My parents had rules about TV and movies, but not books. My mom was definitely better about guiding me towards age-appropriate stuff - I think my dad sort of mentally logged anything he read before age 30 under "stuff I read as a kid" so his notion of what I was ready for at age 10 was a little skewed.

My parents never censored me either, though my mom frequently made dire predictions about how "all that stuff" I read was going to end up in my nightmares. It got to be a running joke, as she was still saying it to me until the past couple of years. My mom is a very slow reader; I suspect she may have some mild reading disorder the way her brother and mom do, so she just didn't read much. My dad, otoh, read medical thrillers and mysteries and was pretty much never without a book in hand. I think the one time they ever gently steered me away from a book was when I found Clan of the Cave Bear on the bookshelf and took it to my mom to see if she thought it would be a good book for me. Heh.

I read Anais Nin off my mother's study bookcase. But I was in high school.

I was totally non-censored by parents, but teachers and librarians tried to censor my reading, which never worked. I was reading Little House AND bodice-rippers. But I was a reading mutant, as has been established.

AFA reading Divergent, personally, I think the discussion/warning/read if you want with discussion tack is appropriate. As a parental figure, I veto some TV/film/videos but am very much non-censory when it comes to books. I give warnings, and talk about the book. M is a pretty good self-censorer when it comes to stuff, in saying "I think this might be too scary for me" and we go from there.

"Where The Red Fern Grows" was THE most upsetting book I read before age 12, and I was reading all KINDS of crazy stuff with sex, violence, death and monsters.

Was there another book with a title like that, but with lilies? I remember something like that traumatized me.

Where the Lilies Bloom?

I'm reading Allegiant right now, and it's a mess. I never bought the social engineering concept, and her efforts in Allegiant to explain mainly reveal that Roth was sleeping during biology classes.

Yes, Ginger! Thank you. At least, that's the title I was thinking of. Maybe it wasn't the one that broke me, though.

Allegiant is a HOT MESS. There were some things I liked, but its writing style was really different from the first 2 (and I don't mean because of the switching POVs). It was more...opaque. I didn't feel as immersed in the world as I did with the first 2.

I *sobbed* at the end of Where The Red Fern Grows. That book was UPSETTING.

It was also like the third book I'd read that year in school where the protagonist's best friend or beloved pet dies. There was that one, Bridge to Terabithia and I think The Yearling.

I *sobbed* at the end of Where The Red Fern Grows. That book was UPSETTING.

My teacher read this aloud to us, after lunch and recess. When we got to the end, there were lots of sniffles in class.

There's a whole sub-sub-sub genre in children's fic of Dead Dog Books.