Ban This Book

Mrs. Jones is immediately on Amy Anne’s side: “I promise you, I’m going to fight this” (14). Mrs. Jones says Amy Anne should attend Thursday night’s school board meeting and tell the members why the book is so meaningful to her. Amy Anne has a habit of keeping her honest response to others to herself. Amy Anne is too afraid to speak in public to a crowd, so what she says to Mrs. Jones in her head is, “Do you have polka dots on the brain? I can’t do that!” (15). What she really says, though, is that she will do it.

From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler is Amy Anne’s favorite book, now banned from the school library. Amy Anne loves it because the main characters, Claudia and her little brother Jamie, run away. Running away from her own chaotic household is a persistent daydream of Amy Anne’s, especially because of her little sisters, Alexis and Angelina. Amy Anne calls them “Thing 1 and Thing 2” (16) and compares them to Fudge Hatcher, Edmund Pevensie, and other terribly frustrating siblings in literature.

Coming home, Amy Anne must wade through Flotsam and Jetsam, the family Rottweilers, almost as tall as Amy Anne. She gets stuck setting the table since Alexis is preparing for ballet class. Amy Anne fibs to her father that chess club went well. She lies to her parents that she attends clubs daily after school so that she can sit and read in the library until the late bus. Youngest sister Angelina renames herself Rainbow Sparkle since she has decided on becoming a pony. Because five-year-old Angelina gets her own room, Amy Anne must share with middle sister Alexis. Alexis is playing music and practicing ballet moves by holding on to Amy Anne’s bed. Amy Anne tries to grab the CD from the player but gets reprimanded. Mom gets a call from work that means she must redo a big presentation. Amy Anne tries to rescue the few books she calls hers from Angelina’s “fence” for her pretend barn of furniture cushions, but Mom tells Amy Anne to “be the mature one” when Angelina starts wailing (24). Dad reprimands Amy Anne for letting the dogs in the kitchen while he is cooking. Amy Anne tries to retreat to the bathroom with the dogs, but Alexis insists she needs in to use the restroom.

At dinner, Amy Anne mentions the book, the banning, and the school board meeting. To her surprise, her parents rearrange the family’s busy weeknight schedule to allow Dad to take Amy Anne to the board meeting. Amy Anne is excited and afraid at the same time.

Amy Anne prepares for the meeting by writing a speech. On Thursday at the meeting, Dad meets Mrs. Jones, who tells him the school board banned the book without following procedure. She points out Mrs. Sarah Spencer, wealthy member of several school and community service groups and mother of classmate Trey—a boy with whom Amy Anne has a “history” (32). Mrs. Jones takes her turn to speak, calling attention to the unused Request for Reconsideration form and the board’s breach of their own procedural policy. She also states that banning a book goes against “intellectual freedom” (33) and that while a parent can certainly judge what books their own child should and should not read, a parent should not make that choice for other children. She asks to reshelve the banned books while concerned parents follow established procedure by filling out the form. The board members looked disinterested.

Mrs. Spencer speaks next. She talks about wanting the school to be a safe place where administrators support the parent’s authority. She says it is just “common sense” (35) to pull those 11 books when so many other better books are in the library that are more age appropriate. A school board moderator asks if anyone else wants to speak, but Amy Anne cannot bring the courage to do so; she sucks on her braids instead. The board votes to uphold the decision to ban the books. Amy Anne regrets her inability to speak up.

Dad sees Amy Anne holding her speech in the car: “I thought that was the whole reason we came all the way out here tonight. The whole reason we rearranged everyone’s schedules” (40). He realizes Amy Anne is crying, and he apologizes. He tries to get Amy Anne to laugh by fumbling the title of the book: “Mixed-up Mrs. Frankfurter or something” (40), but she cannot stop thinking how she failed to speak up. Dad stops at a bookstore and buys her a copy of the book. Amy Anne is grateful that she can read it anytime she wants now, but she realizes that if the book had never been on the shelves of the school library, she would not have discovered it in the first place.

On the school bus, Rebecca asks about the meeting, and Amy Anne admits she did not read her speech. Rebecca asks why From the Mixed-up Files is inappropriate, and Amy Anne loans her new copy so Rebecca can read it. Danny Purcell overhears them and joins their conversation, saying he saw the list of banned titles in the newspaper and recognized one because it was his mother’s favorite book when she was young; they have a copy at his house. Amy Anne deduces from his attempt at remembering the title that it must be Wait Till Helen Comes and asks to borrow it. Rebecca “look[s] lasers” (46) at Amy Anne because she has a crush on Danny, but Amy Anne genuinely wants to read it. Danny thinks all the banned books must “full of good stuff. Like all those channels my parents block on the TV” (46). Amy Anne notices when they get off the bus that Trey might have heard their book talk, but she realizes that they are talking about reading their own copies, not the library’s. That’s when she gets the big idea.

Amy Anne’s Big Idea is to read every book on the banned list, including Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, a book she always stayed away from in the past because older girls at school whisper about it, along with the Captain Underpants books, which, to Amy Anne, are “stupid” (49). She is most eager to read two she never heard of: The Egypt Game and It’s Perfectly Normal. She already read Matilda and Harriet the Spy, and of course From the Mixed-up Files. That would leave Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark and all the Junie B. Jones and Goosebumps books she has not yet read. Amy Anne realizes that counting all the titles in those three series, it is far more than 11 books.

Amy Anne asks to go to the bookstore. It becomes a family outing as Mom needs office store items and Alexis wants new ballet shoes. As Angelina fusses that Amy Anne is too close to her car seat and Dad promises the bookstore will not take long, Amy Anne tries to look forward to reading The Egypt Game and It’s Perfectly Normal that night.

Amy Anne reveals in a three-sentence chapter that It’s Perfectly Normal is not a novel as she expected but a nonfiction book on sex.

Amy Anne hurries away from It’s Perfectly Normal as soon as she gets a glimpse at its pictures and finds The Egypt Game and Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. She reads both in the first night. The Egypt Game includes an ancient Egyptian god communicating with modern-day kids in mysterious circumstances. Scary Stories is very scary; Amy Anne reads one about a murderer in the backseat of a car and another about a horrible spider bite. As she is about to reach the scariest part of “The Wendigo,” Alexis yells that Amy Anne is reading by flashlight.

Amy Anne enjoys Wait Till Helen Comes; once Rebecca reads it too, Amy Anne loves being able to talk about it with someone else. Danny plans to read it as well when he finishes From the Mixed-up Files; “It’s like we had our own little book club” (58). Danny looks forward to reading Scary Stories too, even though Amy Anne currently keeps it buried at the back of her closet. As she is explaining to him that it is indeed very scary, she sees a note in her locker mailbox.