“World’s largest book sale” comes to Middle East at giant hangar in Dubai

A visitor reads a book at the Big Bad Wolf Book Sale, which calls itself the world's biggest, hosted for the first time by Dubai, UAE October 17, 2018. Picture taken October 17, 2018. (Reuters)

• The Big Bad Wolf Book Sale, launched in Kuala Lumpur in 2009, has since regularly toured Asian cities
• Organizers hope to attract as many as 300,000 visitors during 11 days in Dubai

DUBAI: A gargantuan touring book sale that touts itself as the world’s largest is making its first stop in the Middle East, filling a huge hangar in Dubai with stacks of 3 million discounted books, open around the clock.
The Big Bad Wolf Book Sale, launched in Kuala Lumpur in 2009, has since regularly toured Asian cities including Jakarta, Manila, Cebu, Colombo, Bangkok and Taipei. Organizers hope to attract as many as 300,000 visitors during 11 days in Dubai.
Founder Andrew Yap said he expects the sheer number of books will lure in punters.
“In a mature market like Dubai, this will give variety to readers,” he told Reuters.
Roudha Al Marri, an Emirati co-author of a guide to life in the UAE whose own book was on sale at the fair, said a city such as Dubai needed such an event to help spur reading among a “tablet generation” preoccupied with screens.
“To hold a book, smell it, to return us to more beautiful days, to throw us into mazes of stories. Every generation needs this,” she said.