Title: Drama
Author: Raina Telgemeier
Challenged in: Mount Pleasant, Texas
Because: includes LGBT characters, sexually explicit, offensive political viewpoint
This graphic novel is about a seventh grade girl named Callie who’s on the stage crew of her middle school drama club. She also has a crush on a cute boy, but he later reveals that he’s gay. She builds a cool cannon that shoots confetti for the show, and attends the 8th grade dance. It’s pretty slice-of-life and even a little bit banal. The illustrations are super cute, though, and I like Callie’s passion for set design. It’s shelved in our teen section because the main character is in 7th grade, but apparently Scholastic recommends it for ages 8 and up, judging from a lot of one star reviews on Amazon about how MY CHILD IS TOO YOUNG TO KNOW ABOUT THIS. I assume they mean kissing since that’s as ~explicit~ as this book gets. I also assume the same parent was scandalized at the end of any fairy tale and tells her kid that sleeping beauty was awoken by the prince clearing his throat loudly.
This is “sexually explicit”?
Plus at least the two or three kisses in this book are consensual. Which is more than you can say for a lot of fairy tales, actually.
Naturally, the real reason this book was challenged is because it posits a middle school where gay people exist and they’re treated like anyone else. What an “offensive political viewpoint”.
Previously: 2017 Banned Books Week
Next: This One Summer
How little must be going on in these fragile adult babies’ lives that they feel compelled to challenge a book like this