Eat Me,which tells of four women’s exotic sexual exploits with food items (among other objects) and makes extensive comparisons between food and body parts, was challenged July 5 by Loretta Harrison, an avid reader who thought she was borrowing a comical novel along with seven other selections she had made. “I don’t want my grandchildren or any children reading that,” Harrison said in the October 5 Ocala Star-Banner about why she challenged the book as obscene.
When Director Julie Sieg reviewed the book, she found herself overruling the retention recommendation of a three-member reconsideration committee. Sieg reported to the library board August 26 that she had removed the book from circulation because “we aren’t in the habit of providing erotica or pornography.”
Library policy specifies that Sieg’s decision wasn’t final for 30 days, during which time any patron could challenge it. A week later, former board Chair Mary Lutes did just that. “I’m confident that our library system is strong enough for the appeal process and can actually benefit from it,” Lutes wrote, according to the October 3 Star-Banner.
The system is already getting another opportunity to test its ethical muscles: On September 23 Sieg notified trustees of patron Galina Hutcher’s challenge of a young-adult novel shelved in the children’s department. A Stone in My Hand by Cathryn Clinton depicts the intifada from the perspective of an 11-year-old Palestinian girl whose father is killed in a terrorist attack in Israel. Hutcher objected to the book as “written one-sidedly, specifically showing one party to be fully wrong.”
Posted October 13, 2003.