Info
The Helen Ruffin Reading Bowl is an annual event put together by Georgia educators with a goal of getting young people excited about reading. School and public libraries host events throughout Georgia at the local, regional, and state level that encourage young readers to answer questions about the books they’ve read. It is entirely optional, with young people electing whether or not to participate.
Titles included in the Reading Bowl come from the Georgia Peach Book Award nominees. These titles are selected annually through a process that has school and public librarians read widely across recently-published titles to select 20 finalists. Students then have the opportunity to read and rate those books, allowing them the power to select the Georgia Peach Book Award Winner and the Georgia Peach Book Award Honorable Mentions. The Helen Ruffian Reading Bowl helps facilitate the process by encouraging teens to read from this list of finalists.
Things this year, though, weren’t as smooth as in the past. Early last month, the steering committee behind the Reading Bowl quietly removed eight of the 20 titles from the high school reading list. Why? The decision came after “receiving numerous reconsideration requests about some of the books nominated for the 2025-2026 Georgia Peach Book Award for Teen Readers.” This not only narrowed the breadth of titles being discussed by teens across the state, but also narrowed the number of books they will be reading in anticipation of voting for the Georgia Peach Book Awards.
The eight banned books included Bright Red Fruit by Safia Elhillo, Crashing into You by Rocky Callen, Not Like Other Girls by Meredith Adamo, Songlight by Moira Buffini, Thirsty by Jas Hammonds, This Book Won’t Burn by Samira Ahmed, Wander in the Dark by Jumata Emill, and When the World Tips Over by Jandy Nelson. Themes within the books are precisely the types of themes that have been targeted by the far-right for the last four and a half years: stories by and centering marginalized voices, including people of color and queer people; stories about the realities of sexual assault; and even a book about the impacts of contemporary book bans.
Within hours of the story of the books being banned hit the news, the steering committee changed their mind. All eight of the books would be returned to the competition. The steering committee posted the following letter to the Helen Ruffin Reading Bowl website:
Over the past several weeks, the Georgia Helen Ruffin Reading Bowl State Steering Committee has heard from many students, educators, parents, and librarians regarding our recent decision to reduce the number of Georgia Peach Book Award for Teen Readers nominees in this year’s high school competition. We have read every message, followed every discussion, and reflected deeply on what the Reading Bowl stands for.
Georgia HRRB was founded on a desire to foster a love of reading in Georgia children through a friendly and engaging competition. The passion and advocacy we have seen reminded us that the spirit of this competition lives strongest in those who read, think, and speak up.
After thoughtful discussion, and in light of the overwhelming feedback from our community, the Georgia HRRB State Steering Committee has voted to reinstate all 20 Georgia Peach Book Award For Teen Readers titles for the 2026 high school competition.
Our original decision to reduce the number of books was based on concerns brought to us about certain titles. Our sole intent was to ensure that all students could continue participating fully in the Helen Ruffin Reading Bowl. While this decision was made with good intentions, we now recognize that it may have communicated an unintended message. We appreciate and respect the professional expertise of the Georgia Peach Book Award for Teen Readers Reading Committee Members in their selection of titles.
The successful reinstatement of eight books originally banned from the competition isn’t about how the news spread beyond Georgia and led to the change of heart. It’s a story of how several high school students, all of whom are engaged with the Helen Ruffin Reading Bowl, worked to raise awareness of what was happening and ultimately, saw the books put back on the list.
Georgia students brought this story to national attention in several ways. First, students began to reach out to the authors whose books had been banned. While that was ongoing, others worked to create a petition intended for the Helen Ruffin Reading Bowl steering committee. This would not only further raise awareness of what was happening, but it would put the pressure on the committee to address what happened and give a more transparent answer as to why.
As the students began to reach out to the now-banned authors, those authors began to talk about what was happening. One of them reached out to me to bring the story to my attention, and she let me know that this was all bring brought to light by the high schoolers themselves. The truth of the matter is had those students not started to sound the alarm, it’s likely no one would have noticed. The Helen Ruffin Reading Bowl is a big deal to students in Georgia who take part in it every year, but it is not a public school nor public library. People were not showing up at a board meeting nor were there eyes and ears on that website enough to notice the change. Student efforts brought attention to what was happening and student efforts then heralded the change via having their voices heard in their petition and letters sent to the steering committee.
Students should not carry the responsibility of overturning book bans. This isn’t a mess they’ve created; it’s one created by adults who fail to recognize children and teenagers are autonomous individuals with their own rights. They are not property of their parents, of their educational institutions, nor of the country itself. But time and time again, it is young people who are stepping up and speaking out about the impact that book bans–instigated by grown adults lodging absurd accusations of such books being “inappropriate,” “explicit,” or “pornographic”–are having on their lives. See the work of Kate Lindley or Annabelle Jenkins or Students Engaged in Advancing Texas or DAYLO or students at Department of Defense Education Activity schools, to not mention the dozens of students who are plaintiffs in numerous lawsuits nationwide.
Now, we can add several Georgia high schoolers to the ranks of anti-censorship champions.
Take the time to learn about these students in their own words, as well as where and how they stepped up to advocate for their right to read. This interview includes three different students, two of whom worked together and one of whom was working separately but ultimately connected with the others once the books were back on the Reading Bowl list. :
There may have been additional students involved in this tremendous work of advocacy, and while their voices are not included below, their efforts are acknowledge and commended.
 |
Claire: I have been doing Reading Bowl on-and-off since fourth-grade and am now a junior captain at my school.
Ritvik: I’ve been competing in HRRB for over 8 years now, since I was a wee 4th grader. Reading the annual assigned books, studying their content, and actively discussing them with other members of my team has driven my love for reading and expanded my perspectives on the world. My brother, a 5th grader, competed for the first time last year and loves HRRB just as much as I do. Even though I’m a senior, I want to fight to keep HRRB going for kids like my brother, allowing it to continue positively shaping the lives of children across Georgia. I’m currently the president of the team at Wheeler, and the team is excited to defend our State Championship this upcoming year.
Vidya: Surprisingly, I joined the Reading Bowl just this year! Although I’ve been too busy to participate in the past few years, I’m friends with a lot of bookworms who have competed in Reading Bowl for many years, so it’s close to my heart. On occasions, I’ve read novels from the Reading Bowl book list that my friends tout as particularly riveting reads, and I’ve always enjoyed their engaging storytelling and relevant themes.
Ritvik: I found out when one of my friends, who had been procrastinating on reading, googled the book list on the official HRRB website. They noticed only 12 of the 20 books were listed and texted me, confused. I was just as stunned. I immediately texted peers from other schools and none of them had heard anything to indicate a reduced booklist this year. While navigating Google, seeing if context was posted anywhere, I noticed that the main website quietly cited “complaints” buried within the page. There was no further context given. We wondered who complained, when they did so, and more (questions we still don’t know the answer to). Even until the time that the books were reinstated, almost a month after the books were removed, neither coaches nor students were ever actively notified of the change. This seemed to be deliberate silence, to keep concerned students from speaking out. If we didn’t know about the changes, how could we complain about them?
Claire: I was sitting in my World History class when I saw a notification from my school librarian saying that eight books had been removed from the competition.
 |
Vidya: After I heard about the book banning, I was determined to collect signatures for our petition, understanding its potential to amplify our community’s voice. While Ritvik reached out to authors for support, I targeted our peers and everyday citizens through social media. Branching out our efforts was critical to our success.
Ritvik: I live in the city of Marietta, in Cobb County. My region has been one of the most consistent hotbeds for book banning, with nationally publicized incidents almost annually. In fact, the Helen Ruffin Reading Bowl competition itself had been canceled within the county two years prior, with politicians deciding that the books were inappropriate for us. In the past, I’d felt so powerless. At the time, Wheeler had never even made it past the county round, never once qualifying for regionals. Now, however, we had gone all the way to the State competition, forming friendships with kids on teams around Georgia. We were all so outraged by the unfairness of this latest round of book bans, that we decided we had to at least try to speak up. Even if we couldn’t bring these books back, we needed to protect HRRB and the future; so it began as a fight for transparency. As long as the higher-ups could arbitrarily ban books silently, there are no barriers to removing any books. If there was a procedure with a publicly visible process (like a review board, or some other similar procedure), they may be more hesitant to ban in the future. So, our fight began as one for transparency.
Claire: I decided to write the Reading Bowl board, trying to clarify why these specific books got banned (to no response). I also wrote to all the authors of the excluded books, most of whom responded extremely quickly and jumped to give us their support.
Claire: My first reaction to the ban was disbelief. Reading Bowl is an organization that has stood for diversity and inclusion since its founding and to think that they would so quickly crack under barely any pressure was unbelievable. The next thing I felt was anger. The fact that a few parents have the power to control what literature so many kids gain access to is ridiculous. Reading bowl is an optional competition that partially includes legal adults. If parents believe some books are not appropriate for us yet, then I don’t know when they will be appropriate.
Ritvik: We were outraged, and honestly stunned. We’d thought we were in the clear, as book-banning controversies seemed to die down in the previous years, and this one was so silent that it just didn’t feel real. We were outraged that some shrouded figure believed they could silently make our competition a political statement.
Vidya: Frankly, I was stunned. The change occurred almost instantly, with no prior notice. Soon, my shock turned into deep concern for the implications of the book bans- it’s one thing to remove books from a local school curriculum, but it’s another to see books removed from an entirely voluntary reading competition targeted at high schoolers. Can’t we be trusted to make the decision to read or not read a book on our own terms? The removal of certain books seemed to send a message that they were so offensive that they shouldn’t even be within the purview of a high school reading experience, and I knew that just wasn’t true. My friends and I knew we had to do something.
 |
Ritvik: My first action after hearing about the bans was to reach out to my friends on teams across the State. Our emotions went from confusion, to shock, to outrage. After a few conversations ranting to each other, I decided that we had to do something. I’d read about petitions being used to bring about change. In this scenario, the higher-ups seemed to crave silence in order to prevent backlash, so I wanted to break the veil and spread the word, specifically through the petition. I created a flyer with the petition and shared it with HRRB friends. I was pleasantly surprised at the enthusiasm of the other students, and they voraciously shared the petition. I’d also been reaching out to authors to spread the word, but I had neglected one major way of spreading the word. Vidya, my peer, and students at Walton High School, realized the utility of social media. Vidya created an instagram account, posting flyers. Other students continued reposting the petition. She also used Reddit, specifically r/bannedbooks, with her post generating thousands of views.
Regarding the coordination of students: there was somewhat limited coordination. We were all stunned, and this all happened so fast (in a week or two), so the collaboration could have certainly been more clear. However, I think the key was genuine human connection. We were all bonded through our love for HRRB, and we thus worked together beautifully, with students everywhere contributing by telling people about the book banning.
Vidya: Ritvik reached out to the reading bowl leaders at our school and elsewhere, and they joined him in emailing authors for support and writing a compelling petition. I coordinated social media, raising awareness about the issue and the petition.
Claire: Out of the 8 authors I emailed, 6 got back to me. Their support included offers to post on social media, donate books, and connect us with bigger organizations such as PEN America. I later found out that one of the authors who did not respond by email had, in fact, emailed one of these organizations, making them aware of our situation. The only author who did not email back did not have any direct contact information I could find, so I emailed their publisher. It is a possibility that they never got it.
Ritvik: As I was working with students, I thought about the other group of people who’d been affected by these book bans. The authors! I emailed every author whose book had been banned, notifying them of what happened, expressing my sorrow, and requesting them to share the petition. I wasn’t expecting much. I’d never spoken to authors before, and they always felt more like celebrities than real people. However, almost all of them responded! They mostly hadn’t heard about the bans, and were incredibly eager to help. Their positive response, encouragement, and guidance really helped throughout the process. They created social media posts to spread the word and contacted book-banning experts, among other things. They were all incredibly kind and helpful, and I couldn’t be grateful enough for all of their support.
Ritvik: We, led by Vidya, utilized social media as a main source to spread the word. She created an instagram account and posted a multitude of flyers promoting the fight against book banning. However, this by itself would have been ineffective, as the account only racked up a little more than 100 followers, and only a small percentage would actually sign the flyer. What made the instagram account valuable was the student support. First, the instagram accounts of teams at Lakeside and Walton high schools reposted the flyers. Then, students themselves at these schools, and even other schools around Georgia, reposted the flyers. Thanks to this, the flyers spread from just those of us heavily involved with reading bowl to students who’d never competed but believed in intellectual freedom. We also used Reddit. Vidya created a post on r/bannedbooks with thousands of views. By bringing this issue to people who already knew the severity of book-banning, we reached an audience who understood the consequences and were more likely to support us.
Outside of our own social media, authors were invaluable. Multiple authors posted about the book banning and shared the petition within their own social media communities. They also reached out to organizations that could spread the word. Finally, the single largest contributor to the petition was probably the Book Riot article that you wrote. With your support and posting of the petition, the fight went national.
The responses to the petition were overwhelmingly positive. The comments detailed stories of book-banning, and signatures piled up. My original goal of 50 was exceeded quickly. We ended up racking up over 300 signatures. The community’s strong positive response through the petition was actually the primary reason for the reversal of the banning.
Vidya: Ritvik reached out to the authors of the banned books, asking them to share our petition. Additionally, we garnered a lot of support after our petition was included in the BookRiot article “A Georgia Reading Bowl Bans Titles from Competition, Including a Book on Book Bans.” Turning to social media, I created an Instagram account to spread awareness about the issue and encourage people to sign the petition. Additionally, I posted the petition on the subreddit r/bannedbooks, an online space with people who are passionate about stopping book banning. By leveraging diverse platforms to spread the word, we amassed over 300 signatures.
Vidya: The best example of this was our Instagram account. I posted a story and a post about the book banning that included the petition link, and dozens of students from around Georgia reposted the story.
Claire: I got in contact with some students at Wheeler High School and was making plans for more coordinated efforts before we heard of the reinstatement of the books.
Claire: I never heard back from the Reading Bowl board until the books were reinstated. I also never learned why the books had been removed or who had requested their removal. I did, however, read all the banned books this year and can say why I suspect they were removed. Some of the books contained scenes either of consensual sex or sexual assault/attempted sexual assault. I do not believe these topics are in any way a reason to restrict teenagers for reading them. In fact, I’d say they are more important to read, since sex is such a hush-hush topic, meaning we have no idea what a good relationship should look like and are more likely to fall into a bad one.
Ritvik: The only response we received from the coordinators of the Reading Bowl was “complaints.” There wasn’t even a specification of who’d complained. Was it parents, administrators? Had they even read the books, or just glanced at the covers? We were not at all satisfied by the response, and this infuriating lack of transparency was actually the initial inspiration for our campaign. However, we never blamed the HRRB coordinators themselves, as we could tell their hands were tied, and that this situation was more a political statement than anything else. When they returned the books, we were overjoyed. Even with all our fight, we weren’t expecting the full return of the books; we’d seen the sheer volume of tragic book-banning cases that had never been reversed despite strong outlash. Our goal was really for transparency, but we were super, super happy that the books were returned. It felt gratifying, as my mind during those 3-4 weeks was solely on reading bowl, and knowing that we helped create real change was an amazing feeling.
Vidya: The rationale behind the initial book removal was that the Bowl committee was responding to “complaints,” but they didn’t give any further explanation. Neither I nor my friends were satisfied with the details given, and we immediately suspected that the books had been removed due to county-specific complaints. We wanted answers. When they elected to return the books, the committee emphasized that they initially wanted to expand participation in the competition, implying that they were afraid that the original booklist would deter some counties from participating. While I understand that they might have been under pressure, I believe that the right thing to do was to leave the booklist untouched, and I’m grateful that they restored it.
Ritvik: As I mentioned earlier, the campaign to bring the books back was incredibly rapid. Everything happened so fast. We also weren’t aware of the thriving community against book-banning while fighting, and were mostly fighting blindly, learning as we were going. However, after we actually reversed the change, we’ve become involved in community groups. Vidya and I were contacted by representatives from PEN America, namely Dr. Tasslyn Magnusson. We Zoom-called with TAG and were notified of groups all over the country fighting book banning, which we’re now looking to potentially be a part of. We want to help ensure that students across the country are equipped to fight. In case books are still being banned when my brother gets to High School, I want students to know that there is a way to fight, we don’t have to sit still and let politically-driven adults make decisions for us.
Vidya: We had never really participated in any form of political activism, and we had to act fast, so our endeavor was mostly self-directed. After our efforts came to fruition, we got in touch with some pretty awesome activist groups, such as PEN America.
Claire: I would tell other students to spread the word. Reading Bowl is an incredibly niche competition that would never have gained enough support without reaching out to people outside of the area. Encourage other people to write emails, sign petitions, or post on social media. With enough support, organizations will feel the pressure and hopefully reverse their decision.
Vidya: The most important thing is to leverage the support of other individuals who are as passionate about reducing censorship. Reach out to people online, in your local community, authors, and news outlets to organize protests, raise awareness, and create petitions. People are always willing to help when it comes to issues that matter to them.
 |
Ritvik: Ignorance, conformity, lack of intellectual freedom, the list goes on. By taking away the ability to read and learn specific material at such a critical age, we lose critical viewpoints. The beauty of books lies in their ability to show new perspectives. By banning books, students are fed the same perspectives. There is no complexity of thought at all.
Vidya: Books are invaluable windows into the human experience, and when any book is removed from the reach of students, the world becomes less enlightened, less empathetic, and less likely to change for the better.
Book censorship is much more than filtering information; it’s the silencing of voices and the erasure of stories. The very act of book banning itself sends a dangerous message that the best way to deal with divisive topics is to push them out of the sphere of public discussion, and this is deeply hurtful to students. Book censorship is a barrier to understanding one another, navigating difficult yet important topics, and coming to terms with who we are, hindering our intellectual and personal growth.
Claire: People like to belong. It’s a normal part of human nature, and books help us feel like we have a place. For everyone, books are a place we can learn and experience without feeling judged or unsafe.
Ritvik: There’s a few things I want to say.
We are not as fragile as you think. Multiple members of my team are registered to vote, and more than half of us drive. If we’re doing such an impactful activity as voting, shouldn’t we know the truth?
Banning a book for one family is unfair to everyone else. I agree that a parent has the right to decide what their own child reads. They don’t, however, have the right to make that decision for an entire community. A single complaint from one person should not dictate what other students have access to in a school or public library.
You’re shielding us from reality, not helping us. Banned books often deal with challenging topics like racism, sexual assault, and difficult moments in history. Shielding us from these realities doesn’t make the problems go away, but instead leaves us unprepared to confront and navigate real-world issues.
These stories belong to us, too. Book bans disproportionately target works by and about people of color and the LGBTQ+ community. For marginalized students, seeing their experiences and identities reflected in literature is a powerful and validating experience. When these books are removed, it feels like their voices are being silenced and their identities deemed unworthy of being acknowledged.
Vidya: I can understand that an adult would take issue with a particular book being distributed in a school setting if it were exceedingly obscene. However, I’ve noticed a double standard around what is considered “obscene” between LGBTQ and heteronormative media, which is why I believe the reasons that adults ban books run deeper than a simple aversion to pornography.
I’d like people who seek to ban books to consider this hypothetical: what if we lived in a world where every time a novel is deemed controversial, it was removed from the shelves of school libraries? What happens when your children inevitably stumble on topics shrouded by censorship and lack the awareness to create viable solutions? Or when your child’s identity falls under the umbrella of controversy? What happens when your own child becomes ashamed, silent, self-loathing, and never comes to you about their emotions because they never see the topic discussed?
The answers to these questions are why book banning is destructive.
The freedom to read isn’t about pushing a specific political agenda. It’s not about indoctrinating kids; not even close. It’s about creating an environment where important ideas can be discussed without fear, allowing people to learn about themselves and others, and fostering mutual understanding and awareness.
Claire: Book banning gets rid of outside perspectives. Books help us meet and get to know people different from us that we may not have the chance to know if it were not for books. Books containing the unknown are often labeled as radical or explicit. Humans are more inclined to be distrustful of the unknown, which makes types of people who are more obscure in certain communities easy to vilify. Books of different perspectives make it much harder to blame and sow distrust in populations against another. This is why book banning/burning is often the first priority of authoritarian regimes.
Ritvik: I’m really looking forward to Songlight and Looking for Smoke. So far, the books I’ve read this year have been really good. This might be the best year yet!!
Vidya: I’m looking forward to reading Wander in the Dark, which is a thrilling murder mystery and a commentary on social justice.
Claire: I am most excited to read Looking for Smoke by K. A. Cobell.
Claire: My favorite Reading Bowl book was from my first year in 4th grade and is Nevermoor by Jessica Townsend.
Ritvik: Mine is probably Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir. It was just such a fun book and I really loved the world-building.
Vidya: Hollow Fire by Samira Ahmed was a harrowing, powerful novel that featured excellently written characters and a mature treatment of difficult topics.
It would take too much time and space to highlight the massive slate of victories from this week’s elections. But let’s put it this way: many schools which have been targeted from right-wing board members have seen their leadership turn over. People do not want book banners and anti-trans representation on their school boards. These wins are a huge reminder that book censorship ends when people in charge care about representing everyone, not just special (read: white supremacist) interests. Getting to the polls matters.