List Challenge's Banned Children's Book List

Oh I just love this list! It's perfect for Banned Books Week which has just finished. And competitive reader me loved that with my score of 25/60 I came 171st of 956 readers when I took the quiz last week. I wish it was more, I have come perilously close to reading more of these books. Quite a few are sitting waiting, unread, in my house. 

Where the Wild Things Are - Maurice Sendak

The Giving Tree - Shel Silverstein

Charlotte's Web - E.B. White

Bridge to Terabithia - Katherine Paterson

Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark - Alvin Schwartz

In the Night Kitchen - Maurice Sendak

The Great Gilly Hopkins - Katherine Paterson

Olive's Ocean - Kevin Henkes

Julie of the Wolves - Jean Craighead George

Little House on the Prairie - Laura Ingalls Wilder

Harriet the Spy - Louise Fitzhugh (see my review)

The Diary of a Young Girl  - Anne Frank (see my review)

A Light in the Attic - Shel Silverstein

Where the Sidewalk Ends - Shel Silverstein

Are you there God? It's Me, Margaret - Judy Blume (see my review)

My Brother Sam is Dead - James Lincoln Collier & Christopher Collier

The Chocolate War - Robert Cormier (see my review)

The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963 - Christopher Paul Curtis

James and the Giant Peach - Roald Dahl (see my review)

The Witches - Roald Dahl (see my review)

If I Ran the Zoo - Dr Seuss

Where's Waldo/Wally - Martin Handford

A Wrinkle in Time - Madeleine L'Engle (see my review)

The Giver - Lois Lowry (see my review)

The Adventures of Captain Underpants - Dav Pilkey

Heather Has Two Mommies - Leslea Newman, Diana Souza (illustrator)

And Tango Makes Three - Peter Parnell & Justin Richardson (see my review)

Junie B. Jones - Barbara Park

His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's/Sorcerers Stone - J.K. Rowling

Bone - Jeff Smith

Goosebumps - R.L. Stine

Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry - Mildred Taylor (see my review)

Drama - Raina Telgemeier (see my review)

Dragonwings - Laurence Yep

Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging - Louise Rennison

The Rabbit's Wedding - Garth Williams

Shooter - Walter Dean Myers

The Fighting Ground - Avi

Shade's Children - Garth Nix

The Upstairs Room - Johnna Reiss

To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee

The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe - C.S. Lewis

Speak - Laurie Halse Anderson

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian - Sherman Alexie (see my review)

Go Ask Alice - Anonymous

Thirteen Reasons Why - Jay Asher

Perks of Being a Wallflower - Stephen Chbosky (see my review)

Looking for Alaska - John Green

Two Boys Kissing - David Levithan

The Hunger Games - Suzanne Collins (see my review)

Gossip Girl - Cecily von Ziegesar

Twilight - Stephanie Meyer

Prep - Curtis Sittenfeld

Ttyl - Lauren Myracle

The Earth, My Butt and Other BIG Round Things - Carolyn Mackler

Fallen Angels - Walter Dean Myers

The Face on the Milk Carton - Caroline B. Cooney

Forever ..... - Judy Blume

Draw Me a Star - Eric Carle

25/60

This list has the requisite books I've already read, books I want to read, and books I've never heard of (quite a few actually). I should go read one just to annoy some book banner types.

A Year in Books 2015

It's time to look back in awe at the best reading I did in 2015. Well, it's actually getting a little late for it, I know most everyone else has done their list, but I do enjoy this retrospection, and will enjoy looking back on it years from now too.

As usual I'm relying on the books I gave 5 stars to on Goodreads this year. I read 118 books in 2015. A fair effort but well short of the somewhat random 200 I set myself as a goal.


Withering-by-Sea. An exciting Victorian tale of mystery and adventure.

I am Juliet. Always good to have a Jackie French on my end of year list. 

See Ya, Simon. Powerful Kiwi storytelling. 

Redwall. It really surprised me that I liked this book so much. It still does. 

The Man Who Loved Boxes. A beautiful picture book about the father son bond. 

Brock. An extraordinarily powerful book about badgers and many other things. 

Pardon My French. A fabulous little book that taught me so much

Sister Madge's Book of Nuns. Doug MacLeod is hilarious. 

Protected. Claire Zorn is going from strength to strength. 

Mister Monday. I finally got to read, well listen to, Garth Nix, and he's brilliant. 

The Impossible Knife of Memory. More Laurie Halse Anderson brilliance. 

Fattypuffs and Thinifers. Perfect French Quirkiness. 

The Running Man. My book of the year. 

Risk. A great page turning YA cautionary tale. 

Thelma the Unicorn. Picture book perfection from Aaron Blabey. 

Ash Road. An Australian classic, still fresh today. 

The Witches. Roald Dahl, the master.

The Girl on the Train. It's so nice to get caught up in a thriller from time to time.

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. Totally lives up to the hype. 

The Lucy Family Alphabet. Is it possible that I love Judith just that little bit more now?

Coco Chanel. A fabulous illustrated biography of fashion's most famous designer. 

The Wolves of Willoughby Chase. A fabulous near Dickensian story with added wolves. 

22 out of the 118 books earnt themselves 5 stars. That's a pretty good hit rate.

12 Aussie Books

3 Picture Books

3 Nonfiction/Memoir

2 Paris Books

3 Audio Books

6 1001 Books

9 Female Authors

13 Male Authors

14 New to Me Authors

I hope 2016 is another great reading year. No reason to think it won't be...

The Impossible Knife of Memory

I saw Laurie Halse Anderson speak recently at the Sydney Writers Festival. She was magnificent. I've read one of her books, Speak, probably her most famous book, and I loved it. I read it quite a few years ago, way before blogging, so I remember loving it and a bit about what it was about, but don't have any detailed memories. Naturally I bought one of her books at the SWF, her most recent book, The Impossible Kife of Memory, which Laurie signed for me, and thankfully I read it straight away. 

The Impossible Knife of Memory tells a very powerful story. Seventeen year old Hayley Kincain has just settled into a new town and new school. She and her father have spent quite a few years on the road, trying to outrun his torment from PTSD. Hayley's father is a veteran, and living with the after effects of his war experiences. Hayley can never be sure who or what she will come home to.

I opened the front door and walked onto a battlefield. 

PTSD, war experiences and substance abuse are all rather heavy topics and Laurie does not back away from the horror of any of this. Hayley's friends all have their own set of circumstances too. But it is all counterbalanced by Hayley's quirky and laugh out loud funny first person voice. Right from the start.

It started in detention. No surprise there, right?
Detention was invented by the same idiots who dreamed up the time-out corner. Does being forced to sit in time-out ever make little kids stop putting cats in the dishwasher or drawing on white walls with purple marker? Of course not. It teaches them to be sneaky and guarantees that when they get to high school they'll love detention because it's a great place to sleep. 

Hayley has seen more things than she should, and has a knowledge beyond her years. 

Maybe that was why I wanted to slap so many of the zombies; they had no idea how freaking lucky they were. Lucky and ignorant, happy little rich kids who believed in Santa Claus and the tooth fairy and thought that life was supposed to be fair. 

I always love an on form first person point of view. Laurie Halse Anderson has written a gripping, honest book that is a joy to read. These people and their lives feel so real. Flawed perhaps at times, but very real. 

On Instagram Laurie Halse Anderson wrote:

I write books. I try to make them not suck. Newest book: The Impossible Knife of Memory. It doesn't suck. 

It certainly doesn't. I can't wait to read more of her books as I know they won't suck either. My library only has four Laurie Halse Anderson books but I'm rather overjoyed to see that they are all out on loan with reserves on some. I will donate my signed copy to them so that even more people can read her.

Laurie Halse Anderson at Sydney Writers Festival Secondary Days 2015

I had a fabulous day at the Sydney Writers Festival Secondary Day this week. There was a great lineup of 4 authors, and I was very keen to go after a similarly fabulous day last year (but I never got to telling you about that). I wasn't familiar with all of the authors, but got to reading at least one book from three of the four before the day.

Laurie Halse Anderson was first up and she fairly exploded onto the stage. She gave such a high energy presentation the audience of high school students were silent, completely captivated, she held them entranced by her words and her passion. It was honest, true, funny and moving. She spoke to each of them, and so many of them queued to buy her books and get them signed afterwards. It's always great seeing new books fall into the hands of children, and I may have been a little merchandised myself.

I hope all these books have new homes
with readers who will love them

Laurie had several important messages for her teenage audience. Mostly importantly that we have all survived something and everyone has a story to tell. She talked of her own childhood, disrupted by her father returning from World War II a damaged man. Like many returned soldiers he turned to drink, and this caused problems within the family- they lost their home, and the frequent moves naturally meant frequent changes of school for young Laurie. Laurie feels that she was kept alive by reading, even though she had difficulty learning to read in the first place. She didn't of course like the dreary stuff that was assigned in her English classes (who did?), and she rightly believes that teenagers don't like to read things that suck. Just as a point of interest, adults don't either. Laurie was then "saved" by an exchange year spent on a Danish pig farm where her teenage vegetarian self learnt to eat meat.

A library is a hospital for the mind. Anonymous.

Laurie has a great sense of adolescence, which really informs her writing. "It's weird, smelly and awkward for everybody, and it's worse if weird stuff is going on in your family". Laurie's first book success was the amazing Speak, published in 1999- a book that I read quite a few years ago, so long ago it was pre-blogging, so while I have some memories of reading it, they're not particularly detailed memories anymore. Speak tells a powerful tale about the rape of a young girl, and is widely taught in American schools. Laurie has spoken to thousands of kids about this book, and she was struck by how many boys could not understand how the girl would be so devastated for so long.

She then spoke specifically to many boys and learnt three things. Boys were generally confused about girls. Many boys had to deal with bullying, and many were sad because they don't have a relationship with either their own father, or a father figure. Her fourth book Twisted was written from a male point of view.

Her latest book, and my current read, is The Impossible Knife of Memory, a story born out of her father's experiences with PTSD after WWII, and also those of her nephew who is a recent veteran. "When your parent can't be your parent, that's about as bad as it gets". The Impossible Knife of Memory took a year to write, working 50 hours per week. Laurie's historical fiction takes longer to write as it requires lots of research.

Laurie talked about her writing process. She will often think about a story for a few years before she writes it. She writes well about things that make her angry. She never planned to write a story about eating disorders, but her readers were asking her for one. Still she didn't plan to write about it until she discovered that eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric condition. Her book Wintergirls came from those thoughts.

She had a great response to a question about writers block. She thinks three things contribute to writers block.

1. Putting off your writing to the last minute. Emotions then hijack your cortex and you can't think straight.

2. We all sit down too much, and don't move. Moving helps. 

3. Stop trying to be perfect. "Noone writes a great first draft". Fear of not writing perfectly can create writers block. 

I can't overstate how much I loved this session, it was my favourite of the day. It was almost therapy at times. 

Everyone has to deal with sad stuff. We have little control over what happens to us, but we have almost complete control over how we react. Some young people will turn to drugs and alcohol to mute their pain as many adults do, but this will really only create more problems. 

These are powerful messages for young (and not so young) people to hear. If you get a chance to see Laurie Halse Anderson in person you should do it. She's amazing. If not you can still read her books.