Banned Books Week: Or the Children's Crusade

I support the message of the American Library Association’s Banned Books Week. This is a week celebrating the freedom to read; “it highlights the value of free and open access to information.” That’s a celebration I can get behind. The spirit of this week makes me hopeful for open mindedness in general. But every year all of the talk about the irrationality, the indignity, and the sheer stupidity of banning books gets me thinking about the difference between censorship and guidance.

This year those thoughts took the form of squeamishness over two of our most popular young adult books. With the film versions of Ender’s Game and Catching Fire coming out this fall, these two already bestselling books are flying off the shelves. I’ve read and enjoyed both novels, but I don’t know that I would recommend them to my young cousins. The violence inherent in the subject matter of these two novels (war) definitely has its place. However, I am constantly surprised by how much violence is elaborately described. In Ender’s Game we see our hero straight up murder two children (I’m sure I could have stated that more eloquently, but I think my phrasing expresses my feeling). Catching Fire is the second installment in a series about a warrior heroine sent twice to kill or die in a battle with twenty three of her fellow man. By the final book in the trilogy, Mockingjay, Katniss’ kill count nears ten total individuals both inside and out of the arena. 

I have been told by countless parents, teachers, and librarians that they do not worry about the amount of violence in young adult literature (or video games and movies for that matter). Violence is so far from the realm of our daily lives that we do not imagine it being an issue for our children. This is worrisome to me. While I would never imagine that someone would bring the actions of Ender Wiggin or Katniss Everdeen into the real world because of what they saw in their stories, I do think reading these stories when we aren’t ready for them does damage. I mean no negativity to these two titles in particular, but to the culture of youth violence as a whole. We should not seek to ban Ender’s Game or Catching Fire, but we need to be having a different sort of conversation around them. We need to be talking about the meaning of the violence, because in neither of these works is the violence gratuitous or meaningless. If we are going to champion books with difficult themes we need to know why we are doing it.

The conversations about these books are more important now than ever especially as the kids reading them today have friends and parents coming home from very real wars and suffering the same traumas as their fictional counterparts. I would never condone the banning of these two books, but I also fervently disagree with ignoring the greater conversation of why people wish them to be banned in the first place. The nerve being struck is not to be ignored, there just may be something there worth thinking about. 

I celebrate Banned Books Week. I support those challenging established ideas, but I urge everyone to think broadly about why books are banned. Take a look at the root, have a conversation about it, and judge the merit for yourself. The glory of Banned Books Week is that you are free both to read what you want to and bypass what you don’t. That’s FREADOM.

Banned Books Week Contest

Banned Books Week is a celebration of the freedom of speech and the freedom to read.  It is held annually during the last week in September.  It celebrates the FREADOM to read and experience ideas even if others might not agree with them.

In true Banned Books Week spirit, we will be hosting a Banned Books Week Contest!  We will have ten banned books in the store, wrapped in paper. On the wrappings, we'll list the reasons each particular books bas been banned, and participants must guess the titles of the books.  All participants will receive an I Read Banned Books sticker along with a FREADOM bumper sticker and button.  Guessing five out of the ten books correctly will enter you into a drawing to be one of three winners to win a $10 gift certificate to Cavalier House Books!  The contest will open on Monday, September 23rd and last through next Friday, September 27th.  We'll announce the winners the following Tuesday.  Stop by the shop anytime next week to participate!  Happy reading!  

Victoria: Waiting to Catch Fire?

If you're a Hunger Games fan, then the wait for the release of Catching Fire in November will probably feel more like a year than the three months it actually is.  If you're looking for a way to pass the time, then check out our list of recommended reading for fans of The Hunger Games!

Divergent by Veronica Roth

In a future Chicago, 16-year-old Beatrice Prior must choose among five predetermined factions to define her identity for the rest of her life, a decision made more difficult when she discovers that she is an anomaly who does not fit into any one group, and that the society she lives in is not perfect after all.

 Across the Universe by Beth Revis

Seventeen-year-old Amy joins her parents as frozen cargo aboard the vast spaceship "Godspeed" and expects to awaken on a new planet in 300 years. Never could she have known that she would be thrust into the world of a spaceship that lives by its own rules.

I am Number Four by Pittacus Lore

Nine alien teenagers are hiding on Earth. Three are dead. Number Four is next. This is the launch of a gripping, action-packed series that was the basis for the blockbuster DreamWorks feature film.

Incarceron by Catherine Fisher

Incarceron is a prison so vast that it contains not only cells, but also metal forests, dilapidated cities, and vast wilderness. Finn, a 17-year-old prisoner, has no memory of his childhood and is sure that he came from Outside Incarceron. And then Finn finds a crystal key that allows him to communicate with a girl who claims to live on the Outside.

Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

The alien Buggers threaten humanity with extinction, and Earth's ultimate savior may be one small boy. Andrew "Ender" Wiggins thinks he is only playing computer games, but he is really commanding Earth's last great fleet.

 

Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi

In a future world, teenaged Nailer scavenges copper wiring from grounded oil tankers for a living, but when he finds a beached clipper ship with a girl in the wreckage, he has to decide if he should strip the ship for its wealth or rescue the girl.

City of Bones by Cassandra Clare

Suddenly able to see demons and the Darkhunters who are dedicated to returning them to their own dimension, fifteen-year-old Clary Fray is drawn into this bizarre world when her mother disappears and Clary herself is almost killed by a monster.

Cinder by Marissa Meyer

Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth's fate hinges on one girl. . . . Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg.

Uglies by Scott Westerfeld

Tally’s adventures begin in Uglies, where she learns the truth about what life as a Pretty really means. She rebels against the surgery that will make her a Pretty, but ultimately succumbs. In Pretties, Tally has forgotten all about her Ugly life, and when she’s reminded, she has a hard time listening. And what little’s left of the old Tally is further compromised in Specials, because Tally has been transformed into a fierce fighting machine. But when she’s offered a chance to forever improve civilization, will she be able to overcome her brainwashing? The answer is evident years later in Extras, after the Pretty regime has ended. Boundless human creativity, new technologies, and old dangers have been unleashed upon the world. But fame and popularity can be just as dangerous as extreme beauty…

Enclave by Ann Aguirre

In a post-apocalyptic future, 15-year-old Deuce, a loyal Huntress, brings back meat while avoiding the Freaks outside her enclave. But when she is partnered with the mysterious outsider, Fade, she begins to see that the strict ways of the elders may be wrong--and dangerous.

Legend by Marie Lu

North America has split into two warring nations. Fifteen-year-olds Day, a famous criminal, and June, the brilliant soldier hired to capture him, discover that they have a common enemy.

Unwind by Neal Shusterman

In this futuristic thriller, Neal Shusterman creates a world that blurs the line between life and death and challenges ideas about what it means to be alive.

Matched by Ally Condie

Cassia has always trusted the Society to make the right choices for her. So when Xander's face appears on-screen at her Matching ceremony, Cassia knows he is her ideal mate . . . until she sees Ky Markham's face flash for an instant before the screen fades to black.

The Bar Code Tattoo by Suzanne Weyn

The first book in the Bar Code series. Identity vs. access. Freedom vs. control. For Kayla, the choice not to get the bar code tattoo changes everything. She becomes an outcast in her high school. Dangerous things start happening to her family. There's no option but to run . . . for her life.

Partials by Dan Wells

The human race is all but extinct after a war with Partials--engineered organic beings identical to humans--has decimated the population. Reduced to only tens of thousands by RM, a weaponized virus to which only a fraction of humanity is immune, the survivors in North America have huddled together on Long Island while the Partials have mysteriously retreated. The threat of the Partials is still imminent, but, worse, no baby has been born immune to RM in more than a decade. Our time is running out.

Delirium by Lauren Oliver

They say that the cure for Love will make me happy and safe forever. And I’ve always believed them. Until now. Now everything has changed. Now, I’d rather be infected with love for the tiniest sliver of a second than live a hundred years smothered by a lie.

Birthmarked by Caragh O'Brien

IN THE ENCLAVE, YOUR SCARS SET YOU APART, and the newly born will change the future.
Sixteen-year-old Gaia Stone and her mother faithfully deliver their quota of three infants every month. But when Gaia's mother is brutally taken away by the very people she serves, Gaia must question whether the Enclave deserves such loyalty. A stunning adventure brought to life by a memorable heroine, this dystopian debut will have readers racing all the way to the dramatic finish.

The Maze Runner by James Dashner

When Thomas wakes up, he's surrounded by kids who welcome him to the Glade. Just like Thomas, the Gladers don't know why or how they got there. The next day, a girl arrives with a surprising message.

The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater

From the #1 "New York Times"-bestselling author of "Shiver" and "Linger" comes a heartstopping novel. With her trademark lyricism, Stiefvater turns to a new world, where a pair are swept up in a daring, dangerous race across a cliff with more than just their lives at stake should they lose.

2013 Fall Okra Picks

Southern indie booksellers like their okra, and they love their southern books. The new list of Okra Picks-- great southern books, fresh off the vine-- has just been released. A dozen new books that all have two things in common: They are southern in nature, and there is a southern indie bookseller that wants everyone to read each one! The SIBA Okra picks offer a curated reading list for every season.

The Alligator Man by James Sheehan

Kevin Wylie's crooked boss wants to run him out of town, and Kevin's long-time girlfriend is ready to take a hike. He decides that now is the time to leave Miami, visit his father, who he hasn't seen in 28 years, and get some answers. Heading back to his hometown, he doesn't realize that he and his dad will become embroiled in a murder case.
The victim, one of the richest and most-hated corporate criminals in America has been dubbed The Alligator Man since pieces of his clothing were found in a local swamp. Billy Fuller had every reason in the world to want Johnson dead and all the evidence leads right to his doorstep. But legendary trial lawyer Tom Wylie believes in Billy and he and his son reunite to fight the courtroom battle for Billy's life.
The Alligator Man is a story of greed, anger, love, redemption and two powerful trial attorneys who fight to the end-- and risk everything--for the truth.

The Funeral Dress by Susan Gregg Gilmore

A deeply touching Southern story filled with struggle and hope.
Emmalee Bullard and her new baby are on their own. Or so she thinks, until Leona Lane, the older seamstress who sat by her side at the local shirt factory where both women worked as collar makers, insists Emmalee come and live with her. Just as Emmalee prepares to escape her hardscrabble life in Red Chert holler, Leona dies tragically. Grief-stricken, Emmalee decides she'll make Leona's burying dress, but there are plenty of people who don't think the unmarried Emmalee should design a dress for a Christian woman - or care for a child on her own. But with every stitch, Emmalee struggles to do what is right for her daughter and to honor Leona the best way she can, finding unlikely support among an indomitable group of seamstresses and the town's funeral director. In a moving tale exploring Southern spirit and camaraderie among working women, a young mother will compel a town to become a community.

Guests on Earth by Lee Smith

It is 1936 when orphaned thirteen-year-old Evalina Toussaint is admitted to Highland Hospital in Asheville, North Carolina, a mental institution known for its innovative treatments for nervous disorders and addictions. Taken under the wing of the hospital's most notable patient, Zelda Fitzgerald, Evalina witnesses the cascading events leading up to the tragic fire of 1948 that killed nine women in a locked ward, Zelda among them.

Lookaway, Lookaway by Wilton Barnhardt

Presiding over her family and its legacy of masterpiece Civil War art, North Carolina society maven Jerene Jarvis Johnston takes increasingly haphazard steps to protect her grown children from their own heedlessness.

Love and Lament by John Milliken Thompson

A dauntless heroine coming of age at the turn of the twentieth century confronts the hazards of patriarchy and prejudice, and discovers the unexpected opportunities of World War I
Set in rural North Carolina between the Civil War and the Great War, "Love and Lament" chronicles the hardships and misfortunes of the Hartsoe family.
Mary Bet, the youngest of nine children, was born the same year that the first railroad arrived in their county. As she matures, against the backdrop of Reconstruction and rapid industrialization, she must learn to deal with the deaths of her mother and siblings, a deaf and damaged older brother, and her father's growing insanity and rejection of God.
In the rich tradition of Southern gothic literature, John Milliken Thompson transports the reader back in time through brilliant characterizations and historical details, to explore what it means to be a woman charting her own destiny in a rapidly evolving world dominated by men.

Moonrise by Cassandra King

When Helen Honeycutt falls in love with a man who has recently lost his wife in a tragic accident, their sudden marriage creates a rift between her new husband and his circle of friends, who resent her intrusion into their circle. When the newlyweds join them for a summer at Moonrise, his late wife's family home in the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains, it soon becomes clear that someone is trying to drive her away, in this writer's homage to Rebecca, by Daphne du Maurier.

Mother of Rain by Karen Spears Zacharias

Maizee Hurd was an easy target for hard times, according to Burdy Luttrell, the town healer. Burdy is a Melungeon woman with striking features and mysterious ways who owns the land the Hurds leased following their marriage on June 3, 1940.

Necessary Lies by Diane Chamberlain

Caring for her family on their mid-20th-century tobacco farm after the loss of her parents, 15-year-old Ivy connects with Grace County social worker Jane, who strains her personal and professional relationships with her advocacy of Ivy's family, whose dark secrets test Jane's resolve against racial tensions and state-mandated sterilizations.

Respect Yourself by Robert Gordon

Set in the world of 1960s and ‘70s soul music, Respect Yourself is a story of epic heroes in a shady industry. It’s about music and musicians—Isaac Hayes, Otis Redding, Sam and Dave, Wilson Pickett, the Staple Singers, and Booker T. and the M.G.’s, Stax’s interracial house band. It’s about a small independent company’s struggle to survive in a business world of burgeoning conglomerates. And always at the center of the story is Memphis, Tennessee, an explosive city struggling through heated, divisive years. Told by one of our leading music chroniclers, Respect Yourself brings to life this treasured cultural institution and the city that created it.

Someone Else's Love Story by Joshilyn Jackson

Someone Else's Love Story is Joshilyn Jackson's funny, charming, and poignant novel about science and miracles, secrets and truths, faith and forgiveness; about falling in love and learning that things aren't always what they seem--or what we hope they will be. It's a story about discovering what we want and ultimately finding what we need.

The Stories South by William Ferris

"The Storied South" features the voices--by turn searching and honest, coy and scathing--of twenty-six of the most luminous artists and thinkers in the American cultural firmament, from Eudora Welty, Pete Seeger, and Alice Walker to William Eggleston, Bobby Rush, and C. Vann Woodward. Masterfully drawn from one-on-one interviews conducted by renowned folklorist William Ferris over the past forty years, the book reveals how storytelling is viscerally tied to southern identity and how the work of these southern or southern-inspired creators has shaped the way Americans think and talk about the South.
"The Storied South" offers a unique, intimate opportunity to sit at the table with these men and women and learn how they worked and how they perceived their art. The volume also features 45 of Ferris's striking photographic portraits of the speakers and a CD and a DVD of original audio and films of the interviews.

The Tilted World by Tom Franklin and Beth Ann Fennelly

Set against the backdrop of the historic flooding of the Mississippi River, The Tilted World is an extraordinary tale of murder and moonshine, sandbagging and saboteurs, and a man and a woman who find unexpected love, from Tom Franklin, the acclaimed author of the New York Times bestseller Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter, and award-winning poet Beth Ann Fennelly. The year is 1927. As rains swell the Mississippi, the mighty river threatens to burst its banks and engulf everything in its path, including federal revenue agent Ted Ingersoll and his partner, Ham Johnson. Arriving in the tiny hamlet of Hobnob, Mississippi, to investigate the disappearance of two fellow agents who'd been on the trail of a local bootlegger, they are astonished to find a baby boy abandoned in the middle of a crime scene.

What I Came to Tell You by Tommy Hays

Since his mother died earlier this year, Grover Johnston (named after a character in Thomas Wolfe's Look Homeward Angel) has watched his family fall to pieces as his father throws himself into his work rather than dealing with the pain. Left to care for his younger sister, Sudie, Grover finds solace in creating intricate weavings out of the natural materials found in the bamboo forest behind his North Carolina home, a pursuit that his father sees only as a waste of time.
But as tensions mount between father and son, two unlikely forces conspire to lead the Johnstons on a new path -- a presence that seems to come to Grover in his darkest moments and new tenants in the rental house across the street who have come from deep in the Carolina hills and plopped themselves right into Grover's life. The families seem so different but become increasingly intertwined, bound together in unexpected ways. Until one devastating disaster threatens to tear them apart.

Review: Counting by 7s by Holly Goldberg Sloan

Stories about genuinely different kids trying to fit in always seem to resonate with me. Holly Goldberg Sloan’s Counting by 7s is no exception. Like many of these stories, fitting in is always the goal in the beginning, but by the end of the novel that goal seems to be so utterly beyond the point. It’s the ultimate middle grade MacGuffin – it gives us cause to empathize with our protagonist, but by the end we so love and understand them that we no longer see how the world at large cannot.

Willow Chance is an extraordinary twelve-year-old. She is a genius with an obsessive personality. She obsessively gardens. She obsessively diagnoses herself and those around her with various medical conditions. And she obsessively counts by 7s. All of these habits exist to calm an anxious mind. So when Willow’s parents die very early in the novel the reader worries just how much her already delicate psyche can undergo.

Losing your parents at twelve-years-old would be devastating to any kid. It’s the collapse of the only world you have ever known. But to lose your parents who are also your only friends because the other kids at school just don’t get you? And to lose your parents just as you are entering a new school where the teachers are suspicious of your intelligence? To lose your parents when you have absolutely no one else? It is practically unimaginable. But Willow meets Mai Nguyen who takes her under wing and shepherds Willow into a new life.

There is a large cast of characters here as Willow’s personality tends to alarm and then completely disarm everyone she meets. That she is so different, unable to affect pretense or fake her way through social norms she doesn’t understand, is refreshing. Both the people she meets in the story and the readers of it feel compelled to keep her from further harm.

Counting by 7s is a great story about people growing into the best versions of themselves in order to support one another. Willow’s journey away from and back to counting 7s is a testament to family in all of its forms. The characters Holly Goldberg Sloan has created draw you in because of, not in spite of, their differences and their challenges. This is a story of flawed, damaged people and with it Sloan is able to convey to her young readers how important it is to hold each other together. Willow does eventually find her place in the world, not through fitting in but, like the seven colors of the rainbow and the seven important people in her life, by being “vivid and distinct.”

Review: Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

Thus far I have written only one negative review on this blog. I don’t really see the purpose in writing about a book I didn’t like. We all know what they say about opinions…what I think about a book is only relevant here in the sense that I am sharing my passion with you. We should be champions of books rather than their snarky detractors. But then Gone Girl happened.

Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl is a novel told in the split perspective of Nick Dunn and his missing possibly deceased wife Amy. I’m not going to argue that I look to literature to make friends, and I like plenty of books about somewhat less than savory characters. But that being said, Nick and Amy are simply abhorrent people. They are the worst sort of entitled, petulant, pretentious people imaginable. If their story were operating for some greater purpose I would be here singing the praises of Flynn and her novel, but the greater purpose of this novel is only in how enamored it is of itself and its darkness. People are often terrible; usually there is a reason for their lies and deceit and general detestability. Not so here.

Back to plotting though. Amy is missing. The house is a wreck. As usual, the husband is the prime suspect. Nick speaks directly to the reader, defending himself and proclaiming his innocence all as he lies to the police and digs himself a deeper grave involving Amy’s recently increased life insurance policy and Nick’s much younger girlfriend on the side. For Amy’s part we get years worth of her old journals. We hear about her courtship with Nick, her marriage, and her eventual fall from grace when she and Nick lost all of their money and had to leave their savvy New York life behind for the blandest of dying towns in the Midwest. All of this sounds great. Typical crime novel conventions. The problem comes for me when Flynn tries to turn these conventions on their head.

Gone Girl does not want to be a thriller (or at least just a thriller). It wants to be a literary novel about love, marriage, and the personas we are forced to adopt when we promise “till death do us part.” The most frequently quoted passage in the novel comes when Amy writes about the “Cool Girl” – you know the one. It’s the woman that loves bar food and fart jokes, sports and sex. Amy wore the persona of the Cool Girl for years ultimately becoming imprisoned in the falsity of her creation and in her marriage. It’s a great passage and an interesting topic for discussion, but the novel does not support it as a theme. The attempts at a deeper meaning, the contrived plot twists, the completely bananas ending…it all came together in the worst possible way for me.

As I stated earlier, I don’t see much value in negative reviews, but I had to get my thoughts out here. Gone Girl has SO MANY fans and you can see their reviews throughout the whole of the book world. I don’t encourage you not to read Gone Girl – in fact, I want you to read it so we can talk about it! It took me a year to get to this book; everyone was a buzz about it last year – now I’m alone. I was trying to stay away from the hype machine, but it worked so hard and for so long I had to give it a try. Gone Girl was not for me – it hit all of the wrong notes. If you want to read a literary novel about a man who may or may not have killed his wife that functions as a rumination on marriage and shared lives try Adam Ross’ Mr. Peanut. It succeeds in all of the ways Gone Girl fails.

Victoria Reviews: The Long Walk by Stephen King (Richard Bachman)

I don't often read Stephen King books (though this one is under his pen name, Richard Bachman), but when I do, it never seems to be one of his more famous works.  This is the third King book I've read (the first one being On Writing and the second being 11/22/63…both were wonderful).  Many people who have either read none of his works or only a few of them push King into the Horror section and never look back, but they might be surprised to find that King is much more versatile than that.  Of the two of his novels I've read so far, I wouldn't classify either one as horror.  They have some frightening elements, sure, and they are occasionally unpleasant and often tense, but King's writing is so much more than just scary.  He has a wonderful ability to bring characters to life and use all the elements of his story to tie everything together in a unique and fascinating way.

The Long Walk is about a group of 100 boys who volunteer to join the book's namesake event, the Long Walk.  The point of the Walk is for all of them to walk at a minimum speed of 4 mph until there is only one left walking.  Anyone who stops walking, falls below 4 mph, or in some other way breaks the rules receives a "warning," and three warnings earn you a "ticket," which means you're out of the Walk (I won't say how this works…spoilers).  The prize?  Anything you want for the rest of your life.

There are no stops, pauses, rests, or anything of the like in the Long Walk.  The boys must walk constantly and continuously until the end, however long and far that might be.  The book, therefore, turns rather psychological as the constant walking starts to wear on their bodies and minds.

The book is written in third person limited perspective from the point of view of Ray Garraty, number 47.  He quickly makes friends with some of the other boys, forming a group they call the Musketeers.  King does a beautiful job of making these characters come alive.  One might expect the description (and Garraty's thoughts) to linger on the characters' feet – the pain of the beating their feet take as they walk over 100 miles without stopping – but King spends much more time inside their minds.  You really get to know several of the characters very well, and they spend a decent portion of the Long Walk discussing deep and philosophical questions and ideas, most likely to keep their minds off the pain in their bodies and feet.

One interesting thing I discovered while reading this novel is that you really start to feel everything that's happening to the characters.  It's very subtle, but by the end, the effect is unmistakable.  Halfway through, I realized I was physically exhausted and wanted to sit down and rest, but it didn't make much sense because I was already laying down and relaxing.  It was strange to feel a certain physical aspect of the story in real life, rather than just having everything take place in my head, but it says a lot about King's descriptive skills.

This novel was actually the first one that King ever wrote (though it wasn't the first published), and to a certain extent, you can tell.  The writing isn't quite up to the same skill level of his later works, simply because he didn't have the years of experience for this one.  I must say, though, that for a first novel, this one is pretty amazing.  His lack of experience doesn't detract from the story at all, and King's signature style is still quite obvious.  Overall, it was an incredibly tense and fascinating novel to read, quite different from my usual reading material.  The Long Walk proves that time is not what made Stephen King a phenomenal writer; he's always been that way.