KPBS San Diego Book Festival 2026 — University of San Diego

You found this. Be the first one here.

If you are the person who reads in the car while waiting in the pickup line, who has a nightstand stack growing faster than it shrinks, who holds strong opinions about bookstores, a room just opened for you on the hill above Mission Bay.

This is the first year of it, which is either forgettable or foundational, and the lineup argues for foundational: more than fifty award-winning authors alongside a hundred local writers, panels running all day, a youth reading stage, a main stage, and an exhibitor hall of independent booksellers who will happily talk you into something you did not come for. Free parking. Free admission. The kind of day that makes you realize San Diego always had a literary community and had simply never been given a room to hold it.

The USD campus, one Saturday, all day.

Go alone if you want. You will not stay alone for long.