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Two Books at a Time: August 2020 Celebrity Book Club Picks

More book clubs are selecting a second book for the month as some continue their promise of reading works by authors of color in the wake of the latest anti-racism protests.

AMERIE’S BOOK CLUB

The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones

“Jones is unflinching in his exploration of vengeance and justice, the realities of living and growing up Native today, as well as community and where tradition fits into the modern world,” Amerie wrote on the book club’s Instagram profile. “At turns poignant and difficult to digest, I found the story brimming with despair, anger, and, despite everything, hope.”

BELLETRIST BOOK CLUB

Luster by Raven Leilani

Blue Ticket by Sophie Mackintosh

Actress Emma Roberts’ book club with Karah Preiss have taken the two-book route this month for the first time.

“Loving #luster 💖 are you?” Emma shared on Instagram in a selfie with the book.

GMA BOOK CLUB

The Lions of Fifth Avenue by Fiona Davis

“It’s set at the New York Public Library and it’s about a family that lives in an apartment deep inside the building, an apartment that actually existed,” the author told Good Morning America. “It’s about the magic of the written word and the power of women’s voices, and it’s dedicated to some of my favorite people: librarians.”

KAIA GERBER’S BOOK CLUB

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

Teen supermodel Kaia Gerber selects several books throughout the month, and she has chosen a summer book club favorite. She also hosted author Brit Bennett on Instagram Live.

NONAME BOOK CLUB

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination by Toni Morrison

Indie rapper Noname is celebrating the first anniversary of her book club that focuses on social science books for readers of color. This month the book club made its two selections: The Vanishing Half from Noname and Playing in the Dark as the homie pick.

OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB

Caste by Isabel Wilkerson

“It explains why we are where we are in terms of racial injustice and inequality,” Oprah said on her book club website, “and it show us how to rebuild a world in which all are truly equal and free.”

READ WITH JENNA – TODAY SHOW BOOK CLUB

The Comeback by Ella Berman

Here For It by R. Eric Thomas

Jenna Bush Hager, Today Show correspondent and presidential daughter, selected two books for August for the first time in the 2-year-old book club’s history.

“This beautifully written and compulsively readable book broke me from my pandemic blockage,” she said of The Comeback on Instagram.

Jenna partnered with Noelle Santos, the owner of The Bronx-based indie bookstore The Lit Bar, to pick Here For It.

“I just loved how she was bringing a new face to literature and I loved her passion for it,” Jenna said about Noelle in Today.

REESE’S BOOK CLUB

Everything Inside by Edwidge Danticat

You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson

Recently Emmy-nominated producer for the Hulu miniseries based on the novel Little Fires Everywhere, Reese Witherspoon named the latest short story collection by Edwidge Danticat as the monthly pick for her book club.

“#EverythingInside is a collection of short stories anchored in Haitian culture about love, love loss and love of country,” the book club posted on Instagram. “#EdwidgeDanticat encourages you to find rays of hope in each story and to take moments in between to let the narratives sink in.⁠”

Reese’s Book Club also announced last week its young adult version, which chose You Should See Me in a Crown as its inaugural selection. Now, the book club will choose a novel for adult readers and another novel for the YA audience each month.

“I’ve been reading so many incredible, diverse stories in the YA genre and can’t wait to share them with you each month as an additional pick,” Reese said in the announcement of Reese’s Book Club YA.

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Beach Reads, Memoirs Dominate the Summer: July 2020 Celebrity Book Club Picks

With the impact of the anti-Black racism protests last month, some of the celebrity-founded book clubs kept the focus on Black stories as others chose the top books of the summer including reads perfect for the beach (if it’s open) and texts exploring gender and sexual identity.

AMERIE’S BOOK CLUB

You Exist Too Much by Zaina Arafat

The debut novel features a Palestinian American girl who is yelled at by a group of men for showing her legs on a trip to Bethlehem. The experience eventually allows her to tell her mother she’s queer as she moves to different spaces to find her true self.

“I rooted for her and hurt for her as she tried to find her way through one bad decision after another,” Amerie wrote on Instagram. “The main character, whose name is never revealed, stayed with me long after I closed the book, as did her hope for yet another shot at love.”

BELLETRIST BOOK CLUB

The Dragons, The Giant, The Women: A Memoir by Wayétu Moore

The author of She Would Be King and founder of nonprofit One Moore Book has a new memoir about her experience living through the civil war in Liberia. At five years old, she’s waiting to be reunited with her mother, who’s studying in New York, then her world is turned upside down with the war. Her family flees on foot from their home and get smuggled across the border of Sierra Leone, where they get a chance to fly to the U.S.

Belletrist, founded by actress Emma Roberts and producer Karah Preiss, also chose the Black woman-owned Semicolon Bookstore in Chicago as its indie bookstore of the month.

GMA BOOK CLUB

Sex and Vanity by Kevin Kwan

The Crazy Rich Asians series creator’s new book takes place on the island of Capri with a half-Chinese, half-White woman trying to fall for the well-off White man her family likes while avoiding another man, who is Chinese, she keeps suppressing her feelings for.

“It’s a summer escape full of travel, food, fun and fashion,” Kevin told Good Morning America. “The outrageous characters will make your crazy families seem almost normal.”

KAIA GERBER’S BOOK CLUB

Darling Days: A Memoir by iO Tillett Wright

Born female, the author comes of age in downtown New York with a young widowed mother and adopts the persona of a boy amid the 1980s “intersection of punk, poverty, heroin, and art.”
“In talking to him about his experience publishing this book, he taught me that writers who happen to be queer too often are dismissed as ‘queer writers’ and their books, regardless of the topics they cover, end up exclusively stocked on ‘LGBT author’ shelves,” Kaia wrote in an Instagram post. “Darling Days goes far beyond this—it is a story about neglect, creativity, internalized homophobia, and the beauty you can make out of pain. it is a New York story of growing up and out of the life you are born into.” 

NONAME’S BOOK CLUB

Are Prisons Obsolete? by Angela Y. Davis

Captive Genders: Trans Embodiment and the Prison Industrial Complex by Eric A. Stanley and Nat Smith

Rapper Noname picks Are Prisons Obsolete?, a book that calls for the abolition of prisons and how it will benefit society as a whole. The homie pick, Captive Genders, comes from Che Gossett. It studies trans and gender-queer people in prison with the most recent version including a foreword from CeCe MacDonald, who was imprisoned for killing a transphobic attacker, and an essay by Chelsea Manning, the former U.S. Army soldier who transitioned amid getting sentenced for espionage.

OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB

Deacon King Kong by James McBride

This novel tells the story of a church deacon who shoots the neighborhood drug dealer point blank range in front of the community and the aftermath.

“In naming Deacon King Kong my latest Oprah’s Book Club selection, I am hoping readers will find in it what I did: sorrow, joy, resilience, humanity, and an understanding that while we struggle with pain and trauma, we can find shelter in one another—just as the characters in the Cause housing project in McBride’s Brooklyn do,” Oprah wrote in the Instagram announcement. 

READ WITH JENNA – TODAY SHOW BOOK CLUB

Friends and Strangers by J. Courtney Sullivan

Jenna Bush Hager’s book club via her Today Show gig is one of the hottest books of the season. The main character is a new mother who hires a college senior as a baby-sitter. As they grow close, the baby-sitter’s relationship with the mother’s father-in-law leads to a betrayal.

“I wanted to explore American life in the pre-Trump years and sort of how we got here,” the author said in an article introducing the book club pick. “The book very much digs into the gig economy, the shrinking safety net and the notion that privilege takes many different forms.”

REESE’S BOOK CLUB

I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness by Austin Channing Brown

The Guest List by Lucy Foley

After the book club delayed its selection announcement in June, actress Reese Witherspoon directed her book club to make two selections—a first to recognize current events. Both books will be read over June and July.

“Elevating women’s stories is at the core of Reese’s Book Club. I love how this community champions the narrative for women and we are just getting started,” the book club placed in a graphic on Instagram. “Unity and understanding through the lens of storytelling is how we will continue these meaningful conversations.”

Readers expressed their disappointment in the comments over the book club adding a book by a Black woman author last minute and not pushing back the book by a White woman author to another month.

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Recognizing Racial Injustice Delays and Defines Announcements: June 2020 Celebrity Book Club Picks

The deaths of Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and George Floyd and the subsequent worldwide protests to combat racial injustice affected the celebrity book clubs with many delaying their monthly book selection announcements.

Most book clubs make the official announcement on social media the first week of the month, but some news on the latest picks came the second week of June and highlighted works by black women authors.

AMERIE’S BOOK CLUB

My Vanishing Country by Bakari Sellers

“In his unapologetically emotional memoir, CNN analyst @BakariSellers shares what it is to grow up “Black, country, and proud,” Amerie wrote in the book club’s Instagram announcement. “From the tragic event that helped to shape his life though it occurred before his birth, to his rise in politics while pursuing his education, to his dedication to not allowing those in his rural South Carolina community to be forgotten, to his personal experiences with anxiety, Bakari Sellers’ story left me amazed while also leaving me to wonder just how he managed to fit so much life into such a short time.”

BELLETRIST BOOK CLUB

GMA BOOK CLUB

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

Actress Emma Roberts’ book club and Good Morning America‘s book club chose the same book again this month along with other major national book clubs. For May, both book clubs chose The Book of V. by Anna Solomon.

Belletrist shared that it delayed its announcement due to the civil unrest.

“We know we’re about a week later than usual, but we wanted to spend last week thinking about the ways in which we, as an online community, will be moving forward as we approach this seismic shift in our collective consciousness.”

“We have loved Brit’s book since we first got it a few months ago and are very excited to finally announce,” Belletrist stated in its message on Instagram. “Please stay tuned as we will have a more in depth conversation with Brit towards the end of the month, and look out for our weekly quotes, which are curated this month by this month’s author!”

“It’s a compelling read about twin sisters, inseparable as children, who ultimately choose to live in two very different worlds: one black, and one white,” Good Morning America‘s book club wrote in its post. “It’s a powerful story about family, compassion, identity and roots.”

KAIA GERBER’S BOOK CLUB

Kaia Gerber shares book selections every week for her book club on Instagram, but she decided to give her friend Janaya Future Khan, international ambassador for Black Lives Matter, a platform on her account with over 5.6 million followers. She bookstagrammed a pile including Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings and Danielle Allen’s Cuz: An American Tragedy, which follows the author’s journey in trying to rescue her younger cousin who dies after incarceration for a crime he commits as a teenager.

 

“in lieu of book club this week, i am honored that my friend and international ambassador of @blklivesmatter @janayathefuture will be going live on my page. they have been such a leader and powerful voice,” she wrote in her post. “they helped educate me on understanding the weight of privilege and the importance of these protests—and they have continuously and tirelessly worked to give people an understanding of what the mission of Black Lives Matter means for this country and for this world.”

NONAME’S BOOK CLUB

Blood in My Eye by George L. Jackson

Race Music: From Bebop to Hip-Hop by Guthrie Ramsey

Rapper Noname’s book club had selected one book last month, a change from its two-books-a-month template, but the book club returned to two books due to what’s going on in the world now.

“I felt it was important to go back to our old routine of picking two books a month,” Noname said on the book club’s Instagram profile. “In addition to reading Race Music I chose Blood In My Eye by George Jackson. Books about revolutionary action and resistance are vital during this time.” 

Blood In My Eye was written by George Jackson, who died days after completing the book in 1971 at the hands of San Quentin State Prison guards during an alleged escape attempt. He was serving a sentence for stealing $70 from a gas station.

The homie pick, Race Music: From Bebop to Hip-Hop, is from the book club’s project manager Shakira in honor of June being Black Music Month.

OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB

Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family by Robert Kolker

Oprah is finishing up Hidden Valley Road, according to her book club’s schedule though it may have been pushed back with giving space online for the current civil unrest. The book club has posted about anti-racism books to read for kids and young adults.

READ WITH JENNA – TODAY SHOW BOOK CLUB

A Burning by Megha Majumdar

The debut novel surrounds an ambitious Muslim girl from the slums who is accused of executing a terrorist attack because of a careless Facebook comment.

“I think books are a tool for empathy,” Jenna said in her announcement. “And now when we are stuck at home—and I definitely won’t be traveling to India this summer—this is a tool for all of us to learn more about the plight of people all over the world.”

“I started writing from a place of alarm and anger,” Majumdar told Today in the article. “India has been changing in frightening ways and growing more intolerant of minority communities, more extremist. I definitely hope that readers will see resonances in the U.S. as well.”

REESE’S BOOK CLUB

I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness by Austin Channing Brown

The Guest List by Lucy Foley

After the book club delayed its selection announcement, actress Reese Witherspoon directed her book club to make two selections—a first to recognize current events. Both books will be read over June and July.

“Elevating women’s stories is at the core of Reese’s Book Club. I love how this community champions the narrative for women and we are just getting started,” the book club placed in a graphic on Instagram. Unity and understanding through the lens of storytelling is how we will continue these meaningful conversations.”

Readers expressed their disappointment in the comments over the book club adding a book by a black woman author last minute and not pushing back the book by a white woman author to another month.

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May 2020 Celebrity Book Club Picks

AMERIE’S BOOK CLUB

Singer and author Amerie will read Deacon King Kong by James McBride with her book club.

“James McBride tackles trauma, the Black migration, community, racism (of both Southern and Northern variety), and the perils of Growing Up While Black with subtlety and humor,” she wrote in her Instagram announcement. “In his deft hands, the exploration of such themes within a premise in which a perpetually drunk deacon shoots a teen drug dealer is not depressing or gratuitous, but intimate, funny, and full of hope.”

BELLETRIST BOOK CLUB

GMA BOOK CLUB

Emma Roberts, the actress and book connoisseur of Belletrist, and Good Morning America crowned The Book of V. by Anna Solomon as their monthly book club pick.

The book describes the intersecting story between a struggling writer in Brooklyn balancing motherhood and being a second wife, a  political wife who receives a humiliating favor from her husband, and an independent young woman in ancient Persia who may have become a sacrifice to the king in order to save her people.

“I think a lot of readers will find some part of themselves in this book,” the author tells GMA. Whether you relate most to the headstrong Esther, who does not want to become queen to Vivian Barr, a senator’s wife torn between following conventions and breaking free or to Lily, a contemporary mother of two struggling to figure out what she even wants, you’ll recognize and root for the characters in this book.”

KAIA GERBER’S BOOK CLUB

 

Rising teen supermodel and the daughter of legend Cindy Crawford, Kaia Gerber started a weekly book club in March. This week, she announced to her Instagram followers that she’s reading Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens.

She will discuss the book on Friday, May 15 with her mother on Instagram Live at 5 p.m. PST.

Since her book selection changes every week with Instagram Live interviews with authors and others in the literary realm, check out her social media channel to keep up with selections for the rest of the month.

NONAME’S BOOK CLUB

Busy revolutionizing the book club model, indie rapper Noname’s book club usually selects two books each month particularly for readers of color. She chooses a book, which this month has yet to be announced, and the homie pick, the classic black revolutionary memoir Assata: An Autobiography by Assata Shakur, which comes from Blake and Delency, the founders of People’s Breakfast Oakland.

OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB

Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family by Robert Kolker is still Oprah Winfrey’s book club pick, which was named at the beginning of April.

The biography of a family where six out of 12 of the children were born with schizophrenia and became a major source of research for scientists working to understand the genetics behind the devastating mental illness.

“This is a riveting true story of an American family that reads like a medical detective journey,” Oprah announced in a video. “It reveals the shame, denial, shock, confusion and misunderstanding of mental illness at a time when no one was really sure what schizophrenia was or how to treat it.”

READ WITH JENNA – TODAY SHOW BOOK CLUB

Through her Today Show correspondent gig, former first daughter Jenna Bush Hager chose All Adults Here by Emma Straub for her May selection.

“I loved it because I thought, on one hand, it was light and funny,” Jenna said in an article. “On the other, Emma Straub has the capability of writing in a way that explores these themes that are important and interesting.”

REESE’S BOOK CLUB

Actress and producer Reese Witherspoon picked The Henna Artist by Indian-born author Alka Joshi for her monthly book club.

This debut novel surrounds a teenager in India who escapes an abusive marriage and ends up in 1950s Jaipur where she rises as a prominent henna artist and confidante to the wealthy women of the upper class who could never know her secret.

“This vivid story is so rich and complex… reading about Lakshmi’s journey from escaping an abusive marriage to becoming one of the most sought-after henna artists in Jaipur captivated me from the first chapter to the final page,” Reese shared on her book club website.

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Author Jia Tolentino and Model Kaia Gerber Discuss What to Take From ‘Trick Mirror’ During Quarantine

The novel coronavirus quarantine has produced another celebrity book club. Supermodel Kaia Gerber, daughter of the legendary Cindy Crawford, started a book club that’s already receiving praise from fans and young Hollywood.

Now a month into her book club, she had an Instagram Live conversation with Jia Tolentino, the author of Trick Mirror: Reflections on Self-Delusion, on Friday night with an average high of 2,200 viewers. Kaia started the chat saying she found the book to be a refreshing take on modern-day philosophy.

This is how publisher Penguin Random House describes the essay collection: “Tolentino writes about a cultural prism: the rise of the nightmare social internet; the advent of scamming as the definitive millennial ethos; the literary heroine’s journey from brave to blank to bitter; the punitive dream of optimization, which insists that everything, including our bodies, should become more efficient and beautiful until we die.”

A staff writer at The New Yorker, Jia talked about the ills of the internet and social media, a focus in her book, but also mentioned its current necessity as we grapple with self-isolation and quarantine due to the coronavirus crisis. Jia brought up how the internet and social media has made people perform for attention. She asked Kaia about her personal experiences since the Gen Z model has 5.5 million followers due to her career and stature.

Now 18, Kaia said she started her Instagram at 14 and noticed how social media can change a person and their professional goals and give more attention to influencers rather than, for example, doctors and nurses who are saving lives during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The internet, for better for worse, is the biggest change of this era,” Jia said during the conversation. “It’s become this nervous system of our society… There’s an unavoidable centrality to it that seems like every story in a way is an internet story, no matter what.” She added we have a natural impulse to be seen, to be recognized, to be liked, and the business of social media takes these behaviors and monetizes “every inch of human life.”

They discussed how social media and the internet has to be impacting teens’ lives now and adding unique pressures never before experienced. Jia, a millennial who said she graduated during the Great Recession, said it would’ve been “dark” if she owned a smartphone in high school. With dreams to attend Columbia University, Kaia said as social media became a regular existence around her and she became hyper cautious in order to stay clean for college application times.

Jia pointed out to the feminism parts of the book where women were not able to apply for credit cards alone until the Equal Credit Opportunity Act in 1974 and how marriage is supposed to be the main life-changing event for a woman. Kaia brought up how her mother’s wedding dress was revolutionary in a way because it was a slip dress when sexy was looked down upon for a bride.

The chat came to a close with Jia saying how clear it is during the coronavirus quarantine that we can’t wholly replace in-person interaction with the internet and social media. Kaia said she would read anything else Jia writes and added the excitement of being able to have the conversation:

“This is the coolest thing ever. Truly the only people I fangirl over are writers and authors because I admire it so much because the idea of sitting down and writing an entire book is so intimidating to me, but I would read all of them.”

Earlier in the month, Kaia had an Instagram Live chat with the stars of Normal People on Hulu, Daisy Edgar-Jones and Paul Mescal. The TV series is based on Sally Rooney’s literary fiction book about two unlikely friends who develop a complex relationship in high school then college.