With Banned Books Week, ALA’s observance of the importance of intellectual freedom, fast approaching (September 29–October 6), it’s only fitting that the brouhaha over a Maine resident’s efforts to remove a children’s book from local libraries is gathering steam

JoAn Karkos of Lewiston was so offended and “horrified” by the children’s book It’s Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex & Sexual Health by Robie Harris, illus. by Michael Emberley (Candlewick, 1993) that she

checked out the copies from local public libraries and is now refusing to return them.

According to reports in the Lewiston Sun Journal, Rick Speer, director of the Lewiston Public Library,

sent her a library reconsideration form she could fill out, effectively challenging the book via the proper procedural channels. In addition, he has characterized her actions as theft.

But Karkos is not backing down.

she also wrote a letter to the editor of the Sun Journal