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Simon & Schuster announces a new board of directors. More Best of the Year lists arrive, including crime novels and memoirs. The Penguin Random House Winter Book & Author Festival 2023 is today. A California book club finishes Finnegans Wake 28 years after it starts. Megan Follows directs an all-star Canadian cast in a new audio edition of L.M. Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables. Influential writer, director, and producer Norman Lear dies at 101. Plus, new title bestsellers.

On December 6, Urban Librarians Unite (ULU) announced a $1 million general operating grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The four-year grant, made through Mellon’s Public Knowledge program, is the largest ever received by ULU and will allow the grassroots library advocacy organization to expand operations, find other sustainable funding sources, and employ staff.

Tyriek White wins the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize for We Are a Haunting. Patricia Engel wins the Dos Passos Prize. Ten writers receive Whiting Creative Nonfiction Grants. Christianity Today announces its 2024 Book Awards. Reese Witherspoon selects Ella Berman’s Before We Were Innocent for her December book club. LibraryReads and LJ offer read-alikes for Oath and Honor by Liz Cheney, which shot to #1 on Amazon yesterday, even selling out for a short time. Interviews arrive with Alexis Soloski, Gabrielle Korn, Christine Platt and Catherine Wigginton Greene, Margo Steines, Cynthia Manick, Debbie Urbanski, Tariq Trotter, Samantha Harvey, and Liz Cheney.

Best of the Year booklists and recommendations arrive from The Atlantic, Slate, The Millions, Vogue, LA Times, The New Yorker, and more. The Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon is December’s GMA Book Club pick. January's Indie Next Preview features #1 pick The Fury by Alex Michaelides. Plus, Liz Cheney's Oath and Honor: A Memoir and a Warning, publishes today.

Oath and Honor: A Memoir and a Warning by Liz Cheney leads holds this week. Thirteen LibraryReads and 12 Indie Next picks publish this week, including Hall of Fame pick and People book of the week The Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon. December’s Costco Connection features a new paperback edition of Never Lie by Freida McFadden. Audiofile announces the December 2023 Earphones Award Winners. Longlists for the Wingate Prize and the Joyce Carol Oates Prize are announced. “Rizz” is named Oxford’s Word of the Year. Plus, more best of the year lists, including LJ’s Best Books of 2023.

If you're seeing this, chances are you’re someone who identifies as a reader. And, as a reader, you may be shocked to discover that there are many American adults who just aren’t.

On November 15, the American Library Association (ALA) announced that it had selected Leslie Burger as interim executive director, effective immediately. She succeeds Tracie D. Hall, who resigned on October 6. LJ caught up with Burger as she began settling into her new role to talk about the experience she brings and her plans going forward.

Sandra Day O’Connor, author and the first woman to serve on the Supreme Court, has died. Penguin Random House sues Iowa over book banning. David R. Samson wins the $60K Balsillie Prize for Our Tribal Future: How to Channel Our Foundational Human Instincts into a Force for Good. Amazon's editors recommend the best books of December. Andrew Miller is named president and publisher of Henry Holt. Plus, Page to Screen.

Katherine Rundell wins Waterstones Book of the Year 2023 for her “instant classic” Impossible Creatures. AudioFile showcases the Best Audiobooks of 2023. Best Books of the Year lists also arrive from Publishers Lunch, The New Yorker, and WSJ. New title best sellers include Nora Roberts, James Patterson, Danielle Steel and more. Liz Cheney's forthcoming book, Oath and Honor: A Memoir and a Warning, arrives next week. Plus, author and former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger has died at the age of 100. 

Julia Armfield and Jon Ransom win Polari Prizes. Ransom’s book The Whale Tattoo will also be adapted for film. Apple reveals its top books of 2023. Omid Scobie’s Endgame: Inside the Royal Family and the Monarchy’s Fight for Survival courts reviews and controversy. Two pop culture books arrive with buzzy details: Welcome to the O.C.: The Oral History by Josh Schwartz, Stephanie Savage & Alan Sepinwall, and Outrageous: A History of Showbiz and the Culture Wars. Savannah Guthrie announces her forthcoming faith-based book, Mostly What God Does: Reflections on Seeking and Finding His Love Everywhere, due out in February. And Paul Greengrass is set to direct a film adaptation of T.J. Newman's novel Drowning: The Rescue of Flight 1421.

NYT selects the 10 Best Books of 2023. Ed Yong wins the Royal Society Science Book Prize for An Immense World. Robbie Arnott wins the Voss Literary Prize for his novel Limberlost. NPR’s Morning Edition reports on how some groups are hoping to change how selection is handled in public libraries. Interviews arrive with Booker Prize winner Paul Lynch, Nita Prose, Sam Wasson, Maru Ayase, Kenneth Womack, and more. Anon Pls. by Deuxmoi will be adapted for TV. Plus, Merriam-Webster’s word of the year for 2023 is “authentic.”

When Patty Hector, former director of the Saline County Library in Benton, AR, was fired on October 9, it didn’t come as a surprise. A decision to shift control of the library from its board to county officials, driven primarily by Hector’s refusal to comply with a resolution to move certain books containing content about racism, LGBTQIA+ subjects, and sexual activity from areas where anyone under the age of 18 could access them, was proposed in April and passed in August. What may surprise some, however, is that Hector has thrown her hat in the ring for a spot on the Saline County Quorum Court, the same body that had her terminated.

Paul Lynch wins the Booker Prize for Prophet Song. The Mystery Guest by Nita Prose leads holds this week. Jenna Bush Hager picks We Must Not Think of Ourselves by Lauren Grodstein (also People’s book of the week) for her book club. Two LibraryReads and five Indie Next picks publish this week. NPR releases Books We Love, NYPL publishes its Best Books of 2023, and NYT announces its 100 notable books of 2023. Erica Jong’s Fear of Flying turns 50. Plus, a new documentary, The ABCs Of Book Banning, explores the impact of book bans in Florida public schools.

It’s easy, as librarian-educators, to be overwhelmed and intimidated by the pace of technological change, as well as dismissive of the need for educating students and patrons about privacy on the assumption that they have fully embraced these technologies and likely don’t care. But the reality is that students do care about privacy, and want to be able to make informed, intentional choices about how they are known by and accessible to others.

Over the years, Library Journal’s Index of Public Library Service and Star Library ratings have focused on recording and reporting data for the purpose of promoting libraries through quantitative data; helping improve the pool of nationally collected library statistics; and encouraging library self-evaluation. Libraries have effectively used the LJ Index to track progress on outputs including circulation, visits, program attendance, public internet computer use, and, more recently, digital circulation and website traffic. It’s a finely calibrated thermometer.

John Vaillant wins the Baillie Gifford Prize for Fire Weather: A True Story from a Hotter World. Kim Stanley Robinson wins the Hans Carl von Carlowitz Sustainability Award for The Ministry for the Future. The winners of the National Outdoor Book Awards are announced. Waterstones shares its books of the year for Scotland and Wales; Blackwell’s also announces its books of the year. The shortlist for the CBC Poetry Prize is released. Washington Post and Book Riot name their best books of 2023.

Regina Gong was named a 2023 LJ Mover & Shaker for her work developing a student-centered Open Educational Resources (OER) program at Michigan State University (MSU) Libraries to help make education more accessible and equitable, especially for underserved populations. Since being named a Mover, she’s moved on to a position that’s providing her a wider range of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) opportunities. 

The winners of the National Book Award are announced: Justin Torres’s Blackouts, Ned Blackhawk’s The Rediscovery of America: Native Peoples and the Unmaking of U.S. History, Craig Santos Perez’s from unincorporated territory [åmot], and Stênio Gardel’s The Words That Remain, tr. by Bruna Dantas Lobato. Halik Kochanski wins the Wolfson History Prize for Resistance: The Underground War Against Hitler, 1939–1945. Kirkus lists its best fiction of 2023. Washington Post shares more picks for the best books of 2023. Plus new title best sellers.

Sarah Bernstein wins the Scotiabank Giller Prize for her novel Study for Obedience. ALA unveils the 2024 Andrew Carnegie Medals finalists. Two sponsors have withdrawn ahead of tonight’s National Book Award ceremony, due to planned author statements over the Israel-Hamas war. Amazon selects its best books of 2023, including #1 pick The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride. Time reveals its 100 must-read books of 2023. Plus, Publishers Weekly reports on Hachette’s “major and largely unprecedented” restructuring.

James McBride’s The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store is named the 2023 Barnes & Noble Book of the Year. B&N’s Author of the Year is David Grann. The Edge by David Baldacci leads holds this week; titles by Martha Wells, Mitch Albom, Michael Cunningham, and Jonathan Karl are also in demand. Six LibraryReads and six Indie Next picks publish this week. People’s book of the week is So Late in the Day: Stories of Women and Men by Claire Keegan. Plus, the singer Pink announces she will distribute banned books at her Florida concerts.

Benjamin Myers wins the Goldsmiths Prize for his novel Cuddy. Mosab Abu Toha wins the Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry for Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear: Poems from Gaza. Tania Branigan wins the Cundill History Prize for Red Memory: Living, Remembering and Forgetting China’s Cultural Revolution. The winners of the Books Are My Bag Readers Awards are announced. The longlist for the Aspen Words Literary Prize for issue-driven fiction is also announced. Librarians are filing workplace discrimination claims with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to oppose book bans and their firings.

Magic tricks may be momentary, but the annals of performance magic leave a record, commenting on and reflecting the political, cultural, social attitudes of their day. Two collections, the University of Texas at Austin Harry Ransom Center’s Magic and Illusion collection and the American Museum of Magic’s Archives and Library, hold a wealth of information about magic and performers, with a focus on the 19th and 20th centuries.

The Pacific Northwest Book Awards shortlist is announced, along with shortlists for the Nature Writing Prize, the Foyles Books of the Year, and the DRF Writers Award. Luis Mateo Díez wins Cervantes Prize. Earlyword’s November GalleyChat spreadsheet is out now. LibraryReads and LJ offer read-alikes for Iron Flame by Rebecca Yarros, while Time explores how Rebecca Yarros’s novels became a “romantasy Booktok phenomenon.” Plus, Shakespeare’s Folio turns 400.

EveryLibrary tracked over 60 local library elections, annual budget votes, and statewide ballot measures that impacted libraries on the Tuesday, November 7, 2023 ballots across nine states. Voters overwhelmingly voted in favor of libraries.

Jean-Baptiste Andrea wins France’s Prix Goncourt for his novel Watching Over Her. Finalists for the Barnes & Noble Book of the Year are announced. The 2022 Endeavour Award shortlist is announced. Barbra Streisand’s memoir, My Name Is Barbra, gets reviews and buzz. Interviews arrive with Stephanie Land, Shannon Sanders, Philip Norman, and Sigrid Nunez. Entertainment Weekly shares an excerpt from Stephen King’s forthcoming story collection, You Like It Darker, due out in May. And Wall Street Journal stops publishing its best seller lists.

Rebecca Yarros’s Fourth Wing sequel, Iron Flame, leads holds this week. NYT profiles Yarros and her best-selling series. Michael Connelly’s Resurrection Walk and Barbra Streisand’s long-awaited memoir, My Name Is Barbra, also buzz. Nine LibraryReads and nine Indie Next picks publish this week. People’s book of the week is Above the Salt by Katherine Vaz. Audiofile announces the November 2023 Earphones Award winners. Class by Stephanie Land is the November GMA book club pick.

From the first known caricature of Abraham Lincoln to a Pulitzer Prize–winning cartoon satirizing the Tammany Hall political machine, the Michael and Susan Kahn Political Cartoon Collection, now at UCLA, contains thousands of individual images, periodicals, books, and ephemera dating back to the late 17th century.

People 40 and younger are using public libraries, often at higher rates compared with older generations even when they don’t define themselves as readers, according to Gen Z and Millennials: How They Use Public Libraries and Identify Through Media Use, a survey and report by Kathi Inman Berens and Rachel Noorda, both from Portland State University.

One for Sorrow, Two for Joy by Marie-Claire Amuah wins the adult division of the Diverse Book Awards. Winners are announced for Bookshop.org UK’s inaugural Indie Champions Awards. Poets&Writers issues its “5 Over 50” list of the best debut poetry authors. Shortlists are announced for the Ledbury Hellens Poetry Prize for Second Collections and the Waterstones Book of the Year Award.

Recent announcements from Project MUSE, Clarivate, and other vendors, as well as Cornell's arXiv, the Bruce Springsteen Archives and Center for American Music at Monmouth University, and more.

Winners are announced for Taste Canada Awards for cookbooks and food writing. Finalists are announced for Canada’s National Business Book Awards. Southern Book Prize finalists are revealed, representing “bookseller favorites from 2023 that are Southern in nature—either about the South or by a Southern writer.” Plus new title best sellers.

Centering genuine relationships, along with an emphasis on community service and creative partnerships, has earned Kent District Library, MI, the 2023 Jerry Kline Community Impact Prize. Honorable mentions go to Henrico County Public Library, VA, and Kenosha Public Library, WI.

Nandini Das wins British Academy Book Prize for Courting India: England, Mughal India and the Origins of Empire. The co-winners for this year’s Columbia University Press Distinguished Book Award are announced. November book club picks arrive, including The Sun Sets in Singapore by Kehinde Fadipe (Read with Jenna), Maybe Next Time by Cesca Major (Reese Witherspoon), and  Absolution by Alice McDermott (B&N). People shares the latest known photo of John Lennon and Paul McCartney, from Kenneth Womack’s new book, Living the Beatles Legend: The Untold Story of Mal Evans. A You.gov online poll shows that nearly half of Americans have not tried ebooks.

The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters wins Barnes and Noble’s 2023 Discover Prize. The World Fantasy Awards winners are announced. Spooky booklists arrive just in time for Halloween. Rebecca Yarros’s best-selling book Fourth Wing and its forthcoming sequel, due out next week, are headed to TV. Plus, KKR finalizes the deal to buy Simon & Schuster.

Dirty Thirty by Janet Evanovich leads holds this week. Jenna Bush Hager’s November book club pick is The Sun Sets in Singapore by Kehinde Fadipe. People’s book of the week is Absolution by Alice McDermott. Publishers Weekly releases its list of the best books of 2023. Booklists help to support understanding of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Plus, beloved actor Matthew Perry, who released his memoir Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing last year, has died at the age of 54.

The Internet Archive (IA) in September submitted an appeal to the summary judgment against them in the Hachette v. Internet Archive copyright case, and IA is now asking the Second Court of Appeals for a deadline of December 15 for submitting its opening brief, IA Senior Policy Counsel Lila Bailey announced during the organization’s Virtual Library Leaders Forum earlier this month.

Rebecca Campbell’s Arboreality wins the Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction. The shortlist is announced for Scotland’s National Book Awards. Salman Rushdie says that if authors are only allowed to write characters similar to themselves and their own experiences, “the art of the novel ceases to exist.”

Susan Ivey was named one of Library Journal’s 2023 Movers & Shakers for her work making data resources more accessible for researchers at North Carolina State University in Raleigh. We recently reached out to learn more about what that role requires from her and what benefits it provides the university’s researchers.

Maria Stepanova wins the Berman Literature Prize for her family saga In Memory of Memory; the award honors works “in the spirit of the Jewish tradition.” The shortlist is announced for the Nan Shepherd Prize for underrepresented voices in nature writing. Finalists are announced for the Governor General’s Literary Awards, administered by the Canada Council for the Arts. Plus new title best sellers and interviews with Tananarive Due, Megan Kamalei Kakimoto, Margaret Renkl, and more.

Scholastic reverses course on a controversial decision to separate books about race and gender at elementary book fairs. Tian Yi wins 4thWrite prize for her short story “The Good Son.” The Woman in Me by Britney Spears continues to buzz. Norton will distribute Yale University Press and Harvard University Press books starting in 2025. Interviews arrive with Tim O’Brien, John Stamos, Thurston Moore, Michael Harriot, and more. T&C gives a progress update on George R.R. Martin’s forthcoming book, The Winds of Winter. Plus, a third Paddington film, based on the character created by Michael Bond, is in the works.

Oprah picks Jesmyn Ward’s Let Us Descend for her book club. Interviews arrive with John Stamos, Melissa Newman, McKay Coppins, and Tan Twan Eng. CrimeReads hosts a roundtable on indigenous horror, and Shondaland considers “The Long Legacy of Book Clubs.” Plus, Marisa Meltzer’s Glossy will be adapted for TV.

A hearing held October 19 by the House Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education Subcommittee on graphic content in school libraries drew testimony from both witnesses concerned about the suppression of material and others troubled by the content they see in school libraries.

The 2023 Hugo Awards are announced; Nettle & Bone by T. Kingfisher wins best novel, and Where the Drowned Girls Go by Seanan McGuire wins best novella. The Woman in Me by Britney Spears leads holds this week. Also in demand are titles by Lee Child and Andrew Child, John Stamos, Adam Grant, and Jesmyn Ward, whose Let Us Descend is also People’s book of the week. Four LibraryReads and five Indie Next picks publish this week. Lee Child passes the baton to his brother Andrew, and James Patterson talks about the art of collaboration with USA Today. Plus, Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, based on the book by David Grann, is out now.

The shortlist is announced for the An Post Irish Book Awards. No Country for Girls by Emma Styles wins the Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize. Wanda Nanibush and Georgiana Uhlyarik win the Toronto Book Award for Moving the Museum: Indigenous + Canadian Art at the AGO. U.S. authors and European publishing trade bodies call for action on generative AI. 

LeVar Burton to host National Book Awards. Winners are announced for the Forward Prizes for Poetry. LitHub reviews highs and lows from the New York Film Festival’s literary fare and hosts a conversation about Palestine between Masha Gessen and Nathan Thrall, author of A Day in the Life of Abed Salama: Anatomy of a Jerusalem Tragedy. There are interviews with Marie NDiaye, Lee and Andrew Child, N.K. Jemisin, and more. Plus new title best sellers. 

The longlist for the Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence is announced. Revelations from Britney Spears’s forthcoming memoir, The Woman in Me, are buzzing. Scholastic courts controversy with its book fair policy. NYT writes about the reinvention of Barnes & Noble. Spooky bookslists arrive ahead of Halloween. Let Us Descend by Jesmyn Ward gets reviewed. LibraryReads and LJ offer read-alikes for John Grisham’s The Exchange. Plus, there are interviews with Roxane Gay, Ziwe Fumudoh, Dolly Parton, Fran Lebowitz, Jada Pinkett Smith, Walter Isaacson, Elon Musk, and Minecraft author Max Brooks.

Diversity, equity, and inclusion. These three words are commonplace today and serve as important reminders that opportunities should be made available to everyone. Public libraries share similar goals; their facilities, learning materials, services, and programs are open and available to all.

Finalists for the Cundill History Prize and the Cercador Prize are announced. NYT reports on Scholastic’s decision to separate titles that deal with race and gender in elementary book fairs. Interviews arrive with John Stamos, Sam Reece, Aida Rodriguez, Ziwe Fumudoh, Lawrence Wright, Emily Wilson, Rachel Maddow, and more. Michelle Williams will narrate the new Britney Spears audiobook memoir, The Woman in Me. American Fiction, based on the novel Erasure by Percival Everett, has a new trailer. Plus, Colm Tóibín remembers Louise Glück for The Guardian.

Although lacking 2022’s dramatic job market gains, this year’s Placements and Salaries survey demonstrated a hard-won stability.

John Grisham’s The Exchange, the highly anticipated sequel to his 1991 novel The Firm, leads holds this week. The Hamas-Israeli war leads to tensions, cancellations, and controversy at the Frankfurt Book Fair. Three LibraryReads and three Indie Next picks publish this week. People’s book of the week is Madonna: A Rebel Life by Mary Gabriel. Apple TV+’s Lessons in Chemistry, based on the book by Bonnie Garmus, arrives. Plus, U.S. Poet Laureate and Nobel Prize–winning poet Louise Glück, who has died at the age of 80, is remembered.

Barnes & Noble issues its list of the best books of 2023. Woppa Diallo and Mame Bougouma Diene win the Caine Prize for African Writing. Shortlists are announced for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and the Books Are My Bag Readers Awards. Bookshop.org, Electric Literature, Paul English, and Joyce Linehan announce new initiative that allows any resident of Florida to order books that have been banned or challenged in that state, for free plus the cost of shipping.

Since founder and president David Isay conceived of StoryCorps in 2003, the organization has recorded over 356,000 interviews with over 640,000 people in all 50 states, in over 50 languages, with the archive housed at the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress.

James McBride’s The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store and Héctor Tobar’s Our Migrant Souls win the Kirkus Prize. Geraldine Brooks’s Horse and Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa’s His Name Is George Floyd win the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. Richard D. Kahlenberg’s Excluded wins the Goddard Riverside Stephan Russo Book Prize for Social Justice. Michael Rosen is awarded the PEN Pinter Prize. Spotify’s new audiobook streaming could have a devastating effect on audio sales. Plus coverage of the Barbara Bush Foundation’s 2023 National Celebration of Reading.

India issues criminal charges to Booker Prize–winning novelist Arundhati Roy over a 2010 speech. Kevin Lambert, Francine Cunningham & Sarah Ens win 2023 ReLit Awards. Earlyword’s October GalleyChat spreadsheet is out now. Books by Jean Kwok, Jhumpa Lahiri, Bryan Washington, Terry Pratchett, and Justin Torres get buzz. Nobel Laureate Jon Fosse talks about advice at LitHub. Celebrity memoirs by Barbra Streisand and Julia Fox make the news.

In 2019, Kent District Library’s human resources department (HR) set out to strengthen its approach to staffing the organization. Our goals were to create greater equity in the selection process through reduction of implicit bias; improve the viability of candidates through competency testing; and ensure the quality of hires to help reduce first-year turnover, improve the diversity of the workforce, and ensure their competency on the job.

The 2023 £50,000 Baillie Gifford Prize for Nonfiction announces its shortlist. Blood Lines by Nelson DeMille and Alex DeMille leads holds this week. Also getting buzz are titles by Sophie Kinsella, Stuart Woods and Brett Battles, Chloe Liese, and Jean Kwok. Four LibraryReads and five Indie Next picks publish this week. People’s book of the week is Family Meal by Bryan Washington. Plus, James Patterson teams up with the late Michael Crichton on a novel publishing in June.

The data for new public library buildings and renovations featured in LJ's Year in Architecture 2023.

The data for new academic library buildings and renovations featured in LJ's Year in Architecture 2023.

Colors that pop, sophisticated meeting spaces, residential design elements, and more in this year’s top library design trends.

A vibrancy of colors can be seen among the new builds and renovations. Pastels merge with saturated primary colors; lush organic hues and shapes fill reading nooks; and bold colors mark service areas and desks, key spaces to congregate, or alcoves to retreat into. 

Gone are the rows upon rows of tall, fixed shelving in large, open areas. Custom-designed, small-scale shelving offers variety, sightlines, flexibility, and enhanced wayfinding, refining and evolving the concept of flexible, modular zones.

Trends in meeting and reading rooms suggest attention to shifts in remote and hybrid work environments. Built-in shelves, long wooden tables with integrated lighting, and classic wooden chairs make a comeback with contemporary twists. 

Projects continue to integrate exterior spaces, offering patrons not only outdoor seating but also creative use of the grounds, plus an integration of experience built into the wayfinding, aesthetic, and interior layout within open areas. 

The architects featured in the Year in Architecture 2023

A palpable sense of celebration and cultural sensitivity is evident through color, choice of fabric, and the architectural program. These renovations and builds are anything but utilitarian, incorporating thoughtful details like imagery, materiality, and type into their spaces.

As many have grown accustomed to spending more time at home, libraries continue to incorporate accessible, small-massed, and residential design elements. Buildings include vaulted roofs and window bump-outs; interiors feature plush carpeting, integrated display shelving in meeting rooms or small reading areas, and cozy fireplaces.

Furniture echoes architectural elements; places of refuge get playful, and more of the year’s top library design trends. It’s all about flow. Rooms within rooms, nooks, delightful retreats for all ages are designed to seamlessly transition spaces from one function to another in this year’s round up of library renovations and new buildings. While we still see the subdued natural color palettes of last year’s trendsetters, color continues to play a meaningful role in these libraries.

With the sharp uptick in challenges to books with LGBTQIA+ and BIPOC subjects and authors, this year’s Banned Books Week (October 1–7) resonates strongly with library staff and users alike. Public, academic, and school libraries from Los Angeles to Maine have launched local anticensorship campaigns—and some, like Brooklyn Public Library's Books Unbanned and New York Public Library's Books for All, are providing access to removed or restricted books nationally. One such initiative, the Digital Public Library of America’s (DPLA) Banned Book Club, has been providing challenged books to readers across the country, via the free Palace e-reader app, since its launch in July.

In 2022, librarians at Utah State University collected 58 survey responses and conducted 10 interviews with high school librarians and teachers in Utah to better understand information literacy instruction happening within our high schools. Along with investigating the skills being prioritized, our study looked at how teachers and librarians are collaborating as fellow educators.

Norwegian novelist and playwright Jon Fosse wins the Nobel Prize for Literature. Fiction finalists are announced for the Kirkus Prize. The shortlists for the Goldsmiths Book Prize and the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for comic fiction are announced. PEN America is opening an office in Florida to combat the state’s book bans. Plus new title best sellers.

The American Library Association (ALA) announced on October 5 that Tracie D. Hall will be leaving her role as the association’s executive director, effective October 6. Hall—a librarian, author, and advocate, among other roles—was appointed as ALA’s first female African American executive director in January 2020 after a nationwide search, succeeding Mary W. Ghikas, and stepped into the position on February 24—only days before libraries across the country shut their doors to accommodate COVID-19 safety measures.

The National Book Award finalists are announced. Banned Books Week coverage continues. October book club picks arrive, including Safiya Sinclair’s memoir How To Say Babylon, The List by Yomi Adegoke, Starling House by Alix E. Harrow, and The Prospectors by Ariel Djanikian. Paolo Coelho’s novel The Alchemist will be adapted for a feature film. Plus, Netflix’s All The Light We Cannot See, based on the novel by Anthony Doerr, gets a trailer.

Time names the 100 best mystery and thriller books of all time. The 2023 T.S. Eliot Prize shortlist is announced. Catharina Coenen wins the Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing. October booklists arrive. Rick Riordan teases potential future Percy Jackson books. Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner turns 20. Plus, Netflix’s adaptation of Rumaan Alam’s Leave the World Behind gets a trailer.

We already recognize the profound impact of pandemic learning loss: student performance in math and reading has hit its lowest levels in decades. What’s more, students demonstrated slower than average growth in the last school year, meaning learning gaps aren’t closing—in some cases, they’re growing. That’s where libraries can step in.

Faced with a major post-lockdown attendance drop, the marketing team at Baltimore's Enoch Pratt Free Library is re-engaging patrons with creative, data-driven campaigns. Patchogue Medford Library, NY, received honorable mention.

Banned Books Week gets underway. Wildfire by Hannah Grace leads holds this week. Audiofile announces the October 2023 Earphones Award winners. Seven LibraryReads and eight Indie Next picks publish this week. People’s book of the week is The Museum of Failures by Thrity Umrigar.

Safiya Sinclair’s How To Say Babylon: A Memoir is the latest Read with Jenna book club pick. Shortlists are announced for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and the Cundill History Prize. Plus, interviews with Mary Beard, Jill Duggar, and Melissa Lozada-Oliva.

KKR's potential acquisition of Simon & Schuster will undergo scrutiny from the Department of Justice before proceeding and could raise questions about how Simon & Schuster will do business with OverDrive in the future.

Zain Khalid wins the Bard Fiction Prize for his debut novel, Brother Alive. Target picks The First Ladies by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray as the 2023 Book of the Year. Shortlists are announced for the Polari First Book Prize and the Royal Society Trivedi Science Book Prize. Finalists are announced for the Barnes & Noble Discover Prize. A California state law will fine schools for implementing book bans. Plus new title best sellers.

New York Public Library's new "Books for All" campaign launches during Banned Books Week 2023 and seeks to engage teens and young adults.

Students learn invaluable skills they can apply in a variety of settings and applications. Across the nation, there has been renewed debate over the value of humanities degree programs as campus leaders look to overcome steep budget challenges.

The FTC sues Amazon for illegally maintaining monopoly power. Jorie Graham wins the Laurel Prize. Naomi Wood wins the 2023 BBC National Short Story Award. Finalists are named for the 2023 Atwood Gibson Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. Hollywood Reporter goes behind the scenes during the final negotiations that ended the WGA strike. LibraryReads and LJ offer read-alikes for The Running Grave by Robert Galbraith. Plus, CrimeReads celebrates 50 years of Spenser, Robert B. Parker’s iconic character

The Atlantic sifts through the dataset behind Books3, used to train generative AI without permission. Infodocket reports on AI book bans, ahead of Banned Books Week. The 2023 Elgin Awards winners are announced. Zadie Smith will headline the Vancouver Writers Fest, which takes place Oct. 16–22. Interviews arrive with C Pam Zhang, Zadie Smith, Kerry Washington, and more. Plus, Martha Stewart announces she is working on her 100th cookbook.

The Running Grave by Robert Galbraith leads holds this week. Also getting buzz are titles by Ken Follett, Mary Kay Andrews, James Patterson and Mike Lupica, and V.E. Schwab. Four LibraryReads and three Indie Next picks publish this week. People’s book of the week is Wellness by Nathan Hill. Memoirs in the news include Kerry Washington’s Thicker than Water and Cassidy Hutchinson’s Enough. Plus, Hollywood studios and WGA reach a tentative deal to end the 146-day strike.

The ongoing debate over the freedom to read moved to the chambers of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, which held a hearing September 12 entitled “Book Bans: How Censorship Limits Liberty and Literature.”

Shortlists for the Booker Prize and the Financial Times/Schroders Business Book of the Year are announced. Dream States: Smart Cities, Technology, and the Pursuit of Urban Utopias by John Lorinc has won the inaugural Pattis Family Foundation Global Cities Book Award. A new PEN America report finds a 33% jump in school book bans. Plus, Page to Screen and interviews with Aparna Nancherla, Jo Nesbø, Michael Wolff, and more.

Eileen Rhodes was named one of Library Journal’s 2021 Movers & Shakers for her work bringing Open Educational Resources to Capital Community College in Connecticut, enabling students who struggled with the cost of textbooks to continue pursuing their degree. We recently reached out to Rhodes and learned she’s currently the interim library director for Connecticut State Community College, a role that’s shifted her priorities and sent her in new directions.

A new Simon & Schuster program highlights the merits of books that have been subject to censorship and will provide resources for fighting book bans. The Academy of American Poets announces the winners of its annual poetry prizes. LeVar Burton will serve as the honorary chair of this year’s Banned Books Week. Amazon will require publishers on Kindle to disclose when any of their content is generated by artificial intelligence.

New American Library Association (ALA) President Emily Drabinski has her eye on ALA’s projects and goals, as well as the association’s ongoing work standing up for its organizational values. LJ caught up with her in between stops on her tour of U.S. libraries to hear more about what she has planned.

ALA’s data on 2023 book challenges shows a surge this year. Shortlists for the German Book Prize and BBC Young Writers’ Award are announced. The Mellon Foundation appoints historian and scholar Kelly Lytle Hernández as its 2023 Fellow in Residence. Prominent novelists, including John Grisham, Jonathan Franzen, Jodi Picoult and Elin Hilderbrand, sue OpenAI. The September LoanStars list is out, featuring top pick The Armor of Light by Ken Follett. LibraryReads and LJ offer read-alikes for Richard Osman’s The Last Devil To Die. The Hunger Games, based on the book by Suzanne Collins, returns to select theaters in October.  Plus, a verdict is delivered on the “Bad Art Friend” case.

The American Library Association (ALA) has released its preliminary data on the attempted censorship and restriction of access to books and other materials in public, academic, and K–12 libraries during the first eight months of 2023. Between January 1 and August 31, ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom documented 695 challenges to library materials to 1,915 unique titles.

Oprah picks Wellness by Nathan Hill for her book club. Wayne Johnston wins the 2023 Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour for his memoir, Jennie’s Boy: A Misfit Childhood on an Island of Eccentrics. The 2023 British Fantasy Awards winners are announced. Nihar Malaviya is officially named CEO of Penguin Random House. Russell Brand’s publisher has paused all new projects, including a self-help book that was slated to publish this December. NYT explores “How TikTok Is Reshaping the American Cookbook.”  Plus, Kate DiCamillo reflects on the 20th anniversary of her award-winning children’s book The Tale of Despereaux, at Washington Post.

The Last Devil To Die by Richard Osman leads holds this week. The National Book Awards announces its longlist for fiction. The 2023 winners of the McIlvanney Prize and the Bloody Scotland Debut Prize are announced. Rolling Stone cofounder Jann S. Wenner was removed from the Rock Hall of Fame board after an inflammatory interview with NYT while promoting his new book. People’s book of the week is Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll. Anderson Cooper discusses his new book, Astor: The Rise and Fall of an American Fortune, with CBS Sunday Morning. And American Fiction, based on the novel Erasure by Percival Everett, wins the Toronto Film Festival’s top prize.

Library telehealth programs launched in response to the COVID-19 pandemic are beginning to evolve and adapt to changing times.

The National Book Awards announces its longlists for nonfiction and poetry. The Flow: Rivers, Waters and Wildness by Amy-Jane Beer and The Lost Rainforests of Britain by Guy Shrubsole win the Wainwright Prize for nature writing. Plus, Page to Screen and interviews with Leila Aboulela, John Manuel Arias, Kate Atkinson, and more.

The National Book Awards longlist for translated literature is announced; the longlists for fiction, nonfiction, and poetry will be announced later today and tomorrow. Finalists are announced for the Writers’ Trust of Canada’s Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQIA+ emerging writers and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. Plus new title best sellers and interviews with David Diop, Franklin Foer, Zakiya Dalila Harris, London Hughes, Daphne Kalotay, Angie Kim, Marisa Meltzer, Maggie O’Farrell, and Sarah Ogilvie.

The National Book Foundation rescinds Drew Barrymore’s invitation to host the 74th National Book Awards Ceremony host after her talk show resumes during the WGA strike. Sandra Cisneros wins the Ambassador Richard C. Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement Award. Kirsty Whatley wins the 2023 Nature Writing Prize for Working Class Writers. Earlyword’s September GalleyChat spreadsheet is out now, featuring early buzz for Alex Michaelides’s forthcoming novel, The Fury. The Pulitzer Prizes officially expand eligibility to noncitizens. Michael Chabon joins other writers to sue Meta AI platform for copyright infringement. LibraryReads and LJ offer read-alikes for Code Red by Vince Flynn & Kyle Mills.

The U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary hearing, “Book Bans: Examining How Censorship Limits Liberty and Literature” was held on Tuesday, September 12, 2023.  A keyword searchable version of the video recording is available via the C-SPAN Video Library.

OverDrive will soon debut several new features including OverDrive Hub, a portal designed to enable staff in a variety of roles to work with their library’s digital branch, the company announced during the “Forward Together: The Future of Your Digital Branch with the OverDrive Hub and Libby” panel at OverDrive’s biennial Digipalooza conference in August.

The 2023 British Academy Book Prize for Global Cultural Understanding announces a shortlist. The 2023 Whiting Literary Magazine Prizes are announced. PW rounds up September’s book club picks. Books by Lauren Groff, Walter Isaacson, Oprah Winfrey, and Arthur C. Brooks continue to buzz. Rebecca Yarros’s Fourth Wing sequel, Iron Flame, will arrive November 7.  Water for Elephants musical, based on the novel by Sara Gruen, will open on Broadway this spring. Plus, a new Agatha Christie memorial statue is unveiled on a bench in Wallingford.