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2023 Challenge - Regular
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18 - A Book That Was Banned or Challenged in 2022
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Melissa
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Jan 26, 2023 05:20AM
I live in Massachusetts, in the greater Boston area, where we thankfully don't really have to deal with many if any book bannings - but I was volunteering in my daughter's elementary school library class on Friday and chatting with her librarian who told me she'd gotten a call from an older woman last spring who "just wanted to know" if they had Gender Queer: A Memoir in their library. She said no, but not because there's anything wrong with the book - it's just not a K-4 book. (She can't keep her copy of Melissa on the shelf :) ). I'd already wanted to read Gender Queer, but that conversation solidified it as my pick for this prompt. I just finished it this morning.
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Well, I couldn't decide on which one to choose because there are so many fascinating ones.I saw someone post this book on TikTok and thought it would be good, especially since it's now Black History Month. To be honest, I had completely forgotten I had this one for a minute because I had it in a section of my books that I rarely visit.
Definitely going with this one:
Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You
(it's been banned from 2020 through 2022)
Here's a list of some of the banned books I've read and recommend. It's depressing that the list to choose from is so long. Simon vs. the Homosapien Agenda
Cinderella is Dead
Fun Home
Girl Made of Stars
Felix Ever After
Gaby, Lost and Found
The House on Mango Street
Little & Lion
Class Act
The Miseducation of Cameron Post
I am planning to read The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
I moved Stamped because now after seeing that Florida has taken Speak out of libraries and classrooms it infuriates me. Speak is my all-time favorite book (and yes, out of the over 500 books I've read in my life, I can choose a favorite.) I know it's been on banned book lists for years but to continue to see it there and continue to see states... I just can't take it so it indeed calls for a re-read.
Mod
1) story of an immigrant family from Vietnam - mom is learning English, so she and son read together so she can learn.
2) A coming out story - the son is gay and struggles to tell his mom (because he doesn't know the Vietnamese words to explain).
3) FAIRY TALES - the books they read together are fairy tales!
4) Absolutely gorgeous art.
5) Fantastic and thoughtful author notes at the end talking about the deeper meaning of some themes.
It's been banned and/or challenged in a bunch of places, presumably because some people think reading books about gay kids will allow other kids to realize they are also gay. The horrors. I was talking to my daughter about this. She confirmed that she did not know what "gay" meant until 5th grade when some kids explained to her (which doesn't make total sense since when she was in K or 1st, a little boy in her class who lived down the block had two moms - so she definitely knew about the possibility - maybe I just never used the word "gay" or I didn't explain to her that some people think being gay is wrong or weird, because why would I say that). BUT before that time, she just assumed that EVERYONE was queer like her (and that is absolutely the cutest image for me now).
Thanks to Florida, I suppose any book fits this prompt now? Sheesh.
Laura wrote: "Thanks to Florida, I suppose any book fits this prompt now? Sheesh."Unfortunately, it would seem like it. Texas is the same way. It's absolutely insane at how all of these bans have happened within the past couple of years.
There have always been banned books, sure, but these past couple of years...it infuriates me to no end.
(*laughs*)- I was looking through the Texas banned books of 850 that was released in 2021 and I saw that I had Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents highlighted it as one book I wanted to read and sure enough it's there.I won't be adding it for this prompt since I'm already reading Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You , though I still have plans to read 'Caste,' but this just goes to show that you can practically find any book on banned books list these days.
I own a copy of Kindred by Octavia Butler, I know it's been banned in the past but I can't find any 2022 references. I looked at the spreadsheet but it's not listed so I may look outside USA resources.
Noelle wrote: "I own a copy of Kindred by Octavia Butler, I know it's been banned in the past but I can't find any 2022 references."Kindred's gotta be banned in Florida: it's about slavery. And it's such a great book, perfectly illustrating how an oppressive system warps the soul, as a once open-hearted child grows into a selfish, cruel enslaver.
Nadine in NY wrote: "I just started reading The Magic Fish and YOU GUYS THIS BOOK IS GORGEOUS!!! This book has got it ALL! 1) story of an immigrant family from Vietnam - mom is learning English, so she..."
I heard about that book a while ago because it was mentioned in an article that was about how many authors don't get recognized when they get banned and that book was an example.
Mod
1) story of an immigrant family from Vietnam - mom is lea..."
I never came back to say I finished it, and I want to give this book ALL the stars. The way he combines fairy tales with Tien's present day experiences in the USA and his mother's past experiences in Vietnam is GENIUS. And did I mention the art is gorgeous? It's gorgeous!!
Laura wrote: "Noelle wrote: "I own a copy of Kindred by Octavia Butler, I know it's been banned in the past but I can't find any 2022 references."Kindred's gotta be banned in Florida: it's about slavery. And i..."
I'll check it out!
I am reading In the Dream House. It is one of the books banned in Texas because of sexually explicit content. The book is about healthy vs unhealthy queer relationships.
Anshita wrote: "I am reading In the Dream House. It is one of the books banned in Texas because of sexually explicit content. The book is about healthy vs unhealthy queer relationships."Given the content, it makes sense as to why it was banned. So unfortunate. They just keep banning books left and right, even the recently published books which is a complete shame.
Ron wrote: "Jackie wrote: "Texas banned like 800 books this year, so sadly we'll have a lot of options."Yeah and it's not just Texas. Other states are placing bans all over which is just rediculous.
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..."
Gaaah, looking up The 1619 Project on my local library websites and folks have wrote entire books 'debunking' it. Furious that there's an audience for such claptrap.
Ron wrote: "Anshita wrote: "I am reading In the Dream House. It is one of the books banned in Texas because of sexually explicit content. The book is about healthy vs unhealthy queer relations..."I read that conservatives in some school districts in Texas have used the book bans to help bring rally support and attracted unprecedented money to win school board seats campaigning under the promise to clear out “pornographic” materials from schools. This is in the midst of continuing Republican-led political fights over how issues related to race, gender, and sex are allowed to be taught in public schools.
Anshita wrote: I read that conservatives in some school districts in Texas have used the book bans to help bring rally support and attracted unprecedented money to win school board seats campaigning under the promise to clear out “pornographic” materials from schools. This is in the midst of continuing Republican-led political fights over how issues related to race, gender, and sex are allowed to be taught in public schoolsHonestly that doesn't surprise me.
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Jennifer wrote: Gaaah, looking up The 1619 Project on my local library websites and folks have wrote entire books 'debunking' it. Furious that there's an audience for such claptrap
That's insane. It's no different than using the book An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States for Young People which is also banned for the content of critical race theory and marxism and considered revisionist history all because it talks about settler colonialism.
I do want to read The 1619 Project at some point. It's so long of a book that I have a hard time keeping track of it.
I am reading the Indigenous one though and I can see why those...people...would believe all of the things they do.
Personally, the Indigenous People's book is one I wish I had read in school. It tells the truth of what happened. All I learned was a few paragraphs of indigenous people here and there, they were mainly about wars, they were mainly about the Mayans and Aztecs, and the Indigenous people were often vilified.
Sarah wrote: "Even if I just go with books that are already on my TBR, I have The Hate U Give, Six of Crows, Girl, Woman, Other, Cemetery Boys, [bo..."I've read several of the books on your list, and they were all wonderful. I have lots of theories why they've been added to the banned book lists, but I think you'll enjoy them! :)
I read Gender Queer for this one, which I would highly recommend!
This whole thing is making me so unbelievably sick. Thankfully, book banning in Germany is a long and legal process that requires a bit more reasoning than just "witchcraft is evil" or "don't give young people the wrong ideas about gender." I can't even look at these lists for long. I could probably just pick a random book by a queer author or with a queer or Black main character or something fantasy-related from my TBR and just assume that surely some ultra-right conservative librarian hated that book at some point and pushed for banning it.Thank you, reading community, for making a point of reading those books <3
Book banning attempts jumped by almost double from 2021 to 2022. Though I couldn't find a list, the top 10 books banned in 2022 will be released in late April.https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/b...
Jennifer W wrote: "Book banning attempts jumped by almost double from 2021 to 2022. Though I couldn't find a list, the top 10 books banned in 2022 will be released in late April.https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/..."
I read the NPR article about that. It's absolutely insane.
PEN America publishes a list of banned books every year. This is the 2022 list. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...The top ten most banned books of the 2021-2022 school year.
1. Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia Kobabe (41 bans)
2. All Boys Aren't Blue by George M. Johnson (29 bans)
3. Out of Darkness by Ashley Hope Pérez (24 bans)
4. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison (22 bans)
5 (tie). The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas (17 bans)
5 (tie). Lawn Boy by Jonathan Evison (17 bans)
7. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie (16 bans)
8. Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews (14 bans)
9 (tie). Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher (12 bans)
9 (tie). The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini (12 bans)
9 (tie) l8r, g8r by Lauren Myracle (12 bans)
9 (tie). The Crank Series 1-6 by Ellen Hopkins (12 bans)
I read Ace of Spades by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé, banned in the Indian River Public Schools (Florida), per the PEN America list of banned books as of June 2022.
I finished this prompt, but there continue to be so many banned books I want to read, especially given that they are so ridiculous in that they keep banning so many of them.My latest is going to be Shout
It's worth pointing out that the American definition of a 'banned' book is a bit different from what members in other countries are talking about. As far as I'm aware there are NO books that are legally banned in America, in that they're not allowed to be sold or read. Our 'banned' books are books that you can't get through specific library systems, usually school libraries.
The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree is the first book translated from Farsi to be shortlisted for the International Booker award. It is written by Iranian author Shokoofeh Azar who fled to Australia as a refugee when her book was banned in her home country. The story is an historical fiction with strong elements of magical realism and Persian mythology. It tells us about a family from whose lives are turned upside down after the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Here is my review.
The Tale of Aypi is the first book written by a Turkmen author to be translated into English. The author Ak Welsapar was imprisoned for 18 months before fleeing his country. His books are still banned in Turkmenistan. This story is about the bravery of a fisherman resisting the government relocation of his village. ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ my review
Since I moved Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You to my Nanowrimo prompt, I'm going to look for another nonfiction book for this prompt and there are quite a few.I've read plenty of BIPOC books so I want to read a nonfiction that is different than those.
Okay so I've got 3 on my mind:Shout
The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story
I just wish that The 1619 Project would be published in paperback already. It would make it so much easier.
*Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West (this wasn't banned in 2022), but it has been on the banned books list before)*
PEN America came out with their list of the most banned books since the start of the 2022 school year, the following books were banned in at least 10 different places:Gender Queer: A Memoir
Flamer
Tricks
The Handmaid's Tale: The Graphic Novel
Crank
Sold
Push
A Court of Mist and Fury
This Book Is Gay
The Bluest Eye
milk and honey
https://pen.org/report/banned-in-the-...
Thanks, Jennifer. I was just about to make a similar post.I went through the entire PEN America list (37 pgs worth, over 500 books) and it was slightly shocking to see Fangirl on the list. How can a book on generalized and social anxiety disorder be considered a banned or challenged book?!
There is nothing in that book to suggest anything worth banning unless you want to ban mental health issues which they are clear on doing too it seems.
Lol, you read faster than me! I was just scanning for something quick to post!
Ron wrote: "Thanks, Jennifer. I was just about to make a similar post.I went through the entire PEN America list (37 pgs worth, over 500 books) and it was slightly shocking to see Fangirl on ..."
Sadly Fangirl is probably banned because the main character writes Harry/Draco fanfiction.
Also, tomorrow is the American Library Association's Right to Read Day and they will release their list of the top 10 books banned last year. I will post them, too, if they're vastly different than PEN's.https://uniteagainstbookbans.org/righ...
ALA's top 13 banned books last year:Gender Queer
All Boys Aren't Blue
The Bluest Eye
Flamer
Looking for Alaska
The Perks of Being a Wallflower
Lawn Boy
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
Out of Darkness
Count of Mist and Fury
Crank
Me and Earl and the Dying Girl
This Book is Gay
I don't know why ALA and PEN have different books; the methodologies of how they calculate their most banned lists. ALA does include why each of these books were banned, if you're curious, though if you're familiar with the book in a general sense, you can probably guess.
https://www.ala.org/news/press-releas...
Jennifer wrote: Sadly Fangirl is probably banned because the main character writes Harry/Draco fanfiction.Oh, you're totally right! I completely forgot about that part of the story. It's not that I bypassed it, it's just that no big deal to me that I didn't think to consider it because of the LGBTQ+ ship. You know that stuff has just become the norm. You'd think I would have remembered though. Thanks for that.
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Even though there are a lot of banned books to choose from for this prompt (unfortunately), I've read quite a few so I'm thinking of going with The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story
Thanks for posting the ALA list, Jennifer. You beat me to that one.I'm not surprised to see several of the ones I've read on the list.
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I don't know why ALA and PEN have different books; the methodologies of how they calculate their most banned lists. ALA does include why each of these books were banned, if you're curious, though if you're familiar with the book in a general sense, you can probably guess.
From what I'm noticing of the two is that PEN has it broken down by state. ALA is more generalized.
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Between ALA and PEN, I prefer the PEN list because they have so much more titles (is that a good thing or a bad thing?). So many of the books that are on the ALA are often on those lists from previous years so there's nothing new to pay attention to.
My experience with the ALA is that they usually only put out like top 10 lists each year/decade. But then, they haven't had so many books to keep track of before now!
The book that I read for this challenge is The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
I don’t know if it was challenged last year, but was just reading an article about Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman’s poem, The Hill We Climb: An Inaugural Poem for the Country, being banned in Florida. Cannot say I was surprised by the grammatical errors in the form the protesting mother submitted—not to mention that she listed the wrong author. 🫤https://www.latimes.com/entertainment...
Heather L wrote: "I don’t know if it was challenged last year, but was just reading an article about Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman’s poem, The Hill We Climb: An Inaugural Poem for the Country, be..."Yeah, I saw that too. It's rediculous. I mean it was an inauguration poem about hope and prosperity and they want it banned? It makes no sense.
Heather L wrote: "I don’t know if it was challenged last year, but was just reading an article about Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman’s poem, The Hill We Climb: An Inaugural Poem for the Country, be..."Thank you for sharing. Looks like a reason for me to buy Ms. Gorman's book. ;)
Someone in a school district in my state went through the removal process for The Bible. They recommended the removal mostly to show how ridiculous the new regulations are about library books, claiming that The Bible is "pornographic" and "violent" according to the new criteria. It has currently been removed from elementary and middle schools. I'll bet that person who recommended it never thought the district would actually remove it. Hopefully it will help them see that their regulations are too stringent.I believe it was only the King James version that was removed. Other versions were acceptable.
Teri wrote: "Someone in a school district in my state went through the removal process for The Bible. They recommended the removal mostly to show how ridiculous the new regulations are about library books, clai..."I've heard it was all editions of the Bible that were removed. Either way since people complain too much, all the more reason to keep it off banned books list. It's a bunch of hypocrites that are banning these things, Bible's too. It's a...(I won't cuss) that it's "about the kids". If that were true they would be protecting them from far worse things that words on pages.
Don't get me started on the topic of banned books so I'll just stop here.
Mod
There is SO MUCH sex and violence in the Bible. If these folks are banning books for sex or violence, then yeah, the Bible has got to go. I mean, I don't even know how many stories there are about rape and gang rape, but it's more than I can easily count.
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