Earlier this week, the Riverside Unified School District’s “book reconsideration committee” voted to take Green’s The Fault in Our Stars out of Frank Augustus Miller Middle School.

The vote was called when a middle school parent voiced concern over the content of The Fault in Our Stars. Her worries? According to a local newspaper, “the subject matter involves teens dying of cancer who use crude language and have sex.” 

Said the mother, “I just didn’t think it was appropriate for an 11-, 12-, 13-year-old to read. I was really shocked it was in a middle school.”

The committee voted 6-1 to take the book off the middle school library shelf. The Fault in Our Stars will still be allowed at the district’s high school. x

John Green's response to this as a fan asked him in his Tumblr, is very John Green.

He writes:

I guess I am both happy and sad.

I am happy because apparently young people in Riverside, California will never witness or experience mortality since they won’t be reading my book, which is great for them.

But I am also sad because I was really hoping I would be able to introduce the idea that human beings die to the children of Riverside, California and thereby crush their dreams of immortality.