Most Challenged Books of 2004

The ALA has released its list of the most challenged books of the year. Maybe I've mentioned how sick of fundie moralizers I am; maybe I haven't. Not to put too fine a point on it, but I'm sick of fundie moralizers. The majority of challenged books are for teens, and four of the top ten most challenged books deal with themes of homosexuality. Incidentally, one of them, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, is a lovely book written with sensitivity and a deft touch, and I'm not saying this because I once worked with its author Stephen Chbosky for a short time during another lifetime in LA. When I started to read his book, written for a young adult audience -- or, rather, marketed to a young adult audience -- I thought it was going to be a bit twee, trade on precious, and lazily rely on our generation's compulsive self-conscious regard. Nope. Smart, sweet, well-written, and, dare I say, relevant? This book will help some kids. Fact. It'll put the panties in a twist of a fair number of ::ahem:: fundie moralizers, too. I don't have anything more profound to say on this subject matter. it just seems patently obvious that we need to provide a diversity of subjects, themes, and methods of getting at them. Not every book is for everybody. This is a given. Can the fundies now join the rest of us in the 21st century? Hell, can they join us in the 12th?