The provocative and hilarious summer read that will have book lovers cheering and everyone talking! Kirsten Miller, author of The Change, brings us a bracing, wildly entertaining satire about a small Southern town, a pitched battle over banned books, and a little lending library that changes everything.
Beverly Underwood and her arch enemy, Lula Dean, live in the tiny town of Troy, Georgia, where they were born and raised. Now Beverly is on the school board, and Lula has become a local celebrity by embarking on mission to rid the public libraries of all inappropriate books—none of which she’s actually read. To replace the “pornographic” books she’s challenged at the local public library, Lula starts her own lending library in front of her home: a cute wooden hutch with glass doors and neat rows of the worthy literature that she’s sure the town’s readers need.
But Beverly’s daughter Lindsay sneaks in by night and secretly fills Lula Dean’s little free library with banned books wrapped in “wholesome” dust jackets. The Girl’s Guide to the Revolution is wrapped in the cover of The Southern Belle’s Guide to Etiquette. A jacket that belongs to Our Confederate Heroes ends up on Beloved. One by one, neighbors who borrow books from Lula Dean’s library find their lives changed in unexpected ways. Finally, one of Lula Dean’s enemies discovers the library and decides to turn the tables on her, just as Lula and Beverly are running against each other to replace the town’s disgraced mayor.
That’s when all the townspeople who’ve been borrowing from Lula’s library begin to reveal themselves. It’s a diverse and surprising bunch—including the local postman, the prom queen, housewives, a farmer, and the former DA—all of whom have been changed by what they’ve read. When Lindsay is forced to own up to what she’s done, the showdown that’s been brewing between Beverly and Lula will roil the whole town...and change it forever.
There was a time in Ireland when you were no one, in literary circles, unless at least one of your titles had been banned by the Irish Censorship of Publications Board. It was a mark of honour in those days. Time has moved on and society has become a lot more open, and, at least in Ireland, we haven't suffered too much with bans.
However, we've all read the news from America of perfectly good books being yanked off shelves. Some of us have probably even experienced it first hand. I'd like to think that some of the people enacting those bans at least had good intentions, even if their actions were wildly unhinged; Lula Dean doesn't have that excuse.
This is really a series of interconnected stories, some of them going back a generation or more. There are a lot of names to keep track of, and after a while I had to take a few notes, but that's not unusual for me. I found it interesting - and odd that no one in the story pointed this out - that if Lula hadn't tried to remove the books, none of the rest of the events would have happened! None of the characters were visiting the town library, they only started reading books from Lula's library for various reasons. She really orchestrated her own downfall.
There's also a line near the end that kind of made me feel sad for her - I don't want to spoil anything, but it happens during the climactic showdown scene. Lula's not a nice person, but you can see the path that led her to where she ended up.
This is a great read, not only for book lovers but for anyone who's lived in, or been interested in, small towns and the people there, and how the lives we and our ancestors live make us who we are. Fantastic.
Lula Dean's Little Library of Banned Books publishes on the 18th of June, 2024. I received a free copy and am giving an honest review.
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