

Instead of glittering summers on the lakeshore of her childhood, she spends them in a stylish apartment in the city, going out with friends, and keeping everyone a safe distance from her heart. They say you can never go home again, and for Persephone Fraser, ever since she made the biggest mistake of her life a decade ago, that has felt too true.

At the time, Mariko Tamaki told the magazine that the book was “listed as being for readers ranging 12–18”, and “contains depictions of young people talking about, and dealing with, adult things”.Six summers to fall in love. The graphic novel was also challenged in Florida in February, when it was removed from open shelves at three school libraries, according to School Library Journal. It has been challenged occasionally, but as far as we are aware, has been consistently kept in those collections,” says the letter, adding that the removal of This One Summer “solely on the basis of occasional profanity opens the door for parents to request the removal of a great deal of literature that is standard fare in school libraries, including classic works such as The Catcher in the Rye, Slaughterhouse-Five, Black Boy and Beloved.” “The book is part of the collections of school libraries across the United States. However, in a letter to Olson from the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC), backed by organisations including PEN America and the National Council of Teachers of English, the group of free-speech organisations say: “There is no basis to conclude that a book is pervasively vulgar simply because it contains a number of instances of profanity.” The Globe explains that Henning is a small town, of approximately 800 residents, with a library that is used by K-12 students (from kindergarten to the completion of secondary school) and is not divided by grades. He said he struggled to understand “if the educational need for that outweighs the vulgarity – where is that line?” Olson added that he was “not an advocate of censoring books”, but that “where I draw the line is with something I would determine pervasively vulgar”. There was a lot of inappropriate language,” he told the paper. Superintendent Jeremy Olson told the Daily Globe that it was banned after he, along with the school librarian and the principal of the school, found the topics it covered to be “inappropriate for inclusion in the library”. This One Summer by Jillian and Mariko Tamaki, published by First Second Photograph: Macmillanīut earlier this month, it was pulled from the shelves of the school library in Henning, Minnesota, following a complaint from a parent.
