This year's line-up is a unique, diverse and highly creative programme that caters from a wide range of interests and explores many topical themes.

Each year our programme features well-known authors, comedians and journalists, and there is something for all tastes and interests! For the past 8 years, the festival has grown from strength to strength and each year we delivery a jam-packed and diverse programme of events.

The Belfast Book Festival, with its broad and accessible approach to all things literary, covering all manner of genres, from children’s novels to sporting biographies and much else in between, has inspired the city to think differently about books. The programme for 2019 matches with a renewed energy and vision the very best editions of this vibrant celebration, convening a wonderful gathering of writers, thinkers, personalities and opinion-formers, all of whom reach for creative words to achieve their ambitions. The Arts Council, as principal funder, is proud to support the ninth Belfast Book Festival as it continues to promote the immeasurable joy of books, in all their forms.

Damian Smyth, Head of Literature and Drama, Arts Council of Northern Ireland