Category: Recommendations

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Booklists Recommendations

Banned Books Week 2020

by Adult Services Library Associate Nichole

Banned Books Week was launched in the 1980s, a time of increased challenges, organized protests, and the Island Trees School District v. Pico (1982) Supreme Court case, which ruled that school officials can’t ban books in libraries simply because of their content.

While books have been and continue to be banned, part of the Banned Books Week celebration is the fact that, in a majority of cases, the books have remained available. This happens only thanks to the efforts of librarians, teachers, students, and community members who stand up and speak out for the freedom to read.

http://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/top10

Every year, the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom compiles a list of the top 10 challenged books to bring to light censorship that still plagues libraries and schools.

Of the 566 books that were targeted, here are the most challenged, along with the reasons cited for censoring the book:

  • George by Alex Gino | print / digital
    • Reasons: for LGBTQIA+ content and a transgender character; for sexual references; and for conflicting with a religious viewpoint and “traditional family structure”
  • Beyond Magenta: Transgender Teens Speak Out by Susan Kuklin | print / digital
    • Reasons: LGBTQIA+ content, for “its effect on any young people who would read it,” and for concerns that it was sexually explicit and biased
  • A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo by Jill Twiss, illustrated by EG Keller | print / digital
    • Reasons: LGBTQIA+ content and political viewpoints, for concerns that it is “designed to pollute the morals of its readers,” and for not including a content warning
  • Sex is a Funny Word by Cory Silverberg, illustrated by Fiona Smyth | print / digital
    • Reasons:  LGBTQIA+ content; for discussing gender identity and sex education; and for concerns that the title and illustrations were “inappropriate”
  • Prince & Knight by Daniel Haack, illustrated by Stevie Lewis | print
    • Reasons: featuring a gay marriage and LGBTQIA+ content; for being “a deliberate attempt to indoctrinate young children” with the potential to cause confusion, curiosity, and gender dysphoria; and for conflicting with a religious viewpoint
  • I Am Jazz by Jessica Herthel and Jazz Jennings, illustrated by Shelagh McNicholas | print
    • Reasons:  LGBTQIA+ content, for a transgender character, and for confronting a topic that is “sensitive, controversial, and politically charged”
  • The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood | print / digital
    • Reasons: profanity and for “vulgarity and sexual overtones”
  • Drama written and illustrated by Raina Telgemeier | print / digital
    • Reasons: LGBTQIA+ content and for concerns that it goes against “family values/morals”
  • Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling | print / digital
    • Reasons: referring to magic and witchcraft, for containing actual curses and spells, and for characters that use “nefarious means” to attain goals
  • And Tango Makes Three by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson illustrated by Henry Cole | print / digital
    • Reasons: LGBTQIA+ content

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Booklists BPL News & Information Online Resources Recommendations

Gear Up for the 2020 Election

by Adult Services Library Associate Beth

Election Day 2020 is now a mere 43 days away. Somehow this seems like both a lifetime away and, well, tomorrow. Regardless of how you plan to vote this November, Bexley Public Library is here to help! To encourage everyone in the community to exercise one of their most fundamental rights, we are hosting two drive-in voter registration events with The League of Women Voters on Tuesday, (TOMORROW!) September 22 from 3-5PM and Thursday, October 1 from 5-7PM. Both events will be held in the BPL parking lot and will also feature musical guests and food trucks. Join us as we celebrate – maybe not the election itself, but at least our ability to have a say in its outcome! And be sure to visit http://bexleylibrary.org/vote or give us a call at 614-231-2793 to get more information on deadlines, procedures, accessing voting materials, etc.

In the spirit of the election season, I’ve composed a list of some of my favorite “political” (I’m using that term in a fairly broad sense) books. And while this list is attached to a post about preparing for the upcoming election, I’ve chosen books that, I think, are largely non-partisan, and don’t focus much on presidential elections or candidates. Rather, they’re books that have helped me better understand and refine my own political worldview, while also helping me better understand those views I may not agree with. Importantly, several of these books put the struggles and concerns of real people at their centers: in my mind, what politics should always be about. Such stories help us build empathy for, and an understanding of people who aren’t always politically aligned with us already. Happy reading! 

  • The Populist’s Guide to 2020: A New Right and New Left are Rising  by Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti | print
  • Freedom is a Constant Struggle by Angela Davis | print / digital
  • Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt by Hedges and Sacco | print
  • With Liberty and Justice for Some by Glenn Greenwald | print
  • Strangers in their Own Land by Arlie Russell Hochschild | print / digital
  • Hate Inc. by Matt Taibbi | print / digital
  • We’re Still Here: Pain and Politics in the Heart of America by Jennifer M. Silva | print / digital (e-audiobook only)
  • Palaces for the People by Eric Klinenberg | print / digital
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Booklists Recommendations

Latinx Heritage Month

by Adult Services Library Associate Nichole

Did you know that tomorrow, September 15th kicks of National Hispanic Heritage Month?

“The observation started in 1968 as Hispanic Heritage Week under President Lyndon Johnson and was expanded by President Ronald Reagan in 1988 to cover a 30-day period starting on September 15 and ending on October 15.

The day of September 15 is significant because it is the anniversary of independence for Latin American countries Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. In addition, Mexico and Chile celebrate their independence days on September 16 and September 18, respectively. Also, Columbus Day or Día de la Raza, which is October 12, falls within this 30 day period.”

https://www.hispanicheritagemonth.gov/about/

To celebrate, check out these titles written by Latinx authors!

  • Sanctuary by Paola Mendoza and Abby Sher | print
  • It Is Wood, It Is Stone by Gabriella Burnham | print
  • Little Eyes by Samanta Schweblin |print / digital
  • Everything Inside by Edwidge Danticat |print / digital
  • Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia | print / digital
  • A Long Petal of the Sea by Isabel Allende | print / digital
  • Children of the Land by Marcelo Hernandez Castillo |print / digital
  • In the Country We Love by Diane Guerrero | print / digital 
  • A Cup of Water Under My Bed by Daisy Hernandez | print / digital
  • Music to My Years by Cristela Alonzo | print
  • In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado | print / digital
  • Ordinary Girls by Jaquira Díaz | print / digital

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Recommendations Staff Book Reviews

The Overstory by Richard Powers

by Adult Services Librarian Jeff

The Overstory by Richard Powers is a lot of things, possibly too many, at once. But perhaps its most impressive achievement is how it decenters the human experience while simultaneously unfurling a compelling, complex, and ultimately human storyline via its nine main characters. Being a work of environmental fiction, and in particular being tree-centric, it’s not farfetched to expect a fairly breezy, peaceful read with the end result of appreciating nature a bit more. In reality, The Overstory is fraught with traumatic events and incisive critiques of our relationship with nature.

The Overstory is split into four sections: Roots, Trunk, Crown, and Seeds. In Roots, each of the main characters are introduced via a short story-esque passage that ultimately reveals the role trees play (or have played) in their lives. These range all the way from a dendrologist (someone who studies trees/wooded plants) to a young couple who, for much of their lives, don’t pay any attention to trees. In the book’s second section, Trunk, the narrative hops between storylines and the characters’ stories intertwine in various interesting ways, primarily by means of environmental activism. In Crown and Seeds, the fallout from the narrative climax unravels and the story draws to a close.

Tonally, The Overstory is alternately enchanting and disheartening. Passages describing the social nature of trees and how they communicate with one another inspire awe, but this awe is quickly eroded when reading about the sobering environmental devastation of logging, particularly in old-growth areas like the redwood forests in California. This frames one of the central conflicts of the book: environmental activists versus logging companies. And as the book is set in capitalist America, the victor of these confrontations isn’t exactly a surprise.

It’s difficult to overstate just how much is packed into the 500 or so pages of The Overstory. Existential meditations about humanity’s place on Earth, ruminations on the future of artificial intelligence- it is truly much more than a book about trees. Because of this, the book can teeter toward melodrama, and it loses a bit of steam toward the end. It can also be an exceptionally difficult read emotionally, as a human being and as a consumer. However, in a time where the consequences of climate change ominously loom in our everyday lives, the perspective Richard Powers offers is both welcome and utterly paramount.


For fans of Literary Fiction and Environmental Fiction, including Greenwood by Michael Christie and Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver

You can request The Overstory digitally through Overdrive, or request a physical copy or audiobook through the BPL catalog.

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Bexley History Booklists Recommendations

Bexley Women in the Fight for Suffrage

by Local History Librarian David Distelhorst

Columbus Evening Dispatch, September 2, 1912

Dressed in the costume of an English Militant Suffragette, Mrs William Drake Hamilton, the former Ann Eliza Deshler, attended a celebration carrying a can of nitroglycerin, bricks, and bombs. Her husband, Dr. William Drake Hamilton, dressed as a “suffrage sympathizer,” carried a vote for women banner.

It was the 1910s and Ann Hamilton and her sister, Miss Martha Deshler, members of the Taxpayers’ League, an organization seeking equal suffrage, were among Bexley’s women in the fight for full enfranchisement. The daughters of Deshler Bank President John G. Deshler, whose home was at the corner of Parkview and East Broad Street, hosted suffrage meetings and dignitaries in Hamilton’s Bexley home. 

The sisters, among those successful at petitioning Ohio’s Fourth Constitutional Convention to put the issue of equal suffrage before the voters, lost their fight in 1912, and when the votes were tallied Bexley proved “a non-suffrage town.”

Again, two years later, Ohio voters said no, but another Bexley pair had their eyes on a national amendment. Miss Florence Ralston, daughter of Ralston Steel Car Company President Joseph S. Ralston, who like the Hamilton’s lived on East Broad Street in Bexley, joined the College Equal Suffrage League as a student at Ohio State. In 1916 Florence and her mother attended the formation, in Washington D.C, of the National Women’s Party.

The mother and daughter pair were among those representing the local branch of the National Women’s Party at a 1918 meeting with then Senator Warren G. Harding at Columbus’ Southern Hotel. Though Harding did not fully commit to suffrage attendees were “encouraged” that a federal amendment would pass.

That October Senator Harding voted in favor of the Federal Suffrage Amendment, as he did in February and June of the following year. Ratified by the Ohio legislature on June 16, 1919 the women’s right to vote saw final ratification as the 19th Amendment in August of 1920.

For more about the history of the Women’s Suffrage Movement explore these titles recommended by Adult Services Librarian Sue Shipe-Giles:

Research for this article contributed by Scott King-Owen, Ph.D, Teacher, Bexley City Schools.

Categories
Booklists Recommendations

Rom-Coms With a Side of Horror

by Adult Services Library Associate Nichole

If you’re anything like me, Covid-19 has you in a serious reading and viewing slump. If it’s not light and enjoyable, I just can’t get into it. My go-to reading and viewing genre has been romantic comedies, with the occasional horror thrown in. Balance, right?

Sometimes I’m lucky enough to find a horror comedy and all is well in the world. Libby/Overdrive and Hoopla Digital have been lifesaving during this time, and I want to share with you the books and movies that have made life a little sweeter for me over the past few months. 

Happy reading AND viewing! 

*all titles are available digitally through Libby/Overdrive and Hoopla or physically through the BPL catalog*