Janet Rich Edwards at Harvard Book Store
Harvard Book Store, 1256 Massachusetts Ave, Cambridge, MA
Admission: Free
Harvard Book Store welcomes Janet Rich Edwards —professor of epidemiology at Harvard University who works in the Division of Women’s Health at Brigham and Women’s Hospital—for a discussion of her national bestselling debut novel, Canticle, newly available in paperback in November 2026. About Canticle NATIONAL BESTSELLER * LONGLISTED FOR THE 2026 CAROL SHIELDS PRIZE FOR FICTION * NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS’ CHOICE * REAL SIMPLE BEST BOOKS OF 2025 * SPOTIFY BEST DEBUTS OF 2025 * GOODREADS READERS’ MOST ANTICIPATED BOOKS OF FALL A masterful debut novel following a spirited young woman’s explorations of faith, agency, and love in thirteenth-century Bruges. Aleys is sixteen years old and unusual: stubborn, bright, and prone to religious visions. She and her only friend, Finn, a young scholar, have been learning Latin together in secret—but just as she thinks their connection might become something more, everything unravels. When her father promises her in marriage to a merchant she doesn’t love, she runs away from home, finding shelter among the beguines, a fiercely independent community of religious women who refuse to answer to the Church. Among these hardworking and strong-willed women,…