Magic’s Publisher Is Crying Foul

WASHINGTON — Magic Johnson’s publisher is irritated that the basketball star’s book on AIDS has been banned at three of America’s largest store chains.

“What You Can Do to Avoid AIDS” is not being sold at Walgreen or Kmart stores. Wal-Mart, the nation’s biggest retailer, pulled it after determining that it is “not in keeping with what our customers tell us they want to read.”

“I’m frustrated because I think that this is a book that really needs to be read,” said Peter Osnos, publisher of Times Books.

The stores’ “argument is that it’s too explicit in some places, and my answer to that is, it’s only explicit in the sense that it advocates abstinence,” Osnos said.

Johnson, a member of the U.S. Olympic basketball Dream Team and a former Los Angeles Laker, has the HIV virus. Profits from the book’s sales are to go to his foundation to fight AIDS.