Young Adult Genre Revival

This will be a relatively short YAYA posting, but I wanted to get everyone, readers and bloggers alike, involved, so make sure to offer your opinions!

Lately, literary agents have been looking for steampunk and dystopian novels, implying that these may become 'the next big thing' so to speak (no guarantees!).

So here's the question: Is there something you'd like to see in young adult novels, something that was prominent in the lengthy history of world literature, that isn't there now? Some genre, or topic, that you just love, but isn't present in today's young adult lit just yet?

For example, maybe you have a secret love of biji (筆記), a genre from Classical Chinese literature that was like a notebook, with short stories, anecdotes, quotations, etc. from the author (Biji). There are a few books like this in young adult right now, like CATHY'S BOOK by Sean Stewart and Jordan Weisman (Amazon), but maybe you'd like to see more. (Note: Cathy's Book is also an interactive mystery, so slightly different, but very similar in principal.)

Or maybe you reread Homer's THE ODYSSEY (Amazon) every single year and would like to see more young adult that has a large body of water as its main setting. I'm not sure of any current young adult like this, so leave a comment with an example if you know one.

Perhaps you're just looking for a new type of fiction all together such as the slice of life, or tranche de vie, where there is minimal plot, little character development, and an open ending. Something more true to life than any other kind of fiction. The YAYA bloggers discussed a desire to see more of this just the other day. This, of course, would be a more difficult endeavor because keeping someone interested with the daily happenings of life is difficult, but it has been done. Non-YA examples include James Joyce's DUBLINERS (Amazon) and John Steinbeck's OF MICE AND MEN (Amazon).

So let me ask again, in case you become distracted with filling your Amazon shopping cart...

What genre, topic, or literature form would you like to see more of in modern young adult literature?

Ignoring Common Genre Themes (Is It Shooting Yourself in the Foot?)

I decided to be adventurous and buy a book of short stories by prominent YA contemporary spec fic authors. The stories were all about love, and I read it in the two weeks leading up to Valentine's Day. I noticed that all of the stories except one, while very different, had one common theme. Human main character (all girls, in this case) gets romantically involved with a non-human character. Then I look at the last two YA contemp fantasy novels I read. One was Twilight (I'm sure I don't have to explain). The other, Wicked Lovely, which was slightly different in that there were more than one POV, some human, some not (although the MC was still a human girl, at least at first), and the romance played out differently.

Looking at my own novels, I see a huge reversal. Non-human MC (usually a girl) falls in love with a human love interest (or someone who thinks they're human and has been living as a human ;-) ). Now with the other scenario, you have the option of the classic human-character-discovers-magical-world, which is nice for the author because they get to introduce the reader to the fantasy world without an infodump. The reader discovers it with the MC. But is there anything wrong with taking the POV of the "other"?

Of course, this brings me to two huge concerns. One, that maybe readers do have a problem connecting to the "other." Most of my non-human MCs have been very human-like, and I've never had a complaint about them (or the one who I thought would be hardest to connect to). But maybe it is a problem.

More importantly to the post is this. Is the reason that the novels and stories I'm seeing are like this because that's what the market is expecting now? In the wake of Twilight, is it expected that a paranormal romance or a fantasy with romantic elements has a human MC with a supernatural love interest? And does that mean it's harder to get anything else published?

I sure hope not.

Don't get me wrong, my enjoyment of each of those stories wasn't ruined by the fact that they had this common element, but wouldn't it be boring if every genre or subgenre was required to have the same basic set up?

And it's easy to say, "No, you want to be unique. It will get the agent's and editor's attention!" But when you see four stories in a book of five with that same thread, it makes you stop and wonder.

Anyway, within your own preferred genres (reading and writing), what elements do you see commonly, that maybe you've conformed to or perhaps completely ignored?

Christmas YA

Hey all, I'm Chantal, this is my first post here ever (but feel free to visit my blog ;) ). I write mainly Urban Fantasy of the crappy kind and adult Sci-fi of the even crappier kind. Yeah, I'm still working on the self-esteem thing.

I thought I'd write about Christmas YA fiction, something I've been thinking of trying my hand at some day.

I remember hating Christmas stories as a teen/YA. Even before that actually. They were always corny and full of happy warm mushy feelings without any sort of gripping, meaningful plot. Aside from Christmas traditional tales like the one with the Little Match Girl which, to this day, still makes me cry. One thing that really annoyed me was that the parents always saved the day. Or worse, Santa!

Most fiction around Xmas/Hanukkah/Yule etc seems to be aimed at very young children. Surfing with the Amazon, I found some books classified as YA with Christmassy themes but they all seem to be basically the same stuff with more words. At best, it some kind of teen love story of the sort "he kissed her under the mistletoe! He must love her now!".

So I ask you all, are there any decent, smart Christmassy YA books out there? Something with a meaningful, interesting, non-trivial plot that ties up nicely with the spirit of the season? Oh and, not uber religious for those of us who don't care for religion, just for the message?

Common Threads

Most of us--all of us?--here at YAYA have finished more than one novel. Some of us (you know who you are) are insanely prolific. So it's only natural to begin noticing common threads, the little links from one story to the next. These are the threads that will keep your readers hooked on your stories for-ev-er, the things beyond style and voice that can make the difference between loving a book and loving an author.

Maybe the common thread is that they're all YA. Maybe they're all sci-fi, or they have similar themes, even though the plots and even genres are totally different. Sometimes I'll pick up just any book, as long as it A) is well-written, and B) contains some character archetype to which I'm craving exposure.

My stories always take place near an ocean or sea. Most of my characters are female. I often write some kind of freedom theme--I guess this is pretty important to me. Forgiveness is probably the chief virtue in my universe.

Now, the genres are often different and the setting might be current-day Massachusetts or 5th century BC Athens, complete with horny deities. The main character will be somewhere between several million, sixty, and seventeen years old. She may or may not "come of age". But I'm betting my readers will find enough commonality from one story to the next, because of all those little pieces my awesome subconscious inserts.

(Thanks, awesome subconscious.)

What will your readers find in common in your stories? What kinds of shared threads do you, as a reader, like to find in your favorite author's books? Do you need that genre fix, or are you more of a character archetype reader?