this post was submitted on 29 Nov 2023
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The librarians are responsible for curating books and assigning them to the appropriate sections. That said librarians are human and mistakes can happen, if you believe a book is inappropriately categorized speak to a librarian about it (in a respectful manner please) and they will reevaluate the book.
However, while a certain book may generally be appropriate for a certain age range, not every book is appropriate for every reader. While the librarians can offer guidelines, in the end it is the parents responsibility to ensure their child is only checking out materials appropriate for them. This duty cannot be off loaded onto the librarians.
The local libraries should reflect those standards and abide by them.
Most libraries have it written in their policy that one of the factors they should consider when curating books is where they are appropriate for the community they serve. And they have procedures in place for challenging material that individuals find to be inappropriate.
However most communities are more diverse than many individual people realize and just because the book isn't appropriate for them doesn't mean that it isn't serving others in their community.
At my library I once had someone complain that 50 Shades of Grey wasn't appropriate for our library because we have such a large senior community. But to be honest, 80% of the series' checkouts were by the very little old ladies that patron was concerned about.
Honestly if book is getting decent circulation it is probably a better fit for the community than people want to admit. And if it is not a good fit for the community it sits on the shelf collecting dust until it gets weeded out for lack of circulation.