Mask of Apollo and "Restricted Books"

[elizahonig.livejournal.com]

I think I've asked this before and nobody came up with any suggestions, but I'm doing another edit and thought I'd try again.

Nicola gets in trouble at some point because she takes this Mary Renault novel to school with her and not only is it an extra book, and (I think) from the local library, but in the Kingscote library it's Restricted or Limited or whatever the term is.  We've talked before about her take on why it should have been Restricted; and I am sad to think that it would probably still be the equivalent of Restricted in many American school libraries today.

My question was:  what other books would have been restricted in an English girls' school?  Books that would have been deemed suitable for the Seniors but not for the Juniors?  I need something written before 1938, something that might have appealed to an adventurous 12-year-old.  I need this for my own children's book, and it's the kind of thing that's impossible for a 20-year-old American RA to figure out!  I thought that somebody here might have an idea, though.

Comments

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

Ginty reads The Greengage Summer when she's in the Upper Fifth and therefore presumably has access to the Limited section - maybe one of Rumer Godden's other adult novels? I can see the Kingscote staff not wanting the Thirds to innocently think 'Oh, that's by the same person who wrote Miss Happiness And Miss Flower' and pick up The Black Narcissus.

Alternatively, how about something by Joseph Conrad?