The Authors@UF program series emerged to showcase the scholarship and creativity of faculty, creating an intellectual forum within the academic library, and providing informal, extra-curriculum, academic engagement between students and faculty outside the classroom. This article identifies steps to launch an author program, and considerations in finding authors, locating the event, publicizing, budgeting, catering, selling books, and creating an off-shoot vehicle (i.e., "The Authors@UF Bookshelf") to place University of Florida (UF) authors in the institutional repository. This new UF program embraced current academic library service trends, expanded roles for library liaisons, and advanced the library's fundamental role as an intellectual forum for the campus community.