Building on the tremendous success of the 2025 LitFest, the 2026 Convention Co-Chairs are thrilled to bring back LitFest—our celebration of literature, writers, and the power of storytelling. Modeled after world-renowned literary festivals, LitFest will feature sessions woven throughout the convention, offering attendees unique opportunities to engage with a diverse lineup of speakers.
This year’s program highlights both internationally recognized voices and writers rooted in the vibrant literary culture of New Orleans. We invite you to explore their work in advance and join us for thought-provoking conversations, creative insights, and opportunities to connect directly with the authors themselves.
Featured Authors
Maurice Carlos Ruffin—Sunday, March 29, 5:30 p.m.
Author of the National Bestseller The American Daughters, Maurice Carlos Ruffin has also written The Ones Who Don’t Say They Love You—a One Book One New Orleans selection and Story Prize longlist title—and We Cast a Shadow, finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award, the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, and the PEN America Open Book Prize. All three books were named New York Times Editor’s Choice selections.
Marguerite Sheffer—Monday, March 30, 10:00 a.m.
Winner of the Iowa Short Fiction Award for The Man in the Banana Trees, Marguerite Sheffer was also a finalist for the 2025 PEN America Robert W. Bingham Prize. Her fiction has appeared in leading journals such as Asimov’s Science Fiction and BOMB. A New Orleans–based author, she teaches at Tulane University and co-founded the collectives Third Lantern Lit and Wildcat Writing Group.
L. D. Lewis—Monday, March 30, 3:00 p.m.
A Shirley Jackson Award–nominated writer, editor, and publisher, L. D. Lewis is the author of A Ruin of Shadows, The Dead Withheld duology, and the forthcoming Year of the Mer. Her work appears in anthologies including Jordan Peele’s Out There Screaming. She is co-creator of the award-winning FIYAH Literary Magazine and has served as a researcher for the LeVar Burton Reads podcast.
Madi Hannan—Monday, March 30, 4:30 p.m.
New Orleans native Madi Hannan is an educator, artist, and writer whose children’s stories and illustrations celebrate Louisiana’s culture and natural world. By day, she teaches AP Biology, Animal Science, and Anatomy at Mount Carmel Academy, and by night, she creates under her brand Art by Madicat. She will be speaking about her book Scrim on the Run!
Fatima Shaik—Wednesday, April 1, 8:00 a.m.
Acclaimed author of seven Louisiana-based books, Fatima Shaik is best known for Economy Hall: The Hidden History of a Free Black Brotherhood, winner of the American Book Award and LEH Book of the Year 2022. Her career spans fiction, nonfiction, and children’s literature. A PEN America trustee, she also founded Saint Peter’s University’s Communication Department and is a member of Writers Room NYC.
Holly MacKenna—Wednesday, April 1, 11:00 a.m.
Holly MacKenna is a dual board-certified psychiatrist and integrative medicine physician with over 20 years of experience. Founder of Dara Wellness in New Orleans, she specializes in trauma, TBI, and veterans’ mental health. She developed the THRIVE Whole Health Program and co-authored Inhale, Exhale . . . Shoot!, a children’s book that teaches emotional regulation through basketball.
Enhancing the LitFest Experience
To help you connect more deeply with our featured authors, make use of our Book Club Kits—compact, ready-to-use guides designed for single-event conversations such as chapter meetings. These kits will spark discussion, introduce you to our speakers’ works, and may even inspire campus or community-based projects.
For the richest LitFest experience, we encourage attendees to read our featured authors in advance. Books are available through Bookshop.org and Octavia Books, our Convention partner and one of New Orleans’s most beloved independent bookstores. Reading ahead will allow you to engage fully in author sessions, ask thoughtful questions, and gain insights you can carry into your own writing. You will also be ready for book signings and meaningful conversations with the writers themselves.