Pick a Shelf: Adult Fiction or YA?
I was asked today whether the Rootstock saga was written for the Young Adult (YA) audience.
Reading a dozen articles from a dozen different perspectives this evening left me with few pearls of wisdom or hard and fast rules on what constitutes YA, or (please spare me) New Adult.
Age of your protagonist is a primary factor, says Roz Morris in her “Where does My Book Fit on the Shelf” post.
In adult fiction, protagonists can be any age. But when you write for non-adult genres, readers are more fussy. They usually like the main character to be like them but a little bit older – they want the sense of testing a slightly more adventurous world, but not one that’s so ahead of their development that they can’t connect with it.
Rootstock engages several protagonists of various ages, though most are in their early to mid-adulthood years. Because the saga spans nearly two decades, we meet Sethlyan and Isobel in their late teens, but watch them mature to have teens of their own.
Nigel is ageless. Mouse is forever a child.
The real protagonist of Rootstock is a cause, not an individual and the struggle to survive isn’t relegated only to the young.
There are emotional development and interest elements to consider, Morris advises:
So to work out your age range, identify the most significant trials the characters go through and the way you’ve used them in the story. Are you exploring the trials of a particular time of life, or are you looking at humanity in a wider sense?
Rootstock definitely looks at humanity in a wider sense. Much wider.
The Atlantic quotes Jim McCarthy, Vice President at Dystel & Goderich Literary Management as saying,
I don’t know that there’s a real technical definition of what Y.A. is. Essentially, it’s just literature for and about teens, there to bridge the gap between children’s and adult’s books.
This from Robert Wood resonated:
Censorship looms large over YA fiction. The formative aspect of the genre means that parents, usually the ones actually paying for the books, are often on the lookout for subjects and themes they don’t want their children to encounter.
Considering I wouldn’t exactly be comfortable having my grandchildren read some parts of Rootstock, I’m guessing that’s another clue it isn’t intended for the YA audience.
What about these elements from Chuck Wendig?
The prevalence of first person point of view
YA fiction is often told in a first-person point-of-view. One could intuit reasons for this: first-person tends to be a faster and more forthright read, teenagers often embrace their own first-person narratives (from handwritten journals to, say, Tumblr), teens might be more inwardly-focused than adults.
The preponderance of present tense.
YA fiction is also frequently given over to the present tense. One might suggest reasons for this: present tense is a snappier, sharper read (more “cinematic” as the saying goes); it also provides a more urgent read; the teen mind lives more in the present than in the past, and so narrative tense should reflect it.
Shorter, punchier books
You won’t find many Young Adult books that are big enough to derail an Amtrak train or to bludgeon a silverback gorilla. The average Young Adult novel probably hovers around the 70,000 word mark — shorter if it leans away from genre and toward literary, I think. That’s not to say you won’t or can’t see BIG GIANT GALLUMPHING TEEN EPICS, but it isn’t really the norm. Particularly for the first in a series.
Chuck Wendig 25 Things You Should Know About Young Adult Fiction
I tried writing Seth as first person, but tossed it. Too many others in Rootstock have equally compelling voices and, of course, I couldn’t slight Isobel. Present tense and first person are relegated to a few sidebars at the beginning of the a few chapters and as the final chapter of the entire saga.
Shorter? Nope. Definitely not shorter.
But Wendig also includes this amidst the litmus tests:
Pacier, chattier books
They also tend to be more quickly paced and with a great deal of dialogue. I’ve read some young adult books that read with almost the spare elegance of a really sharp, elegant screenplay.
Chuck Wendig 25 Things You Should Know About Young Adult Fiction
Yeah, that fits Rootstock. The dialog is strong. The chapters are short and scene-driven. It would adapt easily to episodic screenplay.
You’d think a group with enough clout to host the Young Adult Literature Convention would know, right? They focus on age of the protagonist.
Writers across the board at YALC agreed that the sine qua non of YA is an adolescent protagonist, who will probably face significant difficulties and crises, and grow and develop to some degree.
Well, maybe. Consider Nate, Cade, Bethan, Avalee, and Lamochatee. They definitely fit the age demographic as characters, and they’d tell you the bit about “significant difficulties” was an understatement.
But I didn’t write Rootstock for a teenage audience in particular.
I wrote books I wanted to read.
I was inspired by A Song of Ice and Fire by George R. R. Martin, and notably, by frustration after getting engrossed in a saga that might never be finished. But I found his multiple POV characters a compelling style and it felt instinctive as a storytelling voice for me.
And, being the stubborn sort, I was determined to finish telling the entire story before trying to publish the first book.
So, that settles it for me.
Rootstock is adult epic fantasy.