To think that a "Children's Edition" should not have swear words in it?

[SpickAndSpan]

I will explain why I have namechanged at the end of this post.

I recently bought "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time" for myself. DS1 (nearly 10) saw it and was interested in it.

It's very simply written and I thought he might enjoy it. I knew there were a few sweary bits in it, so I didn't want him to read mine but said I would get him the children's version, as I have seen it around.

I got it off Amazon, it came today and it still says Fuck on about the third page, plus C* later on and references to porn.

Now I did sort-of know that it this version was more for teenagers, as it was a teenager I saw reading it before, but it says on my Amazon Receipt Children's Edition, not Teenager's edition. Why couldn't they take swear words etc out? They aren't necessary to the plot.

And yes I do realise there are adult themes but I think they would be easy enough for me to discuss with DS1 - we have friends with autism and he is really keen to read it. He was so excited when it came today.

I have namechanged as I may well go through the book with a black pen crossing out all the words I don't like and DS1's teacher might notice and know who I am if she is a mumsnetter...

I would be cross about that too, whats the point of it being a childrens edition with words like that in it ! Complain to amazon.

YANBU - I would expect a children's edition to have swear words taken out.

Mind you, you can take these things too far. When I was at school, we had special editions of that well-known hard core classic "My Family and Other Animals" with the puppies' names removed. The puppies were called "widdle" and "puke" and this was when I was 11!

I would expect the swear words to be taken out of a children's edition.

TBH, though, I can't really find it in myself to get het up about swearing. Sadly, my DSs hear a lot of swearing merely on their way to school - High School opposite.

I always thought 'children's version' simply meant a different cover and possibly a larger font than the adult one. Am I wrong?

Spick and Span - also, if you are going to discuss the adult themes, then it's easy enough to discuss the swearing as well.

I thought the same as oxocube. YANBU though, I wouldn't want my 9 yr old dd to read that.

Crumbs - my 8 year old can swear like a sailor. Although he never uses the c-word [proud].

I totally respect your position but why don't you want your children to read swear words.

I haven't read that book, BTW, but reading swearing per se is not an issue for me. I don't encourage mine to swear themselves, though (6 and 9)

Accio - you are clearly an excellent parent

It's a YA book - "Children's edition" simply means the version published by David Fickling/Red Fox as oppose to the version published by Jonathan Cape/Vintage.

Why don't you mention it to Amazon and ask them to put a note on their review? They're the ones who've chosen to label it that way. If you'd seen it in a bookshop it would have been in the older kids section and you would have flicked through and seen the content.

I have to say though, I'm slightly surprised that you think your DS is old enough to deal with the (pretty adult) themes of the book but NOT old enough to read a swear word.

I'm sure he knows the word exists and knows it's bad and if he's mature enough to deal with the subjects discussed in the book, I'm sure he'll understand if you have a chat about the language too.

The theme of the parents' marriage breaking up is easily discussable though, isn't it?

Marriages break up all the time.

There is worse in "Goodnight Mr Tom" (neglected baby dying) which they have done recently.

I am not too bothered about him knowing swear words. He has certainly heard Fuck. From me. In the car. But I don't think he knows C* yet and I don't want him to learn it because I have given him an inappropriate book to learn.

Likewise porn. He will have to know what it is at some point. But he hardly knows what sex is.

Looks like I have seriously messed up here.

On Amazon there is a bit where you can see the text and I did look at it. I saw the "Fuck" at the start and just assumed they had linked to the wrong version. Fool that I am.

Oh well. Live and learn.

"to learn" ?

to read