One of the unfortunate offshoots of the cancellation of “The Late Show” with Stephen Colbert—his swan song was the May 21st episode —is the apparent concomitant demise of his short-lived celebrity book club. Launched in June 2025 with the comedian-host’s usual tongue-in-cheek swagger, the once-a-month club settled on Samantha Harvey’s 2024 Booker Prize-winner “Orbital” as its first selection. “It won the Booker Prize,” Colbert noted in his on-air introduction, “and it won the even more prestigious prize of being my first book club pick!”
In subsequent months, Colbert chose books by Ian McEwan (“What We Can Know”), Sophie Elmhirst (“A Marriage at Sea”) and George Saunders (“Vigil”), among others, introducing the selections on air and posting discussions on the club’s Instagram and YouTube channels and occasionally hosting the authors on “The Late Show.” He’s with Saunders, as “Vigil” was announced as the February title, here on video.
Novelist Tom Perrotta’s “Ghost Town” was the last book chosen on April 30, and before his final show aired, Colbert posted on social media: “It’s always sad when a good book (club) comes to an end. Thanks for reading with us!”
Though the final chapter has been written for his particular version, the celebrity book club as a phenomenon, famously launched by Oprah Winfrey in 1996, continues to thrive. Famous folk plugging their favorite reads on the airwaves and online include actress Reese Witherspoon, former Indiana Colts quarterback Andrew Luck, singer-songwriter Dua Lipa, former presidential daughter and “Today” show host Jenna Bush Hager, lead singer Florence Welch of the indie rock band Florence + the Machine, actress Emma Roberts and “The Tonight Show” host Jimmy Fallon.
And the award goes to …: Calling it “a captivating, slyly sophisticated novel,” the jury of the International Booker Prize named “Taiwan Travelogue” by Taiwanese author Yáng Shuāng-zi its 2026 winner at a ceremony at the Tate Modern in London in mid-May. Disguised as a rediscovered travelogue from the 1930s by a fictional Japanese author named Aoyama Chizuko, whose country at the time was in imperial control of Taiwan, the novel tracks its protagonist’s complex relationship with her younger interpreter and guide as the pair make their way across the island country sampling all of its most intriguing dishes. Though it’s definitely historical fiction, the novel poses questions about power imbalance and cultural destruction that its author considers relevant today, as Taiwan resists mainland China’s efforts to gain dominance. Originally published in Mandarin Chinese in 2020, it was translated into English by Lin King, who will split the $67,500 prize with Yáng. In 2024, “Taiwan Travelogue” also won the pair the National Book Award for a work in translation.
Authorpalooza: I’m not sure when it happened, but somehow, when my back was turned, the publishing powers that be must have proclaimed June the official your-favorite-authors-release-new-books-month. No fewer than five of them are just coming out and clamoring for piling up-rights on my overburdened nightstand. On June 2, Harper bring us “Whistler” (Harper, $30, 295 pages) from Ann Patchett, the award-winning author of the much beloved “Bel Canto,” “The Dutch House” and 2023’s huge best-seller “Tom Lake.” The new novel is about Daphne Fuller, a 53-year-old creative writing teacher whose chance encounter with a man who dropped out of her life when she was a preteen after being her much beloved stepfather for less than two years churns up a complex of memories and emotions — and a rekindled relationship. Patchett, who runs Parnassus books in Nashville, launches a 20-city book tour that did not initially include the Bay Area, but at the behest of fellow bookseller Elaine Petrocelli of the Book Passage, she’s doing virtual appearance here at 1 p.m. June 15. Check bookpassage.com.
Also coming out June 2 is “The Typing Lady: And Other Fictions” (Viking, $31, 336 pages), the first short story collection from the “My Year of Meats” novelist Ruth Ozeki, whose wonderful novel “A Tale for the Time Being” was a Booker Prize finalist in 2013. Among her new work’s 11 offerings, which feature characters on the cusp of major realizations or life changes, is the intriguing tale of a senior citizen who creates a fake dating profile to spy on her granddaughter’s love life and stirs up more than she bargained for. Ozeki will make two Bay Area appearances, at 7 p.m. June 9 at Kepler’s books in Menlo Park and 7 p.m. June 10 at Book Shop Santa Cruz, where she will engage in dialogue with novelist Karen Joy Fowler. Details are at keplers.com and bookshopsantacruz.com.
Fans of “Hamnet” author (and Oscar nominee for her screenplay) Maggie O’Farrell will be interested to hear about the June 2 publication of her new book, “Land” (Knopf, $29, 400 pages), a historical novel set in a mid-19th-century Ireland that has been ravaged by the great famine that depopulated much of the countryside. Advance word on it is replete with lavish praise from other well-known authors, including this from “Trespasses” novelist Louise Kennedy: “A deep-mapping of a place and its people, a heart-bursting story of resilience and love. ‘Land’ is simply the best novel I’ve read in years.”
Bay Area author and McSweeney’s publisher Dave Eggers adds to his impressive roster of published works with the June 9 release of “Contrapposto” (Knopf, $32, 432 pages). The cerebral Mr. Eggers uses an Italian art term for his title to symbolize the shifting balance between his two main characters, both artists, over their 65-year-long, on-again, off-again relationship. His book tour includes two Bay Area stops, both ticketed events, at 7 p.m. June 16 at Calvary Presbyterian Church in San Francisco, sponsored by book Passage; and at 7 p.m. June 17 at Kepler’s Books in Menlo Park. Find details at bookpassage.com and keplers.com.
San Francisco author Andrew Sean Greer continues his Pulitzer Prize-winning, lighthearted touch with “Villa Coco” (Doubleday, $27, 288 pages), a new novel author Kate Atkinson heralds as “such a sunny book.” In it, Greer takes us to Italy (where he also has a home, in Venice), as his young man protagonist enters the employ of a charming little old lady — a baroness — who is keeping up a somewhat shabby villa in Tuscany. Greer had me breaking into a grin with his first sentence: “The little Tuscan train station, brown shutters against yellow paint, seemed so fanciful you might unwrap it and find it was chocolate.”
The author’s three Bay Area book tour appearances look especially inviting: a 7 to 10 p.m. June 12 party at the Peacock Lounge in San Francisco sponsored by Book Passage; a 1 p.m. June 13 stop at Book Passage in Corte Madera, where he will be joined by his twin brother (who knew?) Michael Greer; and a shared appearance with Berkeley author Ayelet Waldman, plugging her also lighthearted new novel “A Perfect Hand,” at Rakestraw Books in Danville at 6 p.m. June 13. The author’s website, andrewgreer.com, has specifics.
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Hooked on Books is a monthly column by Sue Gilmore on literary buzz and upcoming book events. Look for it on the last Thursday of the month.