AIBU to be angry with DD for reading my book

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Just caught DD sneakily reading my book 'Angela's Ashes'. She is 9 and in my view too young to deal with the themes in her book. Ideas please on how to address this with her tom as she is now asleep.

She has just read black beauty (the original) and she really enjoyed that and little women, however she did say she did not understand all of little women.

She might enjoy I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith.

I was reading Stephen King at that age. YABU

Does she not have a library ticket? If she had a whole pile of her own books she wouldn't have time.

hakuna you said "angry" right there in the title. I do find that sad. However your subsequent posts (written after mine) make it seem like you are not so much angry as worried.

Do you have a general "ask me before you read anything" rule? If not, then yes it is sad if you are angry with her for reading a book! If you do have such a rule, then really you are angry with her for breaking a house rule, not for reading.

No i dont have a specific rule about books but its never really been an issue as she has her own books and book shelf. The only rules are to do with my magazines although she's allowed to read the food ones. She's at the age when she is showing signs of maturing and i guess i'm not ready for it.

How on earth can you not figure this out yourself?

CurlyBlueberry why do you find that sad?

At 9 yrs I found the problem pages in women's magazines fascinating. I don't think my mother knew.

How is she with young adult fiction? I mean if she's already on Black Beauty, Little Women etc but I love YA fiction in between classics and bigger novels - Hunger Games, Divergent, Percy Jackson, Mortal Instruments etc. Escapism but still keeping her mind active, and it won't seem babyish to her.

The teen fiction section at Waterstones usually has some good ideas too :)

She sounds great OP, I used to hide books under my pillow if I didn't want my parents to know I'd been reading in bed

Sovaysovay Shall we ask every mumsnetter that question, yet you took the time to write your post.

I'd just started secondary so would have been 11 when I borrowed Emmanuelle from my mums book shelf. I looked at my mother differently from that point onwards. I thought she was strict and straight laced. I used to read by torch light under my duvet, i don't think she knew.

I went back to reading my dads books after that.

YANBU to be annoyed she took something without asking but if shes stuck with it, is she understanding enough to mean its a learning experience so no real harm done?

I find it sad that a child who wants to read a book gets anger. I don't think that's so unusual a response? Reading is a good thing, and the result is anger?

However as I say your following posts make it seem like you are not really angry.

Look, your title is "AIBU to be angry with DD for reading my book". I think being angry because a child is reading a book is unreasonable, UNLESS you've already said they're not to read it (without asking), in which case you're angry because they've disobeyed you.

oh your mum was wild I think i read emanuelle as a teenager I stole borrowed it

Pippilangstrompe I disagree with your example - it's often far more damaging for a child to be exposed to mature themes in a film than in a book - for obvious reasons. You can't compare Angela's Ashes to an 18 film.

For one thing, it's a 15 cert

I agree with the poster who said not to make it contraband. When I was 12, my mum forbid me to read 'Aztec'. It took me a couple of weeks to secretly plough through it the minute her back was turned . My books are all in my bedroom, so they aren't encouraged to go rooting.

I think i'm kid of struggling with the fact she is in a in between stage at the moment, but i would like to find a middle ground i guess. I am far from stopping her from reading as she has at least 100 books and thats after give a lot away (mostly from the charity shop). poster MoominIsWaitingToMeetHerMiniMe she really likes Jacquiline Wilson is that considered young adult? I think some of her themes are, but I console myself with the thought that they are written in a child focused way

CurlyBlueberry Point taken, acknowledged and disregarded.

you know what she took her mums book without asking it wasnt hers it was her mums she was caught i think it is fine for the OP to have a chat about it not being age appropriate for her and not take take mummys things without asking, she needs to be sneakier next time

Not entirely sure why you're angry? It's hardly 50 Shades of Grey now is it. That would be inappropriate on every level going.

I read The Horse Whisperer when I was 9. If I recall correctly, I was able to read it independently and grasped the themes, granted probably not to the same degree I would reading it as an adult.

I don't believe I was left traumatised by it.

If she can read it and understand it, and it holds her interest, then IMO she's old enough for it.

It's hardly Debbie Does Dallas.

MisForMumNotMaid your mum definitely knew you read with a torch, don't you know that mums know everything?

'they had to ask me before they took a book from the bookshelf'

Another who finds this a bit of an odd rule. Like the previous poster I would ask her whether she liked it and what appealed to her about it, and find her something similar, but frankly I would open up access to all your books. I was in a big clutch of all my friends reading The Joy of Sex at her age which we got from under my friend's mum's bed

I've decided that i will talk to her and just say that next time if she wants to read one of my books she just needs to ask. In our house if you want to use someone else's item you ask. If she wants to read a sad but sweet book ill give her Goodnight Mr Tom, i loved that book when i was younger but it made me cry.

Jacqueline Wilson gets a lot of vitriol on here but I enjoyed her books when I was your DD's age - I'd consider some of them to be young teen fiction; some of the later ones like the 'Girls' series, Love Lessons, Kiss etc are definitely early teen fiction. And others that deal with the more serious issues - Vicky Angel, My Sister Jodie etc - I'd recommend, and my sister (12) loves the historical ones, Sapphire Battersea I think? And Hetty Feather.