Lilith Saintcrow

First of all, I’d like to wander from the usual Friday routine and announce that I’ve sold (or rather, my lovely agent sold) a three-book young adult series, titled Strange Angels, to Penguin/Razorbill. Book 1 is done and book 2 is in the works. I’m really happy and excited to be working with Razorbill, and I’m thrilled to be branching out into YA even though I was terrified, while writing book 1, that I was Doing It Wrong.

I have pretty strong opinions (now there’s a surprise, right?) about YA books, but mostly as a reader. I know what I like and I know what I don’t like in the genre, and it’s stayed pretty much the same (with a few thematic fiddles and indiscretions) since I was about nine years old.

First, there must be either no BS or low BS. This is especially crucial in a YA, since kids have, by and large, exquisitely sensitive bullsh!t meters. They may not be able to put their finger on why, but kids know when an adult is being false. They may not be able to do anything about other adults who lie to or BS them, but they can certainly not buy or read a book.

I think it’s critical not to BS any of your readers, because they will catch you every time. But it’s even more crucial not to talk down to, lecture, dissemble to, or try to “snow” young readers. Besides, how can we expect kids to tell the truth when adults lie to them?

I’m not talking about tact. Or about saying, “This is something I’m not discussing with you because it’s an adult conversation.” I’m talking about flat-out lying just to shut a kid up or take advantage of them. Kids get bombarded with that all the time, and they get just as sick of it as adults do. The difference is, adults can do something about it (most of the time) and kids are helpless.

Example: I remember feeling utterly victimized when a specific YA novel I read completely bombed on the question of teen sex. The Virginal Heroine was vindicated in the face of a nasty whisper campaign and the Bad Girl Who Had Sex was in a car crash and terribly disfigured. Even at the tender age of twelve I had some problems with equating sex to disfigurement, especially when the same boy had been pressuring both girls for nookie–and he ended up with the Virginal Heroine, too! I never read anything from that author ever again, and I still shudder when I think of it.

I think there’s a huge difference between explaining to kids about appropriateness and lying to them, or brushing them off because of their age. My kids expect reasonable and honest answers to their reasonable and honest questions. Sure, it sucks sometimes to have to explain some things. But that’s why parenting is a JOB, you know.

I think it’s incumbent upon the YA writer to be on the lookout for, and avoid, usual adult cop-outs when dealing with kids. There are plenty of YA novels that insulted my intelligence even when I was nine years old–and I very much conflate BS with an insult to the intelligence of the reader.

Next, I like my YA to be fully characterized. I don’t like one-note teen characters any more than I like one-note adult characters. People are multidimensional, and I expect at least a little ambiguity, motivation, and quirkiness in my protagonist. Too many people in the genre seem to think writing for teens means short sentences, short words, and short characterization.

This ties in with another thing–vocabulary. I don’t think a YA writer should bend over backward to get the “current slang” in. (I about hurled a recent YA across the room when I came across a character saying, “Fo shizzle!”) There’s a certain level of faddish slang that will irrevocably date a book; and unless you are certain your book’s appeal will survive being so dated, you should think carefully about your slang. Plus, most kids I knew growing up didn’t give a rat’s patootie about the “in” slang. We just said “cool” or “dude” occasionally.

Speaking of vocab, please for the love of God don’t think that teenagers can’t understand long words. Erudition and large vocabulary are not merely adult traits. Part of the reason I started reading “adult” books–as in, lit fic and SF/F for an adult audience instead of YA–very young was because the “teen” books I had access to back in the benighted 80s had Afterschool-Special vocabularies. I wanted new words. I LIKED going to my dictionary and finding new words, and my other reading friends did as well. (I’ve never lost that habit.) Kids like reasonable expectations in their fiction–they like to rise to them, not sink to the level of a brainless puddle of pseudo-slang word vomit.

Of course, I could be writing the world’s worst YA and not know it. (I fully admit this may be the case, and it’s not just because I feel like EVERY book I write is hideous in the first-draft stages.) But I know what I like, and what I’ve liked for over two decades when it comes to the young adult genre. It’s authors like Sarah Dessen. Robin McKinley and Patricia McKillip. Anne McCaffrey’s Pern series, her Restoree and To Ride Pegasus. Andrea Siegel’s Like The Red Panda. Ursula Le Guin’s Wizard of Earthsea. Katherine Paterson’s Jacob Have I Loved, Russell Banks’s Rule of the Bone, Cynthia Voight’s Dicey Tillerman series. Peter Beagle’s work. LJ Smith’s Forbidden Game, Dark Vision, and Night World series.

There’s some damn fine writing, right there. Those are books that didn’t lie to me when I was young, or made me remember what it was like to be a teen or young adult. That’s the type of book I want to write.

It’s anyone’s guess whether or not I’ll be able to pull it off.

Finishing up this monstrous Friday post, I’d like to point you to Jeff Soesbe and his post on low expectations. Jeff points out that as a new writer, or a previously-unpublished writer, you do have to prove you know the rules before you get the leeway to break them.

I’ve met a few “writers” who think the rules shouldn’t apply to their Deathless Genius. Who believe that the world is too stupid to give them their due–which includes adoration and no editing or feedback.

And lo and behold, they do not get published. Go figure.

Last but not least (more shameless self-promotion here) there’s a round-up of reviews for my recently-released Night Shift. All in all, it’s mostly positive, and I’m really happy about that.

No, really. You can’t guess how happy. As in “wiping the sweat of relief from my tormented brow” happy. As in “dodged a bullet” happy. *grin*

And now, I’m going to go poke at a novel. There’s serious wordcount to get in today, as well as a trip to the library and dishes to be done. It’s a writer’s life, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

Have a great weekend, everyone.

Related posts:

1. Caulfield and Continuity
2. On Young Adult Fiction
3. Truth And The Intentional Mistake

This entry was posted on Friday, July 11th, 2008 at 11:19 am and is filed under Deep Thoughts, Real Life, Writing (About). You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.