This year's Shanghai Book Fair will kick off next month, and bookworms are being promised a more comfortable, cafe-like experience in the main venue this year, with best-selling authors like Elif Shafak from Turkey slated to hold reading events.

British award winning biographer Lyndall Gordon, Norwegian short story writer Roy Jacobsen and Turkish novelist Elif Shafak, author of the best-seller "The Bastard of Istanbul" will be holding seminars.

Some of the 33 Chinese and foreign writers will give talks on their writing experiences, others give more general talks on their literary visions, says Xu Jiong, director of the Shanghai Press and Publication Bureau.

Organizers will announce specific dates under the book fair's WeChat account in early August. This year's show will be set up to look like a book cafe, where publishers display only books for visitors to browse through. They can also scan codes to purchase the book online and get it mailed to their homes.

For those into ancient Chinese literature, do not miss the daily lectures on classic Chinese works during the fair.

The seven-day event begins on August 14 at the Shanghai Exhibition Center, and more than 100 bookstores in town. There will also be 50 sub-venues outside Shanghai for the first time in the event's history. Daytime entrance is 10 yuan per person, and night-time admission is just five yuan at the Shanghai Exhibition Center.

(Cover photo: The 2018 Shanghai Book Fair. /VCG Photo)