This fall, residents of Greater Des Moines are invited to attend a new event, the Wonder of Words Festival (WOW).

This new festival, put on by the Downtown Community Alliance and Des Moines Public Library, will connect readers, writers and publishers by offering a variety of programs.

The event will take place Oct. 21 – 26 in various locations throughout downtown Des Moines. WOW is designed to celebrate the written word in the same way that the Des Moines Arts Festival celebrates the visual arts and the World Food Festival celebrates culinary traditions from around the globe.

Readers festivals have become very popular affairs in North America. For example, the Miami Book Fair attracts hundreds of authors and more than 250,000 people each year, and the Tucson Festival of Books attracted 80,000 people in only its third year of operation.