Three internationally-renowned authors have already booked their place for this year's Hong Kong International Literary Festival, Time Out Hong Kong has learned. Fuchsia Dunlop, Colm Toibin and Luka Lesson will play integral parts in the annual fest, which will be held at venues across the city between October 5 and October 14.

The three authors are already well-known in literary circles across the world and they will be expected to drum up early interest in what is hoped will be the 'biggest and best' Hong Kong lit fest yet. They will be joined by other leading literary names over the coming weeks as the big event approaches.

The festival touts itself as 'one of Asia's premier literature festivals celebrating everything the written word has to offer'. Priority booking for selected events will be available to Friends of the Festival in the summer, according to the festival team. The full programme will be available on the www.festival.org.hk website in September.

This year's Young Readers Festival arm of the fest was hailed as a success in March - however all literary eyes will now be on the October fortnight, where there will be talks, events and visits from authors from across the globe. Last year's event, which was held in March, featured the likes of Amitav Ghosh, Andrew Motion and homegrown talent Xu Xi.

Isabella Lim, festival manager, spoke with Time Out. She says: “Last year's festival was a complete success and this was followed by an excellent debut by the Young Readers Festival in March, this year. But we hope this October's festival will be the biggest and the best yet. It is early days yet but we are already pleased that Fuchsia, Colm and Luka have already confirmed their attendance. Watch this space for more updates in the coming weeks!”

Meet the authors:

Fuchsia Dunlop

She's a UK food writer specialising in Chinese cuisine whose books have, among others, won the Jeremy Round Award and been shortlisted for four James Beard Awards.

Colm Toibin

He's a multi-award winning novelist, short story writer, essayist, playwright, journalist, critic and, most recently, poet. One of his books was shortlisted for the 2004 Booker Prize and listed by The New York Times as one of the 10 most notable books of 2004. Last year, he was named one of 'Britian's top 300 intellectuals' by The Observer - even though he's not British.

Luka Lesson

He is the co-founder and co-director of The Centre for Poetics and Justice - a community organisation dedicated to the integration of poetics and social transformation. He is a 2011 Poetry Slam Champion and has been active in using hip-hop and poetry as a form of self-determination.