Throwback Thursday: Banned Books Week

In honor of Banned Books Week, we are each doing a Throwback Thursday book that has been challenge in the past for various reasons. For more information about banned books, you can visit the ALA website. We hope you enjoy a banned book very soon!

Are You There God, It's Me Margaret? by Judy Blume was first published in 1970 and was frequently challenged having been deemed "sexually offensive and amoral", "profane, immoral, and offensive", as well as having "anti-Christian behavior". 

I was a HUGE Judy Blume fan when I was in middle and high school.  Her books just really resonated with me and I felt like I wasn't alone in thoughts and feelings after reading one of her books.  This one will always be one of my all time favorites.  Re-reading it as an adult with a 12 YO daughter, I still love the book.  For me, the content and feelings of the girls in the book are timeless.  I can't wait to share it with my daughter.

The Bridge to Terabithia was published in 1977 by Katherine Patterson.  It's been frequently challenged due to themes of magic and witchcraft.  Also, there is an issue with how death is handled in this book.  One of the characters does die and I found it was dealt with in a normal, logical way.

This book was required reading when I was in Middle School.  Having kids that have gone through middle school they don't require reading much anymore, but I wouldn't have a problem with any of my kids reading this book.  It's a good story and I think readers of this generation would still enjoy the story.

Banned Books Blog Hop

Once again this year we are participating in the Banned Books Week Blog Hop.  We are listed at #35 at last check.  You can find the full list of participating blog HERE.

We here at From the TBR Pile support the ALA's Banned Books Week.  You can find out more information at the American Library Association's website.  There are extensive lists of books that have been banned, where and why.  Take some time this week and celebrate the right to read whatever you want.

As part of the Giveaway Hop we have two packages.  Open to US Residents ONLY.  Please fill out Rafflecopter below.

YA Package:  Signed Copy of Scars by Cheryl Rainfield  and Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson.  Erotica Package:  Tremble and Quiver by Tobsha Lerner

http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/346b7c9/" rel="nofollow">a Rafflecopter giveaway

Banned Books Week:Throwback Thursday Edition Coraline by Neil Gaiman

While preparing for Banned Books Week, I was trolling the internet and came across The University of Connecticut's banned books page.  In the "youth" tab, they listed Coraline (2002, HarperCollins)as a challenged book.  It has been challenged for age appropriateness and is thought to be scary for younger children.  I wonder how many of those younger children have seen the movie Coraline.  In my house, Coraline is a family favorite.  I, for one, had seen the movie but never read the book. I picked up the audiobook version at the library and dug right in. Honestly, compared to Henry Selick's movie interpretation, the book is pretty mild.  I would think that seeing Coraline on the big screen would frighten children more than the book. 

Coraline is a great character!  She is precocious, smart and very brave.  The book has an important lesson.  Things may seem better on the other side, but you always pay a price.  So, you better be careful what you wish for.  It is also a great commentary on parents of today who are too caught up in their own lives to realize they aren't paying enough attention to their children.  Are there some scary scenes in the book? Yes, probably for some kids they would be scary.  I believe it all comes down to parental responsibility and knowing what your child is reading.  As well as, knowing what your child can handle at his or her age.  I, for one, know my 6YO will love this book. He is a huge fan of the movie.

I am a huge fan of Neil Gaiman. I can't wait to share this book with my kids.   My favorite book, by far, from him is Neverwhere.  If you haven't read that one, definitely try it out.

Banned Books Week: 50 Shades Book Burning

If you were like me, you had to read Fahrenheit 451 in school.  If you haven't read it since then, I heartily encourage everyone to give it a read again, or even better listen to the audiobook.  It'll make a big impression about the topic of burning books.

Kari and I learned that there were organizations calling for book burnings of 50 Shades of Grey.  Now, we aren't fans of that book, however we're more strongly opposed to book burning and the consequences it can bring.  We can both sympathize with the reasoning of domestic abuse counselors that the book might encourage more violence against women.  However, readers and abusers have to take responsibility into their own hands. 

This article from the UK Daily Mail makes and excellent point that once you start with one book, where do you stop?  This woman is all up in arms about this one particular book series, but honestly there are hundreds more out there at are ten times worse.  Why not burn those too? 

Hopefully, this woman will continue her good work dedicated to abused women and not make a career out of burning books.  Her resources would be better used eradicating losers who beat their partners, rather than taking tacky books out of the hands of desperate housewives.

Fahrenheit 451

By:  Ray Bradbury

Summary:  The system was simple. Everyone understood it. Books were for burning, along with the houses in which they were hidden.

Guy Montag was a fireman whose job it was to start fires. And he enjoyed his job. He had been a fireman for ten years, and he had never questioned the pleasure of the midnights runs or the joy of watching pages consumed by flames, never questioned anything until he met a seventeen-year-old girl who told him of a past when people were not afraid. Then Guy met a professor who told him of a future in which people could think. And Guy Montag suddenly realized what he had to do...


***Reposting from Last Year because I think this is a very important book to read***

I read this book in High School and apparently I didn't retain any of it, because as I made my way through the audiobook, I didn't remember much of it at all.  I listened to the audio read by Scott Brick and as usual he did a fantastic job.

If you do read this book, make sure you read the afterword and the coda.  They were very enlightening.  Particularly the coda and it's extremely relevant today.  In it, he talks about how the book burning and book banning started not with the government but with the people and with what he calls minorities.  However he doesn't mean racial minorities necessarily but anything that you identify yourself with that separates you from other people, cat-lover, tea drinker, tree hugger, Republican, Catholic, etc.  The phrase he didn't have then was Political Correctness.  He was right, you can see it happening all the time.  One person gets offended by one little thing and it's a major deal.

He also touched on another issue that we don't ever see or know much about.  How much "censorship" or book burning goes before the book is even published?  Or in later editions.  He talked about editors and publishers changing things around to make them more suitable to the target audience, not considering what the author had intended or wanted.  Is that right?  Where does it stop?  You take out one "damn" or "hell" and then a sentence or two, then maybe a paragraph, then what's the point of the book if you've started to change the whole flavor?

He brought up some things in the book that are happening now.  That it started with the newspapers dying.  That's evident now.  Subscription rates are down, they're laying off workers, they're going out of business.  He talked about how kids would be going to school at younger and younger ages so their parents wouldn't have to deal with them.  Our parents (for the most part) didn't have public school Kindergarten, now our kids have public school Pre-K. 

I thought this was a very timely book to read considering the Koran burning going on this weekend.  So go read this book, go read another book, hoard the ones you have and don't let anyone burn them!

Banned Books Week - Claiming of Sleeping Beauty

Author: Anne Rice ( Writing as A.N. Roquleaure)
Publisher: Plume/Penguin Books (1983)

From bestselling author Anne Rice, writing as A.N. Roquleaure. In the traditional folktale of 'Sleeping Beauty,' the spell cast upon the lovely young princess and everyone in her castle can only be broken by the kiss of a Prince. It is an ancient story, one that originally emerged from and still deeply disturbs the mind's unconscious. Now Anne Rice's retelling of the Beauty story probes the unspoken implications of this lush, suggestive tale by exploring its undeniable connection to sexual desire. Here the Prince reawakens Beauty, not with a kiss, but with sexual initiation. His reward for ending the hundred years of enchantment is Beauty's complete and total enslavement to him as Anne Rice explores the world of erotic yearning and fantasy in a classic that becomes, with her skillful pen, a compelling experience.

I am a huge fan of Anne Rice, but until Banned Books week came up, I had never picked up one of her early erotica novels.  All of them have been on the banned/challenged list at one time or another.  I'm sure that I don't really even need to point out why.  Research shows that people have tried to have them pulled from library shelves because they are thought to be pornography.  I am happy to say that my library system offers a wide variety of erotica, old and new!  

I have to admit that I didn't finish this one.  If you have been following the blog for a while, you will note that I tend to be the one who reads and reviews most of the romance and erotica on here. So, I am in no way a prude or opposed to a story with explicit sexual content.  What I found lacking in this story right from the beginning was emotion. In 100 years, no other prince had figured out how to awaken the kingdom.  The Prince awakens Sleeping Beauty by basically raping her. That really turned me off from the beginning.  Then, I kept reading only to find out that since he figured the trick out, she essentially has to be come his sex slave. Gee, thanks! I stopped reading at this point. Being an Anne Rice fan, I was very disappointed.  Maybe I'll go back to this some day and give it another chance.  But for now, I will stick with her vampire novels.  While I didn't care for this one, I am glad that I had the opportunity to judge for myself! 


--Kari

Banned Books week - Throwback Thursday Edition - A Study in Scarlet

Author: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
First Published in 1887 


In 1887, a young Arthur Conan Doyle published A Study in Scarlet, thus creating an international icon in the quick-witted sleuth Sherlock Holmes. In this, the first Holmes mystery, the detective introduces himself to Dr. John H. Watson with the puzzling line "You have been in Afghanistan, I perceive." And so begins Watson's, and the world's, fascination with this enigmatic character." Doyle presents two equally perplexing mysteries for Holmes to solve: one a murder that takes place in the shadowy outskirts of London, in a locked room where the haunting word Rache is written upon the wall, the other a kidnapping set in the American West. Quickly picking up the "scarlet thread of murder running through the colourless skein of life," Holmes does not fail at finding the truth - and making literary history.

A Study in Scarlet is the first in the Sherlock Holmes series in which it introduced famous detective Sherlock Holmes and his trusty companion, Dr. Watson.  It is the longest of the tales and is really two stories in one.   The story starts out with a mysterious murder in London, then moves to Utah and becomes a completely different story about something that happened in the early days of the Mormon settlement in Salt Lake City.  In a round about way, this tale is supposed to give the reader a motive for the murder in London. It then ends up with Holmes giving his method for tracking down the killer. 

Personally, I thought it was a bit dull.  Don't get me wrong, I love Sherlock Holmes, but this first attempt was not Conan Doyle's best  I thought the switch from London to Utah slowed down the pace of the book.  It took way too long to get to the point.  I had never read this first Sherlock Holmes book before, so when I saw an article that the story was pulled from the 6th grade reading list in Virgina School district earlier this summer, I knew I had to read it for Banned Books week.  Apparently, a parent objected to the story because they felt it portrayed the Mormons in derogatory way.  The story had been used to introduce 6th graders to the mystery genre.  Instead, they have suggest Hound of the Baskervilles as a replacement.  Personally, I think it is a better choice because I think the students would be bored to tears with A Study in Scarlet.

--Kari

Banned Books Week: The Perks of Being a Wallflower

by:  Stephen Chbosky
published by:  MTv Books
publish date:  1999

Charlie is a freshman. And while he's not the biggest geek in the school, he is by no means popular. He's a wallflower--shy and introspective, and intelligent beyond his years, if not very savvy in the social arts. We learn about Charlie through the letters he writes to someone of undisclosed name, age, and gender, a stylistic technique that adds to the heart-wrenching earnestness saturating this teen's story. Charlie encounters the same struggles that many kids face in high school--how to make friends, the intensity of a crush, family tensions, a first relationship, exploring sexuality, experimenting with drugs--but he must also deal with his best friend's recent suicide. Charlie's letters take on the intimate feel of a journal as he shares his day-to-day thoughts and feelings.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower was a complete surprise for me.  I knew nothing about it when I started reading it other than it was being made into a movie with Emma Roberts and that it was written as a series of letters.  Oh, and that it shows up on the ALA frequently challenged books lists in the last decade.

Reasons for banning: drugs, homosexuality, nudity, offensive language, sexually explicit, suicide, and unsuited to age group.

So yeah, all that stuff does show up in the book.  I'm assuming this book would be geared towards high school aged people.  To say it's unsuited to the age group is a little silly.  If you don't think kids in high school don't know what all that stuff is, try watching a PG-13 movie once in awhile.   Talk about unsuited to the age group.  Different soap box!

I found this book to be very intriguing.  I read the entire thing in one sitting.  I enjoyed Charlie, but I can't say I understood everything that was going on.  I didn't understand the idea of writing to someone he didn't know.  I thought the relationship between Michael and Charlie could have been described better.  He didn't really seem like a close friend, but maybe I should have read more into what was actually there.

In the little "About the Author" blurb I found it interesting that Stephen Chbosky was involved with the television show Jericho.  I loved that show when it was on.   He also wrote the screenplay for the upcoming movie of The Perks of Being a Wallflower. I'm very curious to see how the issues of drugs and homosexuality are going to be dealt with in the movie and what the rating will end up being.

Banned Books Week: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian

by:  Sherman Alexiepublished by: Little, Brown Young Readers
publish date:  September 2007

Sherman Alexie tells the story of Junior, 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, which is based on the author's own experiences, coupled with poignant drawings 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 thought he was destined to live.
Reasons cited for banning:  offensive language, racism, sex education, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group, and violence

In reading this book I did encounter "offensive language", racism, and violence.  I didn't find anything "sexually explicit".  I don't even know what "sex education" means in terms of a reason for banning.  I didn't find any sort of step by step manual in the book.  There was a mention of masturbation in the book and perhaps that was the sexually explicit, sex education was, but again it was more of a mention of it and not a how-to and there was no discussion of body parts. 

I don't know what age group this book was geared toward, I would have to assume high school age kids.  I couldn't imagine this book would be in a middle school library.  I would think this book wouldn't be anything outrageous for the average kid in high school.  I don't understand what age group it's unsuited for.

I, personally, found it to be an interesting story.  I liked the way it was written in diary format with a mixture of comic drawings.  It told an important story about life on reservations, one that more kids should understand and if this is the way they come by it, so be it.

Banned Books Week: A Light in the Attic

Author: Shel Silverstein
Publisher:  Harpercollins Childrens Books ( first published October 7th 1981)

Last night while I lay thinking here
Some Whatifs crawled inside my ear
And pranced and partied all night long And sang their same old Whatif song:

Whatif I flunk that test?
Whatif green hair grows on my chest?
Whatif nobody likes me?
Whatif a bolt of lightning strikes me?...

Here in the attic of Shel Silverstein you will find Backward Bill, Sour Face Ann, the Meehoo with an Exactlywatt, and the Polar Bear in the Frigidaire. You will talk with Broiled Face, and find out what happens when Somebody steals your knees, you get caught by the Quick-Digesting Gink, a Mountain snores, and They Put a Brassiere on the Camel.

From the creator of the beloved poetry collections "Where the Sidewalk Ends" and "Falling Up", here is another wondrous book of poems and drawings.


When I found out I was pregnant with my first child, one of the first things I bought for her was the entire Shel Silverstein collection in hardcover.  I loved these books as a child.  I can still remember my mother reading them to me before bed.  I have never forgotten them and couldn't wait to share them with my kids. Mr. Silverstein had quite an imagination and has created a wonderful collection of funny and memorable poems.  The one above in the synopsis is just a taste.  Along with the poems, he has sprinkled illustrations throughout the book that only help to fuel the child's imagination.  One of my favorites is "Backward Bill".  My kids love "Something Missing". What kid wouldn't love a poem about a man who forgets to put on his pants?

This was one of the most frequently challenged books of the 90s.  A little research showed that one of the poems, "How Not To Have To Dry The Dishes" was thought by parents to promote disobedience and uncleanliness.  It has also been challenged for supernatural themes and for some of the illustrations.  Read it for yourself and decide.

--Kari

Banned Books Week: The Giver

by:  Lois Lowry
published by:  Delacourte Books for Young Readers
publish date:  January 2006

Jonas's world is perfect. Everything is under control. There is no war or fear or pain. There are no choices. Every person is assigned a role in the Community. When Jonas turns twelve, he is singled out to receive special training from The Giver. The Giver alone holds the memories of the true pain and pleasure of life. Now, it is time for Jonas to receive the truth. There is no turning back.

I read this book on a rainy Saturday afternoon and thought it was a great story.  I was thinking it was probably one of the books that got this recent trend of YA dystopian going. 

Jonas lives in a perfect society.  Everyone is great.  Everyone gets along, Everyone has their place.  All the children born in the same year age together, celebrate milestones together, receive their job assignments together.   Until Jonas is selected to become The Receiver. 

Once Jonas starts his training with The Giver, he starts to understand the reality behind his community.  He learns what really happens to the elderly in his community.  He begins to understand that babies that are less than perfect aren't really sent to other settlements.  He then plots his escape.

After I was done, I sat there awhile pondering why this would be a banned book.  I was drawing a blank.  After a handy dandy Google search I got some answers.  The main objections to this book centered around euthanasia.  That's what happened to the less than perfect in this book.  They were euthanized.  Another objection raised was suicide.  There was one instance of suicide in this book.  When a character knew she was going to be "released" from the community she asked to inject herself.  The third objection raised by this book was sexuality.  In order to maintain the perfect society, birth rate was strictly regulated.  The society were basically non-sexual due to pills they were required to take.  All this was talked about in a somewhat abstract manner, but Jonas had to report to his parents that he had "Stirrings" and his parents started him on his pills to tamp down his sexual urges. 

I don't know specifically where this was banned, but it's #11 on the ALA's most challenged books in the 90's.  I can understand parents not wanting their middle school children reading it perhaps, but I would think any young person high school age could handle the material in this book.