KRCL’s Day in the Park 2026

“Woah! I didn’t know. Thank you!”

Despite the torrential downpour, I was honored to table with @wellerbookworks, @utahlgbtqchamber, and @lwvutah during @krclradio ‘s 2026 Day in the Park to share banned books as apart of the Read Between the Bans effort put on by a coalition of Utah booksellers!

Do you know there are currently 37 books banned in all public schools in the state of Utah? Including Nobel laureate Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye and Sapphire’s Push, the source material behind the movie Precious?

Toni Morrison spoke often about the dangers of censorship, editing a whole book on the topic called Burn this Book! So it’s not lost on me the great irony that I handed out free copies of her work and more on my first @blackbookstore.day as a Black bookstore owner!

While I do believe in parental and librarian curation of shelves, I do not accept one county deciding what kids can read in an entire state with the way Utah’s law is currently written.

Reading has always been dangerous for Black people. My slogan, Literacy is Liberation, comes out of the long history of reading and writing being illegal for my ancestors. And growing up with dyslexia, my heart breaks to see graphic novels on the banned list that are age appropriate, a gateway into reading that helped me become the voracious reader I am today!

I had a chance to talk about all this and more on @fox13now Thank you to them and @abc4utah who came out to cover our story!

I hope to attend more Read Between the Bans events and be in community! Until then, visit the chamber’s website to learn how to volunteer or consider donating so we can continue to protect the right to read!