Edinburgh International Book Festival Front List line up unveiled - including Outlander author

The spin-off series of talks, held near the main book festival site in the McEwan Hall, is also to include spoken word artist and musician Kae Tempest and Douglas Stuart, Booker Prize-winning writer of Shuggie Bain in conversation with poet, novelist and former Makar Jackie Kay.

Taking place in the Festival’s largest venue, and presented in partnership with Underbelly, The Front List offers audiences a chance to hear from internationally celebrated voices whose work helps shape how contemporary culture, politics, history and society are understood.

Marking 35 years since the publication of Outlander, Ms Gabaldon will reflect on one of the most successful literary franchises of recent decades, credited - alongside its screen adaptations - with transforming both Scotland’s tourism and its film and television industry.

Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales and Cory Doctorow consider who now holds power online and whether the early days of altruism and optimism about the internet are gone for good.

History and public memory are explored in depth, as The Rest is History podcast’s Tom Holland examines the enduring fascination of the Roman emperors, and David Olusoga, appearing amid a new season of A House Through Time – and fresh from stardom on Celebrity Traitors – considers empire, memory and Britain’s contested past.

Writers have been invited to explore memory, migration, identity, belonging, race and the moral responsibilities of storytelling. Colson Whitehead, the Pulitzer Prizewinning novelist behind The Underground Railroad, will join journalist and broadcaster Samira Ahmed; Booker Prize winner Kiran Desai, Ann Patchett and Elif Shafak will also speak as part of the line-up.

Running from 17 August, the Front List series also includes talks from Lyse Doucet, the BBC’s chief international correspondent, who will reflect on decades reporting from conflict zones and geopolitical fault lines, while Edward Wong and Lewis Goodall examine how the US–UK “special relationship” is being tested and reshaped amid global instability and President Donald Trump’s tenure.

Meanwhile, writer, comedian and television presenter Mel Giedroyc, best known for co-hosting The Great British Bake Off, is joined by comedy partner Sue Perkins for a lively conversation bringing together fiction, comedy and reinvention.

The festival last year sold 76,681 tickets, up from 2024’s 69,029 in its first year in its new home at the Edinburgh Futures Institute.

However, the festival has been hit by funding issues since it was forced to end its main sponsor, Baillie Gifford, over pressure from activists. Campaigners targeted Baillie Gifford's investments in fossil fuels and companies with alleged links to Israel.

Last year, it emerged organisers had asked publishers to pay half of authors’ accommodation costs at next year’s festival in a bid to cut costs.

In an email first reported by publishing industry The Bookseller, festival bosses cited rising costs and Edinburgh’s new 5 per cent visitor levy being introduced in the summer as the reasons behind the unprecedented move.

The email sent to publishers by director Jenny Niven, stated accommodation was a “huge area” of expenditure for the festival every year.