Marin County Free Library (MCFL) stands firmly in support of vulnerable communities living in a climate of fear and uncertainty. All people in the United States, regardless of immigration status, have certain rights and protections under the U.S. Constitution. We know our vulnerable community members may feel subject to the removal of policies that protect their rights. We stand with you during these challenging times, fully aligned with the mission and values of our Anti-Racism & Equity Strategic Plan.

Our commitment to MCFL’s mission — to provide welcoming, equitable, and inclusive opportunities for everyone — guides our efforts to build safe environments for the people we serve. We recognize that potential policies under the current administration — such as mass deportation, family separation, and reduced access to protections for those fleeing danger — could severely impact families, staff members, their families, and other vulnerable individuals. Therefore, we reaffirm our dedication to the essential work of solidarity and resources alongside immigrants, refugees, asylum seekers, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients, and others affected.

Though we are present with current realities, our mission remains clear. We will continue to build our Library’s vision of an empowered, thriving community grounded in diverse voices and perspectives. We will reject fear-based misinformation and provide our community with access to factual resources, information, and services that promote well-being. We open dialogue and understanding to bridge divides in our communities, and we will continue to foster an environment where Marin’s incredible diversity is centered and celebrated in each of our branches across Marin County.

MCFL is here for you. You belong here. We stand with you.

Civic Reminder: The California Statewide Special Election is November 4, 2025.

Resources for Community

• Marin County Board of Supervisors Resolution Affirming Democracy and Community
• Marin County Office of Equity
• Marin Immigrant Rights & Justice
• iAmerica You Have Rights
• Immigrant Legal Defense (in English and Spanish)
• California Immigrant Data Portal
• Immigrant Legal Resource Center
• Support for LGBTQI+ Individuals
• Know Your Rights and What Immigrant Families Should Do Now
• Marin County Office of Education – Immigrant Supports and Resources
• California Statewide Special Election Information

Effective November 1, 2025

• Libby holds will go from 25 to 15 at a time.
• Libby checkouts will go from 25 to 15 at a time.

What does this mean for me?

If you borrow digital materials only sometimes, you likely will not notice a change. If you have more than 15 holds or checkouts, you will keep what you already have. You just will not be able to place new holds or borrow more items until your total is under the new limit.

Why the change?

The main reason is rising costs for library access to digital collections. For a quick and engaging explainer, NPR recently released a video that breaks it down.

By lowering the maximum number of holds and checkouts, we hope to:

1. Reduce wait times so popular titles move faster and more patrons enjoy them sooner.
2. Enhance the collection by managing digital resources, ensuring a more balanced and diverse collection.
3. Improve user experience by encouraging more selective borrowing for an efficient and satisfying experience.

Our community impact

Our community reads — a lot! In 2024, MARINet was recognized as one of 180 public library systems worldwide that surpassed one million Libby checkouts. Unfortunately, libraries are charged differently for digital books than individual consumers.

Why are digital books so expensive?

Libraries lend a single copy of an ebook to one patron at a time. Libraries purchase multiple copies to lower hold times, similar to physical materials. In addition, we pay more per limited license than a typical consumer price.

A single ebook license for a library can cost more than $75, and audiobooks are often higher, many over $100. For example, the 2024 Kristin Hannah The Women costs about $15 as an ebook or $33 as an audiobook for an individual consumer. In contrast, a single library license for either format is $60.

In addition, publishers only allow libraries to lease titles based on either time or total number of checkouts. After the defined amount of time or number of checkouts has passed, we must re-purchase the license.

I use my holds list as my to be read list. What else can I do?

If you place holds through the online catalog, try the Shelves feature to tag books you want to read later.

If you use OverDrive Libby, use Tags to create a wish list. See the Libby Help section for more information.

How can I find titles available now?

You can check out many titles right away through our Available Now and Skip The Line collections. These include a wide range of titles and the collection changes often.

How can I help reduce wait times?

If you finish a book early, please return it. If you forget, ebooks and audiobooks will auto return when the loan period ends.

I have more questions...

We understand that changes can be challenging, and staff is here to support you. If you have questions or need help managing holds, please contact us.

Thank you for your understanding and support. We remain committed to the best possible library experience and appreciate your help as we make these improvements.

Happy reading!

You can learn more about using eBooks and eAudiobooks on our blog, and contact us if you need assistance. *Restrictions to using Hoopla apply based on your home address. 

The Usual Desire to Kill

The title reflects the feeling that often wells up as two daughters observe their aging parents.. The scene: a French farmhouse where mom and dad have retired (neither speak French), surrounded by animals, and increasingly unable to keep it together. One daughter, Miranda, is an actor who lives in England but makes many trips across the channel to do damage control. The other, Charlotte, is well-fixed in LA and has little sympathy for her eccentric progenitors, but the siblings have to put their heads together as chaos increases. One fascinating wrinkle: the mysterious Kitty whom their mother has written to for many years; therein lies the secret that has torqued the parents’ long marriage—the cognitive dissonance we sense from the start. Bittersweet.

The Café With No Name

This novel takes us to Vienna in the the mid-‘60s. Robert sees an empty storefront next to the market where he’s done odd jobs, and leaps at the chance to open a cafe. It’s a working class neighborhood and this is a place where folks can find refuge or companionship. We get to know their stories, like young Mila’s. She was desperate for a job, Robert takes a chance on her, and she becomes his right hand person. Case in point: the warm drink she proposes that brings in customers during grim winter days. An acerbic solitary patron who frequents the cafe adds her commentary in periodic chapters. Various dramas play out until—well, nothing lasts forever, and Robert’s lease eventually runs out. But there’s a glorious closing party that celebrates how much life this modest enterprise has provided. Atmospheric and a touch melancholy.

A monthly interview with Bolinas Library readers

Anna Gade

Anna Gade has been living in Bolinas since 2005, when she built a house on the very property where her grandfather had lived since 1954. Originally from San Francisco, she had a long career for over 40 years teaching high school English, with her longest tenure in Fresno, alongside shorter periods in San Francisco and Germany. For the past 16 years, Anna has been a member of the Friends of the Bolinas/Stinson Libraries,, opens a new window serving as President for the last eight. The Friends raise funds to support the two community libraries and programming, as well as the school library. “I am one of those Bolinas readers who loves our library and librarians.” In addition to her work with the libraries, Anna is currently the social chairman of the Bolinas Rod and Boat Club, opens a new window and has previously served on the Bolinas Fireboard., opens a new window She enjoys visiting with her family and grandkids and yearly trips to Yosemite.

What are you reading now? What’s in your pile of books?  Do you read one book at a time or several? What’s the best book you’ve read this year?

I spend part of everyday reading the New York Times, opens a new window and the San Francisco Chronicle, opens a new window (my hometown paper). I read the Hearsay News, opens a new window and New Yorker, opens a new window as well.

I just started the book, Auslander: Memoirs of a Stranger, opens a new window, by Michael Moritz, a part time Bolinas resident.

In addition, I’m reading This Side of Paradise , opens a new windowby F. Scott Fitzgerald. It’s the 100^th anniversary of the Great Gatsby, opens a new window, and one critic remarked that he found it to be better than the latter which I consider part of the canon of the twentieth century American literature.

Other recent reads have been James, opens a new window by Percival Everett. (I love Huckleberry Finn, opens a new window (Mark Twain), and felt compelled to read this “retelling”.) I love poetry, but never read enough; in the last month I read Why I Wake Early, opens a new window by Mary Oliver and The Hurting Kind , opens a new windowby Ada Limon. Etel Adnan’s Journey to Mount Tamalpais, opens a new window caught my eye at Pt Reyes Books, opens a new window a couple of weeks ago. As a lover of that ever present place in my life, I truly appreciate her strong observations of it.

Do you like to read paper or eBooks? Audiobooks? DVDs?

Usually I read books, occasionally an audiobook.

Are you a browser in the library or do you know in advance what you are looking for?  Do you browse the library catalog or pick specific books? If so, how do you find out about them?

I don’t browse much, and usually know what I’m looking for. Although I do enjoy looking at the displays and new books and I occasionally might pick one up.   

Do you have a favorite genre? Any genres that you never read? Have your preferences changed through the years.

I’ve always liked novels and poetry, particularly the classics. I don’t read much non-fiction except for magazines and newspapers.

What was your reading experience as a child? Did you grow up with a lot of books?  A favorite book?

I grew up with books, making weekly visits to my neighborhood library with my father and brother to pick up a stack. The library was a classic Carnegie style building in the Sunset district, within walking distance from the house in San Francisco.  My grandfather regaled us with bedtime stories when he visited; Gulliver’s Travels, opens a new window (Jonathan Swift), Tales from the Odyssey, opens a new window (Mary Pope Osborne), The Jungle Book, opens a new window (Rudyard Kipling).

Were there any books that made a big impression on you in your life? Perhaps a book that has impacted your consciousness a bit? (Maybe something you read at an impressionable age, 20s?)

In college, I always related to books about young women. In War and Peace, opens a new window (LeoTolstoy), I loved the character of Natasha, a strong female, with a main role in the story.

What books might we be surprised to find on your shelves?

Perhaps Howl, opens a new window by Alan Ginsberg. It was a very controversial, hard-to-find poem when it was first published.

Is there a famous author that you ever wanted to meet?  Maybe back in time?

Emily Dickinson, opens a new window would be interesting because she was so reclusive.

What’s the last great book that you read and recommended to a friend?

Recently, I gave my grandson a copy of War and Peace , opens a new window(Leo Tolstoy) and Catcher in the Rye , opens a new window(J.D.Salinger). I think they are part of the canon of American literature.

What do you plan to read next?  Do you plan?

A little book a friend just brought from France, Le Magician des Couleurs, opens a new window (Arnold Lobel), and a memoir a friend just recommended, A Marriage at Sea, opens a new window: A Love, Obsession and Shipwreck (Sophie Elmhirst).

I’m in a book group that focuses mainly on Shakespeare’s Plays, so the leader usually chooses the next play. We have read most of the plays over the last several years.

Is there a book that you always meant to read but still haven’t. Any highly rated books that you thought were overrated?

I haven’t read The Charterhouse of Parma , opens a new windowby Stendhal.

What books do you return to? Are there any books you like to re-read?

Books play a major part in my life. I have been rereading several in recent years. I am a member of two reading groups in Bolinas; one has strictly Shakespeare, opens a new window’s plays as its focus; the other has mostly pretty serious classics. Currently we are reading Richard II , opens a new windowin the one and Milton’s Paradise Lost , opens a new windowin the other.

The classic reading group started with all the volumes of Marcel Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past, opens a new window about 17 years ago. In many cases the books we have read are ones that I read in college as an English major at UC Berkeley:, opens a new window The plays of Aeschylus , opens a new windowand Sophocles , opens a new windowand Euripides, opens a new window, the Odyssey , opens a new window(Homer) and Aeneid, opens a new window (Virgil); Russian novels including War and Peace, opens a new window (Leo Tolstoy); Cervantes’ Don Quixote, opens a new window, and many others. Rereading the classics from the perspective of advances ages is very rewarding.

Do you have a collection of books at home? If so, where do you keep them and do you re-read?

In my bedroom, I have floor to ceiling books, not really organized but books I love that I’ve had through the years. I gave a lot of books away when I moved here from Fresno. I also have a collection of art books in the living room.

When and where do you like to read? Describe your ideal reading experience.

I like to read bound paper books in bed in the early morning or by the fire in my living room.  I will continue to read books for the rest of my life while I am blessed with sight.

Why read?

As my grandfather used to say, “There’s no frigate like a book”, the first line of Emily Dickinson’s poem.

Many Americans suffer from a lack of connection with others.  The Surgeon General’s 2023 report Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation explains how loneliness is “far more than just a bad feeling—it harms both individual and societal health. It is associated with a greater risk of cardiovascular disease, dementia, stroke, depression, anxiety, and premature death.”

How to combat loneliness and isolation?

One place to start is by viewing a past library presentation by Paul Mangal, PhD. In the presentation, Dr. Mangal discusses the health impacts of social isolation and provides practical tips for connecting with others.  The presentation may be viewed on YouTube.

Additionally, check out this list of books on Belonging and Connection, that you can put on hold to check out from the library. 

The list below provides further resources for older adults in Marin County to connect with others: at the Marin County Free Library; through other Marin organizations and services; and through social media and other computer technology.

Connect With Others at the Library

The Marin County Free Library offers many opportunities for connecting with others. Several of our programs take place on a regular basis, providing an opportunity for developing relationships with others in the community who also may attend regularly.

Please note that events listed below may change, so check our Events Calendar before coming to the library. You'll also find many other events listed there.

Stinson Beach Library Coffee Klatch
Join librarians and fellow patrons for coffee, tea, and conversation in both English or Spanish.  Meets every Friday from 10 a.m. – 1p.m. at the Stinson Beach Library.  For more information, call (415) 669-1288.

Fairfax Library Community Poetry Group
Bring your poetry and your creativity to the Fairfax Library’s monthly gathering to learn and to celebrate the written word. There you will collaborate with one another in a welcoming environment using in-class writing, positive feedback, suggested themes and review of poetic forms. Meets on the fourth Monday of each month 5:30 p.m. - 7:30 p.m. at the Fairfax Library.  For more information, call (415) 924-3515.

Fairfax Library Fabric and Fiber Makers’ Club - Club de Aficionados de Telas y Fibras
Calling all Quilters, Sewing Sirens, Mending Divas, Knitters, Spinner and Crocheters - Bring your project(s) to work on in a fun and lively social environment. Share your knowledge and expertise! Group meets up at the Fairfax Library, in person, in the Community Room space from 6pm to 7:45pm on the 2nd Monday of each month. For more information, call (415) 924-3515.

Novato Library Knitfest
Meet others with the same interest, get help with patterns and stitches, and get some work done on your projects. Minimal instruction, but lots of knit-related chat. Bring in your own projects to work on in a fun, social environment. Meets the 4th Thursday of the month at 5:30 pm at the Novato Library. For more information, call (415) 473-2050.

Book Clubs
A great way to connect with people is through books! Several of our branches host Book Clubs that meet on a regular basis, both on-site and on Zoom. Check out the link to find a book club that is right for you!

Local Social Service Agencies and Groups

Several Marin County and California organizations offer free services in which one can connect with others by telephone for information, conversation, and emotional support, or through in-person social visits.

AARP Friendly Voice

“We may be isolated, but we don’t have to be alone. Sometimes, just hearing a friendly voice on the other end of the line can help in challenging times. Trained AARP Friendly Voice volunteers will provide a call to say hello.”

• Call us directly at 1-888-281-0145 and leave us your information and we will call you back
• Llámanos directamente al 1-888-497-4108

Friendship Line California  1-888-670-1360

From the Institute of Aging, calling this toll-free number will connect people to a trained team member. “The Friendship Line was created to challenge the idea that aging means isolation, and to provide warm, personal advice without bureaucratic restraints. We offer connection to those who need emotional support and welcome them into our extended community.“ In addition to English they offer services in: Spanish, Cantonese, Mandarin, Russian, Tagalog, Vietnamese, and Korean.

• Adults age 60+
• Adults living with disabilities of any age
• Caregivers seeking emotional support and guidance

LITA (Love is the Answer): One-to-One Friends

This free program “matches volunteers with residents of long-term care facilities for weekly visits.” LITA’s “100 volunteers … work with 28 of the 55 long-term care facilities throughout Marin. These dedicated volunteers bring personal friendships to the residents, may bring their friendly dog, or even play music. With every visit and through every volunteer interaction, LITA strives to “bring the warmth and vitality of the Marin community directly to residents so that they feel seen, heard and cared about.” For more information, call 415-472-5482.

988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline

“The 988 Lifeline is a national network of local crisis centers that provides free and confidential emotional support to people in suicidal crisis or emotional distress 24 hours a day, 7 days a week in the United States.”

Marin Health & Human Services: Aging and Adult Services
(415) 473-INFO (4636)

• Information and Assistance (I&A) social workers answer calls from the public regarding the full range of social services and related resources available to Marin County older adults, adults with disabilities and family caregivers.
• Assist callers in clarifying their needs and desires
• Language Translation Available: Social workers who speak Spanish are available during business hours.  All language translation services are also available.
• In-depth face-to-face meetings for more complex referrals

Volunteering

In addition to staying active and helping others, volunteering is a way to get to know people and develop friendships. Find volunteer opportunities on the following websites:

• Friends of the Marin County Free Library
• California Volunteers
• County of Marin: Volunteering
• Volunteer Now: Center for Volunteer and Nonprofit Leadership

Activities & Classes

Signing up for an activity or class is a great way to meet others. The following organizations offer recreational and educational opportunities for older adults. Some of these organizations may require a fee for membership or for enrolling in a class.

College of Marin: Community Education
“Discover our short-term, not-for-credit courses spanning from personal enrichment to career advancement. Our aim is to provide you with opportunities to develop your interests. We present an extensive selection of enriching classes, engaging events, and opportunities to rent our campus facilities.”

The Emeritus Students College of Marin (ESCOM)
“Emeritus Students of College of Marin (ESCOM) was designed to foster lifelong learning opportunities for adults of Marin County through educational, social, and cultural activities under the auspices of the College of Marin.”

Front Porch: Well Connected
Well Connected is a free “national phone and online community that brings people together to explore, learn, laugh, and share experiences.  Over 3,500 members from across the country join educational, fun, and engaging groups from the comfort of home.”

Marin Villages
Marin Villages is “reimagining aging and community for older adults. Our members and volunteers enjoy living in the places they already call home, coming together for events and celebrations, building new friendships, and supporting each other through the journey of getting older.”  The organization offers “a range of events each month to suit diverse interests, from coffees and meals to books, games, a men's group, needle arts, fine arts, speakers, training, walks, and hikes.”

Marin YMCA
“We provide various activities for Y-Adult ages 60+ years. From exercise classes to trips and lifelong learning programs, seniors will experience a strong sense of belonging and create a network of friends who provide support for sustained health and well-being.”

Osher Marin JCC
“From San Rafael, CA, the Osher Marin Adult Learning & Living program invites all—members, non-members, residents near or far, people of all backgrounds, faiths, ethnicities, fashion styles, chocolate preferences—to explore the arts, build a broader understanding of our world, taste a few treats together, and possibly pick up a new skill or two.”

San Rafael Goldenaires
The San Rafael Goldenaires Senior Citizen Organization "offers adults over the age of 62 the opportunity to meet and socialize with other people. Join us for classes, which include woodcarving, painting, bridge, and more. Our special events include monthly trips to fun destinations around the Bay Area, Broadway theater productions, and extended tours throughout the state. We also have a great time at our monthly themed luncheons, dinner dances and our annual craft fair." Events typically require purchased tickets.

Vivalon
Vivalon “helps Marin County’s older adults and vulnerable residents thrive through the power of human connection with rides, meals, classes, care, advice, and more.”  Check their website for a schedule of classes.

Computer Help

Vivalon: Tech Tutoring
"Schedule a free one-hour tutoring appointment with one of our tech wizards. Bring your questions about any device – computer, tablet, or smart phone. Call 415-456-9062 to schedule an appointment."

Computer Help at the Library

Please note that events listed below may change, so check our Events Calendar before coming to the library.

Marin City Library: Drop-In Tech Help
Need help with your phone or tablet? Want to set up an email account? Want to check out our digital resources? No need to schedule an appointment, just come on in. Saturdays, 12-4 pm. For more information, call (415) 332-6158.

Stinson Beach Library: Drop-in Tech Help and Tips
Do you have questions about your laptop, tablet, or smartphone? Are there programs, apps, or digital library services that you want to learn more about?  We are here to help!  Bring your devices and/or your questions to the Stinson Beach Library on Tuesday evenings and get one-on-one assistance from library staff. Tuesdays 5:30 – 7:30 PM. Call (415) 868-0252 for more information.

Civic Center Library: One-on-One Tech Help
Reserve a one-on-one, 30-minute session with a Library staff member to receive tech help. Learn how to navigate your laptop, tablet, or smartphone with ease and start to understand the programs, apps, and digital library services that you use in your everyday life. Most Wednesdays 11 am - 12 pm by appointment. Sign up in person at the Civic Center Library main desk or call 415-473-6057.

Chromebooks and Hotspots

All our branches have Chromebooks and Wi-Fi Hotspots you can borrow. Hotspots can be placed on hold and check out for 3 weeks. Chromebooks cannot be placed on hold and check out for 2 weeks. It is possible to check them out separately or together, depending on your preference and branch availability. Call your local branch for more information.

Writing and research: Tom & Dan

You can learn more about using eBooks and eAudiobooks on our blog, and contact us if you need assistance. *Restrictions to using Hoopla apply based on your home address. 

Parallel Lines

The first character we meet is Sebastian, who’s utterly cracked, institutionalized, and quite entertaining. The issue that haunts him is finding the mother who gave him up at birth. His patient, long-term therapist, Martin, gets him released and semi-functional. Ironically, issues of adoption rear their head in Martin’s life as well, and things get thoroughly tangled in a plot worthy of The Bard. Art and environmental concerns also get a workout with the deft wit for which St. Aubyn is prized. Sometimes my head spun with piled up coincidences, but I’ll put up with a little dizziness for the fun of his brilliant spin.

The Slip

Boxing definitely isn’t my thing, but I got sucked into this odd novel based in Austin and started to roll with the punches. Nathaniel, 16, was shipped from the East Coast to be with relatives after a disgraceful dust up at school. During his community service work at a nursing home, his boss, David from Haiti, becomes a raunchy role model and brings him to his rundown but beloved gym. Many bizarre things occur, including teenagers who connect online and in person. Hot crushes develop, boy on boy and boy on (supposedly) Russian girl. Nathaniel tries to pass himself off as Black during phone sex and even darkens his skin for the meetup

You can learn more about using eBooks and eAudiobooks on our blog, and contact us if you need assistance. *Restrictions to using Hoopla apply based on your home address. 

Not Quite Dead Yet

This novel posits an improbable story. Jet is clobbered on Halloween, almost dies, then has to choose between an operation that might save her though her chances of surviving it are very low, or staying alive just another week before her head injury will inevitably cause her death. She chooses the latter so she can find out who did it. Suspicion falls on her ex boyfriend who’s fled, but she keeps digging since the police have stopped their investigation— for good reason as we eventually discover. A childhood friend, Billy, sticks by her and serves as refuge and support as family tensions build. Gripping suspense helped me suspend disbelief.

Vera, or Faith

The eponymous protagonist, a smart cookie, is 10 years old. Her parents are at odds, and of course she wants them to stay together. Jewish Dad was born in Russia, Mom comes from wealth but has liberal leanings, little brother Dylan is their natural child, but Vera was adopted; her birth mother is Korean. Vera’s observations on the dysfunction that surrounds her are spot on and often very funny, especially as she seeds her narrative with newly acquired vocabulary. The name Vera means faith in Russian, a quality she sorely needs to sustain her as she searches for identity at school, at home, and even in Korea where she ends up searching for her origins. Charming.

You can learn more about using eBooks and eAudiobooks on our blog, and contact us if you need assistance. *Restrictions to using Hoopla apply based on your home address. 

Murder Takes A Vacation

Muriel, a widow, picks up a lottery ticket off the ground and guess what? She’s a winner! Uncharacteristically, she takes a river cruise in Paris with a friend.  But before she even gets on the boat, all sorts of peculiar happenings occur, including a dead body. Why is she being tracked, and what are her mysterious stalkers looking for? Muriel is plus-sized and comfortable in her own skin.—refreshing.  She also has some experience working n surveillance which serves her well as things heat up. Atmospheric and entertaining 

Not A Sound

In a devastating accident, Amelia loses her hearing and a lot more: her job as a nurse, and her marriage to a doctor as she turns to alcohol to counter her deep depression. She sobers up and gets a part time job doing data entry for a fancy cancer clinic where she discovers irregularities in the files. She lives next to a river, which is where she comes upon the body of a nurse she recognizes, and this leads her to find out who did. It.  The police don’t go far enough —a familiar trope.. She’s in good physical shape, and knows the wild terrain intimately, which is what saves her in the brutal denouement. Her service dog responds to commands in Czech—a charming detail. 

Why Are Books Being Banned?

In 2025 as well as in previous years, books have been targeted for including diverse perspectives. According to PEN America, books banned from the 2023-2024 school year “overwhelmingly featured stories with people or characters of color and/or LGBTQ+ people.” Also, likely due to the targeting of sexual content, books on recent removal lists often feature romance, women’s sexual experiences, and address rape and sexual abuse. An example of one such ban is the removal of the graphic novel version of The Diary of a Young Girl, which includes sections omitted on its first publication that feature Anne Frank’s discussion and exploration of her sexuality. Contrary to what many might assume, these current demands to rid school shelves of books are coming from state-sponsored organizations more often than concerned parents. In fact, in the state of Florida where book bans have been particularly aggressive, the state’s own board of education has been pressuring school districts to comply or face legal action.

What’s At Stake When Books Are Banned?

Whenever Banned Books Week comes around, I remember the day I walked into my high school library—a library located in a smalltown in the Ohio River Valley and that I visited seldomly since it contained few interesting books—and found our school librarian setting aside items for discard. While “weeding” or pulling books in poor shape and/or that no longer hold interest to patrons is a regular practice in a library, this felt different. I don’t recall a stack as much as a garbage can full of books. Either way, among the heap was Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five, another like Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye and Beloved to find itself yet again in the book banning spotlight. Strangely, the more I reflect on this memory, the more it morphs—had I gone to the card catalog looking for my favorite author, found an entry for one of his classics, and then inquired with the librarian when it was missing from the shelves? Was it that she responded that she had thrown it out?

Although it’s difficult to be sure of the particulars, I remember how I felt knowing my school librarian had tossed out one of my favorites. This was a book I would argue shaped who I am and how I think, an author whom I began reading in the fifth or sixth grade upon finding a yellowed, dogeared paperback of Cat’s Cradle in a dusty box among my mother’s storage boxes, an author I checked out regularly at the public library (after the librarians there, concerned by my reading such “mature” material, spoke to my father and—thank goodness—he told them I could check out and read whatever I wanted).

That day, in high school, I either clutched that copy of Slaughterhouse-Five tight in my hand or, at least, my heart and uttered only one word, “Why?” This librarian’s answer was not that it was old and grimy but that nobody read it. And do I remember a haughty lifting of her head, a scowl even? The only thing I remember beyond that is that a newer copy of that classic of the 20th century, a book regularly assigned in other high school and college courses, was never ordered. In my school, Slaughterhouse-Five stayed in the trash for nobody else ever to find.

In Honor of Banned Books Week 2025

The good news is that many librarians do not fit the outdated, harmful stereotype of the “evil” librarian who shushes everyone and polices what may or may not be read. Instead, they celebrate access to information. In that spirit, here are some staff-created book lists from some of your local librarians. These lists focus on banned classic and newer literature. Predictably, the first includes Kurt Vonnegut’s science-fictional, anti-war, semi-autobiographical Slaughterhouse-Five, or, The Children’s Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death, which has been banned “because of its use of obscene language, depictions of sexual acts, lack of patriotism, and mentions of homosexuality” and championed for its exploration of the nature of free will, time, trauma, and war. Go ahead and check it out if you’d like. The American Library Association and our librarians know it’s your right to do so.

Classic Banned Books

Challenged Books by Black Authors

Banned and Challenged Book Ideas

Contributed by Sarah Broderick, Community Library Specialist

Sources
https://www.ala.org/bbooks/banned
https://www.ala.org/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/top10
https://www.ala.org/tools/challengesupport/selectionpolicytoolkit/weeding
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/aug/16/florida-new-book-bans
https://entertainment.time.com/2005/10/16/all-time-100-novels/slide/slaughterhouse-five-1969-by-kurt-vonnegut/
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/07/book-bans-pen-america-censorship
https://jweekly.com/2023/06/14/a-new-version-of-anne-franks-diary-is-being-called-pornography-and-getting-banned-from-schools/
https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/what-kurt-vonneguts-slaughterhouse-five-tells-us-now
https://pen.org/banned-books-week/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Librarians_in_popular_culture

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Don't Let Him in

The “him” has many names and identities and a considerable talent for filling the void in women’s lives. He’s left a long swath of relationships— some with offspring— in the dust and his past “wives” in perilous financial shape. Some chapters feature him as narrator and others those he victimized. The action toggles from 4 years previous  to current times as the story unfolds in all its creepy horror. At heart is his bizarre point of view; he’s in love with each and every one until he moves on, mostly by economic necessity. And he’s fiercely competitive and must come out on top. A couple of murders, too. Jewell may be the queen of this genre. I listened on CD and found “his” voice the essence of seductive madness. 

Hot Air

Jonathan, absurdly rich, plans a birthday treat for his wife Julia. But  when the hot air balloon he’s ineptly piloting plunges them into a suburban swimming pool, things take a turn, to say the least. The pool belongs to Johnny and Joanie is on her first date with him. Turns out she knew Jonathan way back when and had a crush on him. Unlimited money provides a springboard for absurd happenings.—watch what you wish for and all that.  This is a snarky fable . A surfeit of Disneyland is especially well-drawn.