Books Banned in Iowa
59 banned books
1984
1984 is George Orwell's dystopian novel about Winston Smith, a low-ranking member of the ruling Party in the totalitaria...
A Court of Mist and Fury
A Court of Mist and Fury is the second book in Sarah J. Maas's ACOTAR series, following Feyre as she navigates the after...
A Court of Wings and Ruin
A Court of Wings and Ruin is the third book in Sarah J. Maas's ACOTAR series, following Feyre as she leads a dangerous m...
Empire of Storms
The fifth Throne of Glass novel placed #4 on ALA's 2025 most-challenged books list as Sarah J. Maas remained a major cen...
Melissa (formerly George)
Alex Gino's middle-grade novel about a transgender fourth-grader, the most banned book in America from 2018 to 2020....
Lord of the Flies
Lord of the Flies by William Golding follows boys stranded on an island who descend into savagery. Banned for violence, ...
Beyond Magenta
Beyond Magenta presents the stories of six transgender and nonbinary teens through interviews and photographs. It has be...
The Grapes of Wrath
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck follows the Joad family's migration from Oklahoma to California during the Dust Bo...
The Fault in Our Stars
John Green's bestselling novel about two teenagers, Hazel and Augustus, who meet at a cancer support group and fall in l...
Impulse
Impulse follows three teenagers who meet in a psychiatric hospital after each has attempted suicide. It has been challen...
Lucky
Lucky is Alice Sebold's memoir of being raped as a college freshman and the subsequent criminal trial. It has been chall...
Native Son
Richard Wright's landmark 1940 novel follows Bigger Thomas, a young Black man in 1930s Chicago whose life spirals after ...
Perfect
Perfect follows four teenagers whose pursuit of perfection leads them into eating disorders, steroid abuse, drug addicti...
I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter
I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter follows Julia Reyes, a first-generation Mexican American teenager dealing with he...
The Haters
The Haters follows three jazz camp dropouts who start a band and go on a chaotic road trip through the American South. F...
Tower of Dawn
Tower of Dawn follows Chaol Westfall as he journeys to the southern continent seeking healing and an alliance against th...
Grown
Tiffany D. Jackson's thriller about Enchanted Jones, a teenage singer who catches the eye of a famous R&B artist, only t...
The Female of the Species
The Female of the Species follows Alex Craft, a girl who killed the man who raped and murdered her sister, and the two c...
The Infinite Moment of Us
The Infinite Moment of Us follows Wren and Charlie as they fall in love the summer after high school graduation, navigat...
Crown of Midnight
The second book in Sarah J. Maas's Throne of Glass series, following assassin Celaena Sardothien as she serves as the Ki...
Like a Love Story
Like a Love Story follows three teenagers in 1989 New York City navigating love, identity, and the AIDS crisis. It has b...
Regretting You
Colleen Hoover's novel about a mother and daughter whose relationship is torn apart by secrets after a devastating famil...
The Sun and Her Flowers
The Sun and Her Flowers is Rupi Kaur's second poetry collection, exploring themes of growth, ancestry, immigration, loss...
Everything, Everything
Nicola Yoon's YA novel about Madeline Whittier, a teenager with severe combined immunodeficiency who has never left her ...
Firekeeper's Daughter
An Ojibwe teenager goes undercover to investigate a meth epidemic devastating her tribal community. Challenged for drug ...
Heir of Fire
The third book in Sarah J. Maas's Throne of Glass series, where Celaena travels to a distant land to train with a Fae wa...
Long Way Down
A novel-in-verse about a fifteen-year-old boy who gets in an elevator with a gun, intending to avenge his brother's murd...
Throne of Glass
The first book in Sarah J. Maas's bestselling series, following Celaena Sardothien, a teenage assassin summoned from a b...
One of Us Is Lying
A YA murder mystery about five students who enter detention but only four walk out alive. Challenged for sexual content,...
As I Lay Dying
William Faulkner's novel told through 15 different narrators as the Bundren family transports their matriarch's body acr...
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
Stieg Larsson's international bestseller about journalist Mikael Blomkvist and hacker Lisbeth Salander investigating a d...
Friday Night Lights: A Town, A Team, and a Dream
H.G. Bissinger's nonfiction account of the 1988 season of the Permian High School Panthers football team in Odessa, Texa...
Furyborn
Claire Legrand's fantasy novel following two queens born 1,000 years apart: Rielle, who must prove she's the prophesied ...
Heart Bones
Colleen Hoover's novel about Beyah Grim, who escapes her difficult life to spend the summer with her estranged father on...
Without Merit
Colleen Hoover's novel about Merit Voss, whose family keeps so many secrets that she decides to expose them all, only to...
Hey, Kiddo: How I Lost My Mother, Found My Father, and Dealt with Family Addiction
Jarrett J. Krosoczka's graphic memoir about growing up with a mother addicted to heroin, being raised by his grandparent...
Slammed
Colleen Hoover's debut novel about Layken, who moves to Michigan and falls for her neighbor Will, only to discover he's ...
The Assassin's Blade
A collection of five prequel novellas to Sarah J. Maas's Throne of Glass series, following Celaena Sardothien's adventur...
The Miseducation of Cameron Post
Emily M. Danforth's novel about Cameron Post, a teenager in rural Montana sent to a conversion therapy camp after being ...
The Sun Is Also a Star
A love story between Natasha, a Jamaican American girl facing deportation, and Daniel, a Korean American boy, over the c...
Memoirs of a Geisha
Arthur Golden's novel following Chiyo Sakamoto, a young Japanese girl sold into a geisha house in 1920s Kyoto, who trans...
Point of Retreat
The sequel to Colleen Hoover's Slammed, continuing the love story of Layken and Will as they navigate the challenges of ...
Shiver
Maggie Stiefvater's novel about Grace, who has been watched by a yellow-eyed wolf for years, and Sam, who is that wolf, ...
Stardust
Neil Gaiman's fantasy novel about young Tristran Thorn, who ventures beyond the wall of his English village into the mag...
A Separate Peace
John Knowles' classic novel about the intense friendship between Gene and Phineas at a New England boarding school durin...
Ace of Spades
Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé's debut thriller about two Black students at an elite prep school who become targets of an anonymo...
Kingsbane
The sequel to Claire Legrand's Furyborn, continuing the dual storylines of Rielle and Eliana as their fates hurtle towar...
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo
Taylor Jenkins Reid's novel about aging Hollywood icon Evelyn Hugo, who finally reveals the truth about her glamorous an...
The Sky is Everywhere
Jandy Nelson's debut novel about 17-year-old Lennie Walker, who copes with her sister's sudden death by falling for two ...
This Girl
The third book in Colleen Hoover's Slammed trilogy, retelling the love story of Will and Layken from Will's perspective....
Ulysses
James Joyce's modernist masterpiece follows Leopold Bloom through a single day in Dublin on June 16, 1904. Originally ba...
All This Time
A book by Mikki Daughtry that has been banned or challenged in 5 school districts during the 2023-2024 school year accor...
An Abundance of Katherines
John Green's novel about Colin Singleton, a child prodigy and serial dater of girls named Katherine, who goes on a road ...
Bag of Bones
Stephen King's gothic novel about bestselling author Mike Noonan, who retreats to his lakeside cabin in Maine after his ...
Chain Reaction
The third book in Simone Elkeles' Perfect Chemistry trilogy, following Luis Fuentes as he falls for his chemistry partne...
Four Past Midnight
A collection of four Stephen King novellas including 'The Langoliers,' 'Secret Window, Secret Garden,' 'The Library Poli...
On the Road
Jack Kerouac's defining Beat Generation novel, a semi-autobiographical account of cross-country road trips with his frie...
With the Fire on High
Elizabeth Acevedo's novel about Emoni Santiago, a teen mother in Philadelphia who dreams of becoming a chef while juggli...
The Scottsboro Boys
'The Scottsboro Boys...