With two successful years under its belt, Old Mandeville’s Jane Austen Festival is being expanded this year to the major literary festival it founder hoped it would become.

The festival will take place from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Mandeville Trailhead Cultural Interpretive Center and on Sunday from noon to 4 p.m. at the Lake House restaurant on Lakeshore Drive.

This year, the festival will not be limited to events surrounding works by Austen only. On Saturday, the festival will include booths hosted by several published local authors. From 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., Pamela Ewen, who wrote “Moon IN the Mango Tree;” Christa Allan, who recently had her book “Walking on Broken Glass,” published; and children’s book author Katie Seaman-Williams will be among the authors participating.

As they did at the previous two festivals, local restaurants will join with the festival to provide meals of the era Saturday afternoon. Vianne’s Tea Salon and Café will host a royal regency tea that requires reservations; the Good Earth Market and the Rusty Pelican will be serving up fish and chips; Kickstand Café will cook up some fried green tomatoes; and the Barley Oak will highlight several English beers.

Returning this year on the Trailhead Amphitheater stage Saturday, will be the Looking for Mr. Darcy dramatic reading from 11-11:30 a.m. and the No Plain Janes costume contest from 12:30-1 p.m.

In between these two events will be an hour-long demonstration of the Reg-ency Era dances described in many of Austen’s works. The Louisiana Vintage Dancers of Baton Rouge will conduct this demonstration, and the audience will be encouraged to join in.

Saturday’s keynote presentation, which will be presented from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. in depot building, will focus on the challenges of adapting Jane Austen texts for movies and television specials. Daniel Mangiavellano, a doctorate student in English at Louisiana State University will provide the presentation. His research is focused on 19th Century British Literature.

Other events on Saturday include a calligraphy and wax seal demonstration from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. by the Papier Plume shop, Regency Era hairstyles by Jacqueline’s Family Hair Salon and a love letter writing workshop for students in fourth through seventh grades and for adults. The workshop will be held prior to the keynote presentation.

Winners of a love letter-writing contest held prior to the festival will be read during Sunday’s events.

New this year will be a panel discussion to be held Sunday from 2:30-3:30 p.m. with established Northshore authors providing tips on how to get write and get published.

Admission for Sunday’s events is $35, with teachers and students getting a $10 discount if they provide the proper identification.

Brunch and dessert will be included in the admission and a cash bar will be available. Activities will begin at noon with a harp concert by the New Orleans Celtic Harp Ensemble ending at 1 p.m. After that the popular “Letters from the Attic,” a collection of old letters found by local residents in family collections. While these are on display, there will be a reading from one of the three prayers written by Jane Austen and a dramatic reading.

“We have concentrated over the first two festivals in creating an atmosphere that combines fun cultural activities keyed to the Regency Era in England in which Jane Austen lived and created what are universally recognized as some of the greatest literary works in the English language. But our second goals always has been to create a genuine literary festival for the Northshore,” said Kerri Blache, founder of the festival. “Now, in our third year, we are putting more emphasis this year on the literary aspect of our project.”