This year's Shanghai Bookfair will feature more than 300 writers and academics, as well as 150,000 books from both home and abroad, the local government announced at a press conference Tuesday.

The annual event, which is going into its ninth year, is scheduled to run from August 15 to August 21 at the Shanghai Exhibition Center, 1000 Yan'an Road Middle, Jing'an district. The books on display at the fair will focus on the various aspects of the development of Chinese society, said Fang Shizhong, director of the Shanghai Municipal Press and Publication Bureau.

The fair will primarily feature books in Chinese, Japanese and English.

Fang said every book will be sold at a 20 percent discount.

This year, fans can see novelist David Mitchell, who wrote two books shortlisted for the Booker Prize; Joe Dunthorne, whose novel Submarine was made into a film in 2010; as well as Japanese writers Atoda Takashi and Ishida Ira.

"More than 100 foreign and domestic writers will bring their new books to Shanghai," Fang told the Global Times.

This year, a children's book fair will feature about 10,000 storybooks from 10 international publishing houses. Some of the books are in English, while some are bilingual. The fair will host more than 70 activities in which children and their parents can meet the authors, Fang said.

There will also be a section selling imported books, magazines, CDs and DVDs. "We plan to upgrade the fair next year to an international level so foreigners in Shanghai will have more choices," he said.

The fair took on 100 English-speaking student volunteers to help readers find the books they want and for the first time set up free Wi-Fi around the entire venue.

Organizers have also set up rooms where visitors can keep the books they plan to buy so they don't have to haul their purchases around the fair. Vendors will also offer customers express delivery service for their purchases at below market prices.

The fair will be open from 9 am to 6 pm on weekdays and from 9 am to 9 pm on the weekend. Admission costs 10 yuan ($1.50) per person and is half-off in the evenings from August 17 to 19.