This article has been updated.
Best-selling Indiana author John Green is taking issue with a suburban Indianapolis library’s decision to move one of his teen novels into the adult section.
The move is part of a new policy at Hamilton East Public Library to ensure that materials in the children and teen sections are “age appropriate.”
The policy, which went into effect earlier this year, limits the use of profanity, violence, and sexual conduct that can appear in books shelved in the Juvenile/Youth, Middle School, and High School Sections.
Green’s novel, A Fault in Our Stars, includes a scene of safe sex.
In a letter to library board members, Green calls the decision “embarrassing” – adding that, “I am so disappointed that you would use public time and public resources to engage in work that actively harms the public through censorship, defacto or otherwise.”
In response to a request for comment, library staff say the book is still identified for the Young Adult audience in the online catalog.
UPDATE: The library board president called the move an “error” and the book was returned to the teen zone. In a social media post, Green called for other young adult books to also be returned.
