The Lethbridge Public Library’s annual Word on the Street festival is set for this weekend. It will be at the downtown branch on Sept. 23 from 11 a.m. until 5 p.m. and will feature author from across the country, live music, food trucks and workshops.
“The forecast is looking good and we are hoping we will have a lot of people come out and join us but we are ready to go rain or shine,” said Elisabeth Hegerat, festival organizer and manager of community advancement for the library. “It should just be a busy but fun day here and we hope everybody comes out to join us on the street.”
This is the 13th year the library will host the event and the second since returning to in-person programming since the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Allied Arts Council of Lethbridge will have demonstrations, collaborative projects and face painting all day at the event.
“When we found out that we were going to be on the weekend where Allied Arts Council would usually do their fair on the square over at CASA, we put our heads together and they are essentially picking up everything they would do over there, bringing it over here and putting it down on the street so that we can all share the excitement,” Hegerat said.
The University of Lethbridge Bookstore will sell works from presenting authors throughout the day.
Highlights include longtime prairie poet Sid Marty, nonfiction author John Vaillant writing on the Fort McMurray wildfire, Indigenous journalist Angela Sterritt, local artist and picture book author Hali Heavy Shield, middle-grade fantasy author Kevin Sands, and best-selling literary author Anne-Marie MacDonald.