While lists for the 2024-2025 school year are still being compiled, this is PEN America's list of the most banned books in schools for the 2023-2024 school year. According to PEN America's website, "PEN America has documented nearly 16,000 book bans in public schools nationwide since 2021, a number not seen since the Red Scare McCarthy era of the 1950s. This censorship is being mobilized by conservative groups— and has spread to nearly every state— and predominantly targets books about race and racism or individuals of color and also books on LGBTQ+ topics as well as those for older readers that have sexual references or discuss sexual violence. In the 2023-2024 school year, PEN America found more than 10,000 book bans affecting more than 4,000 unique titles, with about 45% of the bans occurring in Florida and 36% in Iowa."
Statistics on the number of bans for each book come from PEN America's website (https://pen.org/).
Evanston Public Library owns every book on the list in various formats.
In first place, we have NINETEEN MINUTES by Jodi Picoult with 98 bans. A PEN America Article called "Banned in the USA" features Picoult's statement on having the most banned book in America. "Having the most banned book in the country is not a…
In second place, we have LOOKING FOR ALASKA by John Green with 97 bans. According to Green in a video he posted on YouTube, "Text is meaningless without context. What usually happens with LOOKING FOR ALASKA is that a parent chooses one page of the…
Tied in third place, we have THE PERKS OF BEING A WALLFLOWER by Stephen Chbosky with 85 bans. In an interview with the author on the NBC Connecticut website, Chbosky states, "There's a part in the book where Charlie witnesses date rape and I always…
Tied in third place place, we have SOLD by Patricia McCormick with 85 bans. In a New York Times article, McCormick said on the banning of SOLD, "To ban this book, which is based on interviews I conducted with girls in India and Nepal who had been…
Tied in fifth place, we have THIRTEEN REASONS WHY by Jay Asher with 76 bans. In an interview with PBS News, Asher says, "A lot of authors see their book being banned or challenged as a badge of honor. But for me, it’s nothing but frustrating and…
Tied in fifth place, we have CRANK by Ellen Hopkins with 76 bans. In a guest blog post with the ACLU of South Carolina, Hopkins says about her books, "I am a mostly straight, probably white (I was adopted) Lutheran. So why my books? Some of the…
In seventh place, we have IDENTICAL by Ellen Hopkins-- her second appearance on this list-- with 74 bans. In the same guest blog post with the ACLU of South Carolina, Hopkins says, "It’s unthinkable that a handful of people have been allowed to…
In eighth place, we have THE KITE RUNNER by Khaled Hosseini with 73 bans. In a letter to the Brevard County School Board about the banning of his book, Hosseini writes, " Hearing from high school students in their own words, in person and in…
In ninth place, we have THE HANDMAID'S TALE by Margaret Atwood with 67 bans. Atwood has said about book bans, "I had thought America was against totalitarianisms. If so, surely it is important for young people to be able to recognize the signs of…
Tied in tenth place, we have WATER FOR ELEPHANTS by Sara Gruen with 66 bans. The National Coalition Against Censorship's response to the banning of this book read, in part: "If students were precluded from reading literature considered inappropriate…
Tied in tenth place, we have TRICKS by Ellen Hopkins-- her third appearance on this list-- with 66 bans. In an interview with the Salt Lake Tribune, Hopkins said, "This current wave [of book bans] has been going on for awhile, but when it first…
