Joan Of Arc Project is with Frenchmen Art & Books at Frenchmen Art & Books.

18 hours ago

Announcing our 2026 book club choices!

Pelican Girls by Julia Malye (2024)

Book description: Paris, 1720. La Salpêtrière hospital is in crisis: too many occupants, not enough beds. Halfway across the world, France's colony in the wilds of North America has space to spare and needs families to fill it. So the director of the hospital rounds up nearly a hundred female “volunteers” of childbearing age—orphans, prisoners, and mental patients—to be shipped to New Orleans.

Blood Red, Sister Rose by Thomas Keneally (1974)

Book description: *** we selected this book because this is the book that Baz Luhrmann is basing his script of his forthcoming film about Joan of Arc upon!!**** A gritty, authentic retelling of Joan of Arc as a bewildered peasant girl hearing divine voices, focusing on her military triumphs like lifting the Siege of Orleans and the tragic arc of her transformation, challenging legends with historical realism.

Members of the Joan of our book club voted to select one book about New Orleans history and one book about Joan of Arc this year.

We will meet twice in person (location TBD) and are exploring the possibility of adding a secondary Zoom discussion for each book since we have members from out of town and had success with Zoom book and film discussions during Covid.

Here are the in-person book discussion dates:

Saturday, March 28, 2026 at 10 am: Pelican Girls

Saturday, August 1, 2026 at 10 am: Blood Red, Sister Rose

The Joan of Arc Book Club started in 2009 (the first parade year), then was eclipsed by the parade, and other Joan of Arc Project events!

It was revived in 2023 with the publication of the novel “Joan” by Katherine J. Chen, (thanks to Garden District Book Shop, who reached out to ask Amy to review it for them…then this book kicked off a newly resurrected book club season for us, which we held at The Rink!)—

The second year of the club we held at the Broadmoor branch of Nola Public library, and last year we held the book club at various locations around the city at venues that related to the book’s themes.

Stay tuned for more information and locations! All are welcome!

We encourage you to get your books at our partner bookstore Frenchmen Art & Books!

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