So every year I try to read everything on the Banned and Challenged Books list when the ALA puts it out. My dream is that one year the list will come out and I’ll have read every book on there already. This year I’m at 60%, so it’s not impossible. I’m going to be reading the four I never have and doing a breakdown as usual, but first I thought I’d cover the ones I have read.
2) The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
This book is really funny, and also really sweet and meaningful at the same time. It’s full of cool drawings since the main character is a budding artist, but I’m not very familiar with those because I listened to the audiobook which was the best audiobook ever. It’s read by the author, and basically like he’s having a casual, semi-autobiographical conversation with you about what life on the reservation is like and how much people suck sometimes and how cool people are other times. I guess if I think hard about it I can remember some parts that had violence and sexuality which maybe someone might find objectionable, but it’s silly to judge a book based on small incidents taken out of context. This story is about so much more than that, and it’s real and beautiful and amazing. I’ve asked three separate librarians if they have any audiobook recommendations for me and all three, separately, immediately suggested this one. It made me kind of sad that I’ve already listened to it and that pleasure is behind me.
3) Thirteen Reasons Why
Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher
Another amazing audiobook!! It’s weird that my two favorite audiobooks ever are both on this list right next to each other. This story isn’t for everyone: it’s sad and real, but also beautifully written (and performed) and a clever premise. It’s about a boy who gets a package in the mail of 13 cassette tapes, recorded by a classmate who has recently committed suicide. Over the tapes she explains how she came to that point, and each tape is devoted to a specific person or incident. The narration alternates between what she says on the tapes to what the boy listening to them is thinking and doing, and if you get the audiobook there are two different voice actors reading these parts, so it really seems like a conversation sometimes. It’s powerful, listening to it like that, and sad. Just like how people are driven to commit suicide in reality. Taking away the book won’t take away that.
4) Fifty Shades of Grey
You know I’ve got this one down
Yeah, I feel you, book challengers. I would be happy if no one ever read this book again based on its terrible, terrible writing, plot, characters, gender roles, themes, and the way it has somehow made bad fanfiction less shameful. If only ELJames could slither back into the bowels of the Internet from whence she came! But, as long as she’s out here in the sunlight with the rest of us, we might as well have fun laughing at how terrible this is. Occasionally with Phineas and Ferb guest appearances because I can’t help myself.
5) And Tango Makes Three
And Tango Makes Three by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson
A children’s book based on the true story of two male penguins raising an egg/chick together. Come on, guys, if we’re going to be offended by children’s penguins, I direct your attention to this terrible 90s monstrosity. I’m not offended by it because of it’s depressing girl-as-commodity gender roles, but because its anthropomorphic animated penguins are terrifying. Speaking of terrifying…
8) Scary Stories to Read in the Dark Series by Alvin Schwartz
We’ll talk about this nightmare tomorrow
10) Beloved
Beloved by Toni Morrison
Yeah, book challengers, you’re right. It’s too bad slavery has to be such violent and explicit subject matter. But then, I could just make that sentence “It’s too bad slavery has to be”. I read this book in 12th grade English and found it really, really creepy, mixed with the usual tinge of annoyance that comes with reading something and writing too many essays about it. I don’t know what would happen if I read it again just to read it. Probably reincarnated murdered babies is still unsettling, though. As it should be.
Previously: 2012 List
Next: Stephen Gammell still haunts my nightmares, but I forgive him