Free Press Book Club

Free Press
Book Club

Welcome to the Free Press Book Club!

To help ease some of the isolation-related boredom, we’ve started a monthly book club which will run completely online and is open to anyone and everyone to join.

Each month, we will choose a novel and share it on this page, as well as in an email to those who have registered to participate. We’ll send a couple of follow up notes to check in on your progress and suggest a few discussion topics and questions to think about as you go.

At the end of the month, we’ll all gather to participate in a livestream book club meeting, hosted by our books editor, Ben Sigurdson, or one of our pals from McNally Robinson Booksellers, as well as the author of the book.

You’ll be able to submit questions ahead of time, or drop them into one of the live chat boxes during the meeting. (And don’t worry, we’ll provide an easy-to-access link to the stream, so all you have to do is click.)

Right now, our focus is on local authors of varying genres and backgrounds, so we hope you’re excited to dive in.

The Book

Five Wives
By: Joan Thomas

Buy Now

From Harper Collins Canada:

In 1956, a small group of evangelical Christian missionaries and their families journeyed to the rainforest in Ecuador intending to convert the Waorani, a people who had never had contact with the outside world. The plan was known as Operation Auca. After spending days dropping gifts from an aircraft, the five men in the party rashly entered the “intangible zone.” They were all killed, leaving their wives and children to fend for themselves.

Five Wives is the fictionalized account of the real-life women who were left behind, and their struggles – with grief, with doubt, and with each other – as they continued to pursue their evangelical mission in the face of the explosion of fame that followed their husbands’ deaths.

Five Wives is a riveting, often wrenching story of evangelism and its legacy, teeming with atmosphere and compelling characters and rich in emotional impact.

Schedule

Tue
Dec 1

Free Press Book Club pick annoucement

Five Wives, by Joan Thomas

Mon
Jan 4

Check-in

Expect an email from us to check in on your progress. We’ll offer up some discussion questions and other things to think about as you continue reading.

Mon
Jan 11

Livestream information email

This email will provide all the information you need for our livestream book club event, including the access link, some information about your viewing options and how you can submit your questions for the author ahead of time. This information will also be posted to our Free Press Book Club Facebook group.

Mon
Jan 25

Free Press Book Club meeting

Join our live chat starting at 7 p.m. CST with special guest, author Joan Thomas. We’ll also announce the February book club pick at the end of the meeting.

If you have any questions, please email us at bookclub@winnipegfreepress.com