Celebrity Book Lovers and Their Famous Book Clubs

From actors and singers to world-famous athletes and talk show hosts, celebrity book lovers are more common than you might realize. In fact, many of them have taken their love of books to new heights by spearheading different campaigns, celebrity book clubs, and drives to increase reading.

Some famous book lovers use their status to raise awareness about the benefits of reading. Others team up with companies like ThriftBooks and organize book drives to deliver books to underserved populations.

Join ThriftBooks as we celebrate a few celebrity book lovers, and read on to learn about their initiatives.

Celebrity Book Lovers and Their Famous Book Clubs

Some people with celebrity status have taken their love of reading and formed their own book clubs, sharing recommendations and favorite titles with other bibliophiles.

Oprah Winfrey

Oprah Winfrey has one of the most well-known famous book clubs. Oprah's Book Club began in 1996 as a segment of her talk show that highlighted books chosen by Oprah once a month for viewers to read and discuss. She often hosted the authors on her show as well.

Oprah's recommendations have included:

• The Way of Integrity by Martha Beck
• Bewilderment by Richard Powers
• Caste by Isabel Wilkerson

Although the Oprah Winfrey Show no longer airs, Oprah's Book Club is still very much alive online. You can also follow Oprah's book club selections with ThriftBooks.

Reese Witherspoon

Each month, actress Reese Witherspoon chooses a book with a woman as the main character. Reese's Book Club also features books written by women. The club aims to celebrate women, and selections introduce book club members to new authors, perspectives, and voices.

Reese Witherspoon's recommendations have included:

• The Club by Ellery Lloyd
• True Biz by Sara Novic
• By the Book by Jasmine Guillory

All about the joy of reading, Reese's Book Club also has an app, and proceeds from purchases made through the app are donated to advancing literacy throughout the community. You can keep up with her book club selections with ThriftBooks at our book clubs page.

Emma Watson

Emma Watson may be best known for her role as Hermione Granger in Harry Potter, but she's also a stout advocate for female empowerment and equality. Her celebrity book club, Our Shared Shelf, was full of female-powered themed book recommendations that are inspirational, thought-provoking, funny, and sad.

Emma's recommendations have included:

• Hood Feminism by Mikki Hendall
• Whose Story Is This? by Rebecca Solnit
• A Bigger Picture by Vanessa Nakate

While Ms. Watson has discontinued her management of Our Shared Shelf, you can still keep up with the community and find similar reading suggestions at Goodreads where book clubs members have kept the club going.

Jenna Bush Hager

The daughter of former president George W. Bush, Jenna Bush Hager shares her favorite reads through a program called Read With Jenna on the Today Show.

Jenna's recommendations have included:

• Memphis by Tara M. Stringfellow
• Groundskeeping by Lee Cole
• Blake Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson

The Read With Jenna program also offers opportunities for collaboration on Instagram, Facebook, and Goodreads. You can keep up with Jenna's picks on our site's book clubs page.

Dolly Parton

Dolly Parton is the creator of Dolly's Imagination Library, a club that provides children in eligible communities around the world with free books each month.

Dolly's recommendations for children have included:

• Mother Goose by Tomie dePaola
• Llama Llama Mad at Mama by Anne Dowling
• Rhymes Round the World by Kay Chorao

Participation in the Imagination Library program is a wonderful way to encourage a love of books in young readers.

A Special Celebrity Book Lover: Orion Jean

Recently named TIME's Kid of the Year, Orion Jean founded the Race to Kindness initiative in an effort to donate a half-million books to kids in need. Teaming up with Orion Jean's Race to Kindness is Book Drive for Kids, Literacy Achieves, Literacy Connection, Reading is Fundamental, and Reading Partners. These groups work to give kids books at free book fairs.

Last tear ThriftBooks was honored to donate 300,000 books to Orion Jean's cause. In 2022, we look forward to our partnership with Race to Kindness and Book Drive for Kids so we can help their free book fairs expand to more cities across the country.

ThriftBooks salutes all the celebrities who use their influence and voice for the love of books, and we invite you to join us in supporting readers and causes every day.

Read more and spend less with ThriftBooks!

Read more by ThriftBooks Team