6 Great Reads to Get Your Virtual Book Club Talking

Check out our list of spine-tingling mysteries, magical adventures, eye-opening journalism and inspiring autobiographies that are perfect discussion starters for your next virtual book club. 

“The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue” by V.E. Schwab
Genre: Fiction

If staying in for the last year has given you the travel blues, this imaginative adventure fantasy from bestselling author V.E. Schwab is your fix.  

In 16th century France, Addie LaRue makes a desperate bargain for immortality. But this deal comes with a catch. While Addie will live forever, she will also be forgotten by everyone she meets. This is where Addie’s adventure begins, and it spans across borders, generations and history. That is, until Addie runs into a young man in a bookstore who remembers her name.

“Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times” by Katherine May
Genre: Memoir

British author Katherine May’s contemplative memoir offers a warming message: winter is something to be embraced. And not just the season of winter—the hard times in our lives.

May’s writing beautifully details her own personal winter. Near her 40th birthday, her husband fell suddenly ill, and she was forced to leave her career as she faced her own medical issues. The author of several books about stress and hardship, May offers advice on embracing these difficult, but necessary times in our lives and lifting our spirits with the natural world, mythology and literature.

“The Boy from the Woods” by Harlan Coben
Genre: Thriller

Looking for a mystery? New York Times bestselling author Harlan Coben is here with yet another thrilling puzzler to unravel.

The boy is Wilde, who was found abandoned and living feral in the forest, with no memory of where he came from. Thirty years later, another child is missing. No one seems to know what happened to Naomi Pines before she disappeared—except that she was cruelly bullied at school. Wilde is on the case, piecing together Naomi’s disappearance as well as his own mysterious past, only to uncover a secret that is much larger—and more dangerous—than he ever bargained for.

“My Own Words” by Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Genre: Autobiography

Talk about an influential senior. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg changed the world for women, and continued to shape our country well into her later years. Now you can read the late justice’s story in her own words.

In this collection of Ginsburg’s writings, she discusses gender equality, her experience as a Jewish woman, law and lawyers in opera, and how we can look at the U.S. Constitution with fresh eyes. This book gives readers a behind-the-scenes look at the Supreme Court and an inspiring first-hand account of history as it unfolded with the help of one of our nation’s greatest change-makers.

“The Vanishing Half” by Brit Bennett
Genre: Historical Fiction

Longlisted for the National Book Award (and soon to be an HBO series), this emotional family saga explores the complex relationships between identity, race and family. 

“The Vanishing Half” follows the Vignes sisters, identical twins who grew up in a small, southern, Black community in the 1950s. But when the girls run away at sixteen, their lives take turns in radically different directions. Years later, one sister lives with her Black daughter in the town she tried so hard to escape. The other secretly passes as a white woman, hiding her true identity even from her own husband. When the twins’ daughters cross paths as adults, the past meets the present in unexpected ways.

“The Best of Me” by David Sedaris
Genre: Humor

Lighten the mood on your reading list with a book of essays that will make you laugh in the way that only David Sedaris can. For readers new to Sedaris’s witty humor, this book of his greatest hits is the perfect introduction.

See the world through Sedaris’s eyes as he struggles with the absurdity of everyday life, from shopping for prized taxidermy pieces to accidentally spitting a lozenge into a stranger’s lap and, of course, feeding a meat-eating bird by hand.

“Caste: The Origins of our Discontents” by Isabel Wilkerson
Genre: Nonfiction

This powerful and enlightening book has been hailed by critics and was featured in Oprah’s Book Club. American journalist Isabel Wilkerson takes a hard look at race in the United States, revealing that a caste system is at work right before our eyes.

With deep research and immersive storytelling, Wilkerson paints an illuminating and disturbing portrait of America’s history and how it has been influenced by an unspoken caste system. Comparing our society to the caste systems of India and even Nazi Germany, “Caste” is sure to change the way you see the world. 

More Reading to Keep You Connected

Want more ideas on books to read with family and friends? Check out our summer reading list for must-reads you might have missed!