The Los Angeles Times Festival of Books began in 1996 with a simple goal: to bring together the people who create books with the people who love to read them. The festival was an immediate success and has become the largest and most prestigious book festival in the country, attracting more than 130,000 book lovers each year.

Patt Morrison is a writer and columnist for the Los Angeles Times and radio host on KPCC, and author of the best-selling Rio L.A.: Tales from the Los Angeles River. Her numerous awards include two shared Pulitzer Prizes and six Emmys.

Christina Binkley is a columnist for the Wall Street Journal and spent 10 years as its lead reporter covering Las Vegas. Her first book is titled Winner Takes All: Steve Wynn, Kirk Kerkorian, Gary Loveman, and the Race to Own Las Vegas.

James Flanigan is a business columnist for Forbes and the New York Times, and author of the recently released book Smile Southern California! You're the Center of the Universe: The Economy and People of a Global Region. Abe Lowenthal is a scholar who has published a dozen books on Latin America and inter-American affairs and U.S. foreign policy. His most recent book is Global California: Rising to the Cosmopolitan Challenge. Lowenthal is a professor of international relations at USC.