REVIEW: That Librarian: The Fight Against Book Banning in America (nonfiction book) by Amanda Jones

That Librarian is nonfiction. I bought my copy new.

Review:

When I have a big new task ahead of me or a topic that's weighing heavily on my mind for whatever reason, my instinct is often to read about it. That's how I ended up coming across this book. I wanted to read more about recent efforts at book banning and challenging in US libraries. What I really wanted was something focused on academic libraries, but one thing I immediately noticed was that most of what I was finding was focused on school and public libraries. 

Anyway, in this book, Amanda Jones writes about attending a public hearing about "book content" at her local public library in 2022. As a concerned citizen and librarian, she spoke in support of library collections that meet the needs of all members of her local community and warned against the harm that censorship could cause. Her whole speech is included in the last chapter of the book.

Although Jones wasn't the only one who spoke out, Citizens for a New Louisiana used this as an opportunity to target and defame her, saying that she was fighting to keep sexually erotic and pornographic materials in the children's section of the library, despite none of that ever coming up in her speech. Jones writes about the emotional impact of having members of her small community who she'd known and previously been friendly with turn on her and believe everything that was written. Then there was the pain of those who tried not to get involved, out of fear that they themselves might become targets, and those who privately supported her but couldn't bring themselves to do so publicly.

She also writes about her efforts to sue those who harassed and defamed her, about book banning efforts in Louisiana in particular and the US in general, and the work that she's done to try to support other librarians going through similar situations.

Jones' efforts to grapple with her emotions were palpable and at times took over the book a bit. As she frequently said, she was trying to focus on the positives and those who'd supported her in whatever ways they could, but she'd grown up in this community and was enormously emotionally invested in it. Having people who'd previously praised her work with their children turn on her and coworkers she thought she could count on give her a cold shoulder shook her to her core.

One thing that this book did for me (besides remind me that hateful mobs are terrifying and that depression drains your soul) was remind me how libraries are generally supposed to deal with book challenges. It was a bit of a gut punch, honestly, a reminder of how different my own library's approach has been. 

One of the reasons I went into academic librarianship rather than public or school was because I naively figured that book challenges and censorship wouldn't be as much of an issue. Seeing as how Jones herself only ever brought up public and school libraries, it's an assumption that many may hold. Things are changing, however, and another thing this book did for me was remind me that academic libraries could stand to learn a lot from the decades that public and school libraries have spent dealing with these issues and fighting these battles.

This could have been more tightly written, and it wasn't exactly an enjoyable read, but I'm still glad I read it.