The 2024 Children’s Book Festival is set for Thursday, March 28, at the Ford Center for Performing Arts. The first-grade author is Alice Faye Duncan at 9 a.m. Duncan has written more than a dozen books for children, including This Train is Bound for Glory, Honey Baby Sugar Child, and Memphis, Martin, and the Mountaintop. Her most recent book is Yellow Dog Blues, a New York Times Best Illustrated Picture Book Selection for 2022. Her books have been nominated for two NAACP Image Awards and have been named to several best-books-of-the-year lists. lists. Duncan lives in Memphis, where she often writes about her home state’s people and history. At 5:30 p.m. on Thursday, March 28, in conjunction with the OCB, Duncan presents Hip Hop’s 50th birthday party at the Lafayette County and Oxford Public Library with activities for kids, a Delta Blues photography exhibit and live music. Free and open to the public.

The fifth-grade author is Karina Glaser at 11 a.m., with her book The Vanderbeekers of 141st St. Glaser is the New York Times bestselling writer and illustrator of The Vanderbeekers series—a New York Times Notable Children’s Book and the winner of the NYC Book Award. Preceding that from 4:30 to 6 p.m. on Wednesday, March 27 she will sign her book at Square Books, Jr. Glaser is also the author of the standalone novel A Duet for Home, which was a Publisher’s Weeklybestseller. She lives in Harlem with her husband, two teenagers, and an assortment of animals. One of her proudest achievements is raising two kids who can’t go anywhere without a book.

About the Children’s Book Festival

The goal of the Children’s Book Festival is to give each child a book of their own, which they will read along with classmates and their teacher during the school year. The Children’s Book Festival serves more than 1,200 area first-graders and fifth-graders from schools in Lafayette County and Oxford. Committees made up of local school librarians, teachers, and representatives from the Lafayette County Literacy Council (sponsor of the first grade), Junior Auxiliary (sponsor of the fifth grade), and Square Books, Jr. choose the book each year. The Conference then invites those authors to present programs to each grade.

The Children’s Book Festival is underwritten by the Elaine Hoffman Scott Memorial Fund.

For more information on the Children’s Book Festival, contact Afton Thomas at amthoma4@olemiss.edu.

Continuing Education Units for Teachers

Continuing Education Units (CEUs) for teachers are offered for the Conference for the Book through the University of Mississippi’s Division of Outreach and Continuing Education.

The form is available here.

Please address any questions about the CEU process to the Division of Outreach and Continuing Education at 662-915-7283.

The form should be returned to the following address:
The University of Mississippi
 Division of Outreach and Continuing Education
, Attn:  Mary Leach
, Post Office Box 1848, 
University, MS  38677