As If! Authors Support Intellectual Freedom

By John Coy

Recently, I had a disheartening and eye-opening experience. I appeared at a suburban Minneapolis bookstore for the last half of a discussion of my young adult novel BOX OUT. The teachers and librarians assembled spoke positively about the book and liked Liam Bergstrom, the main character, who’s brought up to the high school varsity and encounters a coach who is leading team prayer.

Days later, however, I received an email from someone who had been there for the whole discussion. She said that although she didn’t enjoy sports, she really liked BOX OUT. She thought it would be a great book for eighth and ninth graders and was sad to hear media specialists say that they could not put it on their middle school library shelves because of the mention of lesbianism.

What?

Nobody had hinted at this to me, so I emailed some of the other participants to find out what had happened. In true “Minnesota Nice” fashion, the teachers and librarians had decided not to say anything negative while I was present in order to avoid confrontation. And yes, a number of public school media specialists said they would not¬–and COULD NOT–put the book on their middle school libraries because of the presence of a lesbian character in a story about contemporary high school students. The consensus among them was that, “Someone might object and it’s not worth it to fight with parents.”

In talking with more people in the field, I’ve discovered that for many middle school media specialists the inclusion of a gay or lesbian character is enough to keep a book out of their library. “Those are the books the public library can put on their shelves,” one librarian said. Vicki Palmquist of Children’s Literature Network said, “Media specialists are losing their jobs right and left and in between. They aren’t going to rock their own boat.”

So here are three questions for you:

Have you encountered this ban on books with lesbian and gay characters in middle school libraries?
What message do we send students when one group’s existence is not allowed in the books in these libraries?
And what should we do about it?

Does Sarah Palin believe in the First Amendment?


From The New York Times:

"Shortly after becoming mayor, former city officials and Wasilla residents said, Ms. Palin approached the town librarian about the possibility of banning some books, though she never followed through and it was unclear which books or passages were in question.

Anne Kilkenny, a Democrat who said she attended every City Council meeting in Ms. Palin’s first year in office, said Ms. Palin brought up the idea of banning some books at one meeting. 'They were somehow morally or socially objectionable to her,' Ms. Kilkenny said.

The librarian, Mary Ellen Emmons, pledged to 'resist all efforts at censorship,' Ms. Kilkenny recalled. Ms. Palin fired Ms. Emmons shortly after taking office but changed course after residents made a strong show of support. Ms. Emmons, who left her job and Wasilla a couple of years later, declined to comment for this article.

In 1996, Ms. Palin suggested to the local paper, The Frontiersman, that the conversations about banning books were 'rhetorical.'"

(Full article at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/03/us/politics/03wasilla.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=palin%20library%20censor&st=cse&oref=slogin)

And from The Boston Herald:

"Palin told the Daily News back then the letters were just a test of loyalty as she took on the mayor’s job, which she’d won from three-term mayor John Stein in a hard-fought election."

( http://www.bostonherald.com/news/national/politics/2008/view.bg?articleid=1117009&format=email)

The reports surfacing online and in print media about Governor Sarah Palin’s actions while acting as mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, 12 years ago led me to consider other, possibly pertinent revelations about the new Republican Party vice presidential candidate. For instance, she is a strong supporter of abstinence-only education and is opposed to comprehensive sex education in schools, despite numerous studies proving the ineffectiveness of the former compared with the latter. As Vice President of the U.S., would Ms. Palin work not only to continue to block funding for comprehensive sex education programs, as our current administration does, but also attempt to remove sex education literature from public schools and libraries?

We don’t know which books Ms. Palin had in mind when she asked Ms. Emmons to consider removing some from Wasilla’s library. We do know, however, that Ms. Palin doesn’t believe global warming is the result of human activity. Would she try to have books on global warming purged from our nation’s libraries?

In her speech on September 3rd at the Republican National Convention, Ms. Palin belittled Senator Obama’s work as a community organizer in South Chicago. Would she then, if she becomes our nation’s V.P., attempt to remove from all libraries any tomes that describe the historic movements that have changed our world—for the better, I think she’d agree—movements that owe their roots, their momentum, and much of their ultimate success to community organizing efforts? I’m talking about the labor movement, the gay rights movement, the environmental movement, and the one that allows Ms. Palin to be where she is today, the women’s movement, with suffrage at the top of its agenda.

Ms. Palin said she attempted to fire Ms. Emmons to test the librarian’s loyalty—to Ms. Palin, I presume. If Ms. Palin becomes our next presidential Vice President, I hope that in the realm of public libraries and their collections, she remembers where her own loyalties should lie: with our Constitution’s First Amendment, and with the policies and guidelines of the American Library Association.

—Deborah Davis

 

posted by Jordan Sonnenblick

A new Indiana law meant to target "adult" stores has booksellers up in arms -- and rightly so. The law, according to Indystar.com, "requires businesses that sell sexually explicit material to pay a $250 fee and register with the secretary of state, which would then pass the information to municipal or county officials so they can monitor the businesses for potential violations of local ordinances."

Here are links to two articles that explain the issue way better than I could:

http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080325/NEWS/80325063

http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6544559.html?nid=2286&source=title&rid=1113427106

The whole thing is just so . . . Orwellian. Here at AS IF!, we are accustomed to individuals taking potshots at free expression, but usually the laws are on the side of free speech. When the government itself is the censoring agent, I get scared.

Really scared.

Aside from the blatant constitutional problem in this case, there's another angle. Independent bookstores are hugely important to the health of America's intellectual and literary life, and existing booksellers are already closing faster than new ones open. A $250 licensing fee for new stores (not to mention the ominous spectre of Big Brother) might just be enough to stop potential entrepreneurs from opening bookstores in Indiana.

             - Posted by Jordan Sonnenblick 

Perry Township, IN teacher Connie Heermann was suspended for allowing her high school students to read FREEDOM WRITERS DIARY. The book is a collection of essays from high school students who give candid looks at their lives, fears and hopes. It deals with violence, homelessness, racism, abuse and other topics that this group of urban California students lived with.

The school board had originally taken a motion to severe her contract with the school, but later changed it to an unpaid suspension until the end of the 2008 -2009 school year. Heermann, who has taught for 27-years, was charged with insubordination. Her supervisor was unhappy with the language and content in the book and asked her to stop using it in the classroom, even though her students had signed permission slips.

At an earlier public hearing, Heermann had many supporters, including Californian Erin Gruwell who's students wrote the FREEDOM WRITERS DIARY.

For a teacher to punished for encouraging her students to read about real-life issues is a scary thought. What we at AF IF! would like to know is, was it really insubordination at issue or the book itself?

For more information, check out these links:

http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2008803250366

http://www.wthr.com/Global/story.asp?S=8060931&nav=9Tai

Posted by Lisa Yee

A Guest Blog by Jo Whittemore

A complaint by a Vancouver resident has led to the discontinuation of the Scholastic book club program in Vancouver schools. Yet, the complaint wasn’t with the program itself, but one of the books carried in the Scholastic catalog: The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman.

The legal counsel for the school district says the objection to the book’s perceived anti-Christian theme raised a “whole other different issue.” This issue is that “district policy prohibits (the schools) from promoting for-profit businesses.”
What about the candy bars or wrapping paper that kids sell to go on field trips to museums? Those fundraising companies get a cut of the profits. Do the Vancouver schools plan on discontinuing those educational ventures as well? Or will they wait until someone objects to the museum’s History of Evolution display and then use the “district’s policy” as an excuse to appease one narrow mind?

Because that’s what I believe it comes down to. One person’s opinion on one book is shaping the future of so many others.

The responsibility of running the Scholastic sales in Vancouver has been passed to the parent teacher associations, but this only brings to light the economic disparity between various schools. Some have parents who can afford to help out, while others lack the support necessary to keep the program going. Still other schools are posting sales on their campus websites, but many students come from lower-income families who don’t have credit cards or easy access to the Internet.

Parents are frustrated by the removal of the Scholastic book club program, and rightly so. It can be difficult to get a child to read, but when they see the colorful catalogs and hear their classmates discussing their favorite picks, they get excited and place an order, too. That’s how some readers come to be; they are nurtured in a school environment.

This is made even more complicated when there are no books in the classroom to read, since several schools stock their classrooms with free books they’ve earned from Scholastic book club sales. If you want to talk about a butterfly effect, this is it.
So, who benefits from taking reading opportunities from our students and revenue opportunities from our schools? No one.

Please, Vancouver school district. Surely, in your policy you can make a loophole for literacy.

 

posted by Jordan Sonnenblick

Gee, I thought everything was happening south of the Canadian border, eh? But no it's happening up here, too. Whatever you Americans do, we can do better. : ) First up, the banning/pulling from shelves/or hiding on the back shelf of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials. Read about it here: CBC News Story Or Here: Toronto Star News Story. Since I've waxed on about the reasons why this shouldn't be banned/pulled from the shelves previously, I won't bore you all again.

And now for something completely...well the same. Here's a dastardly article by Susan Juby in The Globe and Mail about banning books: Click right here, eh? This modest proposal suggests iris scanning, wire cages and fingerprinting to prevent children from reading some of the salacious materials available in libraries.

Happy Grey Cup celebrations, fellow Canucks (Go Riders). Happy Thanksgiving to all of you down south. And everyone else around the world, just have a happy day. Read a book. It won't hurt you.*

Cheers,
Arthur Slade
*Unless it's Harry Potter VI and you drop it on your foot.

I thought that the book bannings were over for the season, that Christmas was about to raise its red capped head and people would all be happy and joyous and, well, Christmassy. One big BAH HUMBUG was delivered to the writing world in Medford. Just read this article in the Burlington County Times. The Burn Journals, is a non-fiction book by Brent Runyon which relates his experiences as a suicidal 14-year-old who set himself on fire. No holds barred. A true tale told well which received a starred review from Booklist. But from John Biesz, a parent from Medford, the review was a bit more caustic: "There should be a warning on the book that says it's a piece of garbage." Now, parents are supposed to have opinions. Everyone should have an opinion! What's completely ridiculous about this story is that the school actually sent the book home with a permission slip--they did everything they could to prevent controversy and still this parent is upset and feels "This stuff should never make it into our schools." It would be terrible if people learned about the reality of being a mixed-up teen, wouldn't it? They might learn empathy or maybe understanding. Biesz wants the book removed from the school. I think there are only two words that can sum that up: Bah humbug!

Arthur Slade

What?!?!

A Texas teacher could face criminal charges for handing a book to a student that her parents deemed inappropriate for a 9th grader.

The book, Cormic McCarthy's CHILD OF GOD, is described this way on amazon.com . . . "In this taut, chilling novel, Lester Ballard--a violent, dispossessed man falsely accused of rape--haunts the hill country of East Tennessee when he is released from jail. While telling his story, Cormac McCarthy depicts the most sordid aspects of life with dignity, humor, and characteristic lyrical brilliance."

Texas Penal Code 43.24 prohibits selling, distributing or displaying harmful material to a minor. Since it is alleged that the teacher placed the "harmful material" in the hands of a student, he may be subject to a Class A misdemeanor, which under Texas law is punishable by up to one year in county jail and/or a fine up to $4,000.

What is happening? Can this be for real? It was not required reading, yet the teacher could get jail time?

What do you think about this?

For the complete story, as reported by the Abilene Online ReporterNews, click here.

Oh, and ever since the hoopla, the book has been sold out in stores all over town.

Novelist and memoirist Diana Abu-Jaber visited the college where I teach yesterday where she told us the story of her recent experience with a high school in Texas. The parents of three students objected to the teaching of her novel, Crescent, which has been praised for, among other things, presenting Iraqi-American characters "as real people."

This wasn't what bothered the parents, though. Rather, it was the presence of four paragraphs of sexual content.

The principal at the school ordered the teachers to stop teaching the book. The teachers protested and were offered a compromise: black out the four offending paragraphs and you can still teach the book. The teachers asked Abu-Jaber's permission to do so, arguing that while they were loathe to succumb to such pressure, they felt that there was so much else to be gained from this book, they hoped she would understand and assent to the practice.

As she considered the bargain, Abu-Jaber consulted with writers and "publishing people." The writers were adamant in their insistence that she say no. The publishing people, and even her own husband urged her to accept the compromise.

In the end, she came up with a compromise of her own. She would not give her permission, but she would not stand in the way if the teachers themselves wanted to do the blacking out. And if they did choose to black out the paragraphs and continue teaching Crescent, she would post the excised text on her web site.

Here's the story, straight from Diana Abu-Jaber's website:

Awful as censorship is, I’d always thought there was a reassuring familiarity about banned books—Huck Finn, To Kill A Mockingbird, Lolita—classics powerful enough to frighten people into wanting to silence them.

After all, isn’t that’s what censorship is all about—fear—of controversy, sexuality, difference, of questioning the status quo?

Then I received a sensitive, beautifully-written email from Texas. It was from a high school teacher, informing me that my novel, Crescent, had been banned from her school due to the objections of the parents of three students over the sexual content of four paragraphs in the book.

Her principal was behind the ban, but after teachers protested he offered a compromise. This is an excerpt from the teacher’s letter:

“If we obtain your permission to black out the four offending paragraphs … we are allowed to include the book in our curriculum….I am willing to ask you to do the unthinkable – will you allow us to mark through these four paragraphs in the interest of introducing a discussion of a culture so frequently demonized and belittled in our part of the country? Will you help me bring into a politically conservative community a sympathetic view of Iraq and Iraqi people?”

And so, after much thought and much asking-for-advice, I thought I’d share the response I gave the teacher:

October 2, 2007

Thanks so much for your thoughtful and insightful email. I've spent several days considering your question.

Ultimately, I find that I can't condone your principal's offer to censor my novel in order to make it more acceptable. That said, you do have my permission, to do what you think is right for your students.

In a strange way, I suppose, I think this discussion is an encouraging thing. I find it fascinating that, in our culture of war, macabre violence, and shocking cinema, a literary novel could still carry enough of an impact as to make someone want to silence it.

My husband pointed out that censors are always with us, determining the limits of morality and conventions, in every source of art and information, from books to film to music. He argues, along with you, that it’s better to allow students to read some of a book—indeed most of a book—rather than none at all.

Even though I see the excellent sense of this argument, I couldn’t find a way to feel right about crossing out text. I became a writer in large part because I felt like I couldn’t otherwise make my voice heard. To agree to blackening out such passages feels like colluding in my own silencing.

I once had a debate with a student from Saudi Arabia. I’d complained to him that the problem with America was that nothing was sacred. He’d laughed at me and said, on the contrary, that the great thing about America was that nothing was sacred.

I worry, though, that the American problem is that the wrong things are sacred.

I won’t belabor pointing out the obvious irony of blacking out scenes of love-making in a book that’s concerned with the depiction and the violence of unjust wars and dictatorship. We all already know this—in America, love gets bleeped, the violence stays. The two main characters in Crescent are in love, the few sexual passages in the book are far from graphic. Indeed, the scenes in which they cook and eat together are nearly just as suggestive as the contested passages.

But a friend, upon hearing about this debate, postulated that the real reason the students’ parents are upset is because the book gives a human face to Arab Muslim people.

That might be the part of this that unnerves me the most – and like so many forms of subtle discrimination and racism, we’ll never really know if that’s the case or not. The people who want the book banned may not even be entirely conscious of it themselves.

So I thank you for giving me the chance to think out loud a little about such an important issue. If you decide to proceed with blacking out hte passages, I'll be happy to post the offending text on my website, so those students who might be curious, can decide for themselves if they'd like to see what the fuss is about.

Please feel free to share my response with your principal, the parents, and even with your students. It’s a wonderful object lesson in the free and open exchange of ideas vs. book banning, especially during this, Banned Books Week.

With great respect for wonderful teachers, like yourself,

Diana Abu-Jaber

Well, the attacks on Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials

are about to begin in earnest. There have been several controversies about the books since they first appeared on store shelves, but now that they are set to be released as movies, certain organizations are getting up in arms. Someone might actually see the movie! And after that they might read the book!
To quote the Catholic League's press release: “We are fighting a deceitful stealth campaign on the part of the film’s producers. Our goal is to educate Christians so that they know exactly what the film’s pernicious agenda really is.” A pernicious agenda? A deceitful stealth campaign? Pullman's trilogy was, apparently, "written to promote atheism and denigrate Christianity, especially Roman Catholicism. The target audience is children and adolescents." This is what my ol' philosophy prof used to call an “appeal to fear.” If you see the movie, then read the book, soon everyone and their children will be an atheist.
Now, full disclosure here, I'm a happy agnostic sitting on the fence, swinging my feet. I have no ax to grind with the Catholic church. In fact I’ve always been impressed by classes I’ve spoken to in the Catholic school system. It appears to me to be a church that values intellectual debate. That’s partly why the press release was so shocking to me. The difficulty with it and the corresponding video is that it denigrates the book and authors in general. His Dark Materials is a story, plain and simple. It is inspired by Paradise Lost and uses Christian elements to tell the STORY. Pullman is an atheist (actually if you want to know more of his beliefs read the interview with the The Literary Review) and he is writing from his own point of view. That’s his right as an artist. As an individual or a parent, make your own choice on whether you want to read these books or whether you want your children to read them. A group or organization that speaks with one voice attempting to blot out other views of the universe, that’s a problem. Can artists only write books that are supportive (or at the least, not offensive) towards Christianity?

Philip Pullman's own words on the agenda of the book are: "The problem for those who think there's an anti-religious anti-moral bias in the books comes when they haven't actually read the books: of course there's a criticism of organised theocratic tyrannical religion but who can disagree with that?" I’ve read the books. I felt the church he was criticizing was more the church of the 15th Century (or Inquisition times) than the modern church. If you want to see Pullman debate with the Archbishop of Canterbury visit this link.

(If you look close you can see Pullman's horns).

I do tire of arguments that use the “children” as the flag to wave to rally the troops. We don't want the children tainted. They must be protected. God forbid we let them read an imaginative book and then discuss it with them. How about we try not to limit their imaginations? Children are hardy. Their minds are questing for information about the universe around them. Give it to them. Don’t lock up their minds in a trunk.

As a final point I found it interesting that the League made sure to call Pullman a militant English atheist. There’s some incite-full language. No one likes militants (they use suicide bombs, right?). Atheists are to be feared. And finally, he's English! He's an outsider. Don't trust him. He probably drinks tea.

 

 Banned Books Week, the annual celebration designed to call attention to the ongoing censorship of books, takes place this year from September 29th throughOctober 6th. And wouldn't you know? Lots of AS IF! authors will be participating in events all over the country.

Here's a little video preview of a Chicago event with two of our members, Carolyn Mackler and Chris Crutcher:



Join Carolyn and Christ in Chicago at the Pioneer Plaza (on Michigan Ave between the Tribune Tower and the Chicago River) on Saturday, September 29, 2007, from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m.!

For those interested in GLBTQ teen lit, there are two terrific new blogs reviewing older and new titles, and both with great names: I'm Here, I'm Queer, What the Hell do I Read? and Worth the Trip (a referece to I'll Get There. It Better Be Worth the Trip, the world's first gay teen novel, which came out in 1969).

Also, in other GLBTQ teen lit news, Kimberly Pauley is in the midst of LGBT Teen Lit Month over at YA Books Central. But when she posted the news on a teachers' forum, she got a very depressing reaction. Read about her experiences here.

 Is there something in the air? Another AS IF! member is under fire for a book she's written. This time, it's Ellen Wittlinger and her wonderful and wonderfully thought-provoking young adult novel, Sandpiper. A teenager in Alabama checked it out from her school library, and was so offended by the book's content that she decided, with the support of her grandmother, that she wasn't going to ever turn it in again.

Alas, this is a very common tactic on the part of book censors, so I hope this teenager doesn't think she's being particularly clever. These folks seem to think that by destroying public property, they're "protecting" society from some nefarious "evil"; we at AS IF! think they're depriving others of the fundamental right to decide for themselves what books they want to read and striking at the very heart of what it means to be an American--and that they're stealing to boot.

You say "potato," I say "potahto."

But why am I blathering on when we have the oh-so-eloquent Ellen Wittlinger to tell us exactly what she thinks about all of this?

I was surprised at just how chilling it was to read in the Tuscaloosa News that a fifteen-year-old girl, Lysa Harding, and her grandmother were calling my novel, Sandpiper, “offensive” and “sick.” I know that there are people in this country who, in the name of religion, feel high school students should be kept as ignorant of sex as possible, but I was shocked that the girl herself was equally afraid of knowledge.

Lysa says, “At my high school they teach abstinence and no sex before marriage, but then all the book is teaching is how to do those things.” Which tells me that she didn’t read past page two on which there is one paragraph, six lines, describing the protagonist’s take on oral sex. The last line of the paragraph is, “It’s like I’m not even there anymore.” Hardly a recommendation or a how-to guide. This is the only sex in the book except for a near-rape at the end, also not an advertisement for early promiscuity.

The reason I wrote a book on this subject to begin with was because I kept hearing about middle-school girls who were very blasé about oral sex. They didn’t think of it as “real” sex. They also didn’t enjoy it much, but it was becoming a cool thing to do. It seemed like a worthy topic to tackle in a book, but I knew if I set it in a middle-school I’d have lots of parents upset with me, so I made my protagonist a fifteen high school girl, an age at which there are probably very few students who have never heard of oral sex.

Of course, the bottom-line, as always, is that Lysa Harding didn’t have to read the book if she didn’t want to. But there are no doubt other students who do want to read it and she should not be able to decide what anyone else can or cannot read.

And if you're reading this, Lysa, please know that among the 86 members of AS IF!, there are almost certainly some of your favorite authors (definitely some of mine!). Be aware that virtually all of us, including these authors of the books that have inspired and enchanted you your whole life, are saddened by your actions.

AS IF! member, J.L. Powers, recently had run-in with a sort-of censorship with her first book, The Confessional, when she was de-invited to speak at a Catholic high school in Northern California where she had previously been scheduled. The controversy resulted after a parent complained that the book did not reflect "Catholic principles."

We asked J.L. to write her thoughts on the matter:

Like any young adult writer would be, I am dismayed that THE CONFESSIONAL has been publicly described as harmful to young adults and that there would be an attempt, so soon after its release, to censor it. But I always knew that I was dealing with topics that would make some people very uncomfortable: racism, violence, homosexuality, and religion. Any one of these topics alone could make some people nervous, but I tackle all of them in one book.

Yet to silence a discussion about these issues, or to try to prevent young people from having access to materials about them, is incredibly short sighted. The former judge who pushed to have the event canceled and the book banned stated that Cathedral High School's motto is "enter to learn" and "leave to serve." If students really are entering to learn and leaving to serve, then why would the school have so little faith in their intellectual and moral capacity to discern what is true and what is right?

The school's assumption that it is building the leaders of tomorrow should certainly cultivate a certain level of trust in their students' abilities. Setting aside the fact that the characters in THE CONFESSIONAL learn to take personal responsibility for their own actions, to forgive people who hurt them, and to do the right thing no matter how much it costs--all values that it is difficult to imagine could be condemned by anyone--I would ask this former judge: Is one book truly capable of demolishing years of intellectual and moral education? As powerful as I believe the written word to be, I am not convinced that any single book has that level of power. I am flattered that he thinks my book does!

Regardless, I do hope THE CONFESSIONAL has a distinct social and moral currency: that the young people who read it will take heart as they undergo similar struggles to claim their identities and to stand up for what they believe in. That is, I think, what any young adult writer hopes that their books will achieve

Does the school have the right to cancel Powers' talk? Absolutely. In doing so, are they doing the right thing? Almost certainly not. Here at AS IF!, we believe that disputes and controversies are almost always best solved through dialogue and debate. And the idea that teenagers in a learning environment must be "protected" from certain ideas, especially when those ideas are presented in a thoughtful manner? As authors of books for teens, we find that condescending and offensive.

Aha, the press has uncovered the "bazoongas" story. In other words this is the continuing saga of the banning of Nikki Tate's Trouble on Tarragon book.

Edmonton Journal

Saskatoon Star Phoenix

Alas, the press can't resist a few jokes about the topic (nor could I for that matter). But the actual reasons for banning this book are, well, even more ludicrous. Here's what the principal says are the reasons behind the "screening" of the book: "In this case, the book was screened and was found to be not suitable for addition to Elizabeth School's library because of the language used in the bullying scene in question, he said.
"Do you work from the assumption that everything that is published automatically is guaranteed a spot in a school library until it's removed? And then if something doesn't make it on the shelves you call it censorship?" said Parohl."
So it's only censorship after you put it on the shelf then take it off? But if you choose not to put the book on the shelf at all that is just "screening." Ah, I see. This book has been nominated for three awards. And who were the people who put together those lists of nominees? Librarians. How dare they put a books with interesting stories on their awards lists!

This is really a laugh and cry story. I mean what's so offensive about the word "bazoongas"? It's not even a real swear word.

Art