The Readirect Podcast
Drafting Our Team of Banned Books
Crack open the pages of controversy with us as we venture through the tangled web of banned and challenged books. Today, we're drafting our team of banned books, each picking three books we love that are frequently banned or challenged.
Join us and discover how these books are more than just stories; they're crucial conversations on racism, marginalized communities, and the raw truths of adolescence that are at risk of being silenced.
Team Abigail:
- The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
- Looking for Alaska by John Green
- The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
Team Emily:
- A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J Gaines
- Native Son by Richard Wright
- Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume
Plus, books we've read lately:
- Everyone on this Train is a Suspect by Benjamin Stevenson
- Raiders of the Lost Heart by Jo Segura
- The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang
Follow us on Instagram at @readirectpodcast!
Crack open the pages of controversy with us as we venture through the tangled web of banned and challenged books. Today, we're drafting our team of banned books, each picking three books we love that are frequently banned or challenged.
Join us and discover how these books are more than just stories; they're crucial conversations on racism, marginalized communities, and the raw truths of adolescence that are at risk of being silenced.
Team Abigail:
- The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
- Looking for Alaska by John Green
- The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
Team Emily:
- A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J Gaines
- Native Son by Richard Wright
- Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume
Plus, books we've read lately:
- Everyone on this Train is a Suspect by Benjamin Stevenson
- Raiders of the Lost Heart by Jo Segura
- The Poppy War by R. F. Kuang
Follow us on Instagram at @readirectpodcast!
Welcome to the redirect podcast. My name is Adagio Hewins and I'm Emily Rojas.
Speaker 2:The redirect podcast is a show where we shift the conversation back to books. We discuss themes from some of our favorite books and how those themes show up in real-life experiences.
Speaker 1:On today's episode, we are creating teams and drafting our favorite band and challenged books.
Speaker 2:But before we get to that, if you enjoy the podcast, you would really humbly ask that you consider supporting us in a few simple ways. The first as you know, you can leave us a five star review on Apple podcasts or anywhere else. To let you leave that five star review and let us know how much you love the show.
Speaker 1:We would also love for you to follow us and engage with us on Instagram at redirect podcast and if you really really really like the show, please share our show with a friend. It is so fun the more friends that we have that are listening to the show, who talk back to us about the things that we shared, and it's just become a really fun community, so it's the best way to help us grow our community. We would love your help with that and we love you.
Speaker 2:Let's get into the episode let's go. That was so nice, it's true, though I feel like it's been a lot of fun to connect with book, with people on a non toxic or mostly non toxic corner of the internet.
Speaker 1:It's like a happier place, yeah, on the internet, I agree so all right, so we're talking about band and challenged books.
Speaker 2:What's the deal, abigail? Tell us what's the deal about band and challenge books. There it's definitely an uptick lately, obviously, with the problematic people and states it's definitely, I feel like, been a hot topic as of late. But you know what's what's the deal. What's the deal with band books?
Speaker 1:The deal is that this is not new, so the like. There is a history of banning books going all the way back to the 1600s. This is a tactic for controlling ideas in big populations, and there has certainly been a rise in banned and challenged books in the United States of America, where we live, over the last few years. So since 2020, there has been like a dramatic uptick in the amount of books that have been banned and challenged. According to the American Library Association, 48% of challenges take place in public libraries, 41% in school libraries, then 10% in schools and 1% in higher education, and the majority of band of like challenges, like people who are initiating the challenges, are actually not parents or patrons of the libraries. So, making up that other group, there's 17% of the people who challenge books are political or religious groups, 15% are the board or administration of like a school system, then the rest are librarians and teachers, elected officials and then just other random community members who are not like relatives or guardians of school age children or who don't have a library card.
Speaker 2:So that's definitely becoming more popular. I previously worked in a school district and so work for schools and I think that issue, like I feel like when we were growing up and obviously I had a more limited perspective of the world then, but I do feel like it was more parents in schools like having issues with specific books that their child was reading that they weren't comfortable with, but now it's become such a political issue that there are definitely activists, politicians, people who will like I think I don't know, I don't have the stat in front of me but there was some recent studies that showed like 80% of the challenges were coming from like five people. You know there are definitely more. So I think it's shifting to those like bad actors or people coming into communities who have absolutely no ties to the community, to the school, to the library, who are kind of trying to either make a name for themselves or make this a political issue. So I do think there's kind of a shift in like who is initiating these challenges and why.
Speaker 1:Yeah, these aren't, these aren't challenges that most of the time are led by, like, a big group of concerned parents. It's actually funded and, like, fueled by political groups, people who are interested in shaping the worldview of a new generation of people, specifically when we're talking about school age children. Yeah, and this is, you know, especially pertinent to talk about towards the end of Black History Month. It's a great time to chat about banned books, because a lot of books that are challenged and banned in this country are challenged and banned because they named that anti Blackness exists or it'll be. You know, there's a book about racism. It's a book I'm not going to chat about today but there's a book by Evermucks candy called stamped and it was challenged because it specifically talks about anti Blackness and not just racism in general. So it's created like the phrasing was.
Speaker 1:it's challenged because it is like it uses selective storytelling right which is just insane, because all books are selective story telling literally every book that's ever been written is a selective story.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, it's very interesting and actually I wanted to like share a personal experience not a personal experience but semi personal. But when I was in high school one of the books I'm actually going to talk about in our draft, so I won't go into the details yet but one of those books, and then another book it's 10 little Indians by Sherman Alexi I believe that is the name, if I'm remembering all the way back to high school, and those are two books I read that were really formative in my life. They both deal, you know. One is about, like you said, racism and the Black experience in America, which I'll share more about that one. And then the one by Sherman Alexi is about Native Americans and their treatment and a group of parents the grade younger than me kind of gang together to request that these books were no longer on the reading list, and I remember that was so appalling to me, even as a as a high schooler I think I was a senior and they were juniors when they would have been reading this because it's like these books really did change my perspective and shared a lot about different experiences of the world, and also like I was in the IB program. So these were books that were determined on like a national or international level. They weren't like the teacher just randomly picking, and so it was just so shocking to me.
Speaker 2:So I was like my first encounter with this where I'm like I don't understand, I don't know it's so interesting because it's like I do I'm not a parent, neither I'm sorry, but I can understand.
Speaker 2:There are probably times when you might think my child's not old enough to read about certain content. Like there definitely is graphic content, both of those books I've mentioned. But like what's the fine line? Like it definitely also seems like they picked the two books that were about racial issues and not necessarily other books that might have had like equal, inappropriate or whatever mature content in it. So I think there's obviously an ulterior motive there, but I don't know. That was my first experience with it and I always think about that and about like what's the line? Like as a parent, I think to me it's like you know, if you want your kid as a child not to read something because you don't feel like they're ready for it yet or whatever, that's one thing, but then to try to go get an entire district to ban a book or to take you out of curriculum because you have a problem with it.
Speaker 1:You can always just add. You can always make the rules for your own kid.
Speaker 2:Right, like it just seems bizarre to me that you would think I need this banned from the entire library, that no one can ever read it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's the difference between, like we're saying, what is making it an individual choice for your family and what is trying to control ideas. Yeah, yeah, you know. Another book that has been banned and challenged a lot and it was a really formative book for me was the Watson's Go to Birmingham, which is like a middle grade. Did you ever read that in school?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like a middle grades book about a family called the Watson's who go to Birmingham at the same time as it's like during the civil rights movement and it's during the same time as Dr King is doing the March on Washington. Anyways, it has been banned and challenged for quote offensive language, even though there is not a single curse word or slur in the book, which I think just perfectly demonstrates what we're talking about. It's not actually about removing it, because there is. They're not naming what the event, what, what the thing is that they really want to ban it for, but finding ways around it.
Speaker 1:And yeah, I mean this is just, it's a dangerous game to play. And this is part of the magic of books is that if you don't, if you're someone who doesn't have the privilege and advantages of being able to travel around the world or experience different worldviews, or you grow up in a pretty homogenous society or like a homogenous community, books are away from you, an extremely easy and affordable and accessible way for you to experience other cultures, and it can open the world up to you. And so it's really sad that there are so many bad actors who are trying to cut that resource off from young people specifically, and that's why we felt the need to talk about it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that sums it up basically.
Speaker 1:So, using the American Library Association's list of most frequently banned and challenged books, the three of us or sorry, the two of us chose three different books that we want to add to our quote unquote team of banned and challenged books. So, Emily, I'll let you go first. What's the first book on your team?
Speaker 2:Okay, the first book on my team is Native Sun by Richard Wright, which is the book I was talking about earlier. That was banned and challenged I believe successfully in my high school and this is a pretty popular book. It was written in 1940, and it follows Bigger Thomas, who is poor. He's a young black man in the 1930s in Chicago and he is kind of living like a life of crime in essence, but eventually he does take a job with kind of a wealthy white family. But unfortunately Bigger does end up murdering the daughter of the family and is the subject of a manhunt and eventually, kind of dramatically, is arrested and it becomes like his arrest and crime and defense becomes like a much bigger symbol. And he's like you know, on the one hand, what he did is being used to kind of justify violence and further racism against the black community in Chicago, but also he is being used as kind of like a symbol of, you know, he shouldn't be charged with the death penalty because you know he had no other option but to end up this way, or like he's a kind of a result, a product of his environment, and so it's kind of like, yeah, using what he did to show this kind of like both sides of how this one incident is being used as kind of a symbol for both racism and like anti-racism, and so I remember reading this in high school like the finer plot points are having to be refreshed by spark notes, so credit to them.
Speaker 2:But I do remember the impact it had on me, the discussions we were able to have in class, and I think that is honestly more important than any kind of like book you read to me, like I was able to benefit so much more beyond just reading the book, which was impactful in itself, but also like discussing it with people. And, like you said, like you are able to like 1930, being black, being young, being in 1930 Chicago in poverty that's not a life I'm ever going to be able to understand or live. Or like there's not even that many people left who did live that you know because it was such a long time ago. But you can read it and understand like okay, obviously this murder is not good, but like also his life maybe was set up in a way to direct him to this point that he had little control over or little like choice in the matter.
Speaker 2:You know, to end up to that point where that was even an option, and so I think it's, just like you said, interesting to not only read and experience different lives, but then also to get to discuss it with, you know, people in school was something I still think about and I still have the book on my shelf because it was important to me. So yeah, and unfortunately it was banned. So not only is this a very commonly challenged book, but it was challenged in my school for sex, violence and profanity, which, again, is obviously not the real reason, because there are other books on the reading list that had all those things in it, but maybe centered around white protagonists that were not challenged by the same parents. So it definitely seems like there was a correlation on that one.
Speaker 1:My first book is Looking for Alaska by John Green. This is, you know, obviously John Green is just a small indie author. He's obviously like a really popular young adult author. And Looking for Alaska is a coming of age story about a boy named Miles in his first year at boarding school, and it's about the friendships that he makes. Particularly he falls in love with his friend Alaska. It is about self discovery, it is about first love, it's about trying to fit in, it's about friendship, love and loss.
Speaker 1:And there is a moment in this book that involves oral sex and for that reason it has been challenged and banned a lot. I couldn't get, maybe why some folks wouldn't want their kids to read this book, I guess. But what I will say is someone who's read this book, this is not like. This is the most clinical, like a biological, uncomfortable description of what that encounter is like. This is not like in any way a romantic scene in this book and I think to sanitize that from the book is to take away from, like a true teenage experience. So John Green was actually interviewed about this being banned and here's what he had to say. So he said text is meaningless without context and what usually happens with looking for Alaska is that a parent chose one particular page of the novel to an administrator and then the book gets banned without anyone who objects to having read more than just that particular page. The scene is in question involves a very awkward and ultimately failed attempt at oral sex, which is described in a very cold and clinical language. In fact, the entire passage only includes one adjective nervous.
Speaker 1:He continued and then the books next scene. Two characters have a much more sensually described but patch, and passionate but much less sexually explicit interaction. So in context, the novel is arguing, really in a rather pointed way, that emotionally intimate kissing can be a whole lot more fulfilling than emotionally empty sex. And I don't know, I think this one's a little bit stickier, but for me, I don't know, I'm not a parent, but if I was, or if I could, if I could go back and redo my early teenage years, I would want the scariness around conversations about sex to be taken away and to have more frank conversations about the dangers of emotionally committing yourself to someone being really more intense and more real than just some sanitized physical actions, and have seen depictions of that a lot more often. I read this as an adult. I didn't end up reading it as a kid, but I don't know that one's an interesting one for me and I wonder if you have a reaction to that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I really liked what he said about the context because I think that's exactly right and, again, my experience that administrators or board members are just shown one passage or one page and yeah, in that context it might be inappropriate, but then you really need to take the value of the book as a whole. The context is really important. So I really like what he said about that quote and I also think, again, we're not parents, so I would love, if there are parents listening to weigh in on your thoughts of how you'll handle your child and what they read. But maybe there is an opportunity also for the parent who is concerned about the content to read it with their child and have those conversations if you're really bothered by it.
Speaker 2:What I think about is and I'm not drafting this because of the very problematic author but the Harry Potter books.
Speaker 2:I wasn't allowed to read those growing up because my parents like bandwagoned, I think, and they're listening so they can feel free to comment and disagree but I think they just got swept up in the hype of everyone saying it was evil or whatever.
Speaker 2:And eventually I did start to read it and then my dad read them as well and really liked them and we were able to have so many great conversations about the themes in the book and what they meant to me, and it was a much more beneficial experience than if they had just said I mean, they did say you can't read these and I did anyways, but I think that experience was just way more fun and allowed us to have a great relationship and have these great conversations versus just like you can't read this and we're not going to talk about it. So I think obviously there are probably definitely books I read that I was probably too young to read because of being an advanced reader, and that's valid and I think you should weigh in on what you think your child is ready for. But also, like there is probably opportunity to read with them and, like Abiel said, have these kind of conversations like as they're ready for, as you're ready for it. But maybe that's an alternative to just then to just ban stuff.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, I think also it's like if you're old enough, okay. By the time I was old enough to be in the audience that this book is marketed to, I already knew what oral sex was, and that's not because my parents talked to me about it. It's because, like kids at school, talk about stuff. And yeah, it's just like and so if, and that was in like you know 2006.
Speaker 1:So this is like 20 years later. So like we have to, there's. There's no way your kid hasn't heard about this. So it's whether or not you want to be part of the. I mean whatever. I'm not. This isn't a parenting advice podcast.
Speaker 1:But, I just think in general, like it's whether or not you want to be part of the conversation. It's not like they're about to learn something new, but they're actually about to learn a perspective on it that's different than what they've probably heard or seen in other places, and you have the opportunity to lean into that and be a part of it instead of letting like these they're the extent of their knowledge be what. Like Kyle from third you know, from third period thinks about it.
Speaker 1:You know, I mean that is so unfortunate if you're just like, because, at the end of the day, you can control media, you can control content, but you can't control everything and you can't control what you are going to learn through osmosis, so wouldn't you rather lean into it and learn from a bunch of different, diverse perspectives? I love that, that's my opinion. And if you don't want your kid to look, if you don't want your kid to read looking for Alaska, that's fine, but that doesn't mean that everyone's kid shouldn't be able to read it.
Speaker 2:Totally agree.
Speaker 1:Shout out. John Green yeah, you're welcome on the pod anytime, John, I know, and I'm really, I'm really curious. I mean, I saw this one and it got me thinking about his other books and I was wondering. I bet um, uh, what's that the really famous one that we both like, the false and our stars? I wonder if that one was challenged to. Um, I don't know. Anyways, back to you, Emily.
Speaker 2:What is the next book on your team, I feel like if there's a book out there, it's been challenged yeah exactly Okay.
Speaker 2:Um, the next book on my team is probably I, I don't know. I cite this as probably my favorite book ever, but, um, you know, it's been a while since I read it, but it's a lesson before dying by Ernest J Gaines and this book I honestly have never cried so hard at a book. I can barely talk about it without getting emotional. But, um, I read it in the 10th grade for school and it is about a young man who is black. In the South, it's like fresh post slavery, so, um, there's still like sharecroppers, and um, it's a rural farm setting. Um, and this black man is involved, not a part of, but a bystander in a robbery that ends in both the robbers and the robbie, the store owner, being killed, and he's the only one left, and he was completely innocently there. But because he's black and because he's there and this is, you know, the South he is arrested for the murder and tried and sentenced to death. And so this book follows the local school teacher who teaches, like the children who work on these like farms, and he is contacted by the man who's in jail, by his grandmother, whose friends with this teacher's grandmother, and she asks him to convince him to walk to the electric chair to his death with his head held high as a man, because he keeps like saying I'm just a hog, no one like I am not a person. To these people I don't matter, I'm going to like crawl to my death, basically. And so this book details, like the process of this teacher trying to like have these philosophical conversations with him and basically tell him that he needs to like like he is a symbol and he's not going to live, he's not going to make it out of this one, but he needs to go to death with his head held high and show like the police and the justice system that they can't break him and that he like is a person.
Speaker 2:It is very devastating, it's like horribly devastating and I think about it all the time, and the last sentence or the last part of this book like will break you up Every time I think about it. It's just devastating. And there's a lot of like religion in there as well, because there's, at the same time, a priest who's like really concerned with this man's like soul before he dies and saving him, and it's like this kind of tension between the two people who are visiting him in prison. And anyways, it is so good it honestly is my favorite book Maybe I've ever read. And anyways, it was banned for profanity, cursing and inappropriate subject matter. Are you kidding?
Speaker 1:me.
Speaker 2:Yes, profanity in cursing.
Speaker 1:Are you kidding me?
Speaker 2:No, and oh my gosh, basically this is an anecdote from 2018 in Florida school that this parent requested a district wide ban. A committee reviewed and decide to keep the book, but then the next day the superintendent banned the book. So that's obviously just one district. That's happened other places. I'm very fortunate that I read this book in school and no one banned it, so, but I mean this book, like I said, I can't even talk about it without getting teary, because it is it impacted me so much and I think definitely I was. I was young when I read this. I'm really fortunate. Honestly, I had teachers who exposed me to a lot of books. In ninth grade I read the Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison. I read this book.
Speaker 1:I read Native Sound like I talked about, the Bluest Eye is like on the top of every list.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I was a little bit of a nurse and I think I need to reread it because I definitely think I was. I don't know that it's a ninth grade book. I think it might be. Should have been way to tell it was a little older, because I don't know that I was ready for that kind of content but I was kind of a probably naive ninth grader. But anyways, I would love to reread it as an adult.
Speaker 2:But I think the ability to be exposed to those kind of books I just feel really lucky and it makes me sad to think about people not being exposed to these types of books and not like not everyone doesn't read every book. You know there's a lot of books I never read in school that other people might consider classics. But I think we can't ban books like this because, like, reading these kind of books has made me more empathetic and more thoughtful and has taught me more than you know. Like a history class about racism in America, it can only teach you so much. But then to read something that is so emotionally, like resonant, like this book was for me, and really shows you like the actual experience of a person, of a human being, even if they're not a real person, it's like this kind of situation could easily have happened, and so, anyways, it just is really sad to think about these kind of books not being available for students, and I think it's really important that students are able to read books like this.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, and you think about now, like the increase in misinformation, conspiracy theories, dangerous ideologies being having a lack of education and a lack of perspective. Just, it actually is a disservice to yourself because it creates a lot of vulnerability to dangerous ideologies, and that is also what these political actors who are trying to ban books are trying to get us to do. They want us to feel like we're educated but not have been exposed to diverse perspectives so that we don't demand better, you know, and that's right.
Speaker 1:That's part of this. So thank you for sharing about that book. I really want to read it now, maybe when I'm in the right headspace for it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's tough, but it's also not very long, so if anyone's out there like it's a relatively short book and definitely be in the right space, again, I've never cried so hard, but it is really worth the read in my opinion.
Speaker 1:So yeah, Okay, what's your next one? My next book is Persepolis by Marjan Satrapi.
Speaker 1:This is a book that we talked about earlier this year on the podcast it is a yeah, it's an autobiographical graphic novel about a girl, teenage, woman and woman, so all the different phases of her life, who. She is from Iran and she survived the Islamic Revolution in Iran and the war with Iraq and she highlights through her story the Devata Station of war, her journey with religion, the different phases in her life and how she really coped with them. She discusses times in her life when she experiments with different political viewpoints, with drugs, with different philosophies and her experience as a girl living in Iran with parents who were activists and counter to the Islamic Revolution and someone who ended up having to live abroad from her parents and navigate the world alone. And these are really really heavy subjects, obviously, and they become so much more digestible and accessible to the norm, to the average, typical person, because they're in a graphic novel format, which is just really helpful. And it's a really, really important story, I think, especially in a post 911 world, for someone like me, growing up, you know, white evangelical Christian in Georgia.
Speaker 1:During 911, and in the years following, I had this very messed up view of Muslim people and really anybody who lived in the Middle East, and I think that if, like my personal opinion is, that's at the core of why this book is banned because it is. It creates empathy and you see, the more whole perspective about who brown people are, who Muslim people are, and the diverse experiences like within this, in this, in girl culture, like it's just this. It is an unfortunate piece of misinformation that I feel like I was fed or that I got the impression of, either directly or indirectly, that there was just like singular experience from these. You know, quote unquote, bad guys who attacked America, and I think that's why this book is really, really important. And also because many pieces of what Marjan experienced as a young girl in Iran become eerily, eerily similar to what some parts of the United States have become in terms of their relationship to evangelical Christianity and how those belief systems are being forced upon people in a very legalistic way.
Speaker 1:Very, very timely Very very timely, like no wonder you don't want people reading this book, like you know, whatever. Anyways, this book was officially banned for quote, gambling. I don't even remember gambling in this book. Offensive language and political viewpoint and additional reasons were politically, racially and socially offensive.
Speaker 2:Also to be clear, like again, this is someone's life story.
Speaker 1:This is literally her life. You cannot argue with the events of her life. I'm so sorry.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's not like made up to be like if it's politically offensive or racially or socially offensive. I mean, that was her life, so I don't know what to tell you Like it's objectively an offensive thing that happened.
Speaker 1:You know I don't like and also she doesn't ever characterize another race that is not her own.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:In any sort of positive or negative way. There is literally no characterization of anything Like I don't gambling. That's ridiculous. I don't remember that. Anyways, yeah, in graphic depictions yes, it's a war there were graphic depictions of war. But also, like I don't know, my opinion is that you don't get to have two sides of that.
Speaker 1:You don't get to have your cake and eat it too, you don't get to train up children to be like little American war robots, pledge allegiance to United States under any circumstance and not ask questions about our military activity and then also be like don't talk about wars that happened in other countries, right, you know. Anyways, I am sad that I didn't read this to. I was an adult and I would recommend it to a high school student. I think it's appropriate for high schoolers.
Speaker 1:I mean, I don't know if it's some really big ideas that I don't know if, like an elementary or even early middle school are ready for, but yeah, I totally think this is an appropriate book for high schoolers.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I read this in high school and again, it was really shaped my life, for sure. I think it's also really critical because this is like a subject or a time in history and a region of the world that we really don't learn about, probably for good reasons.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, we don't learn about this stuff.
Speaker 2:So I just had no idea In.
Speaker 1:America in our public school system? I had. No, I did not learn about this.
Speaker 2:No, never, never, never. And so I think stuff like that is really important because, you know, like the history of the Middle East really directly impacts a lot of stuff that we're involved in, and so I think, yeah, it's like this is a really fun way for not fun, but like the graphic novel, like you said, makes it very accessible is probably a better word for high school students to read and to learn about history through the eyes of like one person. I mean this to me is no different. We're letting kids read the diary van Frank, although that is also a band and challenge book, but it's a similar vibe of like you can get a perspective on a big historical event that is way more accessible for a child or a young adult because of the way it's written and it's through one person's eyes, and so I think you know very similar vibes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, when you are able to reduce someone's like humanity to just like a people group that they're a part of and you see that people group as being the bad guys, which, like I will. You know I can only speak from my personal experience, but from my upbringing, indirect messaging and maybe some direct messaging told me that that was true. So you can make lots of excuses about loss of life and you know genocide and things. When you reduce a human being to a big characterization about the population they belong to.
Speaker 1:And I think that's why books like Persepolis are really important.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, totally agree. It's a great book.
Speaker 1:Yeah, all right, emily, what's your last pick?
Speaker 2:Last one what can I say about this book that hasn't been said on this podcast multiple times, but it's. Are you there, God? It's Me, Marguerite Judy Bloom.
Speaker 1:This is the best book of all time Band for.
Speaker 2:Religion and Sexuality.
Speaker 1:That is so stupid. Boo, what sexuality. What are you talking about?
Speaker 2:What they mean by sexuality is literally just the experience of being a girl, is it?
Speaker 1:because she gets her period. I think that's it. That's the only explanation. Having a crush on someone this is insane.
Speaker 2:Talking about boobs growing like one of the bigger boobs.
Speaker 1:I'm sure it's banned because she grew up in an interfaith home. That is insane.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and she's this book to me. Like I wish I had read it as a kid again.
Speaker 1:Oh, me too I've said this a million times.
Speaker 2:I wasn't not allowed to read it. I just thought it looked boring. Based on the title, I thought it was going to be like she's just praying or something, the whole time respectfully, and so I just I remember. I love Judy Bloom. I read a lot of her books, but this one I was always like no.
Speaker 1:If there's like a one small thing I could go back and change about my childhood, it would be that I read this book. Yeah, because this book.
Speaker 2:I mean again, we have a whole episode on this that we've released twice. I'm not going to do it. Please, I'm begging you, Read the book. But I just will say I mean this book, if you don't know, if you missed those episodes. It's about Margaret. She's growing up. Her mom is, her mom was raised Christian, Her dad is Jewish, and so she kind of realizes everyone else around her like has a faith and her parents kind of raised her without one and so she's kind of like trying out different faiths. She goes to churches with her friends, she goes to the synagogue, she goes all around. And she's also about her growing up with her friends and having crushes and going through puberty. And this book was set in the 70s, which I did just Google while you were gone. It was set in the 70s and it's still so relatable Like it felt like it could have been written about me and my friends.
Speaker 1:And so I haven't read this. The female experience is universal.
Speaker 2:It is, it really is. That's what this book taught me.
Speaker 1:When you're growing up. It's Women's History Month. This is the perfect time to read this book.
Speaker 2:This is a book to read. So, yeah, when you're a kid, when you're a young girl at least or when I was you think you're weird. You don't know that everyone's having the same experience as you. And if I had read this book, it would have been like oh, everyone also feels weird and unsure and self-conscious and is not ready for where they are in life, when they want to be more mature or they're scared of how fast things are going, and I just wish I had read it. This book should not be banned. I wish I had unbanned myself because I just thought the cover looked boring. But maybe update that design. Get more kids reading this book, including boys, Maybe Dads.
Speaker 1:The power of a dad reading this book.
Speaker 2:If you're a dad of a teen or tween, specifically, you need to read this book, and the dad in this book is so nice, the movie's so good. You can watch the movie too. I will allow it because the movie is a great adaptation. So if you don't want to read the book, you can still watch the movie.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:Okay, what's your last one?
Speaker 1:My last one is the Big Kahuna. The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret.
Speaker 2:Atwood.
Speaker 1:Everyone knows something about this book. But this is a book, a dystopian story, but really not that far away from our current reality, in a fallen United States of America where women have been enslaved as reproductive slaves I guess for the elite. And it is the recovered diary of one of these handmaids who goes by the name Offred. And this book has been challenged for quote vulgarity and sexual overtones, fair, and you know what?
Speaker 2:Right on the money.
Speaker 1:It is vulgar and by nature and there are sexual overtones. However, this book is so near and relevant to what is currently happening in the United States of America.
Speaker 2:More by the day, more by the day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, ivf being extremely restricted in the state of Alabama, challenges coming to states who offer reproductive health care to women from out of state. Like it is getting crazy out here, guys. So this book is non-band just because there are sexual overtones? If that was the case, there are so many other books that should be banned that aren't ever using that criteria. This is banned because it's too close to reality and, like the actors of patriarchy in this country don't want us thinking about what could happen and what might be happening now. That would lead to a reality that deeply restricts freedom of choice, freedom of religion, freedom of expression, freedom of speech.
Speaker 1:Obviously, the show is good too, but the book is really important and like didn't receive, like, the love in its time until the Hulu show came out. But it's really important and it's particularly important that we educate young people about the importance of reproductive freedom and reproductive choice and what it means to be active in these conversations in the public arena and not just to let other people pass away. Make these decisions for you, because there's a lot on the line.
Speaker 2:So yeah, and I think I mean I've never read the book, but I have watched the show and I think you know, like, in everything that happens where something you once had the ability to do is taken away, it's important to like ask questions and evaluate that like, whatever maybe your thoughts are because, like, I think the IVF decision is a perfect example of that and we're not a political podcast but I think it's important to say, okay, like a lot of people I think are thinking, well, I was pro-life, but I didn't mean it like this, and so I think it's important to just, anytime the government is taking things away from you that you once had the right to do, that might be worth asking questions about.
Speaker 2:And I think this kind of takes it to like obviously the max dystopian level in this book. But what I really liked about the show and I'm assuming the book has some similar vibes is like you can see how it started off innocuously and people let things slide, and then how it gets to this place of being dystopian. So I think you know it's always good to be aware.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think it's like it brings it back to this what we started the conversation of this podcast off as talking about individual choice versus making rules that impact everyone. Right, you know you can make personal choices about your ethics and your life and not force them upon other people. Sure, and that is. That's great. That is one of the beautiful things about America that we're supposed to have. See, if people need to make choices about our own lives, um, yeah, so stop banning books, you guys.
Speaker 2:I don't think any of the book banners are listening to our pod. I don't think so we would have scared them off a while ago, but um but I think what's really important is if you are on the positive side, like you have to say something.
Speaker 2:you know, because if you see this happening in your child school or in your community or in your library, like those people who are banning books and causing these challenges are so outspoken and they are organized and they are infiltrating, like every level of politics, um, with a specific agenda and so like it doesn't take that much to just show up to meetings or to speak out in the favor of books that are being challenged. So I would encourage everyone to consider that because, um, I think it is a very small minority of people who are trying to ban these books, but they're often the loudest and makes it hard for people in charge to, like you know, say I'm not going to do this if they feel like they're getting all this pressure. So it's really good to be a supporter.
Speaker 1:And I think like another, even smaller way and easier way to contribute to making sure that books are available to everyone is that if you don't have a library card and if you're not a patron of your local public library, then you really should be, because, um yeah, when it comes to like input from patrons, like if you don't have a library card and you don't use the library and you don't check books out, then your impact doesn't go as far. So, support books that are being challenged, check them out from libraries, be involved in library programming. Also, you should just go to library anyway, because why are you guys buying every book you read.
Speaker 1:I mean geez.
Speaker 2:Louise, please Stop doing that. I mean, you know, support the authors. Support the authors, you don't have to you don't have to.
Speaker 1:There's another way. You don't have to over consume like this. Books are free. They are literally free, oh my gosh. So, anyways, support your local library. That's a really great way. And also like, vote for members of your school board who are chill and think that people should be able to read everything so critical With their parents consent. Yeah, anyways, all right, cool, this is a good conversation. I'm glad that we did this episode.
Speaker 2:It was great. It was really fun. Do you have anything that you've read lately you want to share?
Speaker 1:I mean, here's the thing I have been traveling a lot so I had like a lot of like plans to read a lot of stuff. Yeah, I feel that, but it just really I don't know. It just really threw me off.
Speaker 2:But let me see.
Speaker 1:I feel you.
Speaker 2:I can share something while you think about it. I just finished a sequel to a book that I loved, that I've recommended before, but it was everyone on this train is a suspect by Benjamin Stevenson. Oh yeah, he's the guy who did. Everyone in my family has killed someone.
Speaker 1:It's the original.
Speaker 2:And so the protagonist is Ernest. I can't remember his last name, my gosh, I'm so bad at the names. Anyways, the protagonist is Ernest, whose last name I don't recall, cunningham, maybe, and he in the first book he starts off as a. He's like a guy who has made a sort of a living writing like Kindle free books about self-published, about how to write a mystery, and he has these rules like the killer has to be someone you're reasonably familiar with you can't just be a random person.
Speaker 1:It's the same main character as the first book. Same main character. Okay, got it, got it, got it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that's the first book he introduces himself that way and then he ends up living out the plot of an actual serial killer and having to solve the mystery. And it was so funny. This is a sequel. In the sequel he has written this first book, which was everyone in my family has killed someone, and he has been invited to go to a crime writers festival which is set on a train and for like their, it's like the 50th anniversary or something of this festival, and so they're doing this whole big thing on a train.
Speaker 2:There's several other writers there and he's trying to think of a plot for his second book because he got a book deal but he doesn't know how to write fiction because the first book thinks happen to him and then, conveniently, people do start dying. So he's able to write a second book about this murder. And these books are like to me if you don't wanna be scared, but you wanna read a mystery, these are the books for you because they are so funny. The author is like writing directly to the audience, so there's so many like little asides where he'll be like okay, I'm gonna figure this out in chapter 31.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, I remember that from the first one, stuff like that. So it's just really it's a great time, so this is a super fun read Again. Like I think you know some people like the mystery, they like the murder mystery, but they don't wanna be creeped out, they don't want the like scariness this is the anecdote to that because they're so funny and like obviously there is murder, so there is that. But like just the tone of the novel is really light and like fun. So I think it was a great sequel and I'm like I don't know how long you can believe and hopefully continue to have a character who's involved in so many murders without, like it, being suspicious, like why are so many murders happening around you? But I do hope that this series continues on for a long time because it's very enjoyable and I love the characters.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what I wanna say back about that is I need to actually read the second one, the first one I listened to on audiobook, and he's Australian. Yeah, the Australian accent was so intense.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And distracting and this is no hate to Australian people. I actually I was just telling you the other day that I really wanna go to Australia now. Yeah, but it was so much to listen to this book in this very strong Australian accent. It was just so distracting to me, so maybe read this one, not listen.
Speaker 2:Yeah, for some reason I've listened to like a ton of Australian audiobooks, so I feel like I have gotten the hang of it, but it is a lot to decipher. It's just a tough accent. So if you're not familiar with it, so I think definitely, I think read this one. But it is kind of fun because in the audiobook there are like certain things will change. Instead of being like 50 pages from now, this is gonna happen, it'll be like 10 minutes from now, this is gonna happen, that's fun.
Speaker 2:So it's very fun, but, yeah, definitely a great book to read. So good morning Okay.
Speaker 1:Do you have anything to share? I do so. Yeah, this is an audiobook I'm finished with, but that's okay, I'm so working on it, that's fine, I do that all the time. Yeah, I have been reading a couple books right now. One is Raiders of the Lost Heart by hold, one while I remember the other. It is a romance book about archaeologists and oh my God.
Speaker 2:I know it's so cute.
Speaker 1:So do, do, do, do, doot, oh, shoot, hold on, You're good. It is called. I'm so prepared for this podcast. Okay, it's called Raiders of the Lost Heart by Joe Segura. This is super fun, it is cute. It is about its enemies to lovers. It is academia, they're in the field, they're doing archaeology for this thing in the Mexican jungle. It is a woman of color author and a woman of color main character. So that's amazing. Trying to, this year I've been tracking, not to hit a particular goal, but just out of curiosity. When I actually track it, what is the gender and the race and ethnicity and sexual orientation of the authors I'm reading and this may be like a lot more conscious about going out of my way to speaking of reading diverse perspectives, to read diverse perspectives. Anyways, it's really cute. So far, I'm like three quarters of the way through and it's a lot of fun and I feel like I'm learning stuff about archaeology. Yes, I just love that. Like you had me at academia, you had me at enemies to lovers. You know, I love that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I already have it on hold. I'm so down. Yeah, it's really cute.
Speaker 1:I mean, is it amazing? I don't know if it's the best book I've ever written or read written, wow, wow. If it's the best book I've ever read, I don't know. Is it extremely cute and fun?
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, that's all that matters.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's all you need.
Speaker 2:That's all you need.
Speaker 1:And then I'm also. I'm still reading the Poppy War, which I think I said on the last podcast. It's been slow going but it's really good and I'm really enjoying it. So recommendation to read the Poppy War by RF Kuang. I think I can go ahead and say it's good.
Speaker 2:Awesome. So there you go.
Speaker 1:Hopefully I'll have something new to report by the next time that we record.
Speaker 2:It's been a lot, but we'll see you guys next time and bye, bye, bye.