Must be a group member before inviting friends
Each night I ask the stars up above, why must I be a teenager in love?
It is officially YA week at Goodreads.
I have little doubt that, if I had come of age during the Twilight era, I would have been obsessed. I remember learning about vampires and finding them fascinating when I was younger, but, other than Bram Stoker, there was very little literature that could appeal to a teenage sensibility, apart from the occasional R.L. Stine horrorfest.
So, of course, I would have been fanatical about Stephenie Meyer and would be all over Midnight Sun right now.
I still love YA fiction, although I am not exactly the demographic at which it's aimed. I love the bildungsroman novel, as the genre was once called before "coming of age" literature was re-branded as YA. At one point, The Perks of Being a Wallflower and To Kill A Mockingbird were YA fiction, at least by the definition we measure it today. Most great literature speaks to that sense of us that we can recall and a great many of us recall the successes and traumas of growing up, far more vividly than anything during our adult years. It's the fountain from which Judy Blume has built her career ... and who can blame her? That's one hell of a fountain.
YA also provides us with the life lessons from which we become adults. Good YA fiction can dictate your values. They drive who you become. Some people become lawyers because of the words of Harper Lee. Others take cross-country trips because of the wit of John Green. Others get involved in social work and politics because of economic disparities in The Hunger Games.
The YA genre is no joke.
I remember devouring Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda on a sunny summer day beneath a tree. Frankly, I read the whole thing in insufficient shade and was severely sunburnt as a result, but I didn't even notice because I was so enthralled in the story and motivated by this love story. I was in my late twenties, far past the age of a sexually confused teenager who is trying to seek out their identity and form a relationship while fearing the reveal of their authentic self. That's not to say that adults don't experience matters like this, but it is often part of the development of adolescent life to seek acceptance from their peers while shaping their identity.
Yet it still entranced me enough to get scorched in the shade. That's how long I sat, turning page after page until I finished the book.
Now each generation will have its own "thing" because the zeitgeist is ever-evolving. Jenny Han novels spoke to my sister, a decade younger than me, the same way a J.K. Rowling release would have whipped me into excitement.
But YA is timeless and universal, and not often recognized for the strength of its writing.
I quote Sherman Alexie. He said, "I write in blood because I remember what it felt like to bleed."
For this week (and likely far beyond it), here's a Band-Aid.
I have little doubt that, if I had come of age during the Twilight era, I would have been obsessed. I remember learning about vampires and finding them fascinating when I was younger, but, other than Bram Stoker, there was very little literature that could appeal to a teenage sensibility, apart from the occasional R.L. Stine horrorfest.
So, of course, I would have been fanatical about Stephenie Meyer and would be all over Midnight Sun right now.
I still love YA fiction, although I am not exactly the demographic at which it's aimed. I love the bildungsroman novel, as the genre was once called before "coming of age" literature was re-branded as YA. At one point, The Perks of Being a Wallflower and To Kill A Mockingbird were YA fiction, at least by the definition we measure it today. Most great literature speaks to that sense of us that we can recall and a great many of us recall the successes and traumas of growing up, far more vividly than anything during our adult years. It's the fountain from which Judy Blume has built her career ... and who can blame her? That's one hell of a fountain.
YA also provides us with the life lessons from which we become adults. Good YA fiction can dictate your values. They drive who you become. Some people become lawyers because of the words of Harper Lee. Others take cross-country trips because of the wit of John Green. Others get involved in social work and politics because of economic disparities in The Hunger Games.
The YA genre is no joke.
I remember devouring Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda on a sunny summer day beneath a tree. Frankly, I read the whole thing in insufficient shade and was severely sunburnt as a result, but I didn't even notice because I was so enthralled in the story and motivated by this love story. I was in my late twenties, far past the age of a sexually confused teenager who is trying to seek out their identity and form a relationship while fearing the reveal of their authentic self. That's not to say that adults don't experience matters like this, but it is often part of the development of adolescent life to seek acceptance from their peers while shaping their identity.
Yet it still entranced me enough to get scorched in the shade. That's how long I sat, turning page after page until I finished the book.
Now each generation will have its own "thing" because the zeitgeist is ever-evolving. Jenny Han novels spoke to my sister, a decade younger than me, the same way a J.K. Rowling release would have whipped me into excitement.
But YA is timeless and universal, and not often recognized for the strength of its writing.
I quote Sherman Alexie. He said, "I write in blood because I remember what it felt like to bleed."
For this week (and likely far beyond it), here's a Band-Aid.
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