A friend recently asked me why I like Young Adult novels. She doesn’t read YA and has no interest in doing so. According to her, adolescence was hellacious enough once; Why would she wish to relive it, albeit vicariously?
I don’t see my fondness for YA fiction as a need – consciously or subconsciously – to reinvent my teenage years. It’s as ridiculous as saying I like romance novels because I’m unhappy in my marriage, or that a fondness for murder mysteries indicates a secret desire to kill.
Fiction is fantasy – no more, no less. I don’t superimpose myself into a story I’m reading, and I have no desire for fantasy to become reality. I like my real life, thank you very much, flaws and all.
On a less defensive note, there are several reasons why YA novels appeal to me, and I’ll list them here.
- My primary interest in a book is quality writing, characters I care about, and an interesting premise. There are several wonderful YA authors writing today, and I’d miss out on some great stories if I rejected their books purely on the basis of the age of their main characters.
- In contrast to many genres, YA stories seem to be permitted more room for creativity and originality than, say, the romance genre, which has become increasingly rigid its settings and themes.
- YA is a broad term and the genre encompasses several subgenres. While YA fantasy and urban fantasy are clearly on the rise, my personal favourites are YA romance and coming-of-age stories.
- I’m a sucker for romances in which a wallflower hooks up with a reformed bad boy. In spite of the young age of the characters, I find a teenage rebel who decides to change his life around far easier to believe in than a thirty-something-year-old man.
- There’s a sense of hope and optimism in YA stories, however depressing they might be. The characters’ youth means that they have their whole lives stretching ahead of them.
Here are some of my favourite YA authors whose books have been published within the last few years:
- Sarah Dessen is hands down my favourite YA author. I loved The Truth About Forever, This Lullaby, and Just Listen.
- Elizabeth Scott writes both relentlessly depressing and upbeat stories. I prefer the latter. I really enjoyed Perfect You.
- Simone Elkeles is the current Queen of YA Romance. Perfect Chemistry and Leaving Paradise are both great reads.
- Meg Cabot’s YA books are light escapism. I enjoyed both her 1-800-Where-R-U and The Mediator series.
- Melissa Marr – I’ve only read the first two books in her Faerie series – Wicked Lovely and Ink Exchange – but I liked them and want to read more.
- Megan Whalen Turner writes the wonderful Thief series. I’ve read The Thief and The Queen of Attolia but have the others on my TBR shelf.
Do you like YA fiction? If so, why? Which books/authors are your favourites?
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YA gives me the warm fuzzies. Somewhat kinder, gentler books in some cases.
“In contrast to many genres, YA stories seem to be permitted more room for creativity and originality than, say, the romance genre, which has become increasingly rigid its settings and themes.”
YES! I like sections of the fiction market where things are a little freer and authors can play more with settings, plots, character types, etc.. I haven’t been reading as much YA lately, but I do like some of the fantasy I’ve been reading and I have plenty in the TBR. I love Megan Whalen Turner’s work. I also like Libba Bray’s writing, though not quite so much as Turner. I also used to like Ann Rinaldi’s historicals, but it’s been years since I read one. The more recent ones didn’t grab me like her older titles.
Great post, I completely agree with everything you said. I adore Sarah Dessen and Meg Cabot. I can’t wait to read books by the other authors!
In case it wasn’t clear on Twitter, my fave YA author is Melina Marchetta.
In one of her interviews she was asked why she liked to write YA/teen fiction, and she replied that it was a time of transition when emotions are always much more extreme and kind of on the edge. I think that’s also part of the appeal of reading YA–for me, anyway.
Very nicely put, Sarah. There are so many things I like about YA fiction, most of which is encapsulated in your post. I think it’s a mix of what Kat said re the rawness and extremity of emotions combined with the optimism and freedom of having your whole life in front of you. And of course, great story-telling!
Slightly OT, I like the fact that YA fiction is all jumbled up together on the shelves (or at least it is here in the UK!) – you can find SF sitting next to romance, paranormal next to historical. You can so easily stumble across a book you normally wouldn’t read just because it would have been shelved in a different section if it had been an adult book.
I would say YA isn’t a genre–more like a marketing category. By far the most appealing about YA for me is that the focus seems to be more on telling a good story than sticking to genre tropes (like in romance, for example) or telling something deep and meaningful (which seems to happen a lot in litfic).
And I sure as heck don’t read YA to relive my teen years. Haha!
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