Banned Books That Have Changed My Life: Reading List #1

Banned Books Reading List by alexandramathews on Polyvore

Hello, everyone! I'm back with the first Reading List! In honor of Banned Book Week, I've come up with a list of books that have been banned in some way or fashion that have changed my life after reading them. I have read each of these books, and they made me changed the way that I look at books and at life.

The first set of books is the Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling. This series is one of the first literary memories that I have. I had read other books before, but I had never obsessed over a series until Harry Potter. My mother actually got them for my brother in hopes that he would read more. She got them on cassette tapes so that my brother didn't have an excuse not to "read" them. He didn't need one because I ended up taking them, spending hours in front of an old boom box listening to a British guy imitating Hermione's voice. I became obsessed with coming home and rewinding tapes and listening to the books over and over again. Part of me still can't understand how someone can ban this series. 

Now, the Harry Potter series was the first series that caught my attention as a child. This second series first caught my eye as a young adult. Yes, I'm talking about the Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer. I know that people have given this series a bad rap and the butt of the joke most of the time, but it changed the way I looked at reading. At the time, I was more focused on reading for school, and I got a copy from one of my friends as a recommendation. I read it and fell in love with it. The next thing I know, the movie is coming out, and I found cosplaying websites dedicated to the Twilight series and the rest was history.

The next series was read when I was in college. It was the first apocalyptic fiction that I read, and, as you may have guessed, that series is The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins. It was one of the young adult books that, while it had romance and relationships, the focus was on a war and survival. Katniss really spoke to me as a strong character. It gave me something to believe in. Not to mention, the idea of taking reality television and civil war and blending them together was a really cool idea for a book. 

The next series I was actually surprised I actually got to read. I say this because I know that this book was banned because of its view of organized religion. That can stir up controversy anywhere, but my school library kept copies of these books on their shelves. I'm talking about His Dark Materials series by Philip Pullman. All of the books are so imaginative, and yes, they did make me think about religion, including my own. But rather than condemning it, it just made me really think about what religion meant to me. I know that "they" do not want to put religion in a bad light, but it can't be that bad to make people think. Right?

Annie on My Mind by Nancy Garden is another book that I read while I was in college. I've reviewed it on the blog, and I have mentioned how much I really enjoyed this book. I also recommended it to the readers of the blog. Just to recap what I said before, this book in one of the few books that challenged me as a reader. It wasn't that it was too difficult to read. It's that, the main character was different than anything else I read. She had to come to terms with her sexuality, something that has never crossed my mind. It put things in a new perspective for me. 

The next book has gotten some hype the past few months for being a best-selling novel as well as the foundation for one of the best movies this year. But lately it has come under fire at a couple of middle schools for being to risque. Of course, I'm talking about The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. Again, I've review this book already, so I'll try to keep this simple. I've never really liked contemporary style books until I read The Fault in Our Stars. It showed me that a book could still be fantastic without having magic. 

Again, one of the few books that stood the test of time from my childhood is Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carrol. I've also reviewed this for the blog, and I'll keep this brief. As a writer, you try to have things make sense and get your point across to your audience. This book is nonsensical, whimsical, and it is still a great book. To think, this book was banned because the animals spoke. God help those Disney movie makers.

So, try your hand at some of these banned books. While some others may think that these books are too much this or too less of that, they are still great books. I don't believe in banning books, and I think that Banned Book Week is a good way to raise awareness about this issue. Read some banned booked, lovelies. They could change your lives.

That's it for this reading list. Comment down below on banned books that tickle your fancy. Subscribe to the blog by adding your email to the Subscribe Box to the right and down below. Follow me on twitter for up to date information on the blog and ridiculousness about my life @KK_Donna_Blog. Add me to your circles by clicking the Google+ button off to the right. Follow the tumblr dedicated to this blog, which you can find at this link. That's all for now! Read on, lovelies! I'll see y'all next post!