The 29th Havana International Book Fair will be held February 6-16, with its main venue in the San Carlos de la Cabaña Fortress, traveling across the country to conclude April 12 in Santiago de Cuba

More than 200 invited guests from some 44 countries will join capital city residents for the country’s most popular literary event, one that nurtures our spirits: The 29th Havana International Book Fair, February 6-16, with its main venue in the San Carlos de la Cabaña Fortress, and set to travel across the country, concluding April 12 in Santiago de Cuba.

At a time when the economic, financial and commercial blockade imposed by the United States on Cuba is tightening its grip to asphyxiate the island, the country is determined to maintain this celebration for Cuban families. According to Juan Rodríguez Cabrera, president of the Fair's organizing committee and the Cuban Book Institute, there will be more than 400 new titles and some 16 books from Cuban publishers highlighting Vietnam, the guest country of honor, with whom we are celebrating 60 years of relations this 2020.

The event will be dedicated to Dr. Ana Cairo Ballester, whose wisdom and teaching has left its mark on so many fairs over the years, and to playwright and film scriptwriter Eugenio Hernández Espinosa.

In a press conference, with fair director Sonia Almaguer and Josué Pérez, director of the literature program, on hand, Vietnam’s ambassador to Cuba, Nguyen Trung, thanked the Book Institute for the honor and explained the significance that his country has for him. "It is a book that is always being written, that lives, feels and loves, that is always evolving," adding that among its most glorious chapters is one on relations with Cuba, "a wandering book that will fly here to be presented in the Cabaña." (Granma)