There’s plenty to do during the summer, but one of our favorite lazy summer pastimes is diving into a really good book. These days, there are plenty of novels to choose from spanning a multitude of categories, time periods, worlds known and unknown and genres. How is anyone supposed to choose the right story when downtime during the summer is so precious?
Well, that’s where some of our favorite celebrities come in to save the day. They’ve actually given us all the reading recommendations we need to make sure our summer reading lists are fattened up with great picks. The following celebs have chosen thrillers, memoirs, sci-fi page-turners and shocking true stories that are going to keep your eyes glued right to the page. The sun may be shining and the beach may be calling, but trust us: All you’ll want to do is read if you end up choosing one of these recommendations.
Which books have celebrities like Oprah Winfrey, Constance Wu and Melissa McCarthy super-excited? Keep clicking and find out.
Oprah Winfrey
Count on Oprah Winfrey, the master of picking a good book, to have exactly the right thing for you to read this summer. On June 5, she announced her next pick, The Sun Does Shine: How I Found Life and Freedom on Death Row by Anthony Ray Hinton. Winfrey hyped up Hinton's story, captioning her video announcement on Instagram with the following: "Book Club friends, I’m SO passionate about my next pick. The Sun Does Shine by Anthony Ray Hinton. A man you should know. This unimaginable memoir is Anthony’s story of being falsely convicted and released from death row after 30 YEARS!"
The Sun Does Shine: How I Found Life and Freedom on Death Row (Hardcover), $14.99 at Amazon
Reese Witherspoon
Reese Witherspoon looked pleased as punch when she announced the pick for June for her book club: Something in the Water by Catherine Steadman. The book, which was announced as the pick in an Instagram post, was described by Witherspoon as "a psychological thriller that captivated me from page one. While scuba diving on their honeymoon in Bora Bora, newlyweds Mark and Erin make a shocking discovery…one that unfolds into a wild, page-turning ride!"
Something in the Water (Hardcover), $16.20 at Amazon
Kelly Clarkson
Clarkson's surprised us all (in a good way!) when she recently revealed she was all about Ashlee Vance's Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for the Fantastic Future. Vance's nonfiction book follow's Musk's rise to the top of the science and tech industries, also exploring what makes him so innovative as well as how he could thrive in a growing market of entrepreneurs and innovators.
Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for the Fantastic Future(Hardcover), $9.99 at Amazon
Melissa McCarthy
Melissa McCarthy can't get enough of her husband's book, Being a Dad is Weird: Lessons in Fatherhood from My Family to Yours. A memoir penned by actor, writer and director Ben Falcone, Being a Dad is Weird tells stories and anecdotes of Falcone's memories of his own father as well as the adventures he's gone on as a father raising two daughters.
Being a Dad is Weird: Lessons in Fatherhood from My Family to Yours (Hardcover), $13.79 at Amazon
Hilary Duff
Back in May, Hilary Duff was spotted on her Instagram reading Pachinko by Min Jin Lee. Pachinko tells the story of teenage Sunja, who becomes pregnant with a wealthy man's child only to reject him once she finds out he's married, instead marrying a traveling minister. You'll definitely want to find out how this dramatic historical drama plays out.
Pachinko (Paperback), $9.59 at Amazon
Emma Watson
Heart Berries by Terese Mailhot has Emma Watson hooked, and for good reason. According to Amazon, the nonfiction story "is a powerful, poetic memoir of a woman's coming of age on the Seabird Island Band in the Pacific Northwest. Having survived a profoundly dysfunctional upbringing only to find herself hospitalized and facing a dual diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder and bipolar II disorder; Terese Marie Mailhot is given a notebook and begins to write her way out of trauma."
Heart Berries (Hardcover), $15.31 at Amazon
Constance Wu
Last summer, Constance Wu was loving Jenny Zhang's Sour Heart, a short story collection of pieces about the Asian-American, Chinese and Chinese immigrant experience.
Sour Heart (Paperback), $13.60 at Amazon
Selma Blair
Blair couldn't get enough of The Lost Family by Jenna Blum recently. Posting a photo of it to Instagram, she captioned the picture, "On page 30 of a new book, and I am all in. My sister knows how heavenly I find a great read and she passed this advanced copy of @jenna_blum ‘s new #historicalfiction right to baby sis. #thelostfamily. Congratulations #jennablum. I can’t wait for the world to read it too. You are a gifted storyteller. Thank you."
Sounds like a pretty rousing endorsement, right?
The Lost Family (Hardcover), $20.54 at Amazon
Mindy Kaling
Mindy Kaling reminded us all that what we should be reading is one of the two books that she's written in recent years: Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (and Other Concerns) and Why Not Me?, both of which you can buy on now.
Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (Paperback), $9.13 at AmazonWhy Not Me? (Paperback), $12.46 at Amazon
Rashida Jones
Rashida Jones was repping her sister, Kidada Jones, and Jones' book, School of Awake over the summer of 2017. But we're pretty certain the book, which features both readings and activities to overcome obstacles and connect to your true self, is basically timeless.
School of Awake (Paperback), $12.88 at Amazon
Lena Dunham
Lena Dunham devoted an entire post to putting Caroline Kepnes' sci-fi thriller Providence front and center. Providence tells the story of Jon, who disappears from his hometown only to return to his childhood sweetheart with strange powers he can't remember getting. Meanwhile, in Providence, Rhode Island, perfectly healthy people are dropping dead. Are the two events connected?
Providence (Hardcover), $20.20 at Amazon
Olivia Wilde
Wilde was all about The Power by Naomi Alderman, which has drawn comparisons to Margaret Atwood's famous book 1985's The Handmaid's Tale. According to Amazon, "In The Power, the world is a recognizable place: there's a rich Nigerian boy who lounges around the family pool; a foster kid whose religious parents hide their true nature; an ambitious American politician; a tough London girl from a tricky family. But then a vital new force takes root and flourishes, causing their lives to converge with devastating effect. Teenage girls now have immense physical power — they can cause agonizing pain and even death. And with this small twist of nature, the world drastically resets."
The Power (Paperback), $15.29 at Amazon
Mandy Moore
This Is Us star Mandy Moore is all about Ronan Farrow's War on Peace: The End of Diplomacy and the Decline of American Influence. Sounds like a pretty brainy read, sure, but Farrow's smooth storytelling more than makes up for it.
War on Peace: The End of Diplomacy and the Decline of American Influence (Hardcover), $18.17 at Amazon
Kerry Washington
While she was filming the final season of Scandal, Kerry Washington encouraged her followers to pick up a copy of The Perfect Mother by Aimee Molloy. The story follows a group of moms who are friends living in Brooklyn. One night, one of the women's children is snatched from their crib, leading to a frantic search to find the child. Wanna know how it turns out?
The Perfect Mother (Hardcover), $15.29 at Amazon
Jessica Simpson
Jessica Simpson is all about Allison Pataki's memoir Beauty in the Broken Places: A Memoir of Love, Faith, and Resilience. Beauty tells the true-life story of Pataki and her husband, who suffered a stroke when she was five months pregnant. You will not want to put this heart-wrenching book down once you crack the spine, we promise.
Beauty in the Broken Places: A Memoir of Love, Faith, and Resilience (Hardcover), $14.75 at Amazon
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