The library is always there to help.
That’s especially true during Banned Books Week, which kicks off on Sept. 22. The yearly event not only celebrates the free access of ideas, but it also highlights the increasing efforts to ban books – especially targeting titles featuring characters or written by authors who are LGBTQ+ and BIPOC.
This year’s honorary chair is filmmaker Ava DuVernay and its youth honorary chair is Julia Garnett, a Tennessee student and a leader in the National Coalition Against Censorship’s Student Advocates for Speech program who has fought book bans in her home state.
This week, I got on the phone with Cindy Hohl, the president of the American Library Association, to talk about Banned Books Week and more.
“Banned Books Week has been going on for more than 40 years now, and it’s an opportunity for us to bring awareness to the attempts to remove books and materials from libraries, schools and bookstores,” says Hohl. “Even bookstores are being told what they can stock and what should be available to consumers. So this year’s theme for Banned Books Week is ‘Freed Between the Lines,’ and it’s an observance of the freedom we find in the pages of books. And as librarians, we are here to defend that freedom from censorship.”
Cindy Hohl is the president of the American Library Association. (Courtesy of the ALA)
Librarians’ jobs are more complex and challenging than most of us realize, so I asked Hohl how librarians are dealing the surge in book banning.
“Our goal is to always put books into the hands of readers,” she says. “One of the beauties of being an American is that, should you pick up a book and you don’t enjoy the content, you can certainly place that book down and pick up another one.
“First Amendment rights are for everyone – for youth, for adults. We want to make sure that everyone knows that the public library space and public school libraries are also there for their students, so that everyone has an equal opportunity to access information.”
These attempts to block the availability to books and information are counter to the library’s mission, she says.
“We are public servants, and we go into this work to serve the public good. And so we want to make sure that everyone has the information they need to make informed decisions. We believe that is every American’s right. You have a right to choose what information you want to read, write, listen to, access – both in print and online.
“But you know, we don’t have the right to tell our neighbors what they should read or listen to. That’s really up to them to make those decisions. We absolutely have the right to make those decisions for ourselves and for our families, but it becomes problematic when anyone wants to say that they know what’s best for you, for the rest of the community, that they want voices silenced. And so the role of the information professional is really here to help everyone access the information, and to do so in a way that is supportive in its understanding, and we absolutely hope everyone uses the library.”
And should someone have questions about a particular book, she says librarians are there to help.
“If someone has a concern, we hope that they’ll come in and talk to us and we can have that discussion together. If there is a form already in place, we’ll help you fill it out. If you’re at home and you’re chatting with a librarian online, we’ll link you to the policy. We absolutely are here to help our community access information, whatever that may be,” says Hohl.
(Courtesy of Banned Books Week / American Library Association)
Hohl also had suggestions for what readers can do during Banned Books Week.
“Go to the library and check out a book. If you can’t go to the library, check one out online. Make sure that you share your love of reading, of literacy, of libraries. Do a shout-out to your favorite librarian. Do a shout-out to your favorite school library. Make a donation if you can, do what you can to help support readership in America, because an educated society is one that we should all want to live in.”
During our conversation, I mentioned to Hohl that one of my favorite parts of this newsletter is when we ask authors about someone – a librarian, a teacher, a parent or relative – who inspired their love of books and reading. It’s the best.
“I love that,” says Hohl, who is a member of the Santee Sioux Nation of Nebraska. “Let me add mine to yours.”
And this is what she told me:
“When I was little, I grew up on a reservation, our village in Nebraska, and several nights of the week, we would all sit around in a circle outside, and our elders would tell us stories. And those are traditions of our people. Those are gifts to our people, hearing those stories.
“In an oral storytelling tradition, you live for those moments to be a part of that community. When we moved to the city, it was a very different experience because I was no longer surrounded by everyone I was related to, and one of the first things we did was our mom walked us over to the public library.
“It was the first time we’d been in one. It was amazing that you could sit down and read any one of these books, and it was amazing that you could actually check them out and take them home. I distinctly remember the colorful room where we went to storytime, and I thought it was such an amazing place,” she says. “Even though everything there was different, it was still the same. So back home, our stories lived in our hearts; and in the city, they became alive in our hands as we held the book. And so that’s really the love of storytelling that I’ve held throughout my entire life.”
She added a note in the language of her ancestors, “‘Yawa wiconi,’” she says, “means, ‘Reading is life.’”
For more information, go to the ala.org or bannedbooksweek.org
Katherine Bucknell discusses “Inside Out,” her biography of Christopher Isherwood with writer Pico Iyer on September 16, 2024 at The Huntington. (Photo by Erik Pedersen/SCNG)
Recent book events
I had a great evening at The Huntington as author Pico Iyer interviewed Katherine Bucknell about her Christopher Isherwood biography, “Inside Out.”
Part of my interest was to find out a little more about Southern California poet Henri Coulette, who I wrote about last year. Coulette was a colleague of Isherwood’s at Los Angeles State College (now Cal State Los Angeles) and Isherwood immortalized him as a character in the novel, “A Single Man.”
One of the evening’s highlights? Bucknell, who has spent decades working on Isherwood material including his diaries and letters, described finding the wonderful cover photograph of the author on a contact sheet in a drawer at the home of Isherwood’s longtime partner, Don Bachardy.
“To my knowledge, it had never been printed large,” said Bucknell, who thinks it was taken in Laguna around 1951. “I knew right away that it was special.”
Upcoming book events
A Celebration of Deaf Culture featuring Raymond Antrobus and Ian Brennan
The awarding-winning U.K. poet Antrobus and Grammy-winning producer Brennan will host a discussion as well as a performance of “Another Noise,” a recent album by Antrobus that features deaf musician Evelyn Glennie.
When: 12:30 p.m., Sept. 28
Where: The Clive Davis Theater at The Grammy Museum, 800 W. Olympic Blvd, Los Angeles
Info: www.grammymuseum.org/event/a-celebration-of-deaf-culture-featuring-raymond-antrobus-and-ian-brennan
Steve Hamilton says he recommends every book by this writer
Steve Hamilton is the author, most recently, of the thriller, “An Honorable Assassin.” (Photo credit Franco Vogt / Courtesy of Blackstone Publishing)
Steve Hamilton is a two-time Edgar Award winner, and the author of the New York Times-bestselling Alex McKnight series, Nick Mason series, and stand-alone novel “The Lock Artist.”
Q. Please tell readers about your new book.
“An Honorable Assassin” is the third book in the Nick Mason series. In the first book, “The Second Life of Nick Mason,” he made a deal with the devil to get out of prison: Any time the phone rings, day or night, he has to answer it and then go do whatever he’s told, no matter how brutal or violent it may be. In the second book, “Exit Strategy,” he’s looking for a way out and, by the end, he actually lets himself believe for one moment that he’s finally free. Turns out he’s only traded one master for another, and that book ends with Mason on a plane to Jakarta, Indonesia. In “An Honorable Assassin,” he gets off that plane, halfway around the world, and finds out he has to hunt down and kill the most dangerous man in the world.
Q. Is there a book or books you always recommend to other readers?
If you’re a fellow crime reader, I’m going to recommend every book written by Don Winslow. He’s just one of the best ever, along with (for me) James Crumley and Donald Westlake.
Q. What are you reading now?
I am reading “August Snow,” the excellent first book in the series by Stephen Mack Jones.
Q. How do you decide what to read next?
I’ve always loved hardboiled crime fiction, so I’m always excited to find a new voice in that genre.
Q. Do you remember the first book that made an impact on you?
I know I’m not the only person who will give this answer, but the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy hit me at just the right time in my young life, so hard that I was absolutely obsessed as a reader in a way I never had been before. I can remember walking home from a friend’s house, having done nothing but read while I was there, and even while walking up the street I still had my nose in that book.
Q. Is there a book you’re nervous to read?
I’ve heard Stephen King say that “Pet Sematary” is the one book he’s written that scares him the most. I’ve read many of his books, but not that one yet!
Q. Do you have any favorite book covers?
The original U.K. hardcover of “The Lock Artist” shouldn’t even work because you can barely read the title, but for some reason I’ll always love it.
Q. Is there a genre or type of book you read the most – and what would you like to read more of?
Crime fiction, no surprise, but I recently read “The Three-Body Problem” by Liu Cixin and it made me realize that I’ve probably missed a lot of great science-fiction.
Q. Do you have a favorite book or books?
For all of my crime reading, I still love everything written by Cormac McCarthy and Gabriel García Márquez.
Q. Which books are you planning to read next?
I still need to catch up with McCarthy’s final two books: “The Passenger” and “Stella Maris.”
Q. Is there a person who made an impact on your reading life – a teacher, a parent, a librarian or someone else?
My high school creative writing teacher, Ms. Anne Nozewski Smith, was a huge influence. Just having that safe environment to write whatever I wanted was incredibly important to me. She actually came to one of my book events in my hometown, but sadly she died not long after.
Q. Do you have a favorite bookstore or bookstore experience?
I love any independent bookstore, no matter where it is. But the two that were the most important to me as I broke in were Aunt Agatha’s in Ann Arbor (no longer in business, sorry to say) and McLean and Eakin in Petoskey, Michigan.
Q. If you could ask your readers something, what would it be?
Real simple: “Once you started the book, did you have to keep reading?” (If so, that’s the best thing a writer can ever hear!)
More bestsellers, books and author profiles
20 mysteries for fall 2024. (Covers courtesy of Soho Crime, Pushkin Vertigo, Pegasus Crime, Doubleday, Pamela Dorman, Berkley, Bantam, Harper, William Morrow and Del Rey)
20 mysteries for fall
Settle in for a season of suspense as Kate Atkinson, Richard Osman and more publish. READ MORE
• • •
“Creation Lake” by Rachel Kushner is the top-selling fiction release at Southern California’s independent bookstores. (Courtesy of Simon & Schuster)
The week’s bestsellers
The top-selling books at your local independent bookstores. READ MORE
• • •
Attica Locke’s 2024 novel ‘Guide Me Home’ will conclude her Highway 59 trilogy. (Photo by Victoria Will / Courtesy of Mulholland Books)
Highway’s end
Attica Locke says “Guide Me Home” will conclude her Texas trilogy. READ MORE
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Garth Greenwell’s latest book is “Small Rain.” (Photo by Oriette D’Angelo / Courtesy of Farrar Straus and Giroux)
Looks like ‘Rain’
How a medical crisis inspired Garth Greenwell’s latest novel. READ MORE
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Rachel Kushner is the author of “Creation Lake.” (Photo credit Chloe Aftel / Courtesy of Simon & Schuster)
Spies telling lies
Rachel Kushner says real-life spy stories helped inspire “Creation Lake.” READ MORE
• • •
In the memoir “Earth to Moon” Moon Zappa chronicles the ups and downs of growing up as the daughter of famed musician Frank Zappa. (Photo by Kim Max/Cover image courtesy HarperCollins)
Moon rising
Moon Zappa shines a light on growing up with celebrity parents in new memoir. READ MORE
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Danzy Senna is the author most recently of the novel “Colored Television.” (Photo credit Dustin Snipes / Courtesy of Riverside)
Producing ‘Television’
Why Danzy Senna says writing her new novel was a struggle. READ MORE
• • •
Postcards for the Analog Outlaw Book and Record Fair, a daytime event set to take place on Sunday, Sept. 22, at Elysian Valley nightclub Zebulon. (Image courtesy of James Weigel / Analog Outlaw Book and Record Fair)
Going underground
This free ‘Outlaw’ book and vinyl festival aims to celebrate the counterculture. READ MORE
• • •
Some end of the summer romances for book lovers. (Covers courtesy of Tor.com, Dell, Berkley, Dutton, Flatiron and Gallery Books)
15 summer romances
The Ripped Bodice’s Leah Koch helped us pick a diverse range of romantic reads. READ MORE
• • •
The author TJ Klune, whose new novel, “Somewhere Beyond the Sea,” is a sequel to “The House in the Cerulean Sea,” says he aims for this new book to celebrate the trans community and hopes we can “be kinder to each other.” (Courtesy of Tor Books)
See more ‘Cerulean’
TJ Klune says “Calvin & Hobbes” inspired a bit of “Somewhere Beyond the Sea.” READ MORE
• • •
Daniel Henning, who did the narration for TJ Klune’s 2020 bestseller “The House in the Cerulean Sea,” returns for the author’s new “Somewhere Beyond the Sea.” (Photo credit Sara Pettinella / Courtesy of Tor Books)
Audiobook adventures
Narrator Daniel Henning says TJ Klune’s writing “got into my soul.” READ MORE
• • •
Eastvale City Councilmember Jocelyn Yow reads her new book, “Voting with Mommy,” to children during a Saturday, Sept. 7, 2024, story time at the Norco Library. Yow hopes the children’s book prompts parents to discuss participating in democracy with their kids. (Photo by Stan Lim, Contributing Photographer)
Early voters
City Councilmember Jocelyn Yow wrote “Voting With Mommy” to inform kids. READ MORE
Did you read anything you loved lately? Email epedersen@scng.com and we may include your comments in an upcoming newsletter.
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Thanks, as always, for reading.
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