Per the Canyon ISD new book policy, the board must approve all book purchases. On Jan 26th, 2023, Canyon ISD Assistant Superintendent Cameron Rosser emailed a list of over 600 books to be purchased by Canyon ISD and gave parents 13 days to review them. The Canyon purchase list contained numerous titles that included sexually explicit content, spells/demons, excessive profanity, LGBT ideology and a lot of picture books (graphic novels). At the February 2023 Canyon ISD School Board meeting, parents expressed outrage. Texans Wake Up released our blog entitled "Canyon ISD 2023 Book Purchase List Full of Obscenities" detailing the event.
On March 9th, 2023, Canyon ISD posted a 'Book Communication' graphic and link on the Canyon ISD Facebook page with a link to the following form.
The Canyon ISD New Library Material Purchases 22-23 - UPDATED list was available for public viewing. The new book purchase list was considerably shorter with under 200 titles and parents now had until May 10th, 2023 to review content.
Texans Wake Up would like to preview a few of the titles proposed for purchase with taxpayer money for the children of Randall County. Please keep in mind that this was Superintendent Darryl Flusche's 2nd chance to do right by the community and present a non-vulgar, educationally-suitable purchase list containing no harmful materials that aligned with community values.
Book #1
"Spells For Forgetting" on Canyon ISD UPDATED purchase list
"....because all I could think was, I can finally f*ck Emery Blackwood....And I did. Over and over and over again.' - Spells For Forgetting, Page 248
"He laid me down on the bed beneath him and his lips broke from mine as I pushed out of my jeans. Between us, his fingertips ran down my breasts, tracing the line of me, until they were trailing over my stomach. My hips." - Spells For Forgetting, Page 287
"I held my breath as his touch moved over my thighs, between my legs, and when his fingers slipped into my underwear, a long, heavy exhale escaped his lips. I drank it in until I was filled with it. He watched me as my back arched and I bit down hard on my bottom lip, a small sound escaped my throat." - Spells For Forgetting, Page 287
"His eyes traveled over my face before his fingers hooked into the band of my underwear, sliding over my hips. I pulled at the buttons of his jeans, pushing them down until I could feel his warm skin against my hands. - Spells For Forgetting, Page 288
"He came low to kiss my collar bone his lips finding the peak of my breast. His mouth moved over me, leaving a trail of cold on my skin in the sharp winter air. I didn't want to wait anymore. I didn't want to wait for another second. I wrapped my arms around his neck and his hands caught my legs, pulling them up around him. His forehead pressed to mine and when he pushed inside me, I wanted to cry, the relief of it like a wave I was drowning in. August's mouth pressed to my throat as he leaned his weight into me and he groaned..." - Spells For Forgetting, Page 288
Word Count
47- spells
28- magic (dark magic, wielding magic)
26- shit
25- fuck
14- god (goddamn, godforsaken, oh my god)
12- bastard
8- damn
8- pregnant
9- curse
5- witch
5- breast
3- summon
3- Jesus
2- sex
1- whoreNote: This title is classified as an Adult book, not a YA (Young Adult) book.
Book #2
'Song of Silver, Flame Like Night" on Canyon ISD UPDATED purchase list
"Meditation is best achieved while sitting and shedding one's awareness of the physical world around us." - Song Of Silver, Flame Like Night, pg 117
"The makeup of demonic and other spiritual energies was strictly only yin, resulting in yin energy's synonymity with the dark and occult side of magic over time." - Song Of Silver, Flame Like Night, pg 223
"Demonic practitioners were prone to losing control and allowing a demon to control their bodies." - Song Of Silver, Flame Like Night, pg 293
"They tortured me for information on demonic bindings. The way it works is...once a demon makes a bargain with you, its interests become aligned with you. It will do anything to keep you alive in order to ensure that it receives its end of the bargain. And so...I couldn't die, no matter how much I wished it." - Song Of Silver, Flame Like Night, pg 231
"Emotions and thoughts warred within him, the lines between his thoughts and his Demon God's thoughts blurring." - Song Of Silver, Flame Like Night, pg 328
Word Count
2 - b*tch
4- sh*t
1- occult
8- curse
31- spell
48- ghost
51- summoning
10- conjure
10- meditation
82- spirit (evil spirit, spiritual energy, supernatural spirit)
103- death
189- magic
266- god
398- demon (demonic energies, demonic gods, demonology, lots and lots of demons)
Note: We did not find anything sexually explicit in the book with our quick look, but we did find it very concerning that it included so much about demons and demonic everything. Focus on the Family continues to post about the rise of children moving into atheism, the occult and becoming witches (Wiccans). 398 is the highest word count of any word on our list that we have ever found in a title. How many demons does it take to make "educationally suitable"?
Book #3
'Tasting Light : ten science fiction stories to rewire your perceptions" on Canyon ISD UPDATED purchase list
Book description on Amazon:
Book description on spreadsheet for parents presented by Cameron Rosser:
The Canyon ISD book description only included the first 2 sentences. Wonder why the rest got cut off?
Please note there are several short stories from numerous authors within this one book.
"Legally, they cannot deny Cadence gender affirming services." - Tasting Light, pg 16
"I'm non-binary. It was a gender thing for me. I don't care about mods otherwise." "Oh." Now Aaliyah feels bad for dragging them out of the closet. "Is that a problem?" Cadence presses. "No. Of course not. I'm queer as hell. So was she." - Tasting Light, pg 25-26
"I brought up the idea of cutting my hair a couple weeks ago, after I told me folks I didn't feel my gender fit me." - Tasting Light, pg 48
"One byproduct of the Melanitis plague was an increase in white fragility."- Tasting Light, pg 51
"Especially because suddenly all of these privileged white people are beginning to become melanated in unpredictable ways and gentrifying Blackness." - Tasting Light, pg 54
"You wanna be seen as a down white woman, but then also slide your rich privilege on the low?' - Tasting Light, pg 57
"F*ck," I gasped, putting my mask back on quickly." - Tasting Light, pg 142
"You will cry in the shower, where it makes sense. Underage sex will be encouraged, because underage marriage will be encouraged..." - Tasting Light, pg 257
"A month later, you will find out you are pregnant. A month later, you will wander the alleys of South Philadelphia, asking where to find the doctor. It will be all you know how to say, and you won't even know why you're there, but eventually you will be escorted into a small basement room. Two women will treat you. They will know precisely where to make incisions. "We couldn't get the smiling one out, but hopefully you can feel now," they will say when it's over. TheBigFinger / Nell Cruz is part of you. You will instantly want to cry. You will put your hand on your belly. You will feel real joy. And then relief. And then dread. It's harder this way, but worth it." - Tasting Light, pg 258
Word Count for "Tasting Light"
17- gender
5- queer
2- binary/nonbinary
1- pronouns
11- fortune teller
9- ass
8- f*ck
1- d*ck
6- sh*t
4- god
3- damn
3- sex
7- pregnant
1- dyke
1- demonic
1- naked
3- privilege
2- negros
19- FAN (fake ass negro)
2- RAN (real ass negro)
Book #4
'The Gathering Dark" on Canyon ISD UPDATED purchase list
The Gathering Dark has 10 authors. Everyone lists their pronouns in their bios on the end of the book. 1 identifies as trans, 1 as queer and 1 says she writes "queer mysteries about lonely places and lonely girls."
Erica Waters, one of the authors of 'The Gathering Dark', touts about being a 'queer young adult dark' author on twitter.
Aden Polydoros, one of the authors of 'The Gathering Dark', identifies as transgender on her twitter page. Aden displays her scars from having her breasts cut off on her twitter profile and assures her readership that she is "not mutilated".
But never mind the authors, let's get back to the actual book.... there is a content warning on the first page of the book.....
"The indignity of her long-term boyfriend cheating with the girl who'd told Jules she was too chubby for cheerleading in seventh grade and outed her to the team as bi during freshman year could only be compounded by him not bothering to use proper grammar while he did it. Jules hated beer, but she took a sip anyway. Next to her, Lanie was on her third. Her parents were heavy drinkers, and she'd been pilfering from their stash since middle school. Jules hoped she'd stop after three. Drinking made her mean." - The Gathering Dark, pg 71
"Apparently, there was a young girl practicing witchcraft in town, and it caused all kinds of problems." - The Gathering Dark, pg 167
"I was a witch. They weren't wrong." Elle's fingertips twitch at her sides now. "I still am I suppose. My friends and I held hands in the trees, danced naked, waited for the Devil at the stroke of midnight. We loved each other more than we loved this ugly little town. We wanted to be part of something bigger." - The Gathering Dark, pg 173
"The truth was, I couldn't see myself living beyond twenty-five, or thirty maybe. Figured one day I'd blow my brains out or make a sharp turn on the I-27, plow right into a cement wall." - The Gathering Dark, pg 184
"For the third and final time, we whispered "Bloody Mary." Seconds later, Quinn started screaming. What's going on?" Gabe shouted. ....They called it a brain aneurysm, just a vessel in Quinn's head that had sprung a leak at the perfect moment, flooding all his brain's twisted little passageways with blood until it gushed from his ears and nose. An aneurysm. While we were waiting for an ambulance, he died with his head resting in Sarah's lap."- The Gathering Dark, pg 187
"I don't remember it well anymore --it's more of a feeling, an idea of what happened, like watching it happen to someone else --but the guy in the restroom, he asked me if I liked trucks, said that he drive them for a living. That if I was good, he'd sit me down in his big shiny red truck and let me honk its horn. And it's all I have of him except, you know, the memory of what he did. And I mean, it wasn't even that bad what he did, you know? He didn't---" My voice caught in my throat like a clot of phlegm. I couldn't. say it. "He didn't do that. Was just a minute or two, and it was just a little rubbing and feel, but ---but f*ck, I was seven." - The Gathering Dark, pg 199
Word Count:
13- f*ck
4- b*tch
16- sh*t
5- ass
3- screw (screw you)
2- Jesus
16- god
9- damn
2- demon
11- witch (witchcraft)
3- naked
3- queer
1- bi (short for bisexual)
1- condom
3- drunk
20- beer
2- wine
1- whiskey
9- vodka
2- liquor
1- pissed
2- crap
7- Bloody Mary (summoning dead spirit)
1- suicide
Book #5
"Wade In The Water" on Canyon ISD UPDATED purchase list
Goodreads clearly shows this is an Adult Fiction title.
Amazon review details sexual violence, molestation, trauma, etc.
"She had seen Edgar's thing at school. All the girls in first grade played Show Me: they would run to a boy, tag him, and say, "Show me.' Then the boy would meet the girl behind the school fence and take out his thing and, after she took a look, she would pull down her pants and underwear Sometimes they made a deal to pull down their underwear at the same time. She had seen seven so far, and they all looked like the baby grass snakes she was used to, only smaller and pink. Each time she had said yuck in real revulsion and then pulled down her underwear for them to see how much prettier and tidier she was. She had been disappointed by their reaction so far. They hadn't seemed impressed, and James had looked and looked and finally asked, "Where is it?" - Wade In The Waters, pg 36
She chased him. He was fast, but he was smaller and much skinnier than she was. She caught up to him and pushed him to the ground. Sat on his stomach and pushed those shorts down. Curly didn't struggle, didn't make a sound. Just looked like he had given up, staring helplessly at her with those huge eyes in his tiny face. She pulled on the elastic of his underwear and stared. She was disappointed he wasn't two colors. His thing was just like the rest of him. She got off as he struggled to pull his shorts back up. "Now I have to show you mine, and it's much better than yours," she said, and she pulled her pants down, and just as she started to pull down her underwear, she felt herself yanked with such force off the ground that it felt like she was flying ground that it felt like she was flying ten feet high in the air, and before she could say a word, her left eardrum went dead from the sound that her father emitted..." - Wade In The Waters, pg 38
"She was just like Daddy--she hated those niggers so much she wanted to spit when she saw one . . . and she couldn't go near a church without getting angry."- Wade In The Waters, pg 50
So I added, with some venom, "Leroy tries to touch me all the time."- Wade In The Waters, pg 64
"Luke had kissed me and it was pretty horrible. Then he put his hand up my underwear and took them down and then he got me on the floor and lay on top of me and rocked back and forth, and after a while, he got up and though I wasn't sure what exactly had happened, he said, okay, that was it."- Wade In The Waters, pg 170
"A day later when Leroy put his hands on me, I slapped them away hard. When his shocked eyes met mine, my black-brown eyes stared brazenly back. He grabbed the back of my braids and yanked my head back till I thought it was about to break, but then I kicked out of him. He slapped me and put me in a headlock, bending me half over." - Wade In The Waters, pg 170
"You've had a shock, Ella. Lie still for a while. You're not pregnant. ....Tears of relief flowed down my face. I was still crying when the doctor returned with a glass of water. "How old are you, Ella?" "Twelve," I mumbled. "Have you had your monthly visitor?" I shook my head slowly, no."- Wade In The Waters, pg 176
"Well, have you had sex?" he asked gently. I nodded. "You have?" I muttered, "Only once. And he never even took his thing out of his pants. He said it was a different way of doing it."- Wade In The Waters, pg 177
Word Count
3- ass
3- b*tch
2- sh*t
52- nigger
4- damn
6- sex
3- pregnant
2- whore
3- breast
6- naked
1- pot (smoking pot)
11- drunk
3- beer
8- wine
1- liquor
2- virgin
18- kiss
3- slut
Book #6
"You Wouldn't Dare" on Canyon ISD UPDATED purchase list
"She's wearing an oversized tie-dyed T-shirt that says CLIMATE CHANGE IS REAL on the front and a pair of tattered jean shorts...." - You Wouldn't Dare, pg 7
"Tallulah smirks. "Rich white women doing rich white women sh*t." - You Wouldn't Dare, pg 78
"She broke up with him after Valentine's Day deciding he was too immature, almost directly after they slept together for the first time. Despite the breakup, she says it was pretty romantic-- that he brought freshly cleaned blankets to cover his truck bed and he was really sweet to her." - You Wouldn't Dare, pg 89
"Tallulah takes a long drag of her cigarette, as if every word out of my mouth pains her. She turns to face me like her bones are rusted gears grinding together as she moves. Juniper Nash," she says slowly her voice low, "I have tried to be patient with you. I have given you plenty of chances to not be so f*cking far removed from reality. Sloan was not my friend. We weren't besties. She was my f*cking girlfriend." - You Wouldn't Dare, pg 115 (referring to lesbian relationship)
"My brain is a hetero-normative black hole. And I don't have the excuse of not knowing any better one of my best friends is bi and my godmother is a lesbian. I mean, we're literally on the front porch of a queer couple's house right now."- You Wouldn't Dare, pg 257
26- f*ck
8- d*ck
21- ass
24- sh*t
7- Jesus
40- god
2- damn
4- sex
3- pregnant
1- queer
1- lesbian
8- demon
3- perv (or pervert)
2- bra
1- boob
7- drunk
20- beer
3- wine
3- pissed
86- kiss
Book #7
"At Midnight: 15 Beloved Fairly Tales Reimagined" on Canyon ISD UPDATED purchase list
"When I finally tell my mother I'm trans, I do it over dinner." - At Midnight, pg 96
"I don't feel like a girl," I tell her, hands knotted over my twisting stomach, eyes downcast on the kitchen table. "I'm a boy. My body's just--wrong." - At Midnight, pg 87
"My head is full of gender f*ckery and laughter and wicked smiles, and I just want to go lie down and fantasize for a while." - At Midnight, pg 96
"I have an appointment in my phone's calendar, three weeks from tomorrow, at a Planned Parenthood in Illinois, to talk to someone about starting HRT. " - At Midnight, pg 103
Word Count
34- f*ck
12- ass (half-ass, asshole)
4- b*tch
25- sh*t (shitty, shit-hole, shitshow, shittier, bullshit)
2- Jesus (in vain)
3- damn
2- sexy
1- pregnant
7- queer
6- gender
2- non-binary
3- pronouns
9- trans (trans for transgender, transphobia, transitioning)
5- demon
3- naked
41- witch (witchcraft)
7- drunk
2- beer
24- wine
1- vodka
1- slut (slutty)
4- pissed
1- porn (torture porn)
1- Planned Parenthood
1- strzyga (is usually female demon similar to a vampire)
Testimony from 04/17/2023 Canyon ISD Board Meeting. More public comment testimonies available here.
It is important to note that the above list is not all of the harmful materials. There are many more concerning titles that we did not have the time to review.
The first question any community should ask is who selected these titles? Was it the high school librarians as indicated from the public information request (PIR) in the first purchase list (Hannah Bailey, Rachel Hall, Joshua Wilson)? It would not be surprising considering some of the existing titles available in our libraries, as well as in the new high school. Was it Lisa Hill, Director of Literacy & Instruction, and Assistant Superintendent, Cameron Rosser? At some point, Superintendent Darryl Flusche has to take FULL responsibility for the lack of vetting.
Parents have been fighting sexually explicit, harmful materials in Canyon ISD since fall of 2020. It is clear that neither the Canyon ISD Superintendent, Darryl Flusche, nor his current administration will enforce the guidelines set forth by the board. It is also obvious that the current board of trustees did not review the new book purchase list prior to it being sent out for public review.
Canyon ISD, like a lot of Texas boards, requires board representation that will ask the hard questions, research, and follow through with tenacity to ensure minors are protected from obscene and educationally, unsuitable content. Canyon ISD has four board positions on the May 6th, 2023 ballot. A majority, conservative win could be the first step in changing the trajectory of Canyon schools and protecting children.
Resources:
The original purchase list (released Jan 2023) posted by Canyon ISD.
A copy of the document (in case Canyon removes the original). Note: there is added data where parents made notes.
Specific harmful books on the original purchase list that have book reviews completed or we have gathered information on.
Our blog entitled Canyon ISD 2023 Book Purchase List Full of Obscenities
The 2nd UPDATED purchase list (Cameron's link).
A copy of the second book purchase list (released March 2023; in case Canyon removed the original) with our notes on right hand side.
See also "Canyon ISD | All Related Blogs".
Canyon policy EFB(local).
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