BAN THIS BOOK (audiobook) by Alan Gratz

Published in 2017 by Blackstone Audio, Inc.
Read by Bahni Turpin.
Duration: 5 hours, 17 minutes.
Unabridged.

My Synopsis

Ban This Book is the story of Amy Anne Ollinger, a fourth grade girl who is shocked when she gets to the library and finds out that her favorite book, From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, has been removed from the shelves as part of a book ban. Amy Anne reads all sorts of books (except Captain Underpants books - they're kind of silly) but she loves this book and comes back to it often. She has read it 13 times and wanted to read it again. 

Amy Anne is told that a parent has complained to the school board about several books and they skipped the established plan to deal with these sorts of complaints and simply voted to remove them. 

Amy Anne's parents buy her a copy of the book and she takes it to school to read when she can during the day. Her friends find out about the book ban, see that she has a copy and ask to read it. In return, they offer her copies of banned books that they own. Other kids see their books and things start to get interesting...

My Review

This was a thoroughly enjoyable audiobook. As the plot gets more complicated, the arguments for and against school library book bans are laid out. Amy Anne is against them in general, but she is no absolutist (and neither are her parents.) She knows that she's just not ready for some topics.

To be completely honest, the kids seem pretty advanced for typical fourth graders, but what transpires is not entirely out of the skill set of kids that age.

What I really liked about this book is that Amy Anne epitomizes what John Lewis meant when he said that we should "get in good trouble, necessary trouble, and help redeem the soul of America."

And that brings us to the reason that I listened to this audiobook. In June of 2024 this book made headlines because a Florida school system banned it from its libraries. Yes, the school board rejected the established plan to deal with parent concerns about books, overruled the findings of the system they established and voted to ban Ban this Book. If that sounds familiar, that is because that is what happened in the book (see 5 paragraphs above.)

A school board member who is also a member of Moms for Liberty - a well-known source of book ban lists - asked to have this book banned. Yes, indeed. These moms are really into banning books in the name of Liberty. In fact, they've been successful at banning more than 140 books in this school system alone.

The author

The board looked at the very existence of the book as a challenge to their authority. A board member said, "The title itself and the theme challenges our authority. And it even goes so far as to not only mention books that are deemed inappropriate by school boards, including ours, it not only mentions them but it lists them."

I like this quote from the author about the book bans: "They banned the book because it talks about the books that they have banned and because it talks about book banning. It feels like they know exactly what they're doing and they're somewhat ashamed of what they're doing and they don't want a book on the shelves that calls them out."

I highly recommend this audiobook. I rate it 5 stars out of 5. Lots of fun.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Ban This Book by Alan Gratz.