‘Ban This Book’ by Alan Gratz

Amy Anne, a fourth-grader, creates a library of banned books in her locker after a classmate’s mother uses her political influence to remove books from the school library. (The school district has an official policy for dealing with challenges to books, but because this parent has so much clout, the board abandons its official policy and simply removes the books.)

I liked this book for its portrayal of students taking positive action, as well as for its advancement of the theme of choosing books for yourself. It’s OK for a child’s parents to make choices for that child about what is, or is not appropriate, but that child’s parents do not get to make that choice for every other child in the school.

One of my favorite scenes concerns Amy Anne’s wanting to keep track of books borrowed from her library. Amy, of course, does not have access to an automated library catalog. So what does she do? She asks the school librarian about how libraries tracked books before the automated catalog, and the helpful Mrs. Jones even equips Amy with her own date-stamp to imprint due-dates in the books.