Oak Ridge event speaker claps back sarcastically to her novels being banned in Florida

The two Ann Patchett books banned from schools in Orange County, Florida? Ann Patchett - who spoke in Oak Ridge, Tennessee seven years ago about her love of books - doesn't think you should read them.

"Be careful," she warned in a tongue-in-cheek Instagram reel recently posted to the social media account for Parnussus Books, the Nashville, Tennessee bookstore she owns. "Don't read these books."

"The Patron Saint of Liars," Patchett's debut novel, is about a home for unwed mothers in rural Kentucky. "Bel Canto," tells the tale of a terrorist situation in South America. Both were included in a list of nearly 700 books the nonprofit organization PEN America says were removed from classrooms in Orange County at the beginning of the 2023-2024 school year "due to fears they violate the state’s new laws banning materials with 'sexual conduct' from schools."

New York Times-bestselling author Patchett, who won the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Orange Prize for "Bel Canto," was a finalist for the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and was one of Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential People in the World in 2012, seemed puzzled by the ban, however.

"The Patron Saint of Liars," Patchett mused sarcastically, seems to line right up with Florida's ideology.

"They have the baby and give the baby up for adoption just like they tell us to in the state of Florida," she said, and suggested it should be required reading instead.

"But maybe it's the idea that in order to get pregnant, somebody had to have sex," Patchett said, holding up the book, "even it happened before the book started."

In "Bel Canto," the terrorists die at the end, which again Patchett thinks fits the Sunshine State's ideals because "this is a book in which the outcome is people get shot."

One commenter on the reel called it "a masterclass in throwing shade."

Patchett was the speaker at the 25th annual Lunch 4 Literacy event in Oak Ridge in March 2017 at Oak Ridge High School. The annual event, sponsored by the Oak Ridge Breakfast Rotary Club and Altrusa International of Oak Ridge, is a fundraiser for literacy projects in the area. About 450 people attended the event in 2017.

In The Oak Ridger's 2017 story on Patchett's talk, the author is quoted as saying that she has a “joy in my heart so huge” for books and reading — that she must tell others.

“I feel like I proselytize for reading and for books,” she said.

The list of banned books, obtained by the Florida Freedom to Read Project, were previously available in teachers' personal classroom library collections and made available to students.

“This is yet another disastrous consequence of Florida’s disastrous education policies,” said Kasey Meehan, program director for PEN America’s Freedom to Read program. “Hundreds of books have now been removed from Orange County shelves under HB 1069, and we continue to be alarmed by the magnitude and scale of censorship following the implementation of this law.”

PEN America: Florida leads nation in book bans

According to nonprofit organization PEN America's latest report, "Banned in the USA: The Mounting Pressure to Censor," there are more books banned here than in any other state, by a wide margin. The number of public school bans in the U.S. under PEN America's definition increased 33% in the 2022-23 school year compared to the previous year, the report said, and over 40% of those happened in Florida.

Florida governor and GOP presidential candidate hopeful Ron DeSantis has made parental rights a keystone of his gubernatorial career.

In 2022 he signed the Parental Rights in Education Bill, dubbed "Don’t Say Gay” by opponents, which barred discussion of sexual orientation or gender identity in certain grades, later expanded through K-12. This year DeSantis signed HB 1069, which restricts books that include “sexual conduct” from grades that are not age-suitable. In August the state released a compiled list of books that had been challenged in Florida school districts, which some have feared will increase the chances of schools removing books without a formal challenge.

PEN America and other advocates claim that the growing book-banning movement is meant to erase narratives by and about LGBTQ people and people of color while whitewashing American history. Proponents say the restrictions are meant to protect children from sexually graphic and explicit stories and provide parents with control over what their children see.

PEN America: Florida is the nation's book banning leader, according to national free speech group

How many books have been banned in U.S. schools?

Nearly 6,000: Banned books in the U.S. since July 2021

3,362: Books banned in the 2022-23 school year, compared to 2,532 the year previous

1,557: Unique titles banned in the 2022-23 school year

1,480: Authors, illustrators and translators affected

Over 75%: The number of banned books that were young adult books, middle-grade books, chapter books, or picture books

153: Number of school districts with book bans

8: Number of states that enacted legislation that either directly facilitated book bans or created conditions for local people or groups to pressure educators and librarians into removing books in the last 12 months.

63%: Percentage of all book bans that occurred in those eight states

Book banning by the numbers: PEN America reports book bans in Florida and U.S. grow by the thousands. What we know

The Oak Ridger's News Editor Donna Smith contributed to this story. Email her at dsmith@oakridger.com and follow her on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, @ridgernewsed.

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This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Oak Ridge literacy speaker gets sarcastic about banning of her books