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Eighth Annual Los Angeles Times Festival of Books to Be Held April 26-27, 2003 at UCLA; Author/News Anchor Jim Lehrer to Emcee 23rd Annual Los Angeles Times Book Prize Ceremony

Business Wire, Dec 10, 2002

News Editors

Los Angeles Times Festival of Books 2003

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 10, 2002

The eighth annual Los Angeles Times Festival of Books will be held Saturday, April 26, from 10 a.m. until 6 p.m., and Sunday, April 27, from 10 a.m. until 5 p.m., on the UCLA campus.

Authors already confirmed to participate in the festival include:

-- Mitch Albom, nationally-syndicated columnist and talk show host and best-selling author, "Tuesdays with Morrie: An Old Man, a Young Man, and Life's Greatest Lesson"

-- Peter Bart and Peter Guber, authors of "Shoot Out: Surviving Fame and (Mis)fortune in Hollywood"

-- A. Scott Berg, acclaimed Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer ("Lindbergh") and National Book Award and Los Angeles Times Book Prize winner

-- Mark Bowden, author, "Killing Pablo: The Hunt for the World's Greatest Outlaw," "Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War"

-- Sandra Cisneros ("Caramelo," "The House on Mango Street")

-- Best-selling suspense fiction author Mary Higgins Clark ("He Sees You While You're Sleeping," "On the Street Where You Live")

-- Michael Eric Dyson ("Holler If You Hear Me: Searching for Tupac Shakur," "I May Not Get There With You: The True Martin Luther King, Jr.")

-- Maria Amparo Escandon, author of "Esperanza's Box of Saints" and "Santitos"

-- Janet Fitch, author of the best-seller, "White Oleander"

-- Carolina Garcia-Aguilera, author of the latest Lupe Solano mystery series, "One Hot Summer"

-- Jonathan Kirsch ("King David," "Moses: A Life," "The Harlot by the Side of the Road")

-- Award-winning crime/mystery writer Elmore Leonard ("When the Women Come Out to Dance," "Tishomingo Blues")

-- Edgar Allen Poe Award-winner T. Jefferson Parker ("Black Water," "Silent Joe")

-- Susan Straight ("Highwire Moon," "I Been in Sorrow's Kitchen and Licked Out All the Pots")

-- Quincy Troupe, author of "Transcircularities: New and Selected Poems," and "Miles and Me"

-- Scott Turow, best-selling author, "Reversible Errors" and "Presumed Innocent"

Admission to the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books is free, although tickets will be required to attend author panel discussions and lectures. Beginning April 20, 2003, tickets will be available without charge at select Ticketmaster locations throughout Southern California. A limited number of tickets will also be available on-site.

General event information is available online at www.latimes.com/festivalofbooks or by calling 1-800-LA TIMES ext. 7BOOK. Detailed information on all festival activities will be published in the April 20, 2003 edition of The Times.

One of the nation's premier public literary festivals, the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books was created in 1996 to promote literacy, celebrate the written word, and bring together those who create books with the people who love to read them. It is presented in association with UCLA.

A record 140,000 people attended the 2002 Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, which featured more than 400 authors, 95 panel sessions and almost 290 exhibitors, including specialty booksellers from throughout Southern California as well as major book publishers.

Los Angeles Times Book Prize Awards Ceremony

Jim Lehrer, novelist, playwright and executive editor and anchor of PBS' "The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer," will emcee the 23rd annual Los Angeles Times Book Prize awards ceremony, which will be held at 7:30 p.m., Saturday, April 26, at UCLA's Royce Hall.

The Los Angeles Times Book Prizes, established in 1980, recognize outstanding literary achievements in biography, current interest, history, poetry, science and technology, fiction, first fiction, mystery/thriller, and young adult fiction.

Information about the awards ceremony is available at www.latimes.com/bookprizes or by calling 1-800-LATIMES ext. 72366.

Note to Editors: New media credential requirements and deadlines have been posted in the Media Center section of the festival's Web site: www.latimes.com/festivalofbooks.>