Book censorship?

[alexsdad]

Good morning! I was wondering whether anyone on here had either considered "censoring" books for their young teenage children?

My DD (14) is very much "into" Vampire books, and whilst we have said she can't watch the True Blood series on TV as we think it is inappropriate, I was thinking of getting her the books. DS (11) is, for some reason, very keen at the moment on getting some Zombie books to read (yeah - don't ask!) and also Stephen King's books. It's been a while since I read any of his, but I seem to recall there may well be "scenes of an adult nature" described - not to mention that they ARE horror stories, and we would not let him watch an 18 horror film for example.

I feel I should be encouraging them to read anything - indeed to some extent with DS, if he can manage the language and length of a Stephen King novel, then a bit of sex and scaryness shouldn't be an issue. But I do feel uncomfortable with them reading something we wouldn't want them to see on the screen. And unlike films/games/TV, you really don't have any idea of what the content might be (especially the odd sex scene) unless you have read them yourselves. And I can assure you, I have absolutely no idea to wade through a bunch of Zombie books to see what they are like!

But again, there would be nothing to stop them from going to the library and getting the books out, or just buying them themselves from the bookshop. So DD (especially) could certainly get the True Blood books herself without us really knowing too much about it.

As you may be able to tell, I'm a bit conflicted about this!

Just wondered if anyone else had gone through similar things, and what solution you had arrived at?

Thanks for reading!

Both the True Blood and Stephen King books are classed as 'adult'. There are loads of other vampire books in the Dark Romance teen section - the usual suspects, Twilight, P C Cast, Rachel Caine, Richel Mead. As for zombies, try your son on Charlie Higson, the Enemy - still pretty gory but aimed at teens.

The PC Cast series are fairly innocuous... definitely more suitable than True Blood. I agree with Engelbert that Twilight series are much 'cleaner' than True Blood but the underlying message is absolutely DIRE re healthy relationships!

I have to admit I read all the Stephen Kings around age 13-14 and don't remember being too shocked at the sex. Scared myself silly reading some of them but then that is part of the fun...:)

If you check out the local library (if it still exists:( ) there is usually a good section of teen fic along those lines. The buffy fiction is also very enjoyable and very little rude stuff:)

Thanks for the comments. The True Blood ones mirror what some in the TV Addicts group have said, though I was interested to get a more general 'teenage' opinion as well.

There are some great suggestions here. Many thanks to all for you for those. They can certainly guide us buying books for them. Very interested with the Zombie recommendations, madamehooch and Maryz. Thank you for those - it's not really a genre I can claim any sort of familiarity with!