Dua Lipa is the latest celebrity to launch a book club.
The English singer-songwriter announced her new club, an extension of her Service95 lifestyle newsletter, on Instagram. Her first selection is Douglas Stuart’s 2020 novel, Shuggie Bain, which won the Booker Prize and was a finalist for the Kirkus Prize and the National Book Award.
“Ever since I can remember, anywhere I go I take a book with me,” Dua Lipa wrote. “Reading is an incredibly important part of my life and one of my biggest joys. I’m so excited to start the @service95 Book Club where we can share that joy of discovery with each other.”
Lipa, who was born in London and raised there and in Kosovo, became a star after the release of her eponymous debut album in 2017. She was awarded the Grammy for best new artist two years after that, and one for best pop vocal album in 2020 for Future Nostalgia.
Lipa’s Instagram post features a slideshow of books including Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude, Khaled Hosseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns, Ocean Vuong’s On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, and Rohinton Mistry’s A Fine Balance.
In her newsletter, which includes an essay by Stuart about the images that inspired his book, Lipa praised Shuggie Bain, writing “This story of a young boy growing up with an alcoholic mother in 1980s Glasgow totally won my heart, and I can’t wait for us to explore it together.”
Michael Schaub, a journalist and regular contributor to NPR, lives near Austin, Texas.
