On a Saturday morning in mid-October, the Grand Ballroom of the Denny Sanford Convention Center in Sioux Falls will fill with the smell of new paper and fresh coffee. More than 75 authors and vendors will set up tables for Novel Lattes, a book festival that its organizers describe as the largest clean book festival in the United States. The book fair runs from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday, October 17, 2026, and admission is free. No ticket or registration is required.
The event is the work of two women from the same family. Paula Miller and her daughter-in-law Myja are the co-founders of Novel Lattes, and they also run the South Dakota Writer's Retreat. Miller grew up hearing her parents read Little House on the Prairie aloud by candlelight, a memory that eventually pushed her to write a children's chapter book when she was a young mother. Family health problems put her writing aside for years before she picked up her pen again. She now writes faith-based historical romance with what she describes as a dash of intrigue and humor, and belongs to the American Christian Fiction Writers, Western Writers of America, and FHL Christian Writers. She is married to her high school sweetheart and homeschools six children.
Myja came to the project from a different direction. She fell in love with literature as a small child and felt the pull toward writing in her early teens, which led her to study English at South Dakota State University. While she was a student there she served as president of SDSU's English Club and worked for the South Dakota Humanities Council on two book festivals. She is working toward publishing her first novel and spends her free time knitting, reading, and taking long walks with her husband.
The festival has not always carried its current name. It began as Literature & Lattes, and the rebrand to Novel Lattes is recent enough that the event's own website still carries testimonials from authors and attendees referring to it by the old name. Those testimonials hint at what the organizers are after. One author, Shannon McNear, praised the arrangement of the venue and the volunteer staff. An attendee wrote that she had been nervous going in but found a community of writers who shared her struggles, calling the experience a blessing. Another attendee said it was welcoming to be in a group of fellow Christians who spoke freely about their faith.
The name is not incidental. Coffee is treated as a co-star rather than an afterthought. A coffee truck parks inside the venue and serves lattes all day, and craft vendors sell merchandise themed around books and coffee. The organizers frame the whole thing as an invitation to readers, writers, and coffee drinkers alike, and the schedule is built to give each group something to do.
Friday, October 16, is the quieter day. Writing workshops and an author panel run from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. in Meeting Room #6, and those sessions require tickets. That evening, from 6:30 to 8 p.m., the Author Meet & Greet takes place, with cosplay encouraged, a photo booth, and light refreshments. Organizers describe it as a character-driven event and welcome attendees who want to dress as a favorite character or simply match the mood of a genre they love. Because space is limited, the meet and greet is not open to children under 13, though nursing infants are allowed.
Saturday is the main draw. Alongside the author tables, the fair includes a silent auction running from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Half of the auction proceeds go to Call to Freedom, a trauma-informed nonprofit headquartered in Sioux Falls that was established in 2016 and provides support services for victims of human trafficking and sexual exploitation across the Midwest. Bidders can donate baskets themselves, and the organizers suggest themes ranging from books and coffee to date night and pets. Winners must be present or able to pick up their baskets that afternoon.
There is also a first this year: a coloring contest. The coloring page was designed specifically for the festival by Trent Landreth of Drawings by Trent, an autistic artist whose work is used to encourage families and help people discover their own gifts. He will be at the fair on October 17. The first 25 people through the door on Saturday receive a free swag bag filled with goodies and coupons, and a concession stand will be open on site for lunch.
The books on offer span a wide range of genres. The event's author list includes fantasy, romance, children's books, devotionals, non-fiction, suspense, and paranormal titles. Among the attending authors are Naomi Musch, an award-winning Christian fiction writer from the Wisconsin Northwoods; D.E. Carlson, who writes Christian young adult fantasy romance and homesteads with her family on the Dakota plains; C.S. Kjar, an award-winning author of small-town romances and mysteries; Nellie Peters, a fantasy romance writer raising four children in Wyoming; and Whitney Amazeen, who writes Christian and young adult romance. Vendors include Wordspire Books, a South Dakota publishing house that bills its output as stories families can trust, along with makers selling embroidered book pocket pillows, bookmarks, tote bags, coffee-themed aprons, and character dolls.
One of the authors at the fair is Colee Ernst, a Sioux Falls woman who left her job to write full time. Ernst has always loved reading, but kept running into a problem. She found herself hunting for books she could not find, and that gap is what pulled her toward writing. The story stayed with her through earlier careers in agriculture and marketing, surfacing in whatever spare time she had. She now has two books out and a third on the way.
Her series, The Birch Girls, follows a group of women connected by one summer at a fictional Camp Falls Creek. The first book, Until We Met, opens with seventeen-year-old Beth, who likes her life predictable, arriving at camp against her will. She makes a deal with a boy named Tucker to help each other survive the summer, and the arrangement turns into something she did not expect. A disaster at the end of the season changes everything, and the story jumps forward ten years, with the rest of the series set around 2015. The second book, Until You Remember, picks up a decade after Tucker vanished, when a man with no memory arrives at Beth's hospital knowing something only Tucker could know, while his wife insists his name is Nate Higgins.
Ernst said she hopes readers find something nostalgic in the books, something that takes them back to their early years, and also something they can connect with. She described the series as being about hope, overcoming grief, finding true community and friends, and seeking out your calling in life. It is a theme that fits the room she will be sitting in on Saturday, surrounded by dozens of other writers who, like her, decided to make something out of the books they could not find.