We’re so pleased to have author Jordan L. Hawk joining us today to help us celebrate the Freedom to Read. Enjoy Jordan’s guest post and then be sure to check out the Rafflecopter widget below where you can enter to win an e-book from her backlist.
Welcome, Jordan!
One of my favorite books as a child is also one of the most consistently banned and challenged books in the decades since its publication. I speak, of course, of Bridge to Terabithia.
I read my copy to absolute rags, because it was one of the few children’s books set entirely in the “real world” with characters I could relate to. Jesse was an artist—like me! Leslie was a tomboy—like me! In response to bullying at school, they spent their afternoons in the woods, escaping to a magical kingdom in their minds, which was exactly what I did. (Except without any friends or siblings to share it with.)
Though originally published in 1977, Bridge to Terabithia remains one of the most challenged and banned books in the US due to profanity, “occult references,” and “Satanism.” (Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone was the #1 banned book 2000-2009 for the last two reasons as well.)
I haven’t read the book in probably thirty-five years, but the fact I still remember it so keenly says a lot about the impact it had on a lonely kid working through a lot of the same issues as the characters in the book. Which speaks to the heart of the problem with attempts to ban books: the very things most commonly cited as “unsuitable” (imaginative children, fantasy, LGBT content, etc.) are so often the very things a child needs to see most.
About the Author
Jordan L. Hawk grew up in North Carolina and forgot to ever leave. Childhood tales of mountain ghosts and mysterious creatures gave her a life-long love of things that go bump in the night. When she isn’t writing, she brews her own beer and tries to keep her cats from destroying the house. Her best-selling Whyborne & Griffin series (beginning with Widdershins) can be found in print, ebook, and audiobook at Amazon and other online retailers.
Find Jordan Online at: Twitter || Facebook || Widdershins Knows Its Own Fanpage || Pinterest
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One of my favourite banned books is Animal Farm, banned in many countries for obvious reasons… I can relate to what happened to you with Bridge to Terabithia, Jordan. It happened the same to me but with The Lord of The Rings. I found I world I wanted to live in… I read it so many times I could recite most of it if prompted!
Both of my kids have read, and were moved by, Bridge to Terabithia. As well as the entire Harry Potter series which they love to talk about.
Some of the YA books I enjoyed as a kid that are on the frequently banned list are:
A Wrinkle in Time
Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret
The Catcher in the Rye
To Kill a Mockingbird
This one I read as an adult, but loved it: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
Thanks for the post!
Gee, Jordan, now I’m going to have to check out Bridge to Terabithia and The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. I read and loved the Harry Potter series and A Wrinkle in Time series. Oh, and Little Red Riding Hood by the Brothers Grimm (there was a gasp bottle of wine in her basket)
Thanks for the post and the new-to-me banned books! It’s never too late to scandalize my relatives.
~ Judy S
The stupid reasons books get banned for and the narrow mindedness of some humans.
YA books I’ve enjoyed that on the frequently challenged or banned list are: The Fault in Our Stars by John Green, Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card, books by Christopher Pike, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, and The Color Purple by Alice Walker.
I like TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD and THE ABSOLUTELY TRUE DIARY OF A PART-TIME INDIAN.
Our class actually read Huckleberry Finn in middle school which rather surprises me now since everyone here is so oppressive. I read Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret. Along with a lot other of Judy Blume’s books. I loved the Harry Potter series, of course (I read those as an adult when my son was reading them) My parents probably would have stroked out if they would’ve known about all the books I sneaked behind their backs! The ones I mentioned here they already knew about.
The Harry Potter series is definitely my favorite banned series. :)
Thanks for your comments about and support for Banned Books. It’s not necessarily a YA novel – To Kill a Mockingbird – but it is read by high schools now, and I read it growing up in the South, so it was especially poignant to me.