Banned Books #1

It's Banned Books Week! It goes from September 26th to October 3rd this year, and in celebration thereof I'm going to highlight some of my very favourite banned books, which also happen to be some of my favourite books period.

The His Dark Materials trilogy, by Philip Pullman, is one of those things I reread periodically, just because it's so wonderful and so full of things to find on rereadings. As you may recall it was on my essential books list to bring to college. According to the Banned Books Week website, it was one of the 10 most challenged books in 2008. It was banned for its political and religious viewpoints and for violence. I love this book because it creates such a real, vivid, almost tactile world(s), because even the invented parts are believable and complete, because it questions institutions, and because all the characters are so very wonderful. Just, all of it. It's one of those books that makes me sort of squirm with joy.

Does anyone else feel kind of gleefully revolutionary when reading oft-banned books?