A children’s book with a transgender protagonist and a transgender author earned a Newbery Honor for the first time ever, and other queer-inclusive children’s and young adult books—and their queer authors—also won big at this year’s American Library Association (ALA) Youth Media Awards.
Preschooler Heather is no stranger to opposition. Lesléa Newman’s 1989 Heather Has Two Mommies, the first picture book to depict happily coupled same-sex parents and their child, faced opprobrium from conservatives since shortly after it was published. Now, it is one of a record number of books for children and teens, largely about people with marginalized identities, that are under attack across the country.
It’s Banned Books Week, the annual event celebrating the freedom to read! LGBTQ-inclusive children’s books are among those most frequently banned, along with books that have themes of race and racial justice. Here are five things you can do now to celebrate and support banned books.
For the third year in a row, George, a book about a transgender girl, topped the American Library Association’s (ALA’s) annual list of the Top 10 Most Challenged Books, and LGBTQ-themed books remained dominant among all the censorship attempts tracked by the ALA. Unlike in the previous few years, however, books with themes of race and racial justice, not LGBTQ themes and characters, made up the majority of books in the top 10. That’s still awful.
The American Library Association has just announced its 2021 Rainbow Book List—with a record-setting number of 129 librarian-approved LGBTQ-inclusive children’s and young adult books! There are so many, in fact, that for the first time, there are two Top 10 sub-lists of books with “exceptional merit,” one for younger children and one for older youth readers. Learn more and see some charts that illustrate just how the genre has grown.
The American Library Association (ALA) today announced its 2021 Stonewall Book Awards for LGBTQ-inclusive children’s and young adult books, part of the Youth Media Awards that also include the prestigious Newbery and Caldecott Medals. The winner was a board book that includes not only same-sex parents, but also gender creative kids and a pregnant transgender man.
Once again, it’s Banned Books Week—and a new list of the Top 100 Most Banned and Challenged Books from the last decade reminds us that LGBTQ-inclusive books for kids remain among the most (needlessly) controversial.
Uncle Bobby’s Wedding, the 2008 picture book about a girl worried that her favorite uncle will no longer have time for her after he marries his boyfriend, is coming out today in a bright new edition. The anthropomorphic guinea pigs are gone, replaced by human characters—and author Sarah Brannen was kind enough to answer some questions for Mombian readers about the changes.
Eight of the titles in the American Library Association’s (ALA’s) latest annual list of the Top 10 Most Challenged Books were challenged or banned because of their LGBTQIA+ content. That’s unfortunately not surprising—but some other new trends this year add to concerns about censorship.
Looking for a list of librarian-approved LGBTQ-inclusive children’s and young adult books to recommend to your local school or library? Want some great books to add to your personal collection? The just-announced 2020 Rainbow Book List from the American Library Association has what you need!
