Hello book club of /r/bangtan!
Did you miss us? After an epic June of processing RPWP, celebrating Festa, getting Jimin’s announcement for MUSE and V’s TYPE-1 photobook teasers, our schedule was busy and time just flew by! Wait… did we miss something? Oh right, THE RETURN OF OUR ASTRONAUT, WWH KIM SEOKJIN! TBH Jin’s discharge event and Festa appearance have been playing in our heads on repeat – the saxophone, the OT7 photo, the hugs, the Super Tuna extended version. Couldn’t have had a happier start to year 12 with BTS and ARMY.
Since we took a breather, here’s a quick recap on our last book club discussion. In May, we read The Midnight Library by Matt Haig, which is a sci-fi/fantasy novel about Nora, who has an opportunity to explore her life’s alternate stories and “what could have been”, if some pivotal moments in her life had turned out differently. It made us introspect and even drew parallels between the book and the Come Back to Me MV. In case you missed it and would like to participate in the discussion, feel free to join in!
This month marks one year since we started Books with Luv! In honor of that, we are presenting five BTS-adjacent books to choose from, all suggested by our lovely Books with Luv admin team. Shout-out to the awesome mods and volunteers for keeping this little club going for one whole year!
As always, these books were either seen on a member's bookshelf/in their luggage, recommended by them, were seen being read by them, or are books about BTS and their music. The ult-list is much longer. Take a look at July’s picks and vote on what we should read next.
Some key dates to remember
(All dates/time are in KST)
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| July 1 | Poll opens now – ends July 4 11:59pm |
| July 5 | Voters’ choice book announced |
| July 17 | Books with Luv discussion meeting |
And your choices are… drum roll by the Smeraldo Garden Marching Band
These are the 5 books you get to choose from for the month of July!
| Title – BTS Connection | Description |
|---|---|
| The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Ezupery (2000) – Recommended by multiple members and inspiration for Jin's Moon performance. | A pilot crashes in the Sahara Desert and encounters a strange young boy who calls himself the Little Prince. The Little Prince has traveled there from his home on a lonely, distant asteroid with a single rose. The story that follows is a beautiful and at times heartbreaking meditation on human nature. The Little Prince is one of the best-selling and most translated books of all time, universally cherished by children and adults alike, and Richard Howard's translation of the beloved classic beautifully reflects Saint-Exupéry's unique and gifted style, bringing the English text as close as possible to the French in language, style, and spirit. In this special edition, the artwork has been restored to match in detail and in color Saint-Exupéry's original artwork. This definitive English-language edition of The Little Prince will capture the hearts of readers of all ages. |
| The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams (1995) – Mentioned by RM during a live in 2017 | It’s an ordinary Thursday morning for Arthur Dent . . . until his house gets demolished. The Earth follows shortly after to make way for a new hyperspace express route, and Arthur’s best friend has just announced that he’s an alien. After that, things get much, much worse. With just a towel, a small yellow fish, and a book, Arthur has to navigate through a very hostile universe in the company of a gang of unreliable aliens. Luckily the fish is quite good at languages. And the book is The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy . . . which helpfully has the words DON’T PANIC inscribed in large, friendly letters on its cover. Douglas Adams’s mega-selling pop-culture classic sends logic into orbit, plays havoc with both time and physics, offers up pithy commentary on such things as ballpoint pens, potted plants, and digital watches . . . and, most important, reveals the ultimate answer to life, the universe, and everything. |
| The Miracles of the Namiya General Store by Keigo Higashino (2019) – In Memories 2018, Jin was spotted reading the book | When three delinquents hole up in an abandoned general store after their most recent robbery, to their great surprise, a letter drops through the mail slot in the store's shutter. This seemingly simple request for advice sets the trio on a journey of discovery as, over the course of a single night, they step into the role of the kindhearted former shopkeeper who devoted his waning years to offering thoughtful counsel to his correspondents. Through the lens of time, they share insight with those seeking guidance, and by morning, none of their lives will ever be the same. |
| Into the Magic Shop: A Neurosurgeon's Quest to Discover the Mysteries of the Brain and the Secrets of the Heart by James R. Doty (2017) – The inspiration for the song Magic Shop | Growing up in the high desert of California, Jim Doty was poor, with an alcoholic father and a mother chronically depressed and paralyzed by a stroke. Today he is the director of the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE) at Stanford University, of which the Dalai Lama is a founding benefactor. But back then his life was at a dead end until at twelve he wandered into a magic shop looking for a plastic thumb. Instead he met Ruth, a woman who taught him a series of exercises to ease his own suffering and manifest his greatest desires. Her final mandate was that he keep his heart open and teach these techniques to others. She gave him his first glimpse of the unique relationship between the brain and the heart. Doty would go on to put Ruth’s practices to work with extraordinary results—power and wealth that he could only imagine as a twelve-year-old, riding his orange Sting-Ray bike. But he neglects Ruth’s most important lesson, to keep his heart open, with disastrous results—until he has the opportunity to make a spectacular charitable contribution that will virtually ruin him. Part memoir, part science, part inspiration, and part practical instruction, Into the Magic Shop shows us how we can fundamentally change our lives by first changing our brains and our hearts. |
| I Decided to Live as Me by Kim Suhyun (2020) – Jungkook was seen reading this book in Bon Voyage | "We can't be or need to be anything else but ourselves." Heartfelt advice to make myself live as me! Deep words of comfort for you who are novice adults! |
Let’s talk about us…
As always, if you have questions or suggestions on how we can make discussions even better please let us know. You can post it here or feel free to reach out to any of our lovely volunteers and mods!
With luv,
Our book club volunteers:
And the r/bangtan Mod Team
Now introducing
Vote for the book you would like to discuss in the next book club!
24070 /r/bangtan Books with Luv: Bangtan is back, and so are we, with a special poll to celebrate ONE year of Books With Luv!
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by Next_Grapefruit_3206
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