The organising team had a fantastic weekend and hope you enjoyed any events that you came to. Do let us know what you thought of the festival. Here are a selection of photos from the weekend.
We don’t seem to have any photos of the Democracy in Crisis event on Sunday so if you took any you’d be willing to let us use, please get in touch! You can email portobellobookfestival@gmail.com
You can also watch our reels from the weekend on Instagram
The 2025 Portobello Book Festival was a great success and
we hope you all enjoyed it as much as we did.
Over the weekend, despite Storm Amy, Portobello Book Festival attracted hundreds of people to the library, and we have had some lovely feedback both from those taking part and those attending. Our intention is always to try as far as possible to make sure that those who make up the community of Portobello see themselves, their experiences and their interests reflected in the programme. The programme is also designed to bring together a distinctive mix of subjects, writers, commentators and readers.
The organising team would like to thank:
All our participating writers for inspiring and entertaining us.
Our fantastic chairs for keeping everything running smoothly.
Brunstane and St John’s Primary Schools for welcoming two authors to their schools on Friday morning and thanks to the pupils attending these events for their enthusiasm!
Our sound team Jock and Dave for making sure that everyone could be heard.
The ‘chair gang’ who helped moved 100 chairs from Portobello Town Hall to the library on Friday and back again on Monday. Also thanks to those who helped move chairs after events.
The Portobello Bookshop for providing a pop-up bookshop run by their cheerful staff over the weekend and making sure all our authors’ books were available for sale after each event.
A big thank you to Paul Hudson and the staff of Portobello Library, a fantastic resource on our doorstep. We really take over the library over the weekend including their staff room! The collaboration with the library and the help and time given by the library staff are what makes the festival the success it is.
And of course, thanks to our engaged and enthusiastic audiences who came along to the events and created such a vibrant atmosphere.
We start to plan our October festival well in advance so if you’re interested in being considered for inclusion, contacting us in the first half of January is a good idea. There are always limited spots and after our early planning sessions most of these are already accounted for. We’re volunteers so can’t always keep track of requests carrying over year on year, so getting in touch in early January makes it easier for us to consider you.
The 2026 programme will be launched early September
with tickets available shortly afterwards.
Unfortunately the Graphic Novel Builder workshop due to take place on Friday afternoon has had to be cancelled. Apologies for any disappointment or inconvenience caused.
Portobello Book Festival 