LOS ANGELES — No matter where it is, the cheerful Rainbow Book Bus always attracts attention.

Inside the bus is a mobile collection of queer books, from love stories to titles for kids, with a mission to bring books to communities that book bans have hardest hit. 

The American Library Association reported that around 4,240 books were banned in 2023. For the Rainbow Book Bus' Co-founder and Director of Operations, Chris Kapell, that's an issue for the queer community.

"Right now, there is a crisis of book fans happening all across the country. Unfortunately, a lot of those book bans disproportionately affect books containing LGBT themes and specifically books for young people," Kappel said. 

So they took an old school bus and a bit of magic and devised a colorful solution. 

"The bus was founded with this idea that if you're going to lose access to these books because legislatures in these regions want to take them off the shelves, we're going to show up with a big, fabulous rainbow book bus and give them away for free," Kappel said.  

This year, the bus went on a cross-country tour, giving away over 7,000 banned LGBTQ+ books.

And like the bus, every detail was designed to represent. 

You can find out more at rainbowbookbus.org.