Author Danny Caine in conversation with Shannon Horton | HOW TO DEFEND BOOKS AND WHY

Who: Danny Caine in Conversation with Shannon Horton What: an evening celebrating his new book, How To Defend Books and Why Where: Pulpit Rock Brewing When: Wednesday, 6/3 at 7pm Join author and small business advocate, Danny Caine, and Decorah middle school and high school librarian, Shannon Horton, for a conversation and Q&A session followed by a book signing on Wednesday, June 3rd at 7pm at Pulpit Rock Brewing at 207 College Dr, Decorah. Everyone is invited to this free event sponsored by the Oneota Valley Literary Foundation, with support from Pulpit Rock Brewing and Dragonfly Books. You’re invited to the book revolution! Fight back against censorship and empower your community with this close look at the book banning movement. In a moving, compulsively readable call to arms for readers everywhere, Danny Caine, bestselling author of How to Resist Amazon and Why and How to Protect Bookstores and Why, offers an expertly-crafted confrontation of far-right, Christian nationalist attempts to reshape American culture through ban campaigns targeting schools, libraries, bookstores, and prisons, with the aim to silence marginalized identities in life and in literature. From the first-ever banned books display at San Francisco’s City Lights in the 1950s to the rapid rise of so-called Moms For Liberty during the COVID-19 pandemic to attempts to silence Palestinian authors, Caine charts the course of repressive censorship campaigns, along with the creative and sometimes unlikely activists who’ve stood up against them. Each chapter is based on a particular book banning episode, bolstered by research and legal precedent, and concludes with helpful takeaways for further reading or resistance. Throughout, Caine approaches these heated issues with gentle openness harkening back to his work as a public school teacher and a bookseller. He emphasizes our collective responsibility towards art, free speech, and each other. Danny Caine is the author most recently of How to Defend Books and Why: Book Bans and How We Fight Them, as well as Jewish American Dream, winner of the inaugural Sarabande Chapbook Prize. He’s also written four poetry collections as well as the books How to Protect Bookstores and Why and How to Resist Amazon and Why. He’s a former owner of the Raven Book Store, winner of Publishers Weekly’s 2022 Bookstore of the Year award. His poetry has appeared in The Slowdown, LitHub, DIAGRAM, HAD, and Barrelhouse. He lives in Ohio. Shannon Horton has been a teacher librarian for over 20 years and holds a Master of Library and Information Studies from the University of Wisconsin. She is currently the middle and high school librarian for Decorah Public Schools and wants nothing more than for her students to enjoy reading and find truth online. This event is part of Dragonfly Books and the Oneota Valley Literary Foundation’s robust author event series, which brings top-notch writers of all genres to Northeast Iowa to lead in conversations about literature and writing. To learn more about this event and other events with Dragonfly Books, visit www.dragonflybooks.com. If you find that you can’t make it to the event but would still like to purchase any books from this author talk, give Dragonfly Books a call at 563-382-4275. Our staff will be glad to reserve a book, have it autographed for you, and shipped out as needed.