Timeline entry for 1997: All But Alice
Leading up to Banned Books Week 2012, ALA will highlight one book from its new timeline of banned and challenged books each day. Today we feature the year 1997 and “All But Alice,” Phyllis Reynolds Naylor.
With her “Alice” series, Phyllis Reynolds Naylor documents the life of Alice McKinley from childhood into adolescence and beyond. Many books in the series have been challenged, as Alice deals with issues of family, relationships, religion, sex, and more as she grows and matures. In 1997, “All but Alice” was restricted to students with parental permission at the Monroe Elementary School library in Thorndike, ME. It was also removed from the District 196 elementary school libraries in Rosemont-Apple Valley-Eagan, MN because of a brief passage in which the seventh-grade heroine discusses sexually oriented rock lyrics with her father and older brother; the school board considered the book inappropriate for the ages of the students.
For more information about Banned Books Week, please visit www.ala.org/bbooks.