A Summer Reading Program for Conservatives

Tired of all the school and public libraries run by lefties who fill the shelves with woke and lewd content? One way to fight back is to reclaim those libraries- one request at a time!

Among my childhood memories are my annual participation in my local library’s Summer Reading program. I didn’t necessarily like the program for the events it hosted (though some of those were cool) so much as I did for the fact that if you read enough books and filled out enough of the sheets, you could win prizes. I never won the prizes that I really wanted though. Others got the $50 gift card, or the bank account, but I did win coupons for ice cream or a discount on a specific book at the local bookstore.

Never let it be said that little children cannot have mercenary ambitions, especially since $50 is a lot of money to a child. I wanted those prizes, but I never attained them. Over time, that resulted in me turning to the reading program, less to win, and more to discover new adventures in the annals of books. Timing yourself as you read and entering a new world could be fun, and it was always nice to return to an old favorite that I was able to read a little quicker than a brand-new book.

I recall devouring the Dear America diary-style juvenile readers, hooked after I discovered one while researching a school project. On a friend’s recommendation, I picked up Nancy Drew: The Secret of Shadow Ranch, and also became a fan of the girl detective from that novel forward. The Baby-Sitter’s Club was another series I kept up with after the same friend’s endorsement, and I perused many other series during those formative years.

While I still love to visit my local library and search through the shelves, many of the books I enjoyed as a child have been purged over time, but at least Nancy Drew still remains on the shelf, and there are some newer gems that make it in every now and then. But as far too many parents learned during the lockdown and continue to discover now, it is very difficult to find books that edify or entertain rather than preach no matter which section you are searching. That is, alas, by design.

“We May Not Be Woke, But We’re Trying to Be”

Publishing has been a cutthroat business for decades, but as many have learned too late, it has become much more difficult these days. Tyler Zed, a conservative YouTuber who posts humorous videos and has his own podcast, released his memoir in January of last year. But as he details in a 2023 video, the book was initially rejected by one publisher because the owner was “a woman, and an immigrant.”

As any independent author who has tried at first to be traditionally published can tell you, it is in fact worse than Zed’s video reveals. One hears from those who were in traditional publishing (before “going indie”) of contracts that required books to have queer, gay, BIPOC, or trans characters, something this article backs up. If you noticed a series that you previously enjoyed suddenly took an inexplicable left turn, odds are that the change was attributable to the publisher including it as a requirement in the author’s contract. Unless the author is like Dean Koontz or J.K. Rowling with a giant fan base, he/she cannot write a story without including LGBTQ-etc, trans, or other similar groups in his stories, even if those tales do not call for such characters.

The Superversive and PulpRev literary movements reacted to this trend long before the lockdowns brought it to mainstream attention. Several of the smaller publishers within this movement, such as Cirsova Magazine, are still going, but others folded during the lockdowns. New publishers, however, have risen to fill that void, such as Raconteur Press, which is currently calling for submissions for boys’ juvenile fiction due to rise in demand for such stories. They recently released Dave Freer’s juvenile novel Storm-Dragon, a tale of a boy on a planet trying to protect a tiny little predator from the bureaucrats making his, his family’s, and others’ lives miserable.

Like Zed, many have been turned away by publishers who bluntly told, “We don’t want you here” because they do not fit within a particular proscribed political box. That leaves a mark. Creatives who will not bow to the traditional publisher’s DEI standards either find a small publisher, or they “go indie.” But they never forget those who told them, “We don’t want you here.”

The Excluded Still Have a Voice

While Raconteur Press and Cirsova do their best to produce content that is free of DEI screeds and characters, Upstream Reviews makes an effort to “put on blast” the publishers who will not release more conservative books. Focusing primarily on sci-fi and fantasy, Upstream’s writers are not averse to reviewing children’s fiction, comics, or juvenile works. As long as it is to the right of Mao, rest assured that it will be read and reviewed. Various sci-fi classics are also given the spotlight as time permits.

In addition, Upstream works to promote the Dragon Awards, a series of awards where anyone can cast a vote for a specific movie, book, or cover art produced between June of one year and July of the next. With the rest of the award circuit being as compromised as the Oscars, the Dragons offer fans a chance to make their voices heard. Co-founder of Upstream Reviews, Robert Kroese, has also started his own convention to counteract the Woke invasion of fiction: BasedCon.

Upstream Reviews also includes Content Warnings in its book and film reviews, which is helpful, but not everyone can afford Amazon’s prices – especially since Amazon is reducing the authors’ paperback royalties by sixteen percent.

But amid all these grand efforts, what practical things can a mother of three do in her small town, U.S.A. to find good reading material for their children when they cannot afford the physical books?

The answer is simple: request that your library acquire books written by independent authors. Upstream Reviews has a post on how to do this, both as a fan (or potential fan) and as a writer. Librarian and author J.M. Anjewierdan was consulted about how libraries think to ensure maximum accuracy, and his advice has proven solid. So long as you can tell the library the title and ISBN number of the physical book, if they believe that it will circulate, they are likely to order it. Or, if you have the money and time, consider adding an independent author’s work to your local Little Free Library (find one near you here).

Despite all the claims to the contrary, the Right can create, and it is creating as we speak. Men still both read and write. They just do not publish via traditional routes because those routes have now been closed to them, as Zed recently learned in the effort to publish his memoir. Thankfully, he got lucky and eventually found a publisher. Others have found it better and easier, as well as more lucrative, to simply go independent. They cannot stop you from publishing if you refuse to go through their gate in the first place.

Building Better Libraries for Future Minds

The summer may not be as lazy now as it was when I was young, but that does not mean I cannot ensure the children entering this year’s Reading Program at my local library will have quality material to choose from. Admittedly, it may not – by order of volume – counteract the DEI-monsoon that has filled the shelves over the past decade, as that would be asking for signs and wonders.

Perhaps all that is needed are just a few little miracles. Some well-placed books should be able to ignite or reignite the first spark of wonder and hope which children like me experienced when we cracked open a new novel. Who knows?...it may just be the ticket to a lifelong habit that will open the door to wondrous worlds for the next generation of readers and writers to explore!

Photo Credit- Raconteur Press, BasedCon, Space Coast Meal Worms, and one pic taken on site at a Little Free Library by an Everyman staff member.