NRPLF Names Sunny Hostin Honorary Spokeswoman for Banned Books Week

Sunny Hostin, three-time Emmy Award-winning co-host of ABC’s “The View” and New York Times best-selling author, has been named honorary spokeswoman for the New Rochelle Public Library Foundation’s Banned Books Week awareness campaign.

An initiative of the American Library Association, Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read is observed during the last week of September each year as a reminder to Americans not to take their precious freedom for granted. Banned Books Week 2022 will take place September 18th through 24th, with the theme "Books Unite Us. Censorship Divides Us." spotlighting the current attempts to censor books in libraries and schools. According to the ALA there were 729 challenges to library, school and university materials and services in 2021, with most of the targeted books by or about Black or LGBTQ+ persons.

As an attorney and an author, the subject of censorship is important to Sunny Hostin, who taped a PSA for the NRPL Foundation. “When we ban books we ban thinking,” says Hostin. “We ban being open to different points of view. On “The View” we like to look at all sides of an issue to gain understanding, and when we ban books we ban diversity of thought.”

The NRPL Foundation hopes to draw attention to the dangerous growth in book banning across America. “The books featured during Banned Books Week have all been targeted for removal or restriction in libraries and schools,” says Chris Selin, President of the NRPLF. “By focusing on efforts across the country to remove or restrict access to books, Banned Books Week is a way to raise awareness about the harms of censorship.”

NRPLF Vice President Lynn Green adds that “sharing stories that are important to us means sharing a part of ourselves. Books reach across boundaries and build connections between readers. Censorship, on the other hand, creates barriers.” For more about Banned Books Week visit the NRPLF website at www.nrplfoundation.org and ala.org/bbooks.

About Sunny Hostin

Sunny Hostin is a three-time Emmy Award-winning legal journalist, New York Times bestselling author, and co-host of The View. In May 2021, Hostin released her debut novel, "Summer on the Bluffs" (William Morrow), which skyrocketed to #11 on The New York Times Bestseller List. The first book in her "Summer" trilogy is being adapted into a series as the first major project for Sunny Hostin Productions. In the fall of 2020, Hostin released her memoir, “I Am These Truths: A Memoir of Identity, Justice, and Living Between Worlds,” with HarperOne. Hostin has been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Forbes Woman, Essence, Newsweek, The New York Post, Latina, and Ebony. A sought-after public speaker, she has delivered a TEDxTalk called “A Possibility Model” and spoken at and moderated panels for the U.C. Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, Corporate Counsel Women of Color, and the National Bar Association, and served as a witness at the Federal Judiciary’s Congressional Hearing for the Public’s Right of Access to the Courts. Hostin lives with her husband and two children in New York.

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