On Young Adult

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The Young Adult fiction genre has seen something of an explosion in the last decade or so. Prior to that, I don’t recall there being a lot of books in between genres classified as “Children’s” and “Adult.” There were obviously books aimed at teenagers, but there wasn’t anything resembling an entire segment of the publication market based around them.

Twilight really started it all. The two series I would classify as “blockbuster” that came before it were Harry Potter and the Inheritance Cycle, both of which are classified as Children’s. It was the popularity of Twilight that spawned a slew of imitators that seem to have jump-started the more commercial aspects of modern YA.

Next came The Hunger Games, which set off another wave in the YA world. Whereas Twilight had spawned a bunch of paranormal romance imitators, The Hunger Games made dystopian fiction the “in” thing. Some of its followers, including as a prominent example the Divergent series by Veronica Roth, went on to be extremely popular on their own.

Even more traditional YA literary fiction has seen growth, as evidenced by the success of The Fault in Our Stars, which doesn’t have vampires or dragons but instead is more literary fiction that deals with teenagers battling cancer.

As for what genre is going to be “in” next, I don’t know. Personally, I’m hoping it’s space opera or high fantasy, but I guess only time will tell.

YA is an interesting thing because it can be hard to classify. After all, what makes a YA book different from adult or children’s books? And what about that New Adult genre that publishers have been courting as of late? There’s also the fact that many, many adults love reading Young Adult books, and so there is definitely an audience outside the intended one.

As for me personally, I do enjoy the occasional Young Adult book every now and then. Imagine Someday was actually originally meant to BE a YA novel before I decided I wanted to take it in a more New Adult direction. However, as I’ve changed from a teenager to an adult I find most YA novels to be too simplistic for my tastes. I think part of this has to do with the fact that I no longer really relate to the problems teenagers do since I’m not a teenager anymore, but I don’t know. Either way, the genre isn’t my favorite, but it can still be a lot of fun.

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