Book Fair Australia is a multigenre literary festival. Founded in 2022 in Sydney, Australia by Ivana Truglio. It is staffed by volunteers, and what wonderful volunteers they are. This will be my third BFA. The first three years it was held in Sydney, and having proven that their model works they decided to bring it to Melbourne, Australia fourteen months after the one in November 2024.
This year they sold out of tickets several weeks in advance. They did open up sales for Sunday afternoon when they saw how Saturday afternoon went. If you needed to change your mind you could attend from 1pm to 4pm on Sunday afternoon for only $30.
Being in my home town means I don’t have to plan the driving and hotel rooms. Here are my thoughts on BFA 2023. And here are my thoughts on BFA 2024. I’m not sure where I got my information about the number of stalls. This year I looked at their map and counted. I’m also not sure where I got my data for the number of books I bought during BFA 2024, I’ve said 30 in the article, but I’ve been saying 40 for some months. One of those numbers is close to correct. This year I counted 26 books. That does include the Book Lover’s Journal that came in my VIP pack.
Yes, I caved and spent extra money on a VIP ticket. It gave me the Book Lover’s Journal which is really good. It has pages where you can write about the book you’ve just read. Write, by hand, and there’s the problem. My writing is so bad I often have trouble reading it. Will I use this book? I doubt it. There was also a tshirt, some washi tape and some bookmarks. My goal when attending book events is to catch up with authors I’ve read and loved, and also find new authors. I love supporting small business wherever I am, and supporting local authors is a must. Over the past few years I’ve found some of the best books are written by self-published authors. But the reason I caved is because by the time I bought my ticket they’d sold out of whole weekend tickets. I could have only bought a ticket for Sunday as Saturday was also sold out, it was very tempting, but I bought the VIP ticket instead. But, I bought my ticket in December 2024. Three months before the event!
I did my usual and cruised most of the stalls without stopping near the panels. If not for a friend who attended on the Sunday I would have missed all the panels. The one we attended was How has generative AI affected you as an author. The speakers were Phillipa Nefri Clark and GR Thomas with moderation provided by Blair Stratton. An interesting topic.
As with previous years I’ve spent parts of the time between BFAs on their Discord catching up with friends. Some of them bemoaned their lack of finances, or the distance from their home. Some people made it there anyway despite their finances.
I spent time telling people ‘I love your hair, cosplay, shoes, whatever’. It seems to now be a part of me giving out compliments.
I will be uploading a video on YouTube in due course. I’m still playing catch up thanks to shingles. Maybe I’m doing too much in the first place, but I found that three months where I did very little means I’ve now got far more to do than normal. And I’m still not over shingles. If you’re going to tell me to rest more often then I’m going to tell you how I lay down and watched a video the other day. I need to consider whether I want to rewatch it as I only saw a few minutes before my brain zoned out and I was asleep. I didn’t sleep much that night. I feel that one afternoon sleep caused more problems than it solved.