Hay Festival Forum Dallas (Texas, USA)

Since 2018, when this Forum began, the bookshop-bar presents literary events and concerts over three days in which international authors as well as people from the world of national and local culture participate in the events. Previous speakers include Jon Lee Anderson, Ben Fountain, Yásnaya Elena Aguilar, Elvira Liceaga, Emiliano Monge, Cristina Rivera-Garza, Pilar Quintana or Joselo Rangel. In its 2020 digital version, we wew joined by Salman Rushdie, Carmen Boullosa, Alma Guillermoprieto and more. More than 1700 attendees have been able to go to the 28 events organized in the Forum since 2018 and 2000 people have been able to follow the events remotely. 

Hay Forum Dallas 2023

Day 1 September 9th
Daniela Rea in conversation Maria Ramos Pacheco (Dallas Morning News)
Rea is known for her fearless investigative journalism, particularly in the realm of human rights, and her in-depth reporting on issues that touch upon violence, conflict, and migration in Mexico. She has often reported from the front lines, highlighting the individual human stories that put a face to abstract statistics and political debates.
Her work shines a light on social justice issues and highlights the human toll of the ongoing drug war in Mexico. Rea's reporting often exposes the harsh realities faced by those living amidst violence, political corruption, and systemic neglect. Her articles and books not only inform but also encourage empathy and action.
Her book Nadie Les Pidió Perdón ("No One Asked Them For Forgiveness") is a notable work, where she narrates stories of ordinary people in the face of the Mexican drug war.

Hernan Diaz
Hernan Diaz is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of two novels translated into thirty-four languages. He is the recipient of the John Updike award from the American Academy of Arts & Letters, given to “a writer whose contributions to American literature have demonstrated consistent excellence.”

His first novel, In the Distance, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the PEN/Faulkner Award, and it was the winner of the Saroyan International Prize, the Cabell Award, the Prix Page America, and the New American Voices Award, among other distinctions. It was also a Publishers Weekly Top 10 Book of the Year and one of Lit Hub’s 20 Best Novels of the Decade.

Trust, his second novel, received the Pulitzer Prize for fiction and was a New York Times bestseller, the winner of the Kirkus Prize, and longlisted for the Booker Prize, among other nominations. It was listed as a best book of the year by over thirty publications and named one of the 10 Best Books of the Year by The New York Times, The Washington Post, NPR, and Time magazine, and it was one of The New Yorker’s 12 Essential Reads of the Year. One of Barack Obama’s Favorite Books of 2022, Trust is currently being developed as a limited series for HBO.

Afro Perreo Session (Elkin & El Nick)
From Mother Africa to America Latina, a dance experience that showcases African Heritage and dance music from the diaspora of the new world, unifying the dance magic of both worlds in one place.

Day 2 September 10th

Brenda Navarro
Brenda Navarro is a critically acclaimed Mexican writer and feminist known for her engaging and poignant work that often explores themes of womanhood, motherhood, and identity. Her work provides a unique perspective on society, particularly the plight of women in contemporary Mexico, and is marked by its ability to combine the personal and political in complex and powerful ways.
Navarro's first book, Casas Vacías (Empty Houses), exemplifies this approach. It's a gripping novel that delves into the sensitive subject of child abduction, told through the perspectives of two mothers - one whose son was kidnapped, and another who raises a stolen child as her own. The story serves as a profound critique of societal attitudes towards motherhood, femininity, and the structural violence faced by women. Navarro's writing is raw, insightful, and characterized by its emotional depth and unflinching honesty.

Ben Fountain 
Fountain’s New York Times bestselling novel, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, has been published in fourteen languages. It won the 2013 National Book Critics’ Circle Award for fiction, the Flaherty-Dunnan First Novel Prize, the PEN New England-Cerulli Award for Excellence in Sports Fiction, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction, and the Jesse H. Jones Award for Fiction. The novel was also named a “best book of the year” on over twenty lists, including Time, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Kirkus Reviews and Publishers Weekly. It was a finalist for the National Book Award. Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk has been made into a feature film by Ang Lee, director of Life of Pi, Brokeback Mountain, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, among other films. 

His next novel, Devil Makes Three, has been published by Flatiron Books in September 2023.  

The Wild Detectives is a bookstore-bar in Dallas, Texas. Since it was opened in 2014 by two Spanish engineers, this small bookshop has held more than 600 events. Since 2014, The Wild Detectives has been selected on six occasions by the local press as bookshop of the year and it is nationally recognized as one of the avant-garde bookshops in the renaissance of independent bookshops in the United States. 

Wild Detectives Bookshop, Dallas
Wild Detectives Bookshop event