"Shocking twists and silly moments" are promised in We Don鈥檛 Talk About Book Club, a season-ending production for Whalley-based Royal Canadian Theatre Company.

Patricia Brooke's new comedy, focused on four friends from college at their monthly book club meeting, world-premieres at Surrey Arts Centre in a four-show run in the Studio Theatre starting Friday, March 14, then moves across the river to Anvil Theatre for five more.

A private-school teacher who lives in New Westminster, Brooke is a rookie playwright whose Book Club script includes "adult themes, offensive language and discussions of infidelity," according to Royal Canadian's content warning.

The story follows a perfectionist stay-at-home mom who tries her best to keep friends together and discuss new things, while her family takes her for granted. Ultimately, drama unfolds, new friends are made and everyone discovers a little more about who they are and who they wish they were.

"It's definitely a comedy, mostly a comedy," Brooke explained. "What's at the heart of the play is how your friends become your family. For me, so many of the people I've met in theatre have become my family over time, and that's the theme of the play."

Brooke initially wrote We Don鈥檛 Talk About Book Club for a Royal Canadian show during the Dine Out Vancouver food festival two years ago, at the Sheraton hotel in Guildford. Impressed by the story, artistic director Kerri Norris urged Brooke to turn it into a main-stage production for the company instead.

Directed by Nitasha Rajoo, the production stars Norris (as Jo), Justine Jones (Margo), Niclole DesLauriers (Allie), Crystal Weltzin (Natalie) and Oliver de la Harpe (Thompson, husband of a book club member "who's been banished upstairs, so you mostly just hear his voice, yelling downstairs," Brooke noted).

The experience of having a play staged "feels a bit unreal at this point," Brooke said. "I'm thrilled, and can't wait to see it. I've tried very hard to not listen to anything about rehearsals and not get involved in any way, shape or form, so it'll be a complete surprise when I actually get to see it on opening night."

This is Brooke's biggest play-premiere yet, and she'd like to write more scripts. "Just finding the time to write is difficult," she added. "I have a couple projects I'm working on but they're on the back burner, because I have report cards due in a week."

Once upon a time, Brooke was a book club member, naturally. But, like one of the characters in her play, "I'm too persnickety about what I want to read to be in a book club," she said with a laugh. "No, I want to read what I want to read when I want to read it, not when someone else tells me to read it."

More details about We Don鈥檛 Talk About Book Club are posted on , where tickets are sold for the Surrey and New West show dates, or call the Surrey Arts Centre box office on 604-501-5566. Group and individual tickets are available, starting at $27.25.

Special dates include Royal Canadian's 2025-26 season announcement March 14 in Surrey, with free cupcakes and a first look at next season's posters, and a Talk Back event with playwright Brooke, director Rajoo and Book Club actors, March 21 at Anvil Theatre, New Westminster.