My kids only kind of sorta almost got into it but it never materialized as the trend of naughty ezra and all the crazy things he did started just as they stopped believing in santa. But elf on a shelf is definitely not new. My mom has one, and it was her mom's. Same exact elf as is sold with the book. Similar story, the elf is here to watch you and report back to santa if you do anything bad. It has to 50 years old if not older. Kind of moth eaten now so it never comes out of the box. Thing is when I was a kid the elf NEVER left the tree and no one thought anything about. The problem at hand is not the book, it's not the elf, it's PINTREST and all these people who feel they have to keep up with the uber mom's who are posting their ideas on pintrest oh, and facebook, because if I see one more naughty ezra post on facebook this year I'm seriously gonna puke.