Letters: Loss of SC Book Festival diminishes Midlands

The demise of the S.C. Book Festival is a very sad development for the Midlands. While it offered repeated visits with beloved authors of the Carolinas (Ron Rash, Pat Conroy), the festival also facilitated something that will be much harder to come by in its absence: making the acquaintance of first-time, up-and-coming authors.

Kathryn Stockett (The Help) read at the festival as a relative unknown. In 2015, notable new author Natalie Baszile came from California to introduce her first novel, Queen Sugar.

I doubt that new writers on the book-tour circuit will schedule stops in the Midlands from now on. They will have neither book festival audiences awaiting them nor the enticement of reading at a vibrant independent bookstore like Asheville's Malaprops. Readers eager for new and unexpected delights will be the losers.