5 KEY MOMENTS AT SUNDAY’S BOOK FEST

1. Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Leonard Pitts Jr., author of the new novel “Grant Park,” said that writing fiction is quite different from writing a column, which is limited in length and has to deal with the facts. Writing a column is like dinner, but writing a novel is like dessert, he said. “It feeds the soul.” 2. Margo Jefferson was raised rigorously by her well-todo African-American parents in Chicago, and she talks about that experience in “Negroland.” She said her parents were“very disdainful of Elvis Presley”and other rockers.“But my mother liked Marvin Gaye in her later years.” 3. Mouse was the big dog at the Children’s Activity Tent. At 115 pounds, he lounged around, with children petting him and reading to him. Children who struggle with reading might be embarrassed to read in front of adults or other kids, but they can practice reading to a dog without feeling judged. 4. While Austin has a reputation for being hip and weird, many residents don’t see it that way. They live on the margins, said writers who contributed to “Invisible Austin.” One of the authors, Katherine Jensen, talked about a cab driver named Kumar, who was a lawyer in Nepal.“Why should we keep Austin weird?” he asked.“I’m not weird. I’m usual.” 5. How would you like to be on a panel titled “Selfish, Shallow, and Self-Absorbed”? It mainly had to do with writers who decided not to have kids. Author Geoffrey Dyer talked of the pressures on women: “You can have it all became, for many women, you must do it all.”