The Hawai‘i Book & Music Festival wants your attention, and the organizers are making an earnest attempt to earn it by presenting a variety of topics of interest to island residents, from health, wellness and spirituality to local and globe-spanning fiction, storytelling and hula. The event grows in range and diversity year after year.

This year’s festival, the 12th, includes more than 140 events scheduled at 10 pavilions and stages over two days on the Frank F. Fasi Civic Grounds. Admission to the festival is free and free parking is available at the municipal parking lot. Author presentations and book signings, panel discussions, music, hula and keiki activities will be offered during the festival, open 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

New to the festival this year is a pavilion devoted to books about food and cookbooks, with chef Mark “Gooch” Noguchi heading up a series of presentations by island authors, chefs and cultural experts. Get a lesson on making dumplings from chef Lee Anne Wong at 10 p.m. Saturday. Have an old cookbook full of recipes you’ve got down pat? Bring it and swap it for someone else’s favorite.

Olympic, world and U.S. figure-skating champion and children’s education advocate Kristi Yamaguchi returns to the islands to showcase the festival’s new Storytelling Pavilion. She’ll be featured at a reading corner at 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. Saturday and 10 a.m. Sunday. Other readers include Hawaii first lady Dawn Amano Ige at 12:30 p.m. Saturday and state Rep. Calvin Say at 11 a.m. Sunday.

Health and well-being is the theme of third new pavilion at the book festival. At 11 a.m. Saturday, it will address the topic “Wellness in Hawaii,” with Buddhist meditation teacher Haemin Sumin discussing his best-seller “The Things You Can See Only When You Slow Down: How to Be Calm in a Busy World.” Other presentations at the pavilion include “Conscious Dying” (1 p.m.), “Opiate Hawaii” (2 p.m.) and “Obamacare vs. Trumpcare” (4 p.m.). On Sunday, the pavilion will be retitled “Disrupt Aging” and feature authors who explore ways to adjust and redesign your life with age.

MORE HIGHLIGHTS:

>> Writer Constance Hale and San Francisco-based kumu-choreographer Patrick Makuakane discuss “The Natives Are Restless: A San Francisco Dance Master Takes Hula into the 21st Century,” Hale’s book documenting the work of Makuakane and Halau Na Lei Hulu i ka Wekiu, at 10 a.m. Saturday at Mission Memorial Auditorium. “The Natives Are Restless” is also the title of Makuakane’s choreographed tale of imperialism and occupation, and the native resistance. The halau will also perform. “The Natives Are Restless” is being revived for performances at 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday at Hawaii Theatre.

>> A tribute to musician and filmmaker Eddie Kamae includes a panel discussion of his work at 1 p.m. Saturday in the Alana Hawaiian Culture Pavilion and a Main Stage performance by his Sons of Hawaii at 3 p.m. Saturday. Other musical events of note include an appearance by kumu hula Tracie and Keawe Lopes and their Halau Ka La Onohi Mai O Haehae, the overall winners of the 2017 Merrie Monarch Festival, at noon Saturday; an hour of guitar by Jeff Peterson and Barry Flanagan at 1 p.m. Saturday; and a singer-songwriter competition at 1 p.m. Sunday.

>> Honolulu Star-Advertiser reporter Michael Tsai discusses his “The People’s Race, Inc.,” about the Honolulu Marathon, at 3 p.m. Saturday at the Authors’ Makai Pavilion.

>> Author Shanthi Sekaran discusses her new novel, “Lucky Boy,” about a Mexican immigrant whose son is taken away from him, 3:30 p.m. Saturday at Mission Memorial Auditorium. Longtime China correspondent John Pomfret speaks about his book “The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom” at 11:30 p.m. Sunday, and Hawaii author Kaui Hart Hemmings talks story about her new book “How to Party with an Infant” at 4 p.m. Sunday.