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So long 2024, and good riddance

Welcome to the final roundup of 2024, and it’s a mixed bag, to be sure. In a year where press freedom and the simple freedom to read met unprecedented setbacks, we should cling to whatever scraps of joy and hope we can find.

• PEN America reported that more than 10,000 titles were removed from libraries and schools this year, which is more than three times the number last year, and about 80 percent were in Florida and Iowa.

• Whee! A federal judge struck down the Arkansas law that would have sent librarians and booksellers to jail for recommending books to minors. Anyone could have objected to any book for any reason and criminal charges would be filed.

• Louisiana’s bill that would criminalize librarians joining the American Library Association did not pass, but several states and local governments have banned the organization, which would have seemed like the least controversial organization in America ten years ago. Kelly Jensen has a comprehensive roundup of pending legislation.

• Elizabeth, Colo. leaders have decided to ban … wait for it… books about race, gender and mental health, and are now being sued by the ACLU.

• Libraries in Crawford County, Ark. and Liberty Lakes, Wash. are now desperately trying to stay open because book-banners are going after their funding. If you don’t ban the books we want, we’ll shut you down! Totally not censorship.

• Current banning efforts are underway in Cincinnati, South Carolina, Michigan, Indiana, Oregon, Colorado, Missouri, Texas and others. The list is shorter than usual because, well, school is out.

• In non-banning news: LitHub detailed the 50 biggest literary stories of 2024, and while some of them are silly (Nicholas Sparks adding Splenda to potato salad, which frankly seems on point for him), others are barnburners. Romance Writers of America filed for bankruptcy. New York City Public Library survived its funding attack. Stanford fired its entire creative writing program over Zoom. Authors who got canceled included Joe Arden, Neil Gaiman, and posthumous Alice Munro for various misdeeds. An Olympic boxer sued J.K. Rowling for being a jerk. AI continued to destroy life as we know it.

LitHub also had one of its most popular articles of the year: Ursula K. Le Guin on how to become a writer. (Step one: write.)

• And incoming President Trump sued the Des Moines Register for reporting that a poll indicated he might lose Iowa, and also sued 60 Minutes for … interviewing Vice President Kamala Harris.

Obviously we’ve all had better years. So grab onto that little scrap of joy, even if it’s just a really spectacular cookie, and enjoy it while you can, folks. I’ll see you on the flip side.

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This week in books: Anything gay is labeled

I wish I could just sail through Dragoncon reveling in the mass creative energy and joyful nerdery on display in Atlanta this weekend, as 100,000 people celebrate the art and artists that bring joy to their lives.

But that joy isn’t coming to Christian County, Mo. this week. Any book with LGBTQ+ content will be labeled with a warning, as will books with violence and sexual content. Apparently the simple fact of being gay qualifies as equal to pornography or violence in Christian County.

And yes, being labeled qualifies as censorship, as Book Riot details this month. With labeling comes “anyone under 18 can’t access this,” and so on. The argument for book banning in schools has often been, “it’s not banned when you can go get it in the library.” Even more obtuse is “it’s not banned, you can go buy it at a bookstore or Amazon.” Setting aside the number of extremists pushing for booksellers to be prosecuted for selling suspicious books, that also keeps a large swath of literature in the hands of the wealthier American. If you’re poor and want to read Sula, you’re out of luck.

Greenville County S.C. is killing the school book fairs because they can’t figure out how to censor them properly and the public library is moving all books that mention transgender to the adult section. Katy, Texas has banned all books about gender fluidity from school libraries. Fort Bend, Texas has granted the superintendent unilateral authority to ban books. Dubuque, Iowa has banned 50 more books, including I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou.

Rutherford County, Tenn. has a list of challenges to consider this week, including some of the usual suspects. Their proposed bans are Beloved by Toni Morrison, The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, Wicked by Gregory Maguire, Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi, Skin and Bones by Sherry Shahan, and Queen of Shadows and Tower of Dawn by Sara J. Maas. At least they’re determined to actually read the books before they ban them, unlike the ones relying on AI and a list compiled by far-right activists to decide their “local standards.” Also considering bans are Oshkosh Public Schools in Wisconsin and the Arkansas State Library Board.

St. Joseph, Mo. opted not to ban The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, and the banners are big mad. El Paso, Colo. students now have to have parents opt in to letting them use the library at all. Moms for Liberty (yeah, they’re still here) is suing Clyde-Savannah Central School district for not banning books they don’t like.

Ketchikan Public Schools in Alaska have banned What Girls Are Made Of, another Alaska library board member literally said “burn it” when opting to remove Identical by Ellen Hopkins from the library, and an Oklahoma teacher lost her teaching license for giving students a QR code to allow them to borrow banned books from the Brooklyn Public Library. And the Baltimore city school board ended its meeting when a so-called “book-banning pastor” from North Carolina showed up to speak.

But the winner this month is the library in Monroe County, Ga., which is moving all LGBTQ books to the adult section, so you have to be 18 or older to read the picture book Heather Has Two Mommies.

What makes them special? They shared this gem from a local op-ed: “On what planet could you say that LGBT books in the kids’ area are ‘neutral,’ or morally equal to Christian books? I mean, if you put LGBT books in the youth section, you’re necessarily, by definition, an anti-Christian library. No serious believer in the Bible would ever allow such.”

Now, they didn’t write it, but they shared it. This, by the way, is a PUBLIC library. Not a school. The op-ed comes from the Monroe County Reporter, and was literally titled “Some books need burning.” I could not get the whole text, since I’d have to sign up for the Monroe County Reporter and I am not in that headspace, thanks. Book Riot’s Literary Activism newsletter handled that so I don’t have to.

Extra credit goes to Virginia state Sen. Chris Head, who is “deeply troubled” by some books in the Botetourt County Library – not school, public. He subscribes to the “it’s not banned if you can buy it online” school, and is deeply troubled by a book about menstruation. Horrors!

Finally, no roundup would be complete without Florida. Many thanks to Book Riot for finding this gem: “A woman complained to Brevard Public Schools that a graphic novel’s depiction of a gay relationship could cause compulsive masturbation in middle schoolers.” The book, by the way, was found not to violate Florida’s statutes but was banned anyway.

And New College of Florida decided to dump every book from the newly-disbanded Gender and Diversity Center into a dumpster. Everything from Jewish folk tales to a history text on same-sex unions in pre-modern Europe went into the trash.

This is only a selection of book-censorship items crossing my inbox this week, and that’s just the stuff I see. Imagine how much more is out there that I missed, or that Book Riot missed, or that didn’t get wider news coverage because the drumbeat is so constant now. I want to run through the halls shouting, “They’re coming for the books!” But I’m not sure anyone would look up.