Step into the spotlight with book picks straight from the stars with the Amazing Book Challenge category, Celebrity Book Club.
This theme features must-read recommendations from your favorite celebrities’ book clubs, including Reese Witherspoon, Jenna Bush Hager, Oprah Winfrey and more. From heartfelt fiction and gripping thrillers to powerful memoirs, these celebrity-approved titles are guaranteed to get people talking.
To see the full list of recommendations and the other Amazing Book Challenge categories, visit www.naperville-lib.org/ABC.
“Spectacular Things” by Beck Dorey-Stein, Reese’s Book Club
Mia and Cricket are the gifted daughters of a young single mother. Each sister has a role to fill: The responsible and academically minded Mia assumes the position of caregiver far too young, while Cricket, a bouncing ball of energy and talent, seems born for soccer stardom. But the cost of achieving athletic greatness comes at a steep price. As Mia and Cricket grow up, they must grapple with the legacy of their mother’s secret past while navigating their own precarious future.
“Broken Country” by Clare Leslie Hall, Reese’s Book Club
Beth and her husband Frank are happily married, but their relationship relies on the past staying buried. When Beth’s brother-in-law shoots a dog going after their sheep, Beth doesn’t realize the gunshot will alter the course of their lives. The dog belonged to her teenage love, Gabriel Wolfe. As Beth is pulled back into Gabriel’s life, tensions around the village rise and dangerous secrets from the past resurface, this time with deadly consequences. Beth is forced to choose between the woman she once was and the woman she has become.
“The Names” by Florence Knapp, Read with Jenna
In the wake of a storm, Cora sets off with her 9-year-old daughter, Maia, to register her son’s birth. Her husband, Gordon, a local doctor, respected in the community but a terrifying and controlling presence at home, intends for her to name the infant after him. But when the registrar asks what she’d like to call the child, Cora hesitates… Spanning 35 years, what follows are three alternate and alternating versions of Cora’s and her young son’s lives, shaped by her choice of name.
“Culpability” by Bruce Holsinger, Oprah’s Book Club
When the family’s autonomous minivan collides with an oncoming car, 17-year-old Charlie is in the driver’s seat, with his father, Noah, riding shotgun. In the back seat, tweens Alice and Izzy are on their phones, while their mother, Lorelei, a world leader in the field of artificial intelligence, is absorbed in her work. Yet each family member harbors a secret, implicating them all in the tragic accident. During a week-long recuperation, the family confronts the excruciating moral dilemmas triggered by the crash.
“Not Quite Dead Yet” by Holly Jackson, Good Morning America Book Club
Twenty-seven years old and back home, Jet is still waiting for her life to begin. Until one night, when she is violently attacked and suffers a catastrophic head injury. Doctors are certain that within a week, the injury will trigger a fatal aneurysm. To her parents’ dismay, Jet rejects an extremely risky operation to guarantee herself at least a few more days to solve her own murder. With the one week she has left, she looks at everyone in a new light: her family, her former best friend turned sister-in-law and her ex-boyfriend.
“Atmosphere” by Taylor Jenkins Reid, Good Morning America Book Club
Thoughtful and reserved, Joan is content with her life as a professor of physics and astronomy until she comes across an advertisement seeking the first women scientists to join NASA’s space shuttle program. Selected from a pool of thousands of applicants in the summer of 1980, Joan begins training at Houston’s Johnson Space Center alongside an exceptional group of fellow candidates. As the new astronauts become unlikely friends and prepare for their first flights, Joan finds a passion and a love she never imagined. In this new light, Joan begins to question everything she thinks she knows about her place in the observable universe.
Ashlee Conour is the marketing specialist at Naperville Public Library.
