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Ban This Book: Banned/Challenged Titles Mentioned in Ban This Book by Alan Gratz

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Today marks the first day of Banned Books Week, an annual celebration of the freedom to read. Ban This Book by Alan Gratz tells the story of a girl in fourth-grade who takes on her school when her favorite book is removed from the library. Over the years, many books have been challenged or banned in the U.S., most frequently for the given reasons of sexual content or explicit language. Here are eleven trouble-making books that made an appearance in Ban This Book.

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Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. by Judy Blume
This book about a girl in sixth grade struggling with questions of religion and her experience going through puberty has been banned and challenged in numerous school districts because the book is supposedly sexually offensive and amoral. Others have targeted it as anti-Christian or immoral.

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Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz
This classic anthology of illustrated horror stories was banned in many schools in the 1990s as too scary or age inappropriate. One parent even compared one of the stories about a murderer to a real life serial killer: “right away I thought of Jeffrey Dahmer.”1

Placeholder of  -40Matilda by Roald Dahl
The beloved story of Matilda, a young girl who loves to read and learns she has telekinetic powers, has been challenged for its depiction of adults, including Matilda’s parents, being abusive and neglectful.

Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh
Poster Placeholder of - 95This novel is about an eleven-year-old girl who spies on her classmates and inadvertently sets off a firestorm when her book of her brutally honest, and sometimes cruel, observations about her classmates is discovered. Parents challenged the book for supposedly setting a bad example for children, supposedly encouraging them to spy, lie, and swear.

Wait Till Helen Comes by Mary Downing Hahn
A story about a girl who finds a ghost in her new house, Wait Till Helen Comes deals with heavy issues of death and suicide, but another parent objected to the book’s portrayal of the main character talking to the dead. “The act of talking to the dead is called spiritism and is condemned in the Bible Galation 5:19-21,” the father of a student wrote in his official complaint.2

It’s Perfectly Normal by Robie H. Harris
It’s Perfectly Normal is a book written for kids ages 10 and older to teach them about sexual health, relationships, and puberty. It’s been banned across the country for content that’s inappropriate for children, both for the frank discussion of sexuality and the inclusion of (non-graphic) illustrations of naked people. The book is intended as an educational resource for kids about a range of topics, including sexual orientation, gender identity, and abuse.

From the Mixed-up Files of  Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E. L. Konigsburg
The removal of this book from her school library is what kicks off Ban This Book’s heroine’s act of protest. Complaints about From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler primarily object to the rest on the fear that children might imitate the heroine, who runs away from home to live inthe Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Indeed, over the years many children have actually written to the Met to profess their desire to live at the museum.

The Junie B. Jones books by Barbara Park
The Junie B. Jones series is written in the voice of its five-year-old heroine – who doesn’t always use proper English. Some adults have protested that the book’s use of childish vernacular might inspire kids to use bad spelling and grammar. One complainant claimed that the series, which shows Junie sometimes acting out, “sends the message that… emotions such as hate are fine.”3

The Captain Underpants books by Dav Pilkey
The long-running series of Captain Underpants books has been targeted for being inappropriate or unsuited to the age group, usually due to its crude humor. Others have claimed that the series encourages children to disobey authority. More recently, the 12th book in the series attracted some attention when a character was revealed to be gay.

The Egypt Game by Zilpha Keatley Snyder
This Newberry Award-winning book about a group of children who create an imaginative game based on Ancient Egypt was challenged on religious grounds for depicting occult rituals involving Ancient Egyptian gods. The parent who challenged the book said: “I don’t believe any student should be subjected to anything that has to do with evil gods or black magic.” (Newsletter on Intellectual Freedom, Jan. 2010, p. 17.)

Goosebumps by R. L. Stine
This beloved series of horror stories made the top twenty most-challenged books list between 1990 to 1999. Some parents feared the series was too frightening for kids, while others objected that the books contained Satanic themes or depictions of the occult.

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Sneak Peek: Molly’s Story by W. Bruce Cameron

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Placeholder of  -52Meet Molly—a very special dog with a very important purpose. An irresistible book for young middle grade readers adapted from A Dog’s Journey, the sequel to the bestselling A Dog’s Purpose—now a major motion picture!

Molly knows that her purpose is to take care of her girl, C.J., but it won’t be easy. Neglected by her mother, Gloria, who won’t allow her to have a dog, C.J. is going through some tough times. Molly’s job is to stay hidden in C.J.’s room, cuddle up to her at night, and protect her from bad people. And no matter what Gloria does to separate them, nothing will keep Molly away from the girl that she loves.

Adorable black-and-white illustrations by Richard Cowdrey bring Molly and her world to life. Also includes a discussion and activity guide that will help promote family and classroom discussions about Molly’s Story and the insights it provides about humankind’s best friends.

Molly’s Story, a heartwarming tale of a dog and her girl, will become available July 3rd. Please enjoy this excerpt.

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At first, everything was dark.

I felt warmth all around me, and I could smell other puppies cuddled up close. I could smell my mother, too. Her scent was safety, and comfort, and milk.

When I was hungry, I would squirm toward that smell, and find milk to drink. When I was cold, I would press close to her fur, or burrow under a brother or a sister. And then I’d sleep until I was hungry again.

When I opened my eyes after a few days, things began to get more interesting.

I could see now that my mother’s fur was short and curly and dark. Most of my brothers and sisters looked like that, too. Only one had fur like mine, as dark as my mother’s, but straight and soft, with no curl to it at all.

One day, after my stomach was full, I didn’t fall asleep right away. Instead, I stood up and braced myself on wobbly legs. I took a few steps, and my nose bumped into something smooth, with a funny, dry smell. I licked it. It tasted dry, too, and not nearly as interesting as licking my mother or the other puppies nearby.

I was pretty worn out by all this excitement, so I pushed my way underneath the sleeping body of a sister and took a nap. Later on, I ventured a little farther. On every side was more of that cardboard. It was under my feet, too. We were in a box.

Sometimes a woman came to lean over the box and talk to us. I’d blink up at her sleepily. Her voice was kind, and her hands, when they came down to pet us, were gentle. My mother would thump her tail, letting me know that this woman was a friend.

One day she slid her hands right under my belly and hoisted me up into the air.

“You need a name,” she told me, holding me close to her nose. I tasted it with my tongue, and she giggled. “You’re sweet, that’s for sure. How about Molly? You look like a Molly to me. Want to explore? Those legs are getting strong.” She plopped me down on a new surface, wrinkly and soft. I put my nose down to it eagerly. I could smell soap, and soft cotton fuzz, and other dogs. I nibbled it. The woman laughed.

“It’s not to eat, silly girl. Here, maybe you need some company. I think I’ll call this one Rocky.” Another puppy, one of my brothers, landed on the blanket next to me. He was the only one who looked like me, with short hair. He tilted his head to one side, studied me, sneezed, and chewed on my ear.

I shook him off and headed off to find out more about this new space.

It was shockingly huge. I could take many, many steps at a time. I was astounded at how much room there was in the world! By the time my nose bumped into new pair of shoes, I was worn out. I barely had energy to get my teeth around a shoelace and tug.

The owner of the shoes bent down to pull the shoelace out of my mouth. I growled, to show her it was mine.

“So adorable!” the person with the shoelace said. “Is she a poodle, Jennifer?”

“Half,” said the woman who’d taken me out of the box. Jennifer, I guessed, must be her name. “Mom’s a standard poodle, definitely. But the dad—who knows? Spaniel, maybe? Terrier?”

“How many did she have?”

“Seven,” said Jennifer. “She was pregnant when I found her. After the pups are weaned, I’ll see about taking her in to get her spayed. Then I’ll find her a home.”

“And homes for all of these puppies, too?” asked the owner of the shoelace. “We’ll take two, but we can’t have more than that.” She scooped me up in soft hands and returned me to the box, where I nestled close to my mother and had a little snack.

“Of course. I understand,” Jennifer said. “Not to worry. I’ve been fostering dogs a long time. The right home usually comes along at the right time.”

She stroked my head as I curled up for a nap, right next to my mother where I belonged.

After that, Jennifer came to take us out of the box more and more often. I got a chance to explore the living room, pounce on a couch cushion to teach it who was boss, and even peek out into a hallway where the floor was so slippery and slick that my feet went out from under me. A sister tried to climb on me when I was down, but she couldn’t get any traction with her back feet on the slick floor, so that didn’t work. All I had to do was roll over and shake her off.

That’s when I caught the scent of another dog on the air.

My head went up. My ears went up, too. I got to my feet, staring and sniffing hard. At the far end of the hallway, a big dog was standing, watching me.

“Barney? Be nice to the new pups,” Jennifer said.

Barney was very tall, much taller than my mother, and I could smell that he was male. He had astonishingly long ears that hung down beside his face and swung back and forth when he put his head down closer to the ground.

I was fascinated. I didn’t have ears like that, and my mother didn’t, either. Neither did my brothers and sisters. I set off to investigate. My sister stayed behind me and whimpered a little for our mother to come and save her. But I was ready to find out more.

With each step, my feet tried to skid away from me. My claws were no help at all; they couldn’t get any kind of grip on the polished wood. But I pressed on, and soon I was right up close to the new dog.

Barney put his giant muzzle down to the ground. It was as big as my whole body! He sniffed at my face. Then he sniffed along my whole body, nudging me so hard with his nose that I lost my balance and sat down. But I held still. He was bigger and older, and I knew that it was my job to stay quiet and let him do what he liked.

“Good dog, Barney,” Jennifer said.

His nose came back to my head. He let out a snuffly sigh and turned to walk away.

His long, droopy, silky ears swung back and forth, back and forth. And I just couldn’t resist.

I jumped forward and snatched at one of those ears with my teeth.

Barney snorted and pulled his head away. I held on. It was tug-of-war! I couldn’t bite very hard yet, with my weak jaws, but already I loved playing this game. I’d do it with my brothers and sisters in the box whenever we found anything we could chew. I’d never played it with anything as wonderful as a long, soft, dangling ear.

“Molly, no!” called Jennifer, trying to sound stern. But she was laughing. Barney backed away, looking confused. He towed me with him, my teeth still in his ear. Then he shook his big head, and I tumbled over in a somersault, ending up flat on the floor with all four of my legs splayed out in different directions.

Barney snorted again and began to walk away. I charged up, ready to chase him and get that ear again. But Jennifer scooped me up before I could manage it and settled me back in the box with my littermates.

It wasn’t fair because I knew that if I set my feet I could really give that ear a good tug, but a big meal and some sleep took my mind off the injustice.

As my siblings and I grew bigger, our box seemed to become smaller and smaller, and our mother wanted more time away from us. Jennifer started taking us outside more and more often to play.

I loved outside. It was wonderful.

There was grass to chew, with a fascinating juicy taste that was not like anything inside the house. There were sticks that tasted even better. Birds flitted overhead. Once I scratched in the dirt and found a worm twisting and coiling between my claws. I nosed it with delight until a brother knocked me away and the worm squirmed back into the earth again while I dealt with my littermate.

Barney did not come outside much. He liked to spend most of his days asleep on a soft bed in a corner of one of the inside rooms. But there was another dog, named Che, who barely came inside at all, except to eat. Che was big and gray, and he loved to run. And it was even better if he were being chased.

The very first time I went outside, he dashed over to where I was sitting next to Rocky. Che bowed down low on his front paws, his back legs high in the air, his tail beating back and forth. Then he jumped up again and ran away, looking at us to see if we’d figured it out.

Rocky and I sat staring at him. What did he want?

Che seemed to decide that we didn’t understand. He came back and bowed again. Then he dashed off once more.

Rocky seemed fascinated by Che’s plumy tail. He set off after it, and I set off after Rocky. It would not be right if he had fun without me.

Che raced in a big circle around the yard so fast he came up behind us. I jumped around to stare at him. Rocky yipped.

Che bowed again and tore off. We followed, running as fast as we could on our short, clumsy legs. It seemed the right thing to do. Every time we came outside after that, Che was there, begging us to chase him. We always obliged.

But Che did not stay long at Jennifer’s. One day a woman came to visit, and she took Che home with her. “It’s wonderful, what you do,” she said to Jennifer as she stood by the gate to the yard, with Che on a leash beside her. “I think if I tried to foster dogs I’d wind up keeping all of them.”

Jennifer laughed. “That’s called ‘foster failure.’ It’s how I ended up with Barney. He was my first foster. I realized, though, that if I didn’t get control of myself I’d adopt a few dogs and then that’d be it, and I wouldn’t be able to help any others.”

“Come, Che!” the new woman said, and she tugged at the leash. Tail wagging, Che bounded after her. They went through the gate, and it shut behind them.

Che was gone.

Copyright © 2017 by W. Bruce Cameron

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Sneak Peek: The Wishing World by Todd Fahnestock

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The Wishing World by Todd FahnestockIn the Wishing World, dreams are real. You can transform into your own hero, find wild and whimsical friends, and wield power as great as your imagination. But Lorelei doesn’t know about any of that. All she knows is that a monster took her family.

It happened during a camping trip one year ago. Hiding inside the tent, she saw shadows, tentacles and a strange creature. By the time she got up the courage to crawl outside, the monster–and Lorelei’s mom, dad, and brother–were gone.

Lorelei is determined to find her family. When she accidentally breaks into the Wishing World, she discovers a way. It’s a land more wonderful than she could have imagined, a land of talking griffons, water princesses, and cities made of sand, where Lorelei is a Doolivanti–a wish-maker–who can write her dreams into existence.

There’s only one problem: the monster is a Doolivanti, too. What he wishes also comes true, and he’s determined to shove Lorelei out, keep her family, and make the whole Wishing World his. To save them, Lorelei must find the courage to face him, or her next wish may be her last.

Award-winning author Todd Fahnestock makes his middle grade debut in this charming and whimsical adventure. The Wishing World will become available October 25th. Please enjoy this excerpt.

CHAPTER 1

I ran like there was a monster behind me. Because one year ago today, there had been. Black tentacles slithered right out of the rain and snatched my little brother. Snatched my parents, too. That’s the way it happened. Freaky truth, right? Bright like a neon sign in your face.

Too bad nobody believed me.

The clouds were low and dark, bellies full of water, so I didn’t stop running until I got to my house. By then my legs were jelly. Lungs burning. I had that metal taste in my mouth that you get when you run too hard. Florid Flecks of Phlegm. Gick.

The towering streetlight made a bright circle on the blacktop, the sidewalk, and the sloped lawn. The first rain droplets speckled my face lightly like they were innocent. Like they hadn’t snatched my whole childhood away. But I was done being afraid. I was done flinching. I stood still with my fists clenched and let the drops hit me. I wanted my family back.

I spat out the nasty acid taste and tried the purple front door. Locked. And I didn’t have a key anymore. Auntie Carrie and Uncle Jone had sold my house last week and sent me to a sleepover in the old neighborhood to make me feel better. Like that works. Have a pillow fight and a cup of hot chocolate, and you’ll forget they’re selling your house. You’ll forget you ever had a brother or a mom or a dad. Welcome to the new normal. You get with the program yet, Lorelei?

No. Double no with a forget-you on top.

So I’d slipped past my best friend’s parents. They thought I was tucked deep in my sleeping bag. Turns out five big stuffed animals look a lot like a Lorelei lump. But they would notice I was gone soon. They would check on me. Auntie Carrie and Uncle Jone would have asked them to. My aunt and uncle were trying to be “good parents,” trying everything to make “the transition” easier on me. Auntie Carrie cried sometimes because I wouldn’t respond to the nice things she did, wouldn’t listen to her advice. They just didn’t get it. I didn’t need a replacement family; I didn’t want a replacement family. I needed my brother and my mother and my father back. Nothing else even mattered. Nothing.

This last year I had been searching, doing everything I could to find my missing family. And wow, nobody liked that. Adults hate it when girls hitchhike, or go camping in the woods by themselves without telling anyone, or do Internet searches on kidnappers, then e-mail them questions.

When you do things like that, they use words like “trauma” and “delusions.” They talk to you slowly, say everything twice, like you can’t understand them the first time.

They used to call me imaginative, decisive. A good student and a better friend. But since the rain and the tentacles, since Narolev’s Comet streaked the sky, it was Loopy Lorelei and her not-so-cute delusions. My replacement parents didn’t know what to do with me, so they sent me to the creepy shrink, Mr. Schmindly.

Adults don’t have a snappy solution for tentacles in the rain. Can we focus on the tentacles, adults?

No. Double no with a sit-down-and-be-quiet on top.

So I stopped pleading with them. Now my caring replacement family was afraid I was some kind of mute because I didn’t cry anymore. But I stopped crying because it didn’t do anything. Crying was really just waiting. Except with tears.

I was done waiting.

Dad said that life is like a story, and we get to fill it with what we want. Well, this last year of my story sucked, and I was going to rewrite it.

Then last week I got the Big Idea: Dad’s comet stone. Dippy Lorelei. That was the first thing I should have thought of after the rainstorm. Narolev’s Comet had been in the air when all the bad stuff happened; it was why we had been in the mountains in the first place. What if it was linked to what had happened? It had to be. Dad said he’d had a chunk of it in the basement, back in the crawl space. And the skeezoids who bought my house were moving in tomorrow. I couldn’t wait one second longer.

I shook the thoughts away. I had to get going. My replacement family could be on their way right now. I looked up at the dark, overcast sky. I couldn’t see Narolev’s Comet, but it was up there somewhere, past those heavy clouds, streaking across the sky. I could feel it, looking down with its white eye.

I walked past the FOR SALE: SOLD sign stuck in my lawn, past the giant green bush to the backyard fence, and I thought of my brother Theron. He was always climbing this fence because the gate didn’t work. He was always climbing everything.

Without Mom and Dad, I woke up most nights feeling like I was falling with no one to catch me. But without Theron, I felt like I’d lost my arm. Awake or asleep, I felt like I was missing something because he and I had almost always been together. The first memory of my life was when he was born. He showed up early. The midwife didn’t get there in time. So I stood right there in the upstairs bathroom watching him take his first breath, squalling in a half-filled tub of water.

Theron was a protector. He fought that mean girl Shandra when she pushed me down and punched me. He leapt from the monkey bars and collared Danny Brogue when that bully stole my Halloween candy. Last year, he even stood between me and the fourth grade substitute teacher, Mrs. Coswell, when she blamed me for something Shandra had done. Theron threw a chair that time. He couldn’t be still when something wasn’t fair, or when someone he loved was threatened. He didn’t know what else to do but fight.

And I protected him, too. Theron had nightmares every night. When he woke up thrashing and huffing like he’d run a mile, I would tell him good stories to calm him down. I would send him back to sleep and save him from the monsters in his head.

I jumped up, grabbed the top of the fence, and swung a leg over. It was up to me to find out where he had gone. Where they had all gone. Nothing else mattered.

I’m just like Theron, I thought. Strong as a gorilla. I can do four pull-ups.

I could really only do three. But imagining what I couldn’t do never helped.

See it real, make it real. Do it real. One practice pull-up at a time.

I hoisted myself up, twisted, and balanced on top of the fence, letting my breath out.

I stretched, reached for the rain gutter, and caught it with my fingertips. Slowly, I pulled myself up. I hooked my heel into the rain gutter and leaned forward. It groaned, but I ignored it. It wasn’t going to fall.

I rolled my body onto the sloped roof. Dark rain dots marked the shingles.

I am an Olympic gymnast, I thought, standing up. I can balance on anything.

I leaned into the roof and walked toward the upstairs window. Each step was tricky. My backpack was heavy, jammed with food instead of stuffed animals for the sleepover, and kept pulling me to the side—

My foot slipped and I went down so fast I cried out. I hit the shingles and slid to the edge of the roof.

“No!” I shouted and jammed my heel into the rain gutter.

It clanged loudly and shook …

I drew a sharp breath, pushing hard on it, trying to get higher up as I stared at the drop below.

The gutter gave way with a sharp crunk.

Double suck with a yikes on top.

I shrieked and went over the edge, falling to the wood chips in the yard below.

Copyright © 2016 by Todd Fahnestock

Buy The Wishing World here:

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Sneak Peek: The Dark Talent by Brandon Sanderson

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Sneak Peek: The Dark Talent by Brandon SandersonAlcatraz Smedry has successfully defeated the army of Evil Librarians and saved the kingdom of Mokia. Too bad he managed to break the Smedry Talents in the process. Even worse, his father is trying to enact a scheme that could ruin the world, and his friend, Bastille, is in a coma. To revive her, Alcatraz must infiltrate the Highbrary–known as The Library of Congress to Hushlanders–the seat of Evil Librarian power. Without his Talent to draw upon, can Alcatraz figure out a way to save Bastille and defeat the Evil Librarians once and for all?

The Dark Talent–available September 6this the fifth action-packed fantasy adventure in the Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians series for young readers by the #1 New York Times bestselling author Brandon Sanderson. This never-before-published, fast-paced, and funny novel is now available in a deluxe hardcover edition, illustrated by Hayley Lazo. Please enjoy this excerpt. 

Chapter

Doug

So there I was, standing in my chambers on the day before the world ended, facing my greatest adversary to date.

The royal wardrobe coordinator.

Janie was a perky Nalhallan woman wearing trendy Free Kingdomer clothing. Technically you could describe her outfit as a tunic—but it was only similar to a tunic in the same way that a high-end sports car is similar to a broken-down pickup. It was more like a dress with a belt at the waist, and had a large bow on one side with stylish embroidery up the sleeves.

It looked nice, making it a complete contrast to the monstrosity she held up for me to wear.

“That,” I said, “is a clown costume.”

“What?” Janie said. “Of course it isn’t.”

“It’s a white jumpsuit,” I said, “with fluffy pink bobs over the buttons!”

“White for the purity of the throne, Your Former Highness,” Janie said, “and pink to indicate your magnanimous decision to step down peacefully.”

“It has oversized floppy shoes.”

“A representation of your magnificent footprint upon the kingdom, Your Former Highness.”

“And the fake flower to squirt water?”

“So that you may shower all who approach you with symbolic waters of life.”

I raised a skeptical eyebrow at her and walked over to the bed, picking up the poofy rainbow clown wig she’d brought for me to wear.

“Obviously,” Janie said, “that is a representation of the varieties of cultures and peoples you served during your kingship.” She smiled.

“Let me guess,” I said, tossing the wig onto the bed. “The Librarians took this ‘regal’ costume worn by retired Mokian kings and, in my lands, gave it to clowns. That turned it into something ridiculous in the Hushlands, like how they named prisons after famous Free Kingdomers.”

“Uh, yeah,” Janie said. “Sure … Uh, that’s … exactly what happened.”

I frowned at her evasiveness. At the moment, I wore only a bathrobe. My old clothing—green jacket, T-shirt, jeans—was gone. My jacket had been cut up, and the rest of my clothing had been vaporized in a rather unfortunate incident containing far too much Alcatraz nudity.

Outside my room, Tuki Tuki—capital city of Mokia—was utterly silent. The drums of celebration had stopped, as had the songs of joy. Their day of celebration past, the Mokians now mourned in silence to highlight the voices among them that had been quieted.

If I was right, that silence was about to get a lot worse. I refer you to the footnote* for proof.

“What else do you have?” I asked Janie.

“Well, let’s see,” she said, obviously disappointed I wouldn’t wear the clown outfit. I might be a former king of Mokia—though I’d only served for one day—but if that was the traditional costume of my station, I’d go without.

She reached into her large trunk and pulled out what appeared to be a dog costume, with furred feet, a tail, and a headpiece with floppy ears.

“No,” I said immediately.

“But it’s the official outfit for a retired prince of—”

“No.”

Janie sighed, setting it on the bed and digging farther into her trunk.

“What is it with these ‘traditional’ outfits?” I said, poking the dog costume. “I mean, even without Librarian interference, you have to admit they’re kind of…”

“Regal?”

“Ridiculous,” I said. “It’s almost like you want your former kings to look silly.”

Janie shifted. “Uh … why would we want to do that? It’s not like we want people to see former monarchs as foolish, so a ruler who has stepped down can never change his mind, stage a coup, and seize back the kingdom.” She forced out a laugh.

“You’re a terrible liar.”

“Thank you! How about this nice cat costume? It represents the way you gracefully maneuvered the politics of the throne!”

“No animal costumes at all, please.”

She sighed, then continued digging in her trunk. A moment later she cursed under her breath. The lights at the sides of the trunk had stopped working.

Curious, I walked over. Why did she even need lights? I soon saw that the inside of the trunk was much larger than the outside would indicate. The trunk was a neat trick, but nothing I hadn’t seen before—in the Free Kingdoms, people use different varieties of glass to accomplish some pretty amazing things.*

The lights at the side were made of a special kind of glass to provide illumination—and that glass was powered by a special type of sand called brightsand. It worked somewhat like a battery for glass. (In the same way that shipwrecked people act like batteries for sharks.)

Her brightsand for the lights appeared to have lost its charge. Fortunately, I knew something else that worked as a battery for both sand and sharks: me.

I reached out and touched the glass of her lights. I might have—somehow—broken the Smedry Talents, but I was still an Oculator. That meant I could power special types of glass.

I dredged up something inside me and pushed it out—it was a little like trying to throw up when not nauseous. The glass lights shining into Janie’s trunk burst aglow, brilliant as the sun. I yelped, startled by the sudden explosion of power. Usually there was a sense of resistance when trying to do this, but today the energy came right out.

I stumbled back as the glass plates actually melted.

“Wow,” Janie said. “Uh … you really hate these clothes, don’t you?”

“I…”

Let me pause here and explain an important point. When you are a coward like me, you should always take credit for something you didn’t intend to do. You see, part of being a coward is being too afraid of not being seen as awesome to admit to not being awesome, though you have to be careful not to let on that you’re too afraid of not being awesome to admit that not being awesome would indicate to those that want someone to be awesome that you are not as awesome as your awesomeness would otherwise indicate.

“I’m awesome,” I said.

Sorry. I got a little confused in that last paragraph. Man, this writing can be as regal as a former Mokian monarch sometimes.

Janie looked at me.

“Ah, ahem,” I said. “I saw a military uniform. What about that?”

I’d only seen a glimpse of it in the bright light: an outfit of Nalhallan design, with big epaulettes* on the shoulders and all kinds of ropes and ribbons and buttons and things, intended to make officers stand out on a battlefield and get shot first so the soldiers doing the real fighting are safe.

“I suppose,” Janie said, “I can try to dig that out—but I’ll need to install some new lights first.” She glanced at the bubbling globs of glass on the sides of her trunk.

“Uh, thanks,” I said.

“You sure you don’t want a frog costume? Technically it’s supposed to be for a retired king who served at least seven days, but you could swing it.”

“No thanks.” I hesitated, but was too curious not to ask. “Let me guess. The frog costume represents how a monarch leaps hurdle after hurdle as a leader?”

“Nah. It’s symbolic of how you survived your kingship without croaking.”

Of course.

Janie got out another pack and began digging around for some lights. Embarrassed at having ruined her glass, I made an excuse about needing to use the restroom and slipped out. In truth, I just wanted to be alone for a little while.

The hallway outside my room was decorated with a woven mat, the walls constructed of large reeds, the roof thatched. I didn’t see a soul. The place was freakishly quiet, and I found myself tiptoeing. (A common action of cowards like me.)

It seemed to me that with everything that had happened in the last few days, I should be doing something far more important than deciding what to wear. Tuki Tuki was safe, but I hadn’t won this war. Not as long as Bastille and so many Mokians lay in comas, Librarians still ruled the Hushlands, and there were footnotes lying scattered around unused.*

We needed to chase down my father and stop him from putting his insane plan into motion. Though … maybe his plan wouldn’t work anymore. I’d broken the Talents, after all. Maybe that would stop him from giving Talents to everyone else.

No, I thought. This is my father. He’d bested the undead Librarians of Alexandria and had uncovered the secret of the Sands of Rashid. He would be able to do this too. If we didn’t stop him.

I heard voices in the hallway, so I followed them to a spacious room topped by lazy ceiling fans. Inside, my grandfather stood before a large wall of glowing glass that showed the faces of numerous people in a variety of ethnic costumes. I recognized them as the monarchs of the Free Kingdoms—I’d saved their lives at one point. Maybe two. I lose count.

Bald on top, my grandfather wore a bushy mustache and had an equally bushy ring of white hair that puffed out along the back of his head, like he’d been in an epic pillow fight and a mass of stuffing had gotten stuck to his scalp. He was, as always, decked out in a stylish tuxedo.

“Now, I don’t want to act ungrateful,” my grandfather was saying to the monarchs, “but … Accountable Alatars, people! Don’t you think you’re a little late?”

“Mokia asked for aid,” said Queen Kamiko, an Asian-looking woman in her fifties.

“Yes,” agreed a man in a European-looking crown. I didn’t know his name. “You wanted armies. We’re sending them, along with the air guard, to help you Smedrys. What is the complaint?”

“My complaint?” Grandpa Smedry sputtered. “The war is over! My grandson won it!”

“Yes, well,” said a dark-skinned monarch in a colorful hat. “Certainly there is still work to be done. Cleanup, reconstruction, that sort of thing.”

“You cowards,” I said, stepping into the room.

Trust me. I know how to spot cowards.

My grandfather looked toward me, as did the monarchs on the screen. The Free Kingdomers liked to claim that they are nothing like the Hushlanders, but things like this glass wall—which was Communicator’s Glass, designed for speaking over long distances—are very similar to Hushlander technology. The two could be sides to the same coin.

The same went for those monarchs and the leaders of the Librarians. Politicians, it seemed, often shared more with one another than they did with the people they represented.

“Lad…” Grandpa Smedry said.

“I will speak to them,” I said, stepping up beside him.

“But—” Grandpa said.

“I won’t be shushed!”

“I wasn’t going to shush you,” Grandpa said. “I was going to point out that you’re addressing the world’s collected monarchs in a bathrobe.”

Uh …

Right.

“It’s a representation of my disdain for their callous disregard for Mokian lives!” I proclaimed, raising a hand with my finger pointed toward the sky.

Thanks, Janie.

“Young Smedry,” said Kamiko, “we are grateful for what you have done, but you have no right to speak to us in such a way!”

“I have every right!” I snapped. “I am a former king of Mokia.”

“You were king for one day,” said a tiny dinosaur. I knew that one; Supremus Rex, monarch of the dinosaurs.

“One day is long enough to get some of the stench on me,” I said, “but brief enough to not be overwhelmed by it. You send armies now? After the fight is won, and you realize that an alliance with the Librarians is impossible? I can’t believe that you—”

“I don’t have to listen to this,” Kamiko interrupted, turning off her section of the glass. The others followed suit, switching off their screens until only one remained, a man with red hair and beard, looking sorrowful. Brig, the High King, Bastille’s father.

I felt my anger fade, and I looked sheepishly at my grandfather. I’d stormed in and ruined his meeting.

“That was quite energetic!” Grandpa Smedry said. “I approve.”

“I don’t know,” another voice said from the back of the room. My uncle Kaz was there, sitting and sipping a fruit drink, his adventuring hat on the table beside him. Four feet tall—and please don’t call him a dwarf or a midget—Kaz was dressed in a leather jacket and sturdy hiking boots. He had a pair of Warrior’s Lenses hanging from his pocket; he wasn’t an Oculator, but he was pretty handy in a fight.

Kaz raised his cup toward me. “It was good calling them cowards, Al, but I think you could have slipped another insult or two in before they switched off their glass. And the send-off … yeah, that wasn’t suitably theatrical at all.”

“True, true,” Grandpa said. “The dramatic effect of your intrusion could have been much greater, and you could have been far more annoying.”

And that’s probably the best introduction I could give you to my family. In the last six months of my life, I’d taunted undead Librarian ghosts, recklessly used my Talent to lay waste to armies, run headlong into danger a dozen times over, and aggravated some of the most powerful Librarians who have ever lived—but compared to the rest of the Smedry clan, I’m the responsible, cool-headed one.

“I doubt insulting the monarchs would do any good, Leavenworth,” the High King said to my grandfather, speaking through his glowing pane of glass. “They are afraid. A few days ago the world made sense to them—but now everything has changed.”

“Because the Librarians were driven off?” I asked. Bastille’s father looked very, very tired, with red eyes and drooping features.

“Yes,” the king said to me. “Driven off by one person, and by a power they didn’t know he had—a power they can’t imagine or understand. They’re afraid that what you have done will enrage the Librarians.”

“Mokia was their sacrifice,” Grandpa Smedry said, angry. “They foolishly hoped it would satiate the Librarians. And now they’re convinced that the Librarians will return in force, determined this time to crush the entirety of the Free Kingdoms.”

Politics.

I hate politics. When I’d first learned about the Free Kingdoms, I’d imagined how wonderful and amazing they’d be. I spent two entire books trying to get there, only to find that—despite their many wonders—the people in them were … well, people.* Free Kingdomers had all the flaws of people in the Hushlands, except with sillier clothing.

I thought of Bastille, unconscious. She’d be so embarrassed to be seen that way. Those monarchs had abandoned her, and Mokia, for their own petty games. It made me angry. Angry at the monarchs, angry at the Librarians, angry at the world. I sneered, stepping forward, and slapped my hands against the Communicator’s Glass on the wall.

“Lad?” Grandpa Smedry asked.

The glass beneath my fingers began to glow.

Perhaps I should have been wary, considering what I’d done to Janie’s lights. I just wanted to do something. I powered the wall glass. I threw everything I had into those panels, causing them to shine brightly.

“You can’t call them back,” Kaz said, “not unless they allow you to—”

I pushed something into that glass, something powerful. I had certain advantages, being raised in the Hushlands. Everyone in the Free Kingdoms had expectations about what was and wasn’t possible.

I was too stupid to know what they knew, and I was too much a Smedry to let that bother me.

What I did next defies explanation. But since it’s my job to try to convey difficult concepts to you, I’m going to try anyway. Imagine jumping off a high building into a sea of marshmallows, then reaching out with a million arms to touch the entire world, while realizing that every emotion you’ve ever had is connected to every other emotion, and they’re really one big emotion, like an emotion-whale that you can’t completely see because you’re up too close to notice anything other than a little bit of leathery emotion-whale skin.

I let out a deep breath.

Wow.

In that moment, the squares of Communicator’s Glass each winked back on. They showed the rooms of the monarchs, most of whom were still there, though they’d stood from their chairs to speak with their attendants. One had gotten a sandwich. Another was playing solitaire.*

They looked at me, and I somehow knew that my face had appeared on each of their panes of glass, large and dominating.

“I,” I told them, “am going to the Highbrary.”

Is that my voice?

“You are worried I’ve started something dangerous,” I said. “You’re wrong. I’m not starting it, I’m finishing it. The Librarians have terrorized us for far too long. I intend to make certain they are the ones who are frightened and they are the ones, for once, who have to worry about what they’re going to lose.

“Some of you are scared. Some of you are selfish. The rest of you are downright ignorant. Well, you’re going to have to put those things aside, because you can’t ignore what’s coming. I know something the Librarians don’t. The end is here. You can’t stop this war from progressing. So it’s time for you to stand up, stop whining, and either help or get out of my way.”

I let go of the glass. The images winked off, the wall turning dark.

“Now that,” Kaz said from behind, “is how you end a conversation with style!”

  •  People who use footnotes in books are very smart, and you can trust what they say.
  •  Like adding footnotes to books.
  •  Footnote: It’s true. Think about it.
  • Epaulettes are those things soldiers wear on their shoulders to make them look more important. Nothing proclaims “look how macho I am” more than a good set of epaulettes. Other than, I guess, a big sign that reads “look how macho I am,” but we wouldn’t want to be flagrant about it, would we?
  • There. That’s better.
  • I guess I was expecting marmosets?
  • Yes, solitaire. What, you think kings and queens are always doing important stuff, like chopping off heads and invading neighboring kingdoms?

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