8 ms·

A lot of the shorter fantasy goes into the Young Adult category now. Especially since the younger age categories read more books a month. Fish around a bit for

by merrua 11y ago

A lot of the shorter fantasy goes into the Young Adult category now. Especially since the younger age categories read more books a month. Fish around a bit for your own taste and you will find shorter novels and novellas there http://www.goodreads.com/choiceawards/best-young-adult-fantasy-books-2014 http://www.goodreads.com/choiceawards/best-young-adult-fanta...

untothebreach 11y ago
I tend to see a disdain for YA books in the SFF community. Which is sad, since many in the community still remember the (not-so-distant) past, when all of SFF was looked down upon by those who only read "real" literature. Romance, too, seems to get this attitude.
- OldSchoolJohnny 11y ago
  Personally my disdain for them is that currently they are mostly telling the same basic story with different window dressing.
  - swombat 11y ago
    Worth checking out Cory Doctorow's YA novels... they tend to be more varied than the typical fare - a good example of what you can do with the genre. Yes, there's a "coming of age", "figuring out what you want to do with your life" common element to them - but then one might argue that many alleged adults in today's world have not actually come of age yet. Maybe we need more of this stuff in our literature.
    - kleer001 11y ago
      Yes, if you can stand Doctorow's breast beating over EFF type themes of autonomy, government, security, etc... Which might be just your thing ;)
      - swombat 11y ago
        He's not breast-beating, just making a clear, compelling, well argued and well illustrated case... Or, you're right, it might well be my thing :-P
        kleer001 11y ago
        Fair enough, lol. The only reason I call it breast beating is because it's such a clear departure from his very early work.
  - JoshTriplett 11y ago
    There are bad YA novels, and bad non-YA novels, in all genres, including fantasy. I've seen plenty of cookie-cutter fantasy stories in the standard fantasy section as well. And on the flip side, there are a lot of excellent fantasy novels squirreled away in the YA section where many people will overlook them.
  - civilian 11y ago
    What's the basic story? (bonus point if you link to tvtropes.)
  - onewaystreet 11y ago
    People have been saying this about the fantasy and sci-fi genres for decades.
- civilian 11y ago
  Yeah, that attitude is odd. My strategy is to be intentionally clueless as to why anyone would have a problem with 28-year-old-me reading The Hunger Games.
JoshTriplett 11y ago
I find the whole "Young Adult" category strange. In film, most people don't automatically look down on movies just because they're not rated R or NC-17. Any book without blatantly adult-only content (which includes the majority of books) could reasonably be read by "Young Adults".
- kbenson 11y ago
  I think the problem is that "Young Adult" encompasses a wide level of maturity, and authors may tailor their works towards vastly different levels of maturity, that the quality can vary quite a bit. Some works are targeted for young readers, but are rather mature in their execution (well explained, well reasoned character motivations and plot, etc), while others bank on the possibly lower expectations of the young and inexperienced reader. I've picked up some horrendous young adult fiction before and read it (I'm looking at you, James Patterson!). That doesn't keep me from reading it, but it does make me wary...
  - merrua 11y ago
    I've found word of mouth and reviews to help out with that. But its not 100% proof alright.
- dragonwriter 11y ago
  Categories are about marketing. "Young Adult" categorization is part of a decision to market primarily to the YA demographic, not a content-based description that the book can "reasonably by read by" young adults in a way that doesn't apply to most other books in a bookstore.
  - JoshTriplett 11y ago
    It certainly makes sense from a marketing point of view, though even there it's possible to market a book to YA without making it a classification. I just don't think the distinction makes sense as a top-level classification.
    - 11y ago
onewaystreet 11y ago
This is getting to be less and less true with the success of series like Harry Potter, Twilight, Hunger Games, The Maze Runner, Divergent etc. Many of the books listed on that Goodreads link are parts of larger series themselves.

by merrua 11y ago

untothebreach 11y ago

I tend to see a disdain for YA books in the SFF community. Which is sad, since many in the community still remember the (not-so-distant) past, when all of SFF was looked down upon by those who only read "real" literature. Romance, too, seems to get this attitude.

OldSchoolJohnny 11y ago
Personally my disdain for them is that currently they are mostly telling the same basic story with different window dressing.
- swombat 11y ago
  Worth checking out Cory Doctorow's YA novels... they tend to be more varied than the typical fare - a good example of what you can do with the genre. Yes, there's a "coming of age", "figuring out what you want to do with your life" common element to them - but then one might argue that many alleged adults in today's world have not actually come of age yet. Maybe we need more of this stuff in our literature.
  - kleer001 11y ago
    Yes, if you can stand Doctorow's breast beating over EFF type themes of autonomy, government, security, etc... Which might be just your thing ;)
    - swombat 11y ago
      He's not breast-beating, just making a clear, compelling, well argued and well illustrated case... Or, you're right, it might well be my thing :-P
      - kleer001 11y ago
        Fair enough, lol. The only reason I call it breast beating is because it's such a clear departure from his very early work.
- JoshTriplett 11y ago
  There are bad YA novels, and bad non-YA novels, in all genres, including fantasy. I've seen plenty of cookie-cutter fantasy stories in the standard fantasy section as well. And on the flip side, there are a lot of excellent fantasy novels squirreled away in the YA section where many people will overlook them.
- civilian 11y ago
  What's the basic story? (bonus point if you link to tvtropes.)
- onewaystreet 11y ago
  People have been saying this about the fantasy and sci-fi genres for decades.
civilian 11y ago
Yeah, that attitude is odd. My strategy is to be intentionally clueless as to why anyone would have a problem with 28-year-old-me reading The Hunger Games.

JoshTriplett 11y ago

I find the whole "Young Adult" category strange. In film, most people don't automatically look down on movies just because they're not rated R or NC-17. Any book without blatantly adult-only content (which includes the majority of books) could reasonably be read by "Young Adults".

kbenson 11y ago
I think the problem is that "Young Adult" encompasses a wide level of maturity, and authors may tailor their works towards vastly different levels of maturity, that the quality can vary quite a bit. Some works are targeted for young readers, but are rather mature in their execution (well explained, well reasoned character motivations and plot, etc), while others bank on the possibly lower expectations of the young and inexperienced reader. I've picked up some horrendous young adult fiction before and read it (I'm looking at you, James Patterson!). That doesn't keep me from reading it, but it does make me wary...
- merrua 11y ago
  I've found word of mouth and reviews to help out with that. But its not 100% proof alright.
dragonwriter 11y ago
Categories are about marketing. "Young Adult" categorization is part of a decision to market primarily to the YA demographic, not a content-based description that the book can "reasonably by read by" young adults in a way that doesn't apply to most other books in a bookstore.
- JoshTriplett 11y ago
  It certainly makes sense from a marketing point of view, though even there it's possible to market a book to YA without making it a classification. I just don't think the distinction makes sense as a top-level classification.
  - 11y ago

onewaystreet 11y ago

This is getting to be less and less true with the success of series like Harry Potter, Twilight, Hunger Games, The Maze Runner, Divergent etc. Many of the books listed on that Goodreads link are parts of larger series themselves.