Do you love food, music, and fun? Join Kansas City, Kansas Public Library for the 4th annual Library in the Park at Big Eleven Lake in KCK. 

This year, Library in the Park is all about community! Come celebrate our diverse community, pick up a free book, and talk with organizations that are working to improve the lives and spaces in our community. The taco contest is also returning with FREE tacos from 4 delicious taquerias around KCK. 

We also have a special guest! Local author, Derrick Barnes, will be there signing free copies of his critically acclaimed picture book CROWN: An Ode to the Fresh Cut. Illustrated by Gordon C. James, the children's book is a poem Barnes wrote after being inspired by a teen's trip to the barber. Barnes wrote the following about the inspiration: "It took me back to when I was a kid, and how sitting in that barber’s chair and receiving a dope haircut was probably the only place in the Black community where boys are treated like royalty. Still are. It’s a poem about self affirmation and how the world may not see your brilliance, or your beauty, but you do, and everyone around you that loves you can definitely see it, recognize it." 

For more information and to sign up for updates, visit libraryinthepark.org

Looking for a way to work up an appetite for the taco contest? Visit dashkck.com to sign up for a 5K walk/run immediately preceding the festival.