Book lovers can find the romance in Hamilton
Steel Town Love, a one-day festival dedicated to romance books, is coming to the Central Library on July 11.
Hamilton will be right up there with the romance capitals of the world, when the Hamilton Public Library central branch hosts the second annual romance book festival Steel Town Love on July 11. Activities will run throughout the day on the library's fourth floor and the Hamilton Farmers’ Market.
Activities include author panels, a writing workshop, book signings, and crafts. The library will also be using its MakerSpace greenscreen to give guests an experience of being on the cover of a romance book.
While activities and panels are happening, guests can visit the reader lounge set up in the Hamilton Farmers’ Market. There will be some romance-related crafts, merchandise for sale, and a space to interact with others or read, said Erica Conly, the Hamilton Public Library’s manager of program development.
Hudson Lin, the Toronto-based author of queer romance, is slated to run a writing workshop aimed at introducing attendees to self-publishing. Lin, author of Dragon Boats & Doctor’s Notes and the Jade Harbour series, will compare self publishing to traditional routes and show the strength and weaknesses of both processes for new authors.
“I hope that it gives them a base to try to demystify publishing in general and then self-publishing in particular, because it can be very daunting when someone is thinking about embarking on publishing their own work.”
Lin’s workshop is scheduled for 1 p.m. and limited to 40 spots in the Hamilton Room on a first-come-first-serve basis, according to Conly and the library website.
Anuja Varghese, author of A Kiss of Crimson Ash, is set to take part in the romantasy author panel, and moderate the contemporary romance author panel.
“We're going to be talking tropes, speech reads, happily ever afters, all the fun things that people really love about contemporary romance,” she said.
The contemporary romance panel will include the voices of Lily Chu, Frankie Scott, and Ellie K. Wilde.
“They do a really amazing job of pairing authors with a common thread through their books so that we can all sort of speak to it,” said Wilde. “I expect us to discuss the importance of the genre and the romance resurgence. I mean, romance has always been the top grossing genre in the world, or at least for the past several years.”
Conly said the event is a result of the many romance readers in the library system. She said this year would have more romantasy and queer romance represented based on guest feedback from last year.
Lin appreciates a festival celebrating romance.
“I really love that publishing in general and festivals are becoming more open to the romance genre and understanding how powerful romance can be.”
Lavanya Lakshmi applauded the genre diversity of romance novels being included in the festival. “A really exciting thing in the festival is that it’s not defining what romance is. There's basically only one real rule to the romance genre, that it has to have a happy ending … So I think that it's a wonderful encompassing of how much the romance genre can hold.”
Lakshmi’s featured book Leave and Come Back, was released on June 16. She will be part of a conversation with Hannah Bonam-Young, author of People Watching.
The Hamilton Public Library is partnering with Epic Books, gritLIT and the Hamilton Farmers’ Market for the event.
Epic Books will be the event book and merch seller, including tote bags, stickers and bookmarks.
“We're excited for the festival. We love working with the library and gritLIT,” says Jaime Krakowski, the bookstore’s owner.
The Hamilton Farmers’ Market is the host of the readers lounge.
"The Hamilton Farmers' Market is excited to partner with the HPL on this event. It was a successful event in 2025 and we’re happy to host their Readers Lounge again in 2026," they said in an email statement to HAMILTON CITY Magazine.
It is recommended for attendees to RSVP on the library website, walk-in guests are also encouraged. The festival is free to the public. The library estimates nearly 360 attended last year's event.
