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.
Sign Up
Join the Free Press Book ClubThe Book
Fishing with Tardelli
By: Neil Besner
Fishing With Tardelli contemplates the relations among four parents — mother, father, stepfather, and a Brazilian fishing companion — and the author. Over marriages and remarriages, fathers and mothers become stepfathers and stepmothers, and brothers gain and lose stepbrothers and half-brothers, sisters and half-sisters across two continents. The various homes become part of Besner’s internal geography; memory, dream, story, fable become permeable layers folded over bald facts baldly stated.
Beginning with an older man’s recollections of himself as a young teenager fishing with Tardelli in the bay in Rio de Janeiro, the memoir reflects on time lost and time regained. The narration ranges across the mid-’40s in Montreal, where two couples marry, divorce, and remarry in a new configuration; proceeds to Rio de Janeiro in the mid-’50s, when one of these newly formed families emigrates; and returns to Montreal in the late ’60s and early ’70s. After a 50-year interlude, Besner returns from Western Canada to the pandemic moment in Toronto.
Schedule
May 30
June book club pick reminder
Fishing with Tardelli, by Neil Besner
Jun 12
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.
Jun 19
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.
Jun 26
Free Press Book Club meeting
Join our live chat starting at 7 p.m. CT with special guest, author Neil Besner.
If you have any questions, please email us at bookclub@winnipegfreepress.com
Upcoming Picks
The Woo-Woo
By: Lindsay Wong
July/August 2023
Past Picks
The Break
By: Katherena Vermette
May 2020
Don’t Try This at Home
By: Rob Krause and Daria Salamon
June 2020
Older Sister. Not Necessarily Related.: a memoir
By: Jenny Heijun Wills
July 2020
Here the Dark
By: David Bergen
August 2020
All Our Relations
By: Tanya Talaga
September 2020
This Has Nothing to Do With You
By: Lauren Carter
October 2020
Black Water: Family, Legacy and Blood Memory
By: David A. Robertson
November 2020
Five Wives
By: Joan Thomas
December 2020/January 2021
Songs for the End of the World
By: Saleema Nawaz
February 2021
We Are All Perfectly Fine
By: Dr. Jillian Horton
March 2021
Treed
By: Ariel Gordon
April 2021
Once Removed
By: Andrew Unger
May 2021
Paul is Dead
By: C.C. Benison
June 2021
The Paris Apartment
By: Kelly Bowen
July/August 2021
Fight Night
By: Miriam Toews
September 2021
Hour of the Crab
By: Patricia Robertson
October 2021
Status Update
By: George Toles, Cliff Eyland
November 2021
Moon of the Crusted Snow
By: Waubgeshig Rice
December 2021/January 2022
The Strangers
By: Katherena Vermette
February 2022
Persephone’s Children
By: Rowan McCandless
March 2022
You Don’t Have to Die in the End
By: Anita Daher
April 2022
The Accidental Veterinarian
By: Dr. Philipp Schott
May 2022
Life in the City of Dirty Water
By: Clayton Thomas-Muller
June 2022
And Then Is Heard No More
By: Raye Anderson
July/August 2022
The Gunsmith’s Daughter
By: Margaret Sweatman
September 2022
The Full Catastrophe
By: Meira Cook
October 2022
Hey, Good Luck Out There
By: Georgia Toews
November 2022
The Theory of Crows
By: David A. Robertson
December 2022/January 2023
Wonder World
By: K.R. Byggdin
February 2023
Even That Wildest Hope
By: Seyward Goodhand
March 2023
Permanent Astonishment
By: Tomson Highway
April 2023
Out Of Mind
By: David Bergen
May 2023
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