The kiddos at my school LOVE Dan Gutman, and I was very excited to read Nightmare at the Book Fair. However, I was pretty shocked when I got near the end of the book - I wasnt loving the transgendered comments in the Fantasy and Fiction for Girls sections (like, why go there at all? was it importa... more

The kiddos at my school LOVE Dan Gutman, and I was very excited to read Nightmare at the Book Fair. However, I was pretty shocked when I got near the end of the book - I wasnt loving the transgendered comments in the Fantasy and Fiction for Girls sections (like, why go there at all? was it important to the story? I dont think so) Also, the Fiction for Girls section was so bad, I found it painful to read : "The Hispanic girl said this..." "The black girl said that..." I think he was trying something, but I really dont think it worked. Now Im not sure what to do with the 2 copies of the book that I bought...our school is ethnically diverse, and that Fiction for Girls chapter really bothered me. I also think all those comments about transgendered people - again, why go there? My kids only go up to 4th grade here - I can just imagine a 3rd or 4th grader asking his mom what "transgendered" means...fine, but Im not sure I want him to learn that word from one of the books in my library. Anybody have any thoughts about this? A fellow librarian & I are going to write to Dan & tell him what we think...