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The Emirates Airline International Festival of Literature has unveiled a strong line-up of writers for its second annual event, with fair director Isobel Abulhoul telling The Bookseller that she would "learn" from her experience putting on the 2009 event, which attracted 60 writers but was briefly caught up in a media furore over the alleged 'banning' of a book.
So far 33 authors have signed up, for EAIFL 2010, including Mark Billingham, Alexander McCall Smith and Martin Amis. Kate Mosse and Kate Adie will both return after attending the festival last year. Abulhoul said that people would be "absolutely spoilt" by the line up this year and added that at least 65 authors would come to the event.
She added that feedback from last year had been incorporated into the programme and the new festival would involve more children and young adult writers. "It was apparent that we needed more," she said. "Dubai is very much a young and growing family orientated society."
This year's event, held in March in Dubai, was briefly rocked when author Geraldine Bedell revealed her book, The Gulf Between Us, had not been accepted as part of the festival because it was feared it would "offend certain cultural sensitivities". The novel features a homosexual sheikh who had an English boyfriend and was also set in the backdrop to the Iraq war.
Abulhoul said the festival organisers would learn from how the wider media reported the story, and EAIFL's attempts to get the "truth of the matter exposed": that the book had not been banned, and its author had never been invited. Abulhoul said: "You can never plan for hiccups - you can live through it and live to tell a great tale. I can't say what will happen [this year]. Hopefully we can learn from the experience."
Next year's event will take place over four days from 10th to 13th March.