Sacramento Is Becoming a Literary Hub

Not too many years ago (well, okay twenty-two of them), Mark and I moved up from the Bay Area to Sacramento. At the time, downtown Sacramento was still pretty much a Monday-Friday town, as the legislators went home on the weekend and all the sub sandwich shops and taquerias on K Street closed down.

Sacramento residents often decry the movement of Bay Area folks up here, and they’re not wrong. They raise real estate prices and crowd our freeways (I feel like I can say “our” after more than two decades) and cause other crowding problems.

But they also have a desire for culture. We’ve seen an explosion of great restaurants who use locally sourced produce. Sacramento, in a couple short decades, has become a foodie town, with its own Michelin star restaurants and a selection of cuisines that would make San Francisco jealous.

We’ve also witnessed the maturation of theater culture. The long-running Broadway Series and Music Circus series have been joined by newer upstarts like CapStage, the B Street Theater, and the Big Idea Theater, and there are smaller theaters iin almost every suburb.

And now we’re seeing the literary community here in Sacramento come into its own. The California Writer’s Club, Sacramento Branch has more than a hundred and fifty author members, and our own Queer Sacramento Authors Collective is approaching 200. The CWC is celebrating 100 years, the Elk Grove hosts an annual writer’s conference, and we even have our own Latino Book and Family Festival.

But the clearest sign yet of Sactown’s maturing book community is the Sacramento Book Festival. It launched as a prototype event in 2024, and then the first full festival was held in May of 2025. The results were amazing. People came from all over California (and Oregon and Nevada) for the event – over 5,000 of them. And they were so enthusiastic!

Even though it was the hottest May 31st in a hundred years, the turnout was incredible, and the authors sold, on average, 19 book a piece. Overall, more than $4,000 worth of books were sold in less than six hours. And the special guests, including James Rollins and Catriona McPherson among others, showed that Sacramento is also home to some very successful authors.

The book festival also brought together writer’s groups, bookstores, indie authors, literacy organizations, libraries, and other … bookies?… in a way that has never happened before in Sacramento.

The 2026 Sacramento Book Festival (April 19th, 2026, from 10 AM-5 PM) will an even bigger success, with more special guests, more panels, more food trucks, more authors and books, and all in a wonderfully air-conditioned space.

So enjoy it. You can say you were here when it all happened. Help us make Sacramento more literate!