[danno3150]

BTW - Shamma must have some serious cash to live in Duxbury. I wouldn't underestimate him getting his way, even without the ACLU.

[angelr1076]

The Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee has said Arabs in the book are portrays as ‘‘backward ... cowardly, and barbaric.'' Yeah, that sounds about right.

[swilhelm73]

The Amazon page on the book;

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0380715635/qid=1105484720/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_2/102-7319787-5820108?v=glance&s=books

It sounds like some hippy dippy leftwing book, interestingly enough, though the reviews could be misleading.

[gridlock]

The Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee has said Arabs in the book are portrays as ‘‘backward ... cowardly, and barbaric.''

Are the Arab characters in the book backward, cowardly and barbaric? It is permissable to have negative characters in literature, isn't it?

You don't see Britons wanting to ban Dickens because Scrooge and Fagin are vicious and mean, do you?

[Nataku X]

Goodness. I remember reading that book as a little girl. It is not anti-Arab by any means. In fact it is about a recent Israel immigrant girl from Canada making friends with an Arab boy across the Jordan river.

[Beckwith]

Arabs in the book are portrays as ‘‘backward ... cowardly, and barbaric.''

So, does she want them portrayed as progressive, brave and humane?

That would fly in the face of all evidence to the contrary.

[MarineBrat]

...Arabs in the book are portrays as ‘‘backward ... cowardly, and barbaric.''

Available in the "World History" section of your favorite book store.

[CindyDawg]

A long article and lot's of opinions but no quotes.

[Alouette]

There are a lot of bad things about Arabs in there and how they are mistrusted and they're called by an Israeli swear word

All the Israeli swear words that I know of are Arabic, English or French.

[Alouette]

Oh, and Russian.

[vpintheak]

Is the book fiction or non-fiction? Wouldn't that have a lot do do with the complaining?

[Publius6961]

This appears to be a work of fiction.
In America we don't ban books.

I sensed back when Mark Twain was being quoted out of context for the same treatment, that we were on a very short slippery slope.

[traumer]

Looks like a nice place... but wouldn't like to pay their taxes :o)

http://www.city-data.com/city/Duxbury-Massachusetts.html

(probably very liberal)

[badbass]

but schools once stopped using an anti-bullying video because of complaints that it was too violent.

Does this statement seem ridiculous to anybody else (and also indicative of what's wrong with public schools)?

[popdonnelly]

I think it's called literary license.

[saquin]

She is writing a paper about ‘‘Baghdad Burning,'' a weblog -- that describes a girl's everyday life in that city during the occupation.

Interesting that she chose probably the most vehemently anti-American of the Iraqi blogs to write her paper about. And this article makes "Baghdad Burning" sound like the modern equivalent of The Diary of Anne Frank. The writer of Baghdad Burning, who uses the nickname "Riverbend", is not a "girl", writing about her "everyday life". She is a young woman in her 20s from a Sunni area of Baghdad who loved "Uncle Saddam", is sorry he's gone and hates Americans.

[cardinal4]

The Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee has said Arabs in the book are portrays as ‘‘backward ... cowardly, and barbaric.''

uh...Ok, so whats the problem?

[expatpat]

If he can't stand free speech, he should go back to Labanon, or whatever hell-hole he came from.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

I wonder, does the Library have BEAU GEST, BEAU SABURER or BEAU IDEAL?

[Malesherbes]

One of the wonders of multi-culturalism is that EVERYTHING makes somebody "feel bad." The solution: ban all books.

[sunshine state]

This is interesting. I was out sick from work yesterday (I'm a children's librarian) and my co-worker told me today that someone came in yesterday looking for a book about a Jewish child/teen becoming friendly with an Arab child/ teen. They were vague on the details. I thought it was "Habibi", but now I'm thinking it might have been this one. I'll have to check tomorrow.
BTW, Lynn Reid Banks wrote the whole "Indian in the Cupboard" series which I thought were nicely done.