Should Smoking Be Banned In Kid Lit?
Over-protective parents have a new cause: smoking in children’s books. The Guardian reports: ‘Julia Donaldson has said that she would “never encourage smoking in a children’s book” after some readers went online to complain about her inclusion of a ne’er-do-well scarecrow character who attempts to impress a lady by blowing smoke rings in her new book, “The Scarecrow’s Wedding.” “Reginald Rake is a villain who smokes a cigar and it is made clear that smoking is bad for you,” said Donaldson, after one parent went on Amazon to claim that the actions of the scarecrow in Donaldson’s new book had gone so far as to prompt his three-year-old to ask for a cigar.’
