More "Telling" in YA?

Depends on what you see as popular. Lots of telling in Twilight. Lots of showing in The Hunger Games.

Internal and external conflict imbalance can also create this feeling of telling. If there's too much going on in the inside and little on the outside, it can feel like a direct mind-meld from the character's head to the reader's and come across as telling.

OpheliaRevived said:

Perhaps limited description and more action?

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Exchange the word 'limited' for 'less' and I would say this is probably at least somewhat true. YA tends to be more tightly written, and sometimes more to the point, but not telling. Although I guess it would depend on which you read, because you're going to get a variety, just like with any other genre, like The Kidd indicated.

mmm i don't know. i think it depends on the book. i've read some fabulous YA novels that've done an amazing job with the "show don't tell thing". then again, i JUST finished a book that's been getting rave reviews all over Twitter.. and goodness i can't tell you just how disappointed i was.

the whole thing was RIDDLED with adverbs and passive voice.
there was so much telling it made me cringe.
i nearly put it down.

these rules are so confusing sometimes. we're told not to do so much, only to stumble across published books that've done EVERYTHING WRONG.

*cries*

Depends on what you mean by "show" versus "tell." Frankly, I like YA fiction because I like a quick pace. So long passages of description? Definitely not for me.

Of course, I'm not a fan of "show, don't tell," or any writing rule, really. To me, there's only one rule: If it works, it works; if it doesn't, it doesn't; and different things work for different people.

Very interesting that this came up, because I was just thinking of telling in YA novels. Like right now. o.0.

I agree about how there's a variety of writing styles in YA--some very show-y, some very tell-y. However, I must say that I've been noticing whenever I don't like a book/ get really fed up, it's because there's some form of telling in it when the author really should be showing:
Ex): 1) being told it's true love forever when there's really no showing of the "love" other than character appearance descriptions 2) being told the character has [insert characteristic] without any proof, which just makes me go whaaaa?

But I think that's just poor writing, and it's not necessarily confined to YA. I do agree YA is definitely a lot punchier, quicker to the point.

I've had problems with this in my writing (I sometimes "tell" a little more than I "show") I don't think this would be such a problem if I were writing in 3rd person, but I always write in 1st. It just gets me all outta whack when I hear these rules over and over again, but then I read a popular YA book that does nothing BUT "tell!"

It REALLY kills me because I'm such a stinking perfectionist, I always think I'm doing something wrong, or that my writing just doesn't cut it. I guess it all boils down to one's own writing style, though. Sometimes you just have to throw the rules away and write how you write.

I think it could be the result of a lot of YA being focused on internal thoughts (which can come off as telling, but isn't necessarily). Also, YA does in general have less description and more action. But action isn't telling, either and truck loads of description aren't necessary to showing in most instances.

I think there's a realllly fine line between showing and telling, sometimes (esp when it comes to internals) and if there's enough voice? It's probably fine. Same deal with passivity. If it's in voice, go for it (though too much does make me wince).

Voice, voice, voice. The "rules" are more arbitrary, imo.

I've been focusing on the beginning of my YA novel and someone suggested that I read the beginnings of some popular books. I pulled open a copy of the first Harry Potter and was shocked at how much telling and backstory there was right there.

Obviously Harry Potter is pretty popular so it worked for her!

Too much telling and/or info-dumping slows the story and lowers its intimacy to the reader regardless of targeted age range. idk, after running a YA book review blog for awhile, I think I've become more selective about what I read, so maybe my perceptions may differ from yours. And then you have to take into consideration genre too. Examples from your batch you've been reading?

I think a lot of the showing vs. telling is all on how you write and your POV. I like to write in omnipresent third person so you can show the reader things that you can't do in first person. In my current book that I am working on I let my character describe the places she's been and the things she has seen in order to show my readers the time/place/action. I think that the readers, especially young adults who have grown up on watching shows like CSI and Bones like to have small clues dropped here and there so they can figure things out for themselves versus having the narrator of the book tell them what they should know.