How to find book(ish) events happening in London
We *love* a book(ish) event. We try to make sure we go to one together at least once a month and sometimes even head to them on our own.
We love hearing authors talk about their work, having a little glass of wine together and even queuing for that signing - all part of the fun!
We find it really inspiring and it gives us a chance to just chat books (which, obviously, we love) and be surrounded by other lovely book people. Our highlight last year was being invited to the Beth O’Leary book launch last year and although not much can top that epic experience (although Kath might argue that meeting David Nicholls comes close), we are always on the hunt for our next outing.
It can be hard to know where to start when looking for things to go, and that’s certainly not for lack of things going on, but more that it’s hard to know where to start.
So we thought we’d put together some of our recommendations for where to find your next book event!
Your local bookshop
This is probably our best recommendation, over the years, living in different places, we’ve always found a community in our local bookshops and this often includes events
Fane is a really cool events company that we’ve discovered more and more this year. They don’t just do book events, their proposition is around culture generally so there’s lots to explore, but we have found that their book events are pretty great (think Dolly Alderton, Elizabeth Day, Stanley Tucci).
Literary prizes
Some of the best events we’ve been to include shortlist readings for some of the big literary prizes (Women’s Prize for Literature, Booker prize). We’re really lucky to live in London and have these events on our doorsteps but they often do streaming ticket options for these events too.
Another good streaming option is The Guardian live events hub. Again, these aren’t always book related but we’ve heard some great authors through The Guardian events over the last couple of years including Maggie O’Farrell and Ruth Ozeki.
Bookstagram!
Of course, this goes without saying, but follow your favourite authors, publishers and book publicists on the ‘gram, Twitter and even TikTok to be the first to find out about the latest upcoming events. Most of our IG DMs are just us sending each other book news to be honest, and cat memes (naturally).
Since starting book(ish), here’s some of the best events we’ve been to are:
Beth O’Leary’s The No Show book launched, hosted by Quercus books
Dolly Alderton in conversation with Moncia Heisey, hosted by BookBar
Jessica George, hosted by Backstory
How to Fail live with Elizabeth Day, hosted by Fane
Dolly Alderton live, hosted by Fane
Hanya Yanagihara signing, hosted by BookBar
David Nicholls, hosted by Backstory
Ruth Ozeki, hosted by The Guardian Live
We’re super excited for even more book(ish) events this year, so please do send us any of your recommendations for finding our next events!