Dear Eleven Adults Responsible for the Majority of Book Bans in Schools,
I’m sorry for that cold salutation. I don’t know all your names yet. But shout out to you, Jennifer Petersen. The Washington Post reported that you’re one of the eleven, working from Spotsylvania, which I imagined as a dark and misty town where dogs became vampires. My imagination got the best of me—I just love speculative fiction. Turns out, it’s a real place in Virginia.
If I’m being honest, I’ve been feeling more than a little overwhelmed with the state of our country lately. It feels like every day, something happens that makes me wonder whether I’ve stumbled right into the fifth dimension from A Wrinkle in Time and lost a couple of decades. I’m guessing you all know that book, since some of your schools have banned it.
What an unexpected pleasure it was to feel an actual jolt of joy when I read that the entire movement to ban books in US public schools is coming from fewer people than I fed this Thanksgiving. Thank god (do you have an issue with me saying “god”? Or “God”? I’m guessing no) it’s just eleven of you.