11:00 AM - 12:00 PM Pacific
There is often a fine line between fiction and reality. Just ask Penticton author, Julie Wise. The political changes in the United States since January 2025 bear an uncanny resemblance to her recently released novel, Make No Mistake. The novel, written in 2019, is a feminist thriller about a corrupt American president, his billionaire cronies and their dismantling of democracy starting with women’s rights.
In March 2025, as media headlines began to mirror events in Make No Mistake, Wise released the novel as serial fiction on the Substack platform. Two months later, Make No Mistake had expanded from Substack to a podcast (on Apple and Spotify), a paperback and an e-book, attracting readers from across Canada, the United States and around the world. One reviewer called it “a thunderous love letter to feminist resistance—Wise’s thriller is The Handmaid’s Tale with a Molotov cocktail twist.”
Underground book clubs, covert apps, and social media campaigns are some of the unexpected strategies used by the main character, Maggie, a retired women’s rights activist. In another interesting blend of fiction and reality, book clubs are now springing up around Make No Mistake as readers examine some of the banned books and social justice issues explored in the novel.
“Writing this novel, and finding unconventional ways to share it with readers, is an act of resistance for me,” Wise said. “I hope that readers will be inspired to come together, speak out and change the world.”
Join Julie Wise at the Penticton Public Library on Thursday April 9th for a discussion about novels that seem to have predicted the future such as 1984 by George Orwell, Fahrenheti 451 by Ray Bradbury, and The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood.
(phone: 2507707782)
| 4/9/2026 |    |