Before I begin, I should point out that the few examples of YA fiction I read when I was younger (“Holes”, “Tom Clancy’s Net Force Explorers”, “Goosebumps” etc...) were pretty good. And, in my very early twenties, I read at least two of Clive Barker’s amazing “Abarat” YA books as well. But, whilst looking for novels online in mid-March, I found an interesting-looking one… but quickly moved elsewhere as soon as I saw the “YA” acronym mentioned in several reviews. So, I thought that I’d talk about why I usually avoid reading this category of fiction. Even if there are clearly good books in it that I would enjoy.
[Edit: Ironically, several months after preparing this article, I found myself reading the novelisation of the first season of “Wednesday” (expect the review sometime next February?), which is technically a “YA” novel apparently. So, I guess that I do read them if they’re based on TV shows and stuff like that. I don’t know. Still, most of the time, I don’t really read YA fiction because…]
The first reason is how and why I first seriously got into reading fiction. Although I was lucky enough to have grown up around books and it wasn’t like I didn’t read anything before the age of thirteen, the main reason why I read so much during my teens and early twenties can be attributed to a single second-hand 1980s splatterpunk horror novel that I found on a market stall in Stafford whilst visiting relatives in the Midlands during the early 2000s when I was about thirteen.
The novel was “Assassin” (1988) by Shaun Hutson. The cover was solid black, with the author and title in shiny gold letters and a painting of a zombie’s decaying hand ominously holding a revolver. It looked really cool and I had to buy it. And, when I read it, it was exactly like what my younger self imagined all of the cool-looking “18 certificate” horror films I “wasn’t supposed to watch” must have been like. It was a novel unlike any I had ever read before. One which, in retrospect, was actually much edgier than many of the old 1980s “video nasties” that were starting to get un-banned during the early 2000s.
(Seriously, I’m not exaggerating here! It has been more than twenty years since I read it and I still remember…that… infamously gross “shock value” scene from it! But, as an introduction to the fact that novels are a completely uncensored medium, I couldn’t have asked for a better book LOL!)
Anyway, I’d found a clever way to bypass the patronising, over-protective film censorship that walled off so many interesting horror, thriller, sci-fi horror etc… movies from my younger self 🙂 I may have read books before then, but I instantly became a reader on that very day!
To my younger teenage self, books were rebellious. I gleefully read every second-hand 1970s-1980s horror novel I could get my hands on, as well as S.D.Perry’s “Resident Evil” novels and edgy “high-brow” novels by authors like J.G.Ballard, George Orwell, Brett Easton Ellis, Anthony Burgess, Hunter S. Thompson etc… – as well.
In this context, the idea of reading “age-appropriate” fiction that publishers had decided was “suitable for teenagers” seemed like an anathema! Books were the ONE uncensored medium and I’d be damned if I wasn’t going to get the most out of this! Of course, what this also means is that, when I experience the nostalgia that leads most other thirtysomethings to reach for a “YA” novel, I instead reach for either a 1980s horror novel or a modern indie one in the style…
Not only that, another reason why I didn’t read much “YA” when I was a teenager – and therefore don’t really have much nostalgia for it – is because I utterly hated being a teenager! Seriously, the last thing I wanted to do was to read about being a teenager as well as actually having to be one! No, I wanted to read stories about older people doing cool things, I wanted to read stories written for older readers… In short, I wanted escapism from being a teenager. And general fiction novels were something that was actually there for me. Escapism. Something I could read and vicariously not be a teenager for a while.
Ironically though, this didn’t apply to videogames – I first played a second-hand PS2 copy of “Silent Hill 3” (2003), a survival horror game where the main character is a teenager, when I was about sixteen. And, yes, this is one of those games which is just a “cool scary game” when you are that age. But, if you re-play it a couple of times when you’re older, you’ll gradually start to notice all sorts of clever stuff about it, all sorts of themes you didn’t notice before, the sheer quality of the game design etc… Seriously, it’s one of those games where you notice something new about it every time you play it. But this isn’t an essay about “Silent Hill 3”, I’ve already written at least two of those…..
Anyway, one cool side effect of reading general fiction when I was a teenager was that, not only did I gain a better vocabulary (because even the “pulp” novels from the 1980s used longer words and longer sentences than modern ones…), but it also gave me a lot more confidence in my own reading abilities as well. Because these non-YA books were fun, rebellious escapism from the hell of being a teenager, I became a much better and more confident reader. Because, when I found an unfamiliar word, I’d work out its meaning from the context. Because longer sentences and more formal writing are something you eagerly adapt to if the reward is getting to read a cool “If this was a film, I wouldn’t be allowed to watch it” horror story about zombies, giant rats or whatever.
And I miss this about fiction! I miss the pre-social media days when general fiction novels were expected to be edgy and shocking! When novels were the ONE uncensored medium, when reading was actually rebellious. One common theme I’ve seen in articles and videos about why adults read “YA” is because of the nostalgia. Well, general fiction is my nostalgia. It let me raise a metaphorical middle-finger to the film censors and escape from having to be a teenager.
Although smartphones are probably the main reason why teenagers don’t read as much as they used to, I think that the publishing industry is missing a trick here. Fact is, most gamers of my age were playing all of the coolest classics (Doom, GTA, Resident Evil etc..) long before we were “officially” old enough to. In fact, that was literally part of the fun – ditto those silly “explicit lyrics” stickers on albums as well. And finding a way – whether late-night television, a friend’s house etc… – to watch “18 certificate” films back then made each one feel cooler, more memorable and nostalgic. Seriously, making books rebellious is a very overlooked way of getting the next generation of readers interested in the medium.
And that’s why I don’t read YA very often. Yes, there are certainly good books in this category, but it also goes against the whole reason and spirit of why I really got into reading novels in the first place….
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Anyway, I hope that this was interesting 🙂
