This year’s MacReads selection, “In the Wilderness: Coming of Age in Unknown Country,” will be featured in a reading by author Kim Barnes Wednesday, May 12, at 7:30 p.m. in the Jereld R. Nicholson Library at Linfield College.

A community discussion about the book, led by David Massey, Linfield College chaplain, will be held Thursday, April 29, at 6:30 p.m. at Third Street Books. Barnes will also speak to some classes during her visit and sign books on Wednesday, May 12, from 3-4 p.m. at Third Street Books. Books will be available for purchase and signing at the event which is free and open to the public.

“In the Wilderness: Coming of Age in Unknown Country, ” a memoir focusing on family, religion and the Idaho wilderness, was selected as a finalist for the 1997 Pulitzer Prize. Barnes is also the author of the novel “Finding Caruso” and “Hungry for the World.” Her essays, stories and poems have appeared in a number of journals and anthologies, including The Georgia Review, Shenandoah, MORE magazine and the Pushcart Prize Anthology. Her latest novel, “A Country Called Home,” has received the 2009 PEN USA Literary Award in Fiction and was the Barnes and Noble book-of-the-month club selection in December.

Barnes is currently working on a third novel set in Saudi Arabia as well as a collection of personal essays and a screenplay. She teaches creative writing at the University of Idaho and lives with her husband, the poet Robert Wrigley, outside Moscow.

MacReads is in its sixth year and is designed to create intergenerational conversations with a common book and discussion opportunities. It is sponsored by the Linfield College English Department, Friends of Nicholson Library, Friends of McMinnville Public Library and Third Street Books. It is open to any person or group interested.

Books will be available at Third Street Books in McMinnville. For more information, contact Susan Barnes Whyte, director of Linfield’s Nicholson Library, 503-883-2517.