Banned Books Week Begins

Banned Books Week is a catchy title for a list of books challenged or out-right-banned by various schools and libraries. Books that some say don’t belong in school or public library collections. Last year I posted daily on various so-called banned books.  I hope you will join me in reviewing books that others have challenged–usually without reading them, but not always. I never mind when a parent objects for his or her own child, but to ask for it to  be made unavailable to all is another matter entirely. For the record, I asked twice in all my kids’ school years for them to be given a different book and to not be present when the offending book was discussed. Neither the teacher nor the district had a problem with that.

In a public library I watched as members of a church peacefully, civilly and at no cost to the community, kept borrowing, “losing” and paying the replacement free for a young person’s book on sex and sexuality. It consistently made the book unavailable which I did not feel was right, but they did it in a polite and no-cost manner so they were not stopped.

Today I’m linking to Banned and Challenged Books I’ve reviewed elsewhere on this blog during the past year or so. Click the linked title to view the previous post with my full review. To see all such books reviewed on this blog, click on the phrase Banned and Challenged Books in the tag cloud in the sidebar.

 

 

 

 

The Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle is a book on the expericoence of illegal immigrants from Mexico and Central America that aims to echo the Grapes of Wrath.

 

 

 

 

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. An incredible coming-of-age story.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Looking for Alaska by John Green, another coming-of-age story, but one with a punch.

 

 

 

 

 

What do these books have in common? All are about outcasts of some sort. Even if they are outcasts only in their own minds. They are about differences from a perceived norm. They are also all brilliantly told stories. What’s more all have helped readers far more than they have supposedly hurt them.

All this week I will again be featuring banned and challenged books–and I hope you’ll do the same. Civil disobedience is fine, as long as it is civil. Civil disagreement is not very common any more. That’s tragic for it was long part of the strong fabric of this country.

If you are posting on Banned and Challenged Books this week, please leave a link in a comment. I’d love to read your post–whether it is pro banning or adamantly against! Civil disagreement still occurs in my world.