2024 at Wordfest

Become Part of the Vital Wordfest Community

Celebrating its 30th Anniversary in 2025, Wordfest™ produces lively, accessible shows year-round, in addition to presenting the Imaginairium Festival every October. Our goal is to help you think bigger, dig deeper, and build meaningful connections with the world’s best authors and books. Whether you love fiction or non-fiction, memoir or mysteries, food culture or pop culture, politics or poetry, major prize winners or breakout stars, a Wordfest show is the exclamation between the book being written and the book being read.

Sign up for our newsletter here so you’ll never miss out on the wide range of local, national, and international writers that we are able to showcase in Calgary. For questions or assistance booking tickets, please email us at boxoffice@wordfest.com

May

May 22 @ 7 PM MT $25

Memorial Park Library, 2nd Floor
1221 2 St SW

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For Eden Grinshpan, everyday cooking means saying yes to more shareable and delicious dishes, more veggies, and more fun in the kitchen. Discover how to create bold, fresh dishes that don't take themselves too seriously when Wordfest showcases the Top Chef Canada host and her new cookbook, Tahini Baby: Bright, Everyday Recipes That Happen to Be Vegetarian. This event includes an audience Q & A and book signing, fuelled by Cookbook Co. Cooks. "It's packed with the zestiest, most drool-worthy recipes; overflows with warmth; and overdelivers on her playful, signature style," says Top Chef judge Gail Simmons. You can also pre-order Eden's book here. READ MORE

Wordfest & CAJ present Gabrielle Drolet & Brittney McNamara

May 29 @ 7 PM MT $25

Memorial Park Library, 2nd Floor
1221 2 St SW

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As legacy media struggles, the next generation of journalists is producing relevant, engaging, refreshingly fearless coverage. Wordfest is thrilled to be able to bring together two North American powerhouses disrupting the journalism landscape: Canadian editorial cartoonist and journalist, Gabrielle Drolet and Brittney McNamara, the features editor at Teen Vogue, which bills itself as “the young person’s guide to conquering (and saving) the world.” The lively and timely conversation includes an audience Q&A and book signing. READ MORE

May 31 @ 2 PM MT $25

Memorial Park Library, 2nd Floor
1221 2 St SW

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At this crucial time for journalism, facts, and public trust in media, Wordfest and the Canadian Association of Journalists are proud to present a conversation with Mark MacKinnon, Senior International correspondent for The Globe and Mail, who has been covering international affairs and Canada’s role in the world since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States and the subsequent war in Afghanistan. One of Canada’s most decorated foreign correspondents, MacKinnon has won the National Newspaper Award seven times. He was nominated in 2022 and again this year for his ongoing coverage of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This vital afternoon conversation, hosted by journalist Christina Frangou, includes an audience Q&A and book signing. READ MORE

June

Wordfest presents Guy Gavriel Kay & J. M. Miro

Jun 03 @ 7 PM MT $35

Memorial Park Library, 2nd Floor
1221 2 St SW

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This 30th Anniversary pairing of Guy Gavriel Kay and J. M. Miro (the fantasy nom de plum of Steven Price) promises to be as exquisite as the fine whiskey you’ll be tasting at this spirited conversation, ringlead by Wordfest’s Shelley Youngblut. Miro describes Kay’s newest bestseller, Written in the Dark, as a masterpiece: “An absolutely astonishing novel about poetry, and war, and what it means to be human, by our greatest living writer of the fantastic.” Not sure what to expect? Think "Hebridean Baker experience," but with a fantastical twist. Your ticket includes a premium tipple, audience Q & A, and book signing fuelled by Owl’s Nest Books. You can pre-order both featured books—Written in the Dark and Ordinary Monsters—and the authors’ back lists here. READ MORE

Jun 10 @ 7 PM MT $25

Patricia A. Whelan Performance Hall, Central Library
800 3 Street SE

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Wordfest turns 30 this year and we’re throwing a lively bash to celebrate the Calgarians who helped build Wordfest. It’s our way of thanking writers, readers, and community builders for helping to spark our thriving literary scene. And what better way to showcase this city’s range of wordy goodness than inviting seven of our finest storytellers to share a seven-minute tale about the relationship between their art and their hometown, in its all its contradictions, complexities, and connections. Join us for The Way We… Calgary’d, featuring Ali Bryan, Marcello Di Cintio, Will Ferguson, Cheryl Foggo, Richard Harrison, Joshua Whitehead, and Teresa Wong, with a special performance by Tom Phillips. READ MORE

September

Sep 14 @ 4 PM MT $55

Patricia A. Whelan Performance Hall, Central Library
800 3 Street SE

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SOLD OUT! Click here to join the waitlist. (Thank you, Wordfesters, for your remarkable support. If you missed out on tickets, get yourself, your friends, family, and neighbours to sign up for our e-blast to ensure you never miss out next time!) Wordfest welcomes bestselling fantasy phenom R.F. Kuang with her highly anticipated novel Katabasis, a dark academia tour de force drenched in magic that author Leigh Bardugo calls “a witty, gory, harrowing ride.” Kuang’s oeuvre (including Babel and Yellowface) has established her as a master of storytelling. This exclusive experience will be hosted by Paula Turcotte. Your exclusive ticket includes a pre-signed deluxe limited-edition copy of Katabasis with a custom Canadian tour stamp. READ MORE

About Us

Wordfest™ beams out from Calgary, Canada in the foothills of the Canadian Rockies, Treaty 7 territory. We are an entrepreneurial arts non-profit founded in 1996 as one of Canada’s leading literary festivals. Our small team’s mission (which is to connect the world’s best audiences with the world’s most compelling authors) has evolved to include producing lively, accessible shows year-round, in addition to the fall Imaginairium (Canada’s Liveliest Literary Festival). Our unique (and free) Wordfest Youth program focuses on Grades 5 to 12 to fuel teen literacy, providing interactive experiences and class sets of books to thousands of students every year. We also produce Imagine On Air Audio, as well as online programming. Our goal? To help you think bigger, dig deeper, and build meaningful relationships.

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