Looking For Alaska - GH Library Books

Looking for Alaska by John Green is available to 12-18 year old students at Lakeshore Middle School and the Grand Haven High School. The story takes place at a boarding school and centers around the life, adventures and pranks of the students. Much attention is given to the character Pudge’s infatuation with Alaska, but the story takes a dramatic turn after Alaska dies in a car crash and the students learn to move forward with their own lives.

Although this story was highly entertaining, I don’t think it is appropriate for children. There is foul language throughout, cigarette smoking, teen drinking, cheating on school work, lying to parents, and explicit sexual scenes. At the beginning of the story and the main character, Pudge, is encouraged to take up smoking which he does. The characters smoke all the time and even have a place off campus where they go to smoke as it is a prohibited behavior. Pudge’s roommate, the Colonel, keeps milk mixed with vodka in their dorm room refrigerator, and Alaska has a fake id. Pudge and Alaska rummage through the rooms of other students searching for pornography, then proceed to watch the video they find. Lara gives Pudge a blow job, and Alaska and Pudge have a hot and heavy evening.

According to Michigan Law, the age of consent for sex is 16. In Michigan you can legally purchase cigarettes at the age of 18 and alcohol at 21. We all know that these behaviors sometimes take place at younger ages, but they are illegal. If these behaviors are illegal, then why are they normalized through library books and being promoted through the school system? What are we teaching our children?

We should be helping our children to succeed and not encouraging behaviors which are destructive to them and to society. If books like this are available in the school libraries, parental permission must be required before children have access to these materials. Due to the graphic nature of the sexually explicit scenes and illegal behavior portrayed in this story, it should be given a rating of 16+ at minimum.

According to Michigan law, Michigan school personnel have a duty to protect children when they are in their care. As a community, we can offer our students so many better reading options. Offering books such as this not only has the potential to harm our children, but does them a great disservice. If children truly crave this reading material, they can get it at a bookstore or at a public library. I do not believe in censorship. I do believe in uplifting our children and giving them tools of success.

Encouraging Smoking and Normalizing Smoking Marijuana

p. 18 – Let’s go get some cigarettes and start this year off right.

p. 23 – … and then I decided to smoke.

p. 36 – He walked over to his crimpled shorts lying on the floor and pulled out a pack of cigarettes. He lit two and handed one to me. I smoked the whole goddammed thing.

p. 53 – The colonel dispersed the cigarettes.

p. 66 – Studies show marijuana is better for your health than those cigarettes.

p. 69 – “Let’s go smoke.” … You’re out of cigarettes.

p. 91 – Pudge, you need a cigarette.

p. 124 – I’m gonna go for a cigarette then.

p. 180 – An hour after the colonel left, resident stoner Hank Walstrom dropped by to offer me some weed.

Teen Drinking

p. 46 – It’s five parts milk and one part Vodka. (he keeps it in his fridge)

p. 101 – I have a fake ID she said… I try to buy 10 bottles of this and some Vodka for the colonel.

p. 108 - … she unearthed a forty-ounce bottle of Magnum Malt liquor from Longwell Chace’s closet

p. 138 – But that night the booze felt great, as the warmth of the wine in my stomach spread through my body.

p. 139 – Why did we drink? For me, it was just fun.

p. 141 – And then Alaska decided that although it wasn’t nearly dark yet, it was time for us to get shitfaced.

p. 142 – We have to slow down or I’ll puke.

p. 149 – In the long quilt that followed, as we passed around the wine and slowly became drunker…

p. 151 – Later that night after Alaska stuck her finger down her throat and made herself puke in front of all of us because she was too drunk to walk…

p. 192 – I could see her drunk enough and pissed off enough (About what – about cheating on Jake? About hurting me? About wanting me and not him?)

p. 217 – You got any alcohol? Why he asked? Uh, because we want to get drunk?”

p. 220 – Illegally drank milk and vodka out of a half-gallon jug at two o’clock in the morning, the colonel took his sixth shot of Vodka

Lying and Cheating and Foul Language

p. 22 – Ninety-nine percent of the time your parents never even have to know though. The school doesn’t want your parents to think you became a fuck-up here any more than you want your parents to think you’re a fuck-up.

p. 87 – She’s a complete and total bitch.

p. 89 – The fuckers flooded my room.

p. 90 – It’s a fuckin’ food pyramid.

p. 97 – A lot of my friends are staying – lie. – I have a lot of work to do – double lie. (lying to parents)

p. 104 – Breaking into someone’s room – and stopped in front of a window, placed her palms flat against it and pushed up until the window was half open, then crawled inside.

p. 130 – Because no one can catch the mutherfucking fox.

p. 136 – And the good news is that the three assholes who had the gall to prank us have progress reports coming saying that they are failing three classes.

p. 179 – I am shit sure keenly aware that we should have stopped her.

p. 254 – And when I couldn’t catch up, I cheated. (homework)

Inappropriate Sexual Scenes for 12-Year old Readers

p. 25 - … with her breasts straining against her tight tank top.

p. 26 - … I’ll get you laid

p. 29 – Trifecta…lying naked in bed together (“genital contact being offense #1), already drunk (#2), they were smoking a joint (#3)

p. 58 – He loves weed like Alaska loves sex.

p. 75 – She has great breasts.

p. 96 – There are times when it is appropriate, even preferable, to get an erection when someone’s face is in close proximity to your penis.

p. 101 – He’s probably masturbating for the first time in a month (speaking of the school disciplinarian)

p. 102 – Her hand just above my knee, the palm flat and soft against my jeans and her index finger making slow, lazy circles that crept toward the inside of my thigh, and with one layer between us, God I wanted her.

p. 106 – Because they’re compensating for their tiny little penises?”

p. 107 – Wanna go porn hunting?... Don’t you like porn?

p. 109 – It opened with a woman standing on a bridge with her legs spread while a guy knelt in front of her, giving her oral sex… A woman knelt on her hands and knees while a guy knelt behind her. She kept saying, “Give it to me.” And moaning…

p. 110 – Look me in the eye and tell me this doesn’t turn you on.

p. 123 – French, Feel, Finger, Fuck

p. 157 – “Have you ever gotten a blow job?

p. 158 – Lara unbuttoned my pants and pulled my boxers down a little and pulled out my penis.

“Wow,” she said.

“What?”

She looked up at me, but didn’t move, her face nanometers away from my penis. “It’s weird.”

“What do you mean weird?”

“Just beeg. I guess.”

I could live with that kind of weird. And then she wrapped her hand around it and put it into her mouth….

p. 162 – Hook up with me, so I did….and we were kissing. Zero layers between us. Our tongues dancing back and forth in each other’s mouth until there was not her mouth and my mouth but only our mouths intertwined. She tasted like cigarettes and Mountain Dew and wine and Chap Stick. …

..She moved my hand from her waist to her breast, and I felt cautiously, my fingers moving slowly under her shirt but over her bra, tracing the outline of her breasts and then cupping one in my hand, squeezing softly. “You’re good at that,” she whispered…..

p. 182 – I am sleeping, and Alaska flies into the room. She is naked, and intact. Her breasts, which I felt only very briefly and in the dark, are luminously full as they hang down from her body.

p. 236 – When you’re old and grey and your grandchildren are sitting on your knee and look up at you and say, “Grandpappy, who gave you your first blow job?”

If your children have brought home or read any books at school that are inappropriate and you would like to share your story, please send us an email at jsn1984@protonmail.com.