Borders Book Festival draws in record-breaking 40k visitors

The Borders Book Festival has reported attracting record-breaking visitor numbers last weekend, up almost a quarter on 2022’s event.

Around 40,000 people came through the gates of Harmony Garden, in Melrose in the Scottish Borders, a 23% increase on last year, while ticket and book sales were up by 13%, according to organisers. “Events over the four days were well attended, with almost a third sold out, demonstrating audience confidence and an appetite for live events that has, at long last, returned following the years of the Covid-19 pandemic,” organisers said.    

Prize-winning novelists Douglas Stuart, Robert Harris and Sebastian Barry appeared as well as crime authors Val McDermid, Christopher Brookmyre, Mark Billingham and Doug Johnstone, who went on to perform with their band, The Fun Lovin Crime Writers, as the final event of this year’s festival.  

The children’s programme, sponsored by Baillie Gifford, ran throughout the weekend and included author and illustrator Lauren Child.

Festival director Alistair Moffat said: “It was glorious. Right from the giving of the Walter Scott Prize, the first event on the opening day, to the closing events with Gordon Brown and Jim Naughtie, there was an atmosphere of celebration.   

“The Baillie Gifford children’s programme was hugely popular, and I have never seen so many babies at the book festival. It was the 20th festival and the best so far.”

Literary organisers recently confirmed to The Bookseller that festivals were flourishing again after years of lockdown restrictions and uncertainty. 

The Borders Book Festival returns next year to the same venue, running from 13th to 16th June 2024.