Nick Hornby is clearly not a robot zombie. Like legions of writers before him from Shakespeare to Raymond Carver to Erica "zipless f---" Jong and even George Bernard Shaw, who scandalised London by having Eliza Doolittle say "bloody" in Pygmalion, his work swears when it needs to.

But does it need to? A new app, Clean Reader, says no. Developed by a couple in Twin Falls, Idaho, because their precocious young daughter said the profanities in a book made her "a little sad", it lets you sanitise e-books by blanking out rude words. There are three settings: clean, cleaner and squeaky clean. The app can also supply substitutes: Hornby's newsreaders might exclaim that motherfreakers flew the freaking plane.

Clean Reader has drawn a ferocious response from writers, who have labelled it "stupid" and "offensive", among the milder adjectives. It has been condemned as censorship, philistinism and/or a violation of intellectual property. But Sam Leith in The Guardian argues that the reader has a right to choose their path through a book. Lionel Shriver (We Need to Talk About Kevin) reckons the dirty words scream from the page all the more when they're covered up. But, she suggests, the app is at least a quaint reminder in the age of internet porn that obscenities once had the power to offend. "These blushing Midwesterners are doing us a favour, preserving the delicate sensibilities without which 'cocksucker' blends harmlessly in with 'boy' and 'go'."