Character ages

It's all about how well its written, IMHO. You can write about any subject and as long as your writing's good, someone will want to read it. (Hopefully...that's the thought I keep in my mind, anyway, in the hopes of being published one day).

My WIP is about a summer in the life of 3 teenage boys and it is not a YA. There are too many examples out there for the answer to be anything but...YES IT IS OKAY.

Stand By Me is about a bunch of teenage boys. It's not YA. It depends on the writing, the language, the themes, etc.

The lead characters in my WIP are teenagers. It's not YA novel.

I think this is a great question. I pondered this too about my novel. The main character is definitely a teenager and it's told from her POV. But the subject matter is very serious, so I'm hoping it's not too dark, too depressing for teens. I tried to inject some humor into it to lighten things up in places.

My feeling was that if I told the story from the teacher's perspective, it would be an adult story and if it is from the girl's POV, it will be a YA story.

YA

I'd say Huckleberry Finn is a YA novel. Definitely. Adults like reading good YA as much as do young adults. I'd even classify "Stand By Me" as YA. Though the right tile is "The Body." Stand By Me" is the movie version.

But it's more how adult and graphic you get with themes and langauge that makes somethng YA or adult, not the age of the characters.

But really good YA is nearly always read by as many adults as it is by young adults.

MillyBecker said:

Can I have a novel about characters in their teens and it not be a YA novel? I know it's been done, like it Sparks' A Walk to Remember, but is it a bad idea?

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To Kill a Mockingbird. Kids as main characters, not a kid's book, serious theme.

To some extent, YA is more of a marketing category than anything else. Some books have been released as both YA and adult - The Lovely Bones, for example, and Life of Pi. My agent told me that we could go either way with my novel - 17-year-old protagonist, very serious subject matter - but she thought the book would really stand out as a YA, so we decided to go that route.

I think there are very sophisticated YAs, in terms of subject matter, themes and language. People who think otherwise are usually people who have not read widely in the genre. I was told by several beta readers that my book is too sophisticated to be YA - but their idea of YA was Sweet Valley High, not Sarah Dessen or John Marsden.

Currently published YAs do usually have a protagonist under 20 and are generally shorter than adult novels. Otherwise, there seem to be few if any restrictions. And I agree that the best of them are read by as many adults as younger readers.

And isn't The Catcher in the Rye considered a young adult novel? I know we read it in high school. But some of the subject matter and language might be more suitable for adults.

MillyBecker said:

Can I have a novel about characters in their teens and it not be a YA novel? I know it's been done, like it Sparks' A Walk to Remember, but is it a bad idea?

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Some people may argue that A Walk to Remember is YA. Certainly a lot of teenage girls read it... It's about love, struggles, faith. It has no foul language. And it's sappy.

I am not sure if Catcher in the Rye would be considered YA. To me, it's more literary... what do I know? I mean we read all kind of things in high school. I know KatieMac read Lolita -- and one of the main character is a teenager. I doubt Lolita would be considered YA.

Catcher

Cather in the Rye? I'd have to think about that one. I believe I'd put it in the literary category. We read almost no YA novels in high school. Tom Saywer and Huck Finn both came before high school.

Lord of the Flies.

Would you call William Golding's Lord of the Flies a YA novel?

We read Shakespeare in High School, and I'm pretty sure Romeo and Juliet isn't considered YA, either. I think YA is better described as early teen --Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys-- than high school level writing. Harry Potter carries the label, but those $55 books on cd aren't being snatched up by 14 year olds... so how important is the label?

Yes, see this is why it is so hard to categorize or label novels. I know plenty of adults who enjoy reading the Harry Potter series.

I guess what I meant about Catcher in the Rye is that the main character, the narrator is a teenager. Not just the fact that teens were reading the novel.

As far as I'm concerned, there is a big age span in the young adult category. What might be appropriate for an older teen (17) is not appropriate for a younger teen (13). But sometimes you're writing about a younger teen who has older teen kinds of problems. That's really tricky.

Well, in terms of YA as a marketing category... most teens do switch to reading mostly or entirely "adult" novels around 14-15. So the real market for YA novels is, say, 12-15--middle-schoolers who want to read about high schoolers, who have SUCH exciting lives.

So are books that were written for an adult audience, but are widely read by teens, YA? (I'm thinking of Pern, Mercedes Lackey, Orson Scott Card, and such, among fantasy/SF--some of these are out in YA editions now, but even when they were published for adults, the teens read them).
What about books written for adults that are assigned in high school classes?

A YA book is typically a book about 17-year-olds that will appeal to 14-year-olds. So, even if you write a book about teenagers, it probably is an "adult" rather than a "YA" book if the writing style and theme are suited for someone older.