Editorial: Don’t let your kids read this

This is a good one. A number of librarians are complaining because the latest Newberry Award-winning children’s book, “The Higher Power of Lucky,” describes a rattlesnake biting a dog on the ballsack…I mean scrotum.

The book uses the anatomically-correct term, so what’s the problem, exactly? That a children’s book acknowledges the existence of canine private parts? I am using nearly all my strength to suppress the urge to vomit at the thought of a rattlesnake biting anything anywhere near my…scrotum, but that really isn’t the point, anyway:

“Because of that one word, I would not be able to read that book aloud,” one [librarian] explained, calling it “a Howard Stern-type shock treatment.” We have three words for that: Oh, come on.

I recall several Newberry books I read as a kid, and many of them deal with some pretty tough issues. While I am not certain that snake bites on the junk are on the same level as death or racism when it comes to issues children must confront, I am not convinced that this is such a horrible thing for a librarian to have to say out loud.

I wonder what the book is actually about?