Prompt Response Seven: Andrew Luck Book Club

When thinking about celebrity book clubs, I remember last year when Indianapolis Colts quarterback, Andrew Luck announced that he was starting a book club.

I remember talking about this in a room full of other librarians and we were so surprised. Pretty much our team's MVP is taking the time to start a book club? There was no way he was actually in charge of it - maybe it was a PR thing. What kind of books does the guy read? All sports? We chuckled about it.

Boy were we a little judgmental when we should've been ecstatic. Reading the study about Oprah's book club got me thinking about something valuable that I had taken for granted. I got on google and found the official website for Andrew Luck's book club.

Andrew Luck Book Club


The first think you see are two book recommendations for February. I was surprised to see the first book was Number the Stars by Lois Lowery. Just underneath the books is a short video from Andrew explaining how the club worked. Each month he posts two books, one for 'Rookies' - books that he loved as a child, and one for 'Veterans' - what he's currently reading. To participate, all you need to do is read the book(s) and post on social media using his hashtag. The twitter feed is pretty active on the page, - people are reading and Andrew seems to follow along and participate as well.

I'd recommend watching the interview that Andrew says inspired him to start the club here. It starts talking about his love of reading around 3:30. You can see that the interviewers are making a big deal of his love of reading and making some misconceptions about the type of books that he could get his team to read and Andrew immediately jumps to their defense: "Not just sports books, don't sell the locker room short. There's a bunch of good guys in there."

I think celebrity book clubs can do a lot of good at building a community of readers and give fans a chance to connect with their role models through reading. I feel a little bad for not thinking too seriously about Andrew Luck's book club before because I think it's a phenomenal thing he's doing. People don't really consider sports players and fans very literary - it's a common stereotype and it's not good. The fact that a professional NFL quarterback is taking so much time to promote reading to not just kids- but to everyone is awesome and I think that kind of influence would encourage hesitant readers to read more.

The books that Luck recommends are impressive. I definitely had a fan girl moment when I saw one of the previous 'rookie' books he recommended was Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder. He read that book as a kid? Me too! I loved that book!

Andrew Luck Book Club still seems pretty small scale- no where near the hype that Oprah's book club ever had. However, I know how much Indy loves the Colts so I see it making an impact here. Imagine if Lebron James started a book club and managed to put as much into it as Andrew Luck does. I think the reception would be insane. I did look this up to make sure he didn't already have one and that  "all the cool sports athletes have book clubs, DUH!" He doesn't, but I did see that he reads a lot as well and at least tells new outlets what he's been reading if asked.

(I know I didn't talk much about the article itself, but this was really where my thoughts were carrying me. I think I kind of mashed the two prompt choices together as this is more of a personal response.)

Butler, R. Cowen, B., & Nilsson, S. (2005). From Obscurity to Bestseller: Examining the Impact of Oprah's Book Club Selections. Publishing Research Quarterly, 20(4), 23-34. Retrieved from Academic Search Premier database.