Hello and welcome to my first blog! I've decided to begin this blog for several reasons:
1. I read a lot of books and I think others would benefit from my reviews and comments.
2. I think today's parents, as a whole, don't have enough time to preview or even skim what is available out there for kids to read...and let me tell you, much of what is out there is not wholesome!
I know several years ago I made the mistake of trusting a book list put out by OBOB (Oregon Battle of the Books). They had just added a high school reading list of 16 books to their program. In the past I had purchased all of the books on the reading lists for the younger aged readers and would have my two kids read all the books on the list as their summer jobs. When my daughter, who was going into 9th grade at the time, started on the first book she ran across some sexual content and showed it to me. I was shocked! I told her to stop reading the high school list and to read the middle school list instead while I previewed the rest of the high school list. Actually, the book she showed me was one of the cleanest! One of the books contained graphic sexual content AND was full of profanity (even the "F" word.)
As a concerned parent and a teacher, I contacted OBOB and voiced my concern. They offered to let me serve on the committee as they picked the books for the high school list for the second year. I took them up on this offer. During the book selection process I read over 60 book nominations. However, I realized that there was a hidden agenda during the first book selection meeting when they told me that they had to select a book that glorified masturbation because it was more important to pick a book to honor Native American culture (which is where this book was set) than to worry about values. Morals were not to be considered when picking books for their program. So, I ultimately resigned from the committee so that I could spend my time reading books that were more in line with my values and beliefs.
I intend to use this blog to review books that I read and to let parents know what can be found in the books that may be against their values. At this point there are rating systems for music, video games, and TV & movies, but there is not anything out there for books. I hope to provide some of that through my blog.
