Is This Novel Young Adult?

Disclaim: As someone who reads mostly young adult novels, I have no prejudices against this literature. In a matter of fact, I'm a huge advocate of this literary category (it features characters and plots as complex as those in novels marketed for adults and deserves to be recognized by the critics).

Last weekend, I finished my reading of Our Dark Stars by Audrey Grey and Krystal Wade. While I was writing a short review on Goodreads, I noticed some reviewers mentioned the novel was young adult. I was confused and surprised because, even though there was no smut, the novel features some sexually-charged interactions and the main male character was in his early twenties. This was not the first time I came across such a situation. I'm always left bewildered by how books that I don't read as young adult are placed in this category. As any blogger going through a blogging slump, I thought that this topic had the potential for an interesting discussion. Today, I'm asking myself (and to everyone who reads this article) what makes a novel young adult.

If you take a peek at Goodreads, you will notice that many novels that are not young adult are shelved in this category (I apologize if I'm being pretentious, but young adult is a literary category and not a genre). Why does it happen? All these books have in common a protagonist is in their late teens. However, is the presence of a teenager enough to categorize a novel as young adult? 

Mickey wondering about the question.

First, I'd like to dwell on this question: who is considered a young adult? Some scholars argue that a young adult is any person between twelve and eighteen years old. This notion meets the definition book publishers use -- they usually use "young adult" to describe teenagers. However, in psychology, "young adult" is used to describe any person who is on the final stage of adolescence to a person who is thirty. Since we are discussing books, then the definition provided by the publishers should be the one to be taken into account: young adults are teenagers (even if psychology says otherwise).

IS THIS NOVEL YOUNG ADULT?

Since its emergence in the late sixties with the publication of The Outsiders (1967) by Susan E. Hinton and The Contender (1967) by Robert Lypsite, the definition of this literary category has gone through several changes. Quick note: all the definitions of young adult literature featured here are actually part of my thesis (since I'm studying Monsters of Verity by Victoria Schwab, I had to argue the value of this literary category to the academic world).

In the fifties and sixties scholars "defined young adult literature as anything read by those between the ages of 13 and 18” (Wadham and Ostenson), which means that it didn't only include the young adult novels that were being published, but any other books that a teenager would read (even if it was written for an adult audience or children). In 1998, Chris Crowe argued that literature for young adults is "all genres of literature published since 1967 that are written for and marketed to young adults.” For a book to be young adult, it has to be written specifically for young adults. Books such as The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885) and The Catcher in the Rye (1951), among other whose the main characters are teenagers, do not belong to the young adult category, even though they did play a part in the emergence of this genre (as Bildungsroman romances, these novels focus on the moral and psychological growth of the main character). More recently, in Integrating Young Adult Literature through Common Core Standards (2013), a young adult book is defined as “a work that represents an entirely adolescent point of view that is mainly marketed to that same audience” (Wadham and Ostenson).

Taking a look at these definitions, then, nowadays, a young adult book is any book that is written thinking of teenagers AND is marketed to them. Thus, not every novel whose main character is teen-aged is young adult; having a teenager as the main character doesn't mean one can immediately label a novel as young adult (no one would ever claim classics as Northanger Abbey and Jane Eyre are young adult even though Catherine and Jane, by today's standards, are teenagers). The truth is that many publishers and sellers are responsible for this mislabelling. Publishers often market a book as young adult because the writer is a known YA author (as in A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas) and has a huge YA fan-base (if we take a look at reading statistics -- or hop blog -- most young adult novels readers are people who publishers classify as adults) or because the potential to increase sale numbers since the young adult book market has grown in the past ten years (even if there was a drop in sales in 2018).

*eye roll*

I've noticed some disregard concerning the author's voice. Even after the author explains that their book was not written for young adults, but that it might appeal to them, it doesn't discourage readers from adding the book to this category. Why keep mislabelling a book after the author telling that their novel isn't young adult? Some authors might do it because they don't wish to be connected to a category seen as simple and for kids, but, in most cases, they are just explaining to whom they wrote the book to (which clearly doesn't mean teenagers can't read it). 

WHY CAN'T A NOVEL BE YOUNG ADULT?

Once again, I'm not trying to be pretentious nor snobbish, but there are characteristics in non-young adult novels, identified by many readers as young adult, that reveal to which literary category a book belongs to. Instead of listing the characteristics highlighted in adult books (or in-between books; that would be a good word to describe books for both teenagers, young adults, and adults), I compiled a few characteristics that can be found in YA. In Young Adult Literature in the 21st Century (2008), Pamela B. Cole enumerates some common characteristics that can be found in young adult books:

• The protagonist is a teenager; 
• The events in the story revolve around the protagonist and the struggle to resolve the conflict; 
• The story is often told from the viewpoint and in the voice of a young adult; 
• The genres are written for and by young adults; 
• Stories don't always have happy endings; 
• Parents are often absent or have conflicts with the young adults in the stories;
• Coming of age issues are highlighted in the various genres in young adult literature.

In many books categorized by readers as young adult, when in fact they are not, the plot does revolve around a teenager protagonist and coming of age issues are highlighted (first kiss and first love, the discovery of the place in the society, and the quest for the self, among many other themes). That does blur boundaries between literary categories. Nevertheless, many of these stories feature multiple voices (among these voices, the reader might find the POV of an adult) and family plays a huge part in the plot, as in The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden, or the main character is attending university, as in Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell. These aren't popular characteristics in a young adult narrative.

Maybe we shouldn't always be so willing to put everything into a box...

In your opinion, what makes a book YA? Should publishers increase the young adult age gap and make it overlap with the psychological concept? Or should they put an end to the categorization? Should NA be brought back to "life"? Or should a new literary category be created?

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