There's a story on the New York Times web site today about the Brooklyn Public Library's response to book challenges. The story mentions my book Looking for Alaska in passing:

"The 11 written objections to Brooklyn’s collection include complaints about “Beloved,” by Toni Morrison (sexual content), and “Looking for Alaska,” by John Green (obscenity and denigration of religion)."

First, let me just say what a pleasure it is to appear in the same sentence as Nobel laureate Toni Morrison. Anyway, the coolest thing about the story is that the Times reprints the complaint letters and the library's responses.

Everyone who has to deal with challenges should take the time to page through those documents, because I think the library's response is pitch perfect. They don't try to argue that Alaska isn't obscene (although it isn't) or that it doesn't denigrate religion (although it doesn't*); instead they just point out that lots of people feel the book has literary value and that libraries aren't in the business of being parents. Amen.

Also, this complaint letter about Beloved is totally worth reading because it begins, "It said stuff about [word blacked out] cows," and it is fun to imagine what that word might be.



*This of course I find particularly galling, obviously. But it's not the library's job to defend the religious cred of the book, or to defend it against charges of obscenity. That's my job.