I would like to thank NetGalley and William Morrow for providing me with an advance e-galley of this book in exchange for an honest review. Look for it in your local and online bookstores and libraries on June 18, 2024.

Lula Dean's Little Library of Banned Books is a realistic fiction book about the right to read what you want without censorship. It has components of race, sexual assault, religion, politics, and censorship. Taking place in a southern state, all those issues are magnified. The book shows how working together for a common good can change the minds of those who are the loudest.

I was a huge fan of The Change so I had really high hopes for this one. But I got 25% of the way through and couldn't keep reading stories of conservate people's lives who changed after reading a book from this library. It seemed a little gimmicky and over the top. Just story after story and I wanted it get to the bigger picture already, I didn't want to keep reading all these stories. It just wasn't for me...

When this book first started out, I was nervous about how this was going to shake out. Re-reading these awful diatribes I am already subjected to in my job at a public library was jarring, and I didn't know where this novel was about to go. What I was not prepared for was the emotional, heart-clenching book gifted to us by Kirsten Miller. This book made me laugh, cry, grasp my chest from how much my heart squeezed for these characters. It showed our capacity for growth and change when open to new perspectives, and how love and understanding can prevail in the face of bigotry and close-mindedness.

As someone who not only works in a public library, but runs a book group solely dedicated to these silenced and maligned novels, this book should be mandatory reading for all those who seek to ban and burn them. This is what I HOPE will happen in the face of the modern book banning movement we find ourselves in. Miller took a horrifically real issue we are facing today, and instilled hope where it is often hard to find.

This is an open love-letter to literature, banned books, and the people who see their own stories in these taboo titles. It is a call to action to never stop resisting and fighting back against the tide of hate.
Thank you, Kirsten Miller!

Lula Dean's Little Library of Banned Books highlights the importance of reading and how book bans can lead to closed minds on important social issues. The book takes place in a small town in Georgia, and each chapter is narrated by a different member of the town. While there is a group of central characters, I liked getting these different perspectives and the way the author uses their circumstances to highlight how different books can expand their worldview.

It's a witty, wholesome book that wraps up neatly with a town reclaiming its freedom. I enjoyed the utopian aspect of the story's finale, but couldn't help but compare to what we see today and how unlikely the same outcome is in the real world.

This is my first exposure to this author…and what a wild introduction it turned out to be. I’ll never look at one of those little neighborhood lending library hutches without a smile and a chuckle after reading this book.

This novel tackles just about every contemporary social issue in the public consciousness – systemic racism, slavery, censorship, LGBTQ+ rights, sexism, rape, and political corruption. Add to the mix the “secrets” being revealed through the science of DNA testing to fill out family trees with surprising results.

As sure as the two lead characters – Beverly Underwood and Lula Dean – are polarized in their efforts to serve the community, the content of this novel will potentially polarize readers on a variety of the issues explored.

I found this read a highly provocative look into a small Georgia town that seemed to fit all the stereotypes of the deep South. It offers all this with a satirical bent that is tempered by insight, compassion, and a sense of justice. Once I started reading the book, I couldn’t put it down.

My thanks to the author, the publisher, and NetGalley for the privilege of reviewing this book. The opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

This review is being posted immediately to my GoodReads account and will be posted on Amazon upon publication.

4.5/5

After the Change I wasn’t sure what to expect from this book but I knew I had to read it and I’m glad I did.

Set in a southern small town that has a lot of wounds it needs to heal from, a chain of events is set in motion that will chain everything. When books are banned, a rebellious teenager decides to pull a prank on the book banning ring leader by swapping the books in her lending library with the banned books but swapping the dust jackets. Slowly the banned books make their way into the homes of the citizens, changes heart and minds and inciting change.

Tackling the long term implications of slavery and racism, sexism and rape, and just about every other tough topic feels like a lot to get through and I’ll be honest I could have done with one or two less tough topics (there were also maybe 20% too many characters) but all and all I really enjoyed the reckoning that Troy Georgia went through

I did not finish this one. Although this is listed as humor/satire, I found the characters annoying and I just didn't care enough about the story to finish.

Lula Dean's Little Library of Banned Books by Kirsten Miller is an enjoyable and captivating book that sheds light on important issues faced by today's society. The story is set in a small town in Georgia that has a Concerned Parents Committee, which has decided to ban books considered unsuitable for the town's youth. Kirsten Miller fearlessly portrays this hilarious, witty, and entertaining novel about one person taking offense at something trivial and a whole city coming together to reclaim their freedom to read. I highly recommend reading this book, especially for any librarian.

The story is set in a rural Georgia town with a Concerned Parents Committee, which determines to ban books the town's children should not read. The plot revolves around a town busybody, Lula Dean, who sets up a little free-lending library with some wholesome books, and one of the town's youth switches the books to the 'banned' books and keeps the original jackets so no one can know. As chaos ensues, the entire town is left divided. However, a group of teenagers and a few adults come together to expose Lulu and save their community from despair.

Miller narrates each story from various POVs and still does an admirable job in making their names and stories different enough for you to pick up on as you read.

As a town unites to fight for their right to read against the objections of one individual who gets annoyed at something trivial, Miller’s no-holds-barred style flourishes. The book is funny and eye-opening at the same time; therefore, I felt it was a good read.

Thank you to William Morrow and NetGalley for allowing me to read and review this book.

What an absolutely delightful love letter to the power of banned books while simultaneously dishing out sweet southern revenge on the small minds that support them! Read this amazing book with sweet tea and peach pie!

Kristen Miller’s most recent novel “The Change,” a Good Morning America Book Club choice, was a feel good feminist revenge fantasy mostly against a patriarchy. In “Lula Dean” Miller constructs a new story about bullies vs otherwise normal people. The main bully is crazy book banner Lula Dean vs the head of the school board, Beverly Underwood. They have been rivals since their cheerleading days in the little town of Troy, Georgia. Until recently, Lula was mainly the town crank, having detergent pods locked up so they weren’t eaten by gullible teenagers and campaigning to have certain very intimate personal items removed from Walmart. But suddenly Lula’s recent crusade has, to Beverly’s dismay, taken off and supposedly sensible people (the mailman knows otherwise) are actually talking about burning books. Ack!

Lula has erected her very own Little Library with totally wholesome books (bought at Goodwill to fake out proof that she actually reads). But Beverly’s adult daughter Lindsay takes some undercover action and decides to swap out all those bland comforting books — switching dust covers with the banned books that ended up languishing in her mom’s basement (saved from the bonfire). And as the surreptitious banned books are borrowed and new ones are added by people who realize the clever deception, minds are awakened and lives change. There’s an excitement every time a book gets borrowed — what is the real book?!

Miller dubs her chapters with book titles and creates a multitude of vignettes, set against a developing mayoral race between Lula and Beverly. This book is funny, charming, raunchy, and empowering all at once. Readers who agree that “those who seek to ban books are never on the right side of history” will love this novel! 5 stars!

Literary Pet Peeve Checklist:
Green Eyes (only 2% of the real world, yet it seems like 90% of all fictional females): SORT OF Crystal has turquoise eyes.
Horticultural Faux Pas (plants out of season or growing zones, like daffodils in autumn or bougainvillea in Alaska): YES There are no purple hydrangeas, white, blue or pink only. Also of note: no need to read the “Georgia Field Guide to Mushrooms” when the library flower beds have enough poisonous varieties to pluck for free in order to off your husband.

Thank you to William Morrow and NetGalley for a free advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review!

3.5 ⭐️ Lula Dean’s Little Library of Banned Books centers around a small town in the South, with a diverse cast of characters. When Lula Dean is on a mission to ban books in her town, she builds a little free library in front of her house with books she thinks are “appropriate” reads instead. Little does she know that two young town members swap out the books Lula chose with the very books she had banned by replacing the dust jackets. Every chapter of this book reads like a short story following different members of the town and their journeys of growth and self-discovery guided by whatever banned book they happened to have inadvertently borrowed from Lula’s library.

This book touches on very important topics including systemic racism, LGBTQ+ rights, politics, rape, and more. It’s a bit of an emotional rollercoaster, for the reader is filled with grief one moment due to the heavy topics and laughing out loud the next because of the characters themselves. Overall, it’s a heartwarming story filled with lessons everyone can benefit from.

While I appreciate how well the author wove together the stories of so many characters, it did feel a bit repetitive at times and the lessons learned sometimes felt too easy and unrealistic (unfortunately).

I hope that when it publishes, there’s an audiobook version because I think this book would be an excellent one to listen to!

Thank you to NetGalley, William Morrow, and Kirsten Miller for the free e-ARC in exchange for an honest review!

What a great book! I was laughing throughout the first part of the book, then later that turned to some chuckles but also some serious thoughts about what was going on in this little Southern town. Living in a small Southern town, I know that unfortunately many of the prejudices described in the book often exist. Although let’s face it: These views can exist anywhere, and there’s no geographic boundary that changes that. Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for letting me give my honest opinion.

“Lula Dean’s Little Library of Banned Books” by Kirsten Miller was a fun and engaging book that dealt with very important topics facing today’s society. The story takes place in a small town in Georgia that has a Concerned Parents Committee that has decided to ban books deemed unsuitable for the towns youth. The plot centers around Lula Dean who sets up a little free lending library filled with supposedly “wholesome” books when one of the towns youth switches the books to the “banned” books and keeps the original dust jackets so no one knows. Reading how all the townsfolk deal with the issues of racism, antisemitism, gender, and sexuality was absolutely fascinating and huge credit to the author who brings these important & timely issues forward in such a charming way. I highly recommend this book!

Thank you NetGalley & William Morrow for the ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

As someone who was born and raised in Georgia, some pieces of this story just felt off and filled with stereotypes. However, the premise of the story was fun and the characters were a hoot!

The beginning of this book did not catch my attention, and I almost put it down...but then came the book lady :)! It was hard to not THINK about the book challenges and political rhetoric that is playing out right now in our local school libraries and media while I read Lula Dean; I reflected on "Who should decide what books we read?"

I read and reread the passage beginning "They had to do whatever it took to keep future generations from living lives more fulfilling than their own..."; it is powerful! I loved the story and the characters, and this book brings a powerful message about the Right to Read. I recommend Lula Dean's Little Library of Banned books to readers who love books, are staunch advocates of public libraries and who read books as soon as they are banned to see what someone doesn't want them to read :)

I wanted to love this book because I adored Miller's first novel The Change, but this fell so flat for me. The characters felt more like caricatures and the dialogue felt cheesy and stilted.

Lula Dean is deemed the town lunatic when she took it upon herself to remove books from the school and local library because these books filled children’s minds with pornography and the knowledge of butt plugs.

Lula Dean created her own Free Little Library with wholesome books that the town of Troy would enjoy like Lord of the Flies, Chicken Soup for the Soul, Gone With the Wind and others. When residents started borrowing books, their lives were impacted by the stories within the pages. Lula’s books weren’t powerful, but the banned books snuggled inside her sinless dust jackets were the talk of the town.

Kirsten Miller holds nothing back in this hilarious, witty, & fun novel about one person being offended over something silly and an entire town coming together to take back their freedom of reading.

I would hurry and read this before someone is offended by its contents, and it too is placed on the list of banned books.

Excellent idea for a book. As a book lover, I was drawn to the title and the premise. It did not disappoint. Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC. I could see this as a Book Club pick.

This book looks like it's being marketed as a mainstream chick lit book, and if it is, it gives me so much hope. It manages to be light, funny, and entertaining while addressing the very pressing matters of racism, Christian Nationalism and violence that our society is grappling with. So glad to see this conversation being brought into the open and addressed with humor.