15 Books to Read for Banned Books Week
Happy Banned Books Week!
For years, I’ve advocated against book bans. Click here to read my 2017 "Banned Books Week" post and here for my 2018 "Banned Books Week" post and my 2019 “Banned Books Week” post. But this year, it hits different. For the first time since starting this blog, I received hateful pushback to my advocacy against banning books. Book bans are not the answer. I found this series of Instagram stories helpful, if you’re unsure why banning books is wrong.
Banned Books Week is an annual event that celebrates the freedom to read and raises awareness about the challenges to literary freedom that occur in libraries, schools, and bookstores. It shines a spotlight on books that have been challenged or banned in the United States because certain groups or individuals consider their content controversial or inappropriate.
Key Facts about Banned Books Week:
Origin: Launched in 1982 in response to a sudden increase in book challenges across schools, bookstores, and libraries.
Timing: Typically observed during the last week of September.
Purpose: The week emphasizes the importance of intellectual freedom and serves as a reminder that censorship still exists. It also brings together readers, writers, educators, and others in the fight against censorship.
Activities: Events often include public read-outs from challenged or banned books, displays in libraries and bookstores, and discussions about censorship.
Support: The event is backed by organizations such as the American Library Association (ALA), along with bookstores, schools, and publishers.
Books frequently challenged often address themes like race, gender, sexuality, and religion, or contain language or ideas that some find offensive. Banned Books Week aims to defend readers' rights and promote open access to information and ideas.
Why read banned books?
Reading banned books is important for several reasons:
Intellectual Freedom: Banned books often explore complex themes, ideas, and perspectives that challenge societal norms. Reading them allows individuals to engage with diverse viewpoints and think critically about the world around them.
Understanding Controversy: Banned books are frequently challenged due to their treatment of controversial subjects like race, gender, sexuality, and politics. Reading these books can provide insight into why these topics provoke strong reactions and help readers develop a deeper understanding of the issues.
Promoting Empathy: Many banned books tell stories of marginalized or underrepresented groups. By reading these books, readers can gain empathy and a better understanding of experiences different from their own.
Supporting Freedom of Expression: Reading banned books is an act of defiance against censorship and a way to support the freedom of authors to express their ideas and the right of readers to access those ideas.
Encouraging Dialogue: Banned books often spark discussions about important societal issues. Reading and discussing these books can lead to meaningful conversations about values, ethics, and the complexities of the human experience.
Expanding Knowledge: Banned books are sometimes targeted because they challenge existing beliefs or introduce new concepts. Reading them can expand a reader’s knowledge, push boundaries, and encourage personal growth.
Celebrating Literature: Many banned books are critically acclaimed works of literature that have made significant contributions to culture and thought. Reading these books allows readers to appreciate the artistry and importance of literature in society.
By reading banned books, individuals assert their right to think freely, question authority, and explore the full spectrum of human experience.
I also found the podcast below about how the current push to ban books in order to “protect children” is misleading.
The Top Most Banned Books in Schools
Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews
Banned and challenged for profanity and because it was claimed to be sexually explicit
This is the funniest book you’ll ever read about death.
It is a universally acknowledged truth that high school sucks. But on the first day of his senior year, Greg Gaines thinks he’s figured it out. The answer to the basic existential question: How is it possible to exist in a place that sucks so bad? His strategy: remain at the periphery at all times. Keep an insanely low profile. Make mediocre films with the one person who is even sort of his friend, Earl.
This plan works for exactly eight hours. Then Greg’s mom forces him to become friends with a girl who has cancer. This brings about the destruction of Greg’s entire life.
Fiercely funny, honest, heart-breaking—this is an unforgettable novel from a bright talent, now also a film that critics are calling "a touchstone for its generation" and "an instant classic."
Crank by Ellen Hopkins
Banned and challenged for drug use and because it was claimed to be sexually explicit
Life was good
before I
met
the monster.
After,
life
was great,
At
least
for a little while.
Kristina Snow is the perfect daughter: gifted high school junior, quiet, never any trouble.
Then, Kristina meets the monster: crank. And what begins as a wild, ecstatic ride turns into a struggle through hell for her mind, her soul—her life.
A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J. Maas
Banned and challenged because it was claimed to be sexually explicit
Feyre has undergone more trials than one human woman can carry in her heart. Though she's now been granted the powers and lifespan of the High Fae, she is haunted by her time Under the Mountain and the terrible deeds she performed to save the lives of Tamlin and his people.
As her marriage to Tamlin approaches, Feyre's hollowness and nightmares consume her. She finds herself split into two different people: one who upholds her bargain with Rhysand, High Lord of the feared Night Court, and one who lives out her life in the Spring Court with Tamlin. While Feyre navigates a dark web of politics, passion, and dazzling power, a greater evil looms. She might just be the key to stopping it, but only if she can harness her harrowing gifts, heal her fractured soul, and decide how she wishes to shape her future-and the future of a world in turmoil.
Out of Darkness by Ashley Hope Perez
Banned and challenged for depictions of abuse and because it was claimed to be sexually explicit
A Top Ten Most Challenged Book of the Year
"This is East Texas, and there's lines. Lines you cross, lines you don't cross. That clear?" New London, TX. 1937. Naomi Vargas is Mexican American. Wash Fuller is Black. These teens know the town's divisive racism better than anyone. But sometimes the attraction between two people is so powerful it breaks through even the most entrenched color lines. And the consequences can be explosive.
Naomi and Wash dare to defy the rules, and the New London school explosion serves as a ticking time bomb in the background. Can their love survive both prejudice and tragedy?
Race, romance, and family converge in this riveting novel that transplants Romeo and Juliet to a bitterly segregated Texas town. Includes a fascinating author's note detailing the process of research and writing about voices that have largely been excluded from historical accounts.
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
Banned and challenged for profanity and because it was claimed to be sexually explicit
Junior is a budding cartoonist growing up on the Spokane Indian Reservation. Determined to take his future into his own hands, Junior leaves his troubled school on the rez to attend an all-white farm town high school where the only other Indian is the school mascot.
Heartbreaking, funny, and beautifully written, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, based on the author's own experiences and coupled with poignant drawings by Ellen Forney that reflect the character's art, chronicles the contemporary adolescence of one Native American boy as he attempts to break away from the life he was destined to live.
Lawn Boy by Jonathan Evison
Banned and challenged for LGBTQIA+ content and because it was claimed to be sexually explicit
For Mike Muñoz, life has been a whole lot of waiting for something to happen. Not too many years out of high school and still doing menial work--and just fired from his latest gig as a lawn boy on a landscaping crew--he’s smart enough to know that he’s got to be the one to shake things up if he’s ever going to change his life. But how? He’s not qualified for much of anything. He has no particular talents, although he is stellar at handling a lawn mower and wielding clipping shears. But now that career seems to be behind him. So what’s next for Mike Muñoz?
Funny, biting, sweet, and ultimately inspiring novel, bestselling author Jonathan Evison's coming-of-age novel evokes the lives of working class people with compassion and honesty.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
Banned and challenged for depiction of sexual abuse, LGBTQIA+ content, drug use, profanity, and because it was claimed to be sexually explicit
This #1 New York Times bestselling coming-of-age story with millions of copies in print takes a sometimes heartbreaking, often hysterical, and always honest look at high school in all its glory.
The critically acclaimed debut novel from Stephen Chbosky follows observant “wallflower” Charlie as he charts a course through the strange world between adolescence and adulthood. First dates, family drama, and new friends. Sex, drugs, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Devastating loss, young love, and life on the fringes. Caught between trying to live his life and trying to run from it, Charlie must learn to navigate those wild and poignant roller-coaster days known as growing up.
Looking for Alaska by John Green
Banned and challenged for LGBTQIA+ content and because it was claimed to be sexually explicit
First drink. First prank. First friend. First love.
Last words.
Miles Halter is fascinated by famous last words—and tired of his safe life at home. He leaves for boarding school to seek what the dying poet François Rabelais called the “Great Perhaps.” Much awaits Miles at Culver Creek, including Alaska Young, who will pull Miles into her labyrinth and catapult him into the Great Perhaps.
The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
Banned and challenged for depiction of sexual abuse, EDI content, and because it was claimed to be sexually explicit
In Morrison’s acclaimed first novel, Pecola Breedlove—an 11-year-old Black girl in an America whose love for its blond, blue-eyed children can devastate all others—prays for her eyes to turn blue: so that she will be beautiful, so that people will look at her, so that her world will be different. This is the story of the nightmare at the heart of her yearning, and the tragedy of its fulfillment.
All Boys Aren’t Blue by George M. Johnson
Banned and challenged for LGBTQIA+ content and because it was claimed to be sexually explicit
In a series of personal essays, prominent journalist and LGBTQIA+ activist George M. Johnson's All Boys Aren't Blue explores their childhood, adolescence, and college years in New Jersey and Virginia.
A New York Times Bestseller!
Good Morning America, NBC Nightly News, Today Show, and MSNBC feature stories
From the memories of getting his teeth kicked out by bullies at age five, to flea marketing with his loving grandmother, to his first sexual relationships, this young-adult memoir weaves together the trials and triumphs faced by Black queer boys.
Both a primer for teens eager to be allies as well as a reassuring testimony for young queer men of color, All Boys Aren't Blue covers topics such as gender identity, toxic masculinity, brotherhood, family, structural marginalization, consent, and Black joy. Johnson's emotionally frank style of writing will appeal directly to young adults. (Johnson used he/him pronouns at the time of publication.)
Gender Queer: A Memoir, by Maia Kobabe, 15 bans
Books to Read for Banned Books Week
2020 ALA Alex Award Winner
2020 Stonewall — Israel Fishman Non-fiction Award Honor Book
In 2014, Maia Kobabe, who uses e/em/eir pronouns, thought that a comic of reading statistics would be the last autobiographical comic e would ever write. At the time, it was the only thing e felt comfortable with strangers knowing about em. Now, Gender Queer is here. Maia’s intensely cathartic autobiography charts eir journey of self-identity, which includes the mortification and confusion of adolescent crushes, grappling with how to come out to family and society, bonding with friends over erotic gay fanfiction, and facing the trauma and fundamental violation of pap smears.
Started as a way to explain to eir family what it means to be nonbinary and asexual, Gender Queer is more than a personal story: it is a useful and touching guide on gender identity—what it means and how to think about it—for advocates, friends, and humans everywhere.
Flamer by Mike Curato, 15 bans
Banned and challenged for LGBTQIA+ content and because it was claimed to be sexually explicit
Books to Read for Banned Books Week
Award-winning author and artist Mike Curato draws on his own experiences in Flamer, his debut graphic novel, telling a difficult story with humor, compassion, and love.
"This book will save lives." ―Jarrett J. Krosoczka, author of National Book Award Finalist Hey, Kiddo
I know I’m not gay. Gay boys like other boys. I hate boys. They’re mean, and scary, and they’re always destroying something or saying something dumb or both.
I hate that word. Gay. It makes me feel . . . unsafe.
It's the summer between middle school and high school, and Aiden Navarro is away at camp. Everyone's going through changes―but for Aiden, the stakes feel higher. As he navigates friendships, deals with bullies, and spends time with Elias (a boy he can't stop thinking about), he finds himself on a path of self-discovery and acceptance.
Tricks by Ellen Hopkins, 13 bans
Books to Read for Banned Books Week
Five troubled teenagers fall into prostitution as they search for freedom, safety, community, family, and love in this #1 New York Times bestselling novel from Ellen Hopkins.
"When all choice is taken from you, life becomes a game of survival."
Five teenagers from different parts of the country. Three girls. Two guys. Four straight. One gay. Some rich. Some poor. Some from great families. Some with no one at all. All living their lives as best they can, but all searching...for freedom, safety, community, family, love. What they don't expect, though, is all that can happen when those powerful little words "I love you" are said for all the wrong reasons.
Five moving stories remain separate at first, then interweave to tell a larger, powerful story -- a story about making choices, taking leaps of faith, falling down, and growing up. A story about kids figuring out what sex and love are all about, at all costs, while asking themselves, "Can I ever feel okay about myself?"
A brilliant achievement from New York Times best-selling author Ellen Hopkins -- who has been called "the bestselling living poet in the country" by mediabistro.com -- Tricks is a book that turns you on and repels you at the same time. Just like so much of life.
The Handmaid’s Tale: The Graphic Novel by Margaret Atwood and Renee Nault, 12 bans
Books to Read for Banned Books Week
The stunning graphic novel adaptation • A must-read and collector’s item for fans of “the patron saint of feminist dystopian fiction” (New York Times).
Look for The Testaments, the sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale
In Margaret Atwood’s dystopian future, environmental disasters and declining birthrates have led to a Second American Civil War. The result is the rise of the Republic of Gilead, a totalitarian regime that enforces rigid social roles and enslaves the few remaining fertile women. Offred is one of these, a Handmaid bound to produce children for one of Gilead’s commanders. Deprived of her husband, her child, her freedom, and even her own name, Offred clings to her memories and her will to survive.
Provocative, startling, prophetic, The Handmaid’s Tale has long been a global phenomenon. With this beautiful graphic novel adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s modern classic, beautifully realized by artist Renée Nault, the terrifying reality of Gilead has been brought to vivid life like never before.
Crank (Crank Series) by Ellen Hopkins, 12 bans
Books to Read for Banned Books Week
The #1 New York Times bestselling tale of addiction—the first in the Crank trilogy—from master poet Ellen Hopkins.
Life was good
before I
met
the monster.
After,
life
was great,
At
least
for a little while.
Kristina Snow is the perfect daughter: gifted high school junior, quiet, never any trouble.
Then, Kristina meets the monster: crank. And what begins as a wild, ecstatic ride turns into a struggle through hell for her mind, her soul—her life.
