There is so much sex on TV and on billboards today-seemingly more than when Forever first came out-why do you think the book continues to be so controversial?

Because it's a book. Some adults, for whatever reason, have a desperate need to control everything in their children's lives. They can't control what's on television or on a billboard, but many think they can control what their children read. These individuals believe if their kids don't read about it, they won't know about it, and if they don't know about it, they'll never do it. They think they can have a book banned if they don't want their children to read it. They'll go into school waving a book, demanding that it be removed. There are a lot of would-be censors out there. Not only do they want to make the decision for their children but for all children. How much better it would it be if the parents could read the book, too, and then talk about it with their teens.

Dozens of literary masterpieces and international bestsellers have been banned in Iran in a dramatic rise in censorship that has plunged the country's publishing industry into crisis. Companies that once specialised in popular fiction and other money-spinners are being restricted to academic texts under a cultural freeze instigated by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Several thousand new and previously published works have been blacklisted by Iran's culture and Islamic guidance ministry, which vets all books.

Terry Chevalier's best-selling novel Girl With a Pearl Earring has been banned after completing six print runs. Dozens of literary masterpieces and international bestsellers have been banned in Iran in a dramatic rise in censorship that has plunged the country's publishing industry into crisis. Companies that once specialised in popular fiction and other money-spinners are being restricted to academic texts under a cultural freeze instigated by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Several thousand new and previously published works have been blacklisted by Iran's culture and Islamic guidance ministry, which vets all books.

Newly banned books include Farsi translations of Tracy Chevalier's best-seller Girl With a Pearl Earring and Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code, the latter for upsetting clerics within Iran's tiny Christian community. Chevalier's novel has completed six print runs in Iran and earned hefty profits for its local publisher, Cheshme.

Another publishing house has been banned from selling a successful series of books featuring lyrics by the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Doors, Black Sabbath, Queen and Guns n' Roses. Stores were told to remove the books or face closure. Permission was subsequently denied for the publisher to reprint. The crackdown also covers classics, such as William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying, and scores of works by Iranian authors.

Amy Crump, director of the Marshall Public Library, said once the new policy is place the two books will be reconsidered for circulation under the new guidelines, "as if they were new." Fun Home and Blankets were challenged earlier this month by a Marshall patron who claimed the books were inappropriate because of explicit graphics.

Crump said this is the first time any book has been challenged by a library patron, "which is probably why we've never had a selection policy." She said the new policy,"is not aimed at just these two books," and once implemented, "we'll be able to make decisions about all kinds of books." The materials selection committee will include six of the eight members of the board and two or three library staffers experienced in collection development, said Crump. "The committee will consult with other libraries about their policies and with attorneys," she said. The process of developing the guidelines and gettting approval by the board will take a minimum of two months.

The Marshall library has approximately 75 graphic novels in its collection. All books, including graphic novels, are placed in adult, young adult or children's sections as appropriate. Fun Home, Bechdel's story of growing up a lesbian with a closeted gay father, was placed in the adult nonfiction section, said Crump, while Blankets, an autobiographical story about Thompson's Christian fundamentalist childhood, was originally in the young adult section.