Barnes & Noble Celebrates the Fifth Anniversary of the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books.

Business & Entertainment Editors

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 24, 2000

Series of Free Readings by 20 Internationally Acclaimed Authors

and Editors at the Barnes & Noble Stage April 29th and April 30th,

on the UCLA Campus

1,000 Square-Foot Store on Site With Cafe, Barnes & Noble

Bestsellers, Bargain Classics, Children's Books, Discover,

Trade Paperback Titles

Frank McCourt Booksigning Event at the

Inverted Pyramid at Franz Hall

Barnes & Noble, Inc., the nation's largest bookseller and presenting sponsor of the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, announced it will host a series of readings on the UCLA Campus, Hilgard and Sunset Boulevard, on the Barnes & Noble stage from 10:00a.m. to 4:00p.m. Saturday, April 29th, and from 10:00a.m. to 4:00p.m. Sunday, April 30th. This year's lineup features authors Sherman Alexie, Giocanda Belli, Julia Cameron, Mark Danielewski, Joie Davidow, Chitra Divakaruni, Maria Escadon, Helen Fielding, Aleksandar Hemon, Ha Jin, Chang-rae Lee, Edna O'Brien, Michael Palin, Francine Prose, Rachel Resnick, Elissa Schappel, Cybill Shepherd, Nicholas Sparks and Ilan Stavans.

Frank McCourt, the author of 'Tis and Angela's Ashes, will make a special appearance at Franz Hall on April 29th at 10a.m. He will sign books which Barnes & Noble will then sell in both the stage area and the Pavilion.

Since the festival's inception, Barnes & Noble has been a presenting sponsor and partner; hosting more than 60 author readings and book signings. For the third year in a row, Barnes & Noble will build a 1,000-square-foot store at the Pavilion with a cafe, serving coffee and espresso drinks; tables of Barnes & Noble bestsellers; bargain classics; Discover Great New Writers titles; fiction; non-fiction; trade paperback titles and children's books. The store, built and staffed by Barnes & Noble booksellers from Los Angeles area stores, will be open from 10:00a.m. to 6:00p.m. Saturday, April 29th and from 10:00a.m. to 5:00p.m. Sunday, April 30th.

"Barnes & Noble is known for bringing great authors and people together to celebrate the power and beauty of the written word," said Alan Kahn, chief operating officer for Barnes & Noble, Inc. "The Los Angeles Times Festival of Books is one of the nation's top literary festivals, and we are proud to be a presenting sponsor."

The schedule of author readings is as follows:

Saturday, April 29th: --------------------- 10:00a.m. Frank McCourt makes a special appearance at the Inverted Pyramid at Franz Hall to sign copies of his internationally acclaimed bestsellers, Angela Ashes and 'Tis.

11:00a.m. Michael Palin, one of the six original members of Monty Python's Flying Circus, reads from his bestseller, Hemingway's Chair: an affectionate portrait of a shy and disappointed man who's obsessed with Ernest Hemingway.

12:00Noon Cybill Shepherd will read from her candid biography Cybill Disobedience: How I Survived Beauty Pageants, Elvis, Sex, Bruce Willis, Lies, Marriage, Motherhood, Hollywood and the Irrepressible Urge to Say What I Think.

1:00p.m. In Las Mamis: Favorite Latino Authors Remember Their Mothers, several renown ed Latino authors share memories of their mothers. Editor Joie Davidow will be joined by contributors Giocanda Belli, Maria Escandon and Ilan Stavans.

2:00p.m. Acclaimed by Time as "one of the better new novelists, Indian or otherwise," Sherman Alexie has drawn comparisons to Richard Wright and James Baldwin. He will read from his new collection The Toughest Indian in the World.

3:00p.m. Chang-Rae Lee won the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Award for his first novel, Native Speaker. He will read from his widely acclaimed second novel, A Gesture Life; the story of an upstanding citizen who has come to epitomize the decorous values of his New York suburban town, but has a secret which threatens the foundation of the life he has built.

4:00p.m. Helen Fielding has captivated readers all over the globe with her bestseller, Bridget Jones Diary. Join Ms. Fielding as she reads from the sequel, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, a wildly entertaining account of the life of Bridget Jones, a single girl on a seemingly doomed quest for self-improvement.

Sunday, April 30th: ------------------- 10:00a.m. As part of Barnes & Noble's Discover Great New Writers program, Los Angeles author Mark Danielewski reads from his astonishing novel, House of Leaves: a complex commentary of a young family who moves into an apparently normal house. They quickly discover that something is terribly wrong -- their house is bigger on the inside than it is on the outside.

11:00a.m. Ha Jin, winner of the 1999 National Book Award and the PEN/Faulkner Award, will read from his heartbreaking work of fiction, Waiting. The book's protagonist Lin, a devoted and ambitious doctor, has been in love with an educated, modern woman, Manna Wu. Every summer, his compliant wife agrees to a divorce but then backs out.

12:00Noon Nicholas Sparks, author of the bestsellers Message in a Bottle and The Notebook, reads from his latest work, A Walk To Remember: a touching tale of Landon Carter, a teenage boy living in the small town of Beaufort, North Carolina, in the late 1950s.

1:00p.m. Edna O'Brien reads from her highly acclaimed novel, Wild Decembers. O'Brien charts the centuries-old quarrel and warring relationships within a family in the countryside of Western Ireland.

2:00p.m. Chitra Divakaruni will read from her novel, Sister of My Heart. Set in India, Sister of My Heart is the story of Anju and Sudha, girls who have been sisters of the heart since the day they were born. Their lives take opposite turns when they are urged into arranged marriages. But when tragedy strikes both of them, they must turn to each other once again.

3:00p.m. Join us as we welcome Julia Cameron for a reading from her latest work, The Right to Write, recently released in paperback. Cameron breaks down the mythology behind the "writing life," making the writing experience a playful and reflective event.

4:00p.m. Francine Prose, author of Blue Angel; Rachel Resnick, author of Go West Young F***ed Up Chick; and Aleksandar Hemon, author of Question of Bruno will read from their works featured in Tin House Magazine with editor Elissa Schappel.

About Barnes & Noble, Inc.:

Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS) operates 542 Barnes & Noble and 400 B. Dalton bookstores, and Babbage's Etc., one of the nation's largest operators of video game and entertainment software stores. Barnes & Noble stores stock an authoritative selection of book titles and provide access to more than one million titles. They offer books from more than 50,000 publisher imprints with an emphasis on small, independent publishers and university presses. Barnes & Noble is one of the world's largest booksellers on the World Wide Web (http://www.bn.com), and the exclusive bookseller on America Online (Keyword: bn). Barnes & Noble.com has the largest standing inventory of any online bookseller. Barnes & Noble also publishes books under its own imprint for exclusive sale through its retail stores, mail-order catalogs, and Web site.

General financial information on Barnes & Noble, Inc. can be obtained via the Internet by visiting the company's investor relations Web site: http://www.shareholder.com/bks/.