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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.” The hearing was convened by Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-IL), in response to data from the American Library Association (ALA) revealing that between January 1 and August 31, ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom recorded 695 attempts to censor library materials and services, and documented challenges to 1,915 unique titles.

Every year, Peer Review Week honors the contributions of scientists, academics, and researchers in all fields for the hours of work they put into peer reviewing manuscripts to ensure quality work is published. This year, the theme of Peer Review Week is “The Future of Peer Review. ”But what actually is peer review?

"Audio is the fastest-growing format in the industry,” says HarperAudio Associate Publisher Brad Hill. This rapid growth has encouraged publishers to experiment with audiobook production. For instance, publishers are releasing more audiobook originals, adding more music and sound effects, and creating multicast productions that resemble radio plays.
 

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.

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.

Research data are the underlying evidence that supports the claims made in scholarly publications, and making these data publicly available is a fundamental aspect of open access publishing. Yet, owing to a number of obstacles—some real, some perceived—many researchers are reluctant to share their data with the broader research community.

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.

Mysteries to look forward to, including a list of new series titles.

Navigating the many facets of a heating planet.

Book lovers will delight in a display full of titles that feature books, bookstores, libraries, and writers across both fiction and nonfiction. 

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.