This year’s Byron Bay Writers Festival will be the biggest ever: that’s the proud boast made by festival chairperson Chris Hanley at last night’s official opening at the Byron Bay surf club.
Three-day passes and Saturday tickets have sold out, although some Friday and Sunday tickets and session tickets are still available.
Mr Hanley and new festival director Edwina Johnson acknowledged the high quality of writers in this year’s program.
From an idea hatched as Chris walked around the Adelaide Writers Festival in the mid-90s, the festival has grown from attracting 200 people to the first 1997 event to its current level.
This year Mr Hanley said Collins booksellers, who normally bring a ‘warehouse of books’, have ‘two warehouses’.
The writers were welcome in the area, Mr Hanley said, ‘there is no more receptive or appreciative audience or community than you are going to find here in Byron in the next two or three days’.
~ Photos Eve Jeffery
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
