brit Bennett, Jack Carr, Jane Smiley and others. SBF was fortunate to have significant support from its sponsor base to provide the virtual events, keeping the Savannah book loving community connected to a variety of authors during these challenging times. SBF plans to continue offering some virtual events in addition to the February 2022 in-person festival.  

Visit Savannah president Joe Marinelli says, "COVID fatigue, pent-up demand, and widespread vaccination distribution are giving many folks the green light to begin traveling again. With all of this said, we see events, festivals, and conventions for later this year and into 2022 being organized and planned again as well. We are extremely optimistic that events like Savannah Book Festival will be able to get back to the programming that their audiences are accustomed to."

Ariel Felton, Teaching Artist and Publications Manager at Deep Center, Jeffrey Capshew, former VP of Sales at Macmillan Publishing, Brooke Phillips, Small Business and Events Manager with Savannah Area Chamber of Commerce, Dr. Kristin Ott,Emergency Medicine Physician with Georgia Emergency Associates, and Bruce Pendleton, former distributor for Swagelok in Kansas City have joined the SBF Board of Directors

“We are delighted to begin planning for an in-person 2022 festival and look forward to safely bringing our community together in February to celebrate the written word and the art of civil conversation, face-to-face. I am grateful to the Board of Directors, the SBF sponsors, and the SBF staff for their support and commitment to the festival now and into the future,” said incoming Board Chair Rachel Young Fields.

The Savannah Book Festival Inc. (SBF) is an independent, non-profit corporation committed to encouraging literacy and the love of books. For more information, please contact Executive Director Erika Dongre at 912.598.4040, [email protected] or visit www.savannahbookfestival.org.