YABookgate

[Captain Hastings Official]

Is there any reason not to beat this woman within an inch of her life with a sack of brass doorknobs?

Yes. Because she'd get off - possibly literally - on the feeling of being a martyr.

 

[Kari Kamiya]

I'm honestly shocked that A Series of Unfortunate Events are children's novels, not YA books. They fit right into the YA demographic (once you take out the shrieking harpies from the demographic), and I never felt like I was ever once being talked down to even when the Baudelaire children were being talked down to by most of the adult characters. They still hold up nicely, too, I don't think an adult will ever feel embarrassed to be caught and silently judged for reading it out in public.

I dunno, might just be the nostalgia talking, but it was honestly the perfect transitional period for me by the time it ended right when I entered high school. I never saw them as something that's beneath me, but it was as if it grew up with me without sacrificing its identity to better "fit in". Harry Potter was like that, too, in that it felt like it grew up with the reader, but in hindsight I think J.K. Rowling was trying too hard to make it much more mature than it really should've been.

 

[Trashfire Garbagefuck]

I dunno, might just be the nostalgia talking, but it was honestly the perfect transitional period for me by the time it ended right when I entered high school. I never saw them as something that's beneath me, but it was as if it grew up with me without sacrificing its identity to better "fit in". Harry Potter was like that, too, in that it felt like it grew up with the reader, but in hindsight I think J.K. Rowling was trying too hard to make it much more mature than it really should've been.

that's the ideal with children's book series. not everyone can accomplish it but that's what what you want to shoot for. narnia tried that too but just got boring. I barely made it through the fourth book in jr high and gave up.

Well, Paige Cee/LegallyPaige who is discussed at the beginning of this thread will literally DNF and one-star a book just on the basis that the main character is a cishet white male, regardless of the writing quality. And for some unfathomable reason she seems to have a lot of sway in the YA book community.

View attachment 1296316
And I will say that having a cisgender, straight male character be mentally ill or an abuse victim will not get you a pass from these people. Because, as we know, men's mental health doesn't matter because "male tears", and in the realm of SocJus, men can never be abused.

what on earth does "allo" mean?

 

[Elwood P. Dowd]

what on earth does "allo" mean?

I had to look it up. It apparently means "experiencing sexual attraction in some form," and is a shortening of "allosexual." As in, being the opposite of asexual.

So many ways my horizons get expanded, coming to KF.

 

[neverendingmidi]

There are some male-led YA novels (Hatchet, Gone, Maze Runner, etc) but the vast majority of YA is female-centric, in terms of both characters and authors. In the few instances I've seen where a male MC was written by a female author, they're almost always pigeonholed into an "Acceptable" category for a male character (gay, black, trans, abuse victim, mentally ill, etc).

It's a vicious cycle, tbh: Male authors writing non-"diverse" media about boys are the minority, and so they don't publish many books in the genre; boys see that they aren't really represented in YA, so they either have to go back to the kids' section or elevate to adult lit. And since the market isn't there, male authors aren't as in demand, so their numbers stay low.

Whether you like YA as a genre or not, whether you think it's trashy or idiotc, it's a bridge for teens and young adults to elevate their reading level from kids' lit to adult lit. And when you have a situation where teenage boys are less into reading as girls are, I think you'll find a tie-in to the fact that there isn't a lot of age-appropriate (in terms of reading level, not content) books available to them. Girls have a HUGE selection across a variety of topics that will appeal to them and be sufficiently challenging for their reading level; teenage boys do not. And for boys who are too advanced to be reading Harry Potter, but maybe not advanced enough to be reading Lord of the Rings, that inevitably means that they're going to have decreased interest in reading.

Young adult is just marketing language. I really think it was created by Harry Potter, simply because adults liked reading it so they created a "new" marketing term so they could separate it from the children's section. In the 90's a lot of these books would've been polished up more and either tossed specifically into childrens or adults.

For example: Tamora Pierce is now classed as Young Adult, but her first books were classed as Children's because there was no Young Adult section. For another: the EU Star Wars books. In a bookstore you generally see them in the Sci-Fi/Fantasy section with the other branded series, but in libraries they're frequently in the Young Adult section, and when I was checking them out as a teen in the 90's they were mixed in with the Adult section by author. The Redwall series is another that flip-flops between being Children/Young Adult depending on who is doing the filing.

 

[Elwood P. Dowd]

Young adult is just marketing language. I really think it was created by Harry Potter, simply because adults liked reading it so they created a "new" marketing term so they could separate it from the children's section. In the 90's a lot of these books would've been polished up more and either tossed specifically into childrens or adults.

For example: Tamora Pierce is now classed as Young Adult, but her first books were classed as Children's because there was no Young Adult section. For another: the EU Star Wars books. In a bookstore you generally see them in the Sci-Fi/Fantasy section with the other branded series, but in libraries they're frequently in the Young Adult section, and when I was checking them out as a teen in the 90's they were mixed in with the Adult section by author. The Redwall series is another that flip-flops between being Children/Young Adult depending on who is doing the filing.

I dunno. Maybe they weren't called YA, but stretching back at least as far as The Outsiders you've had stuff that is identifiably YA. And I would argue was marketed as such. Hell, a book like House of Stairs (1974) is probably the grandddaddy of the "YA Dystopian" type book at this point. The Tripods (1967- was even made into a BBC TV series...that was never finished, but okay.

FWIW, I think The Outsiders has held up reasonably well, House of Stairs very well and the The Tripods not at all, in terms of 21st century kids actually reading them.

 

[JohnDoe]

FWIW, I think The Outsiders has held up reasonably well, House of Stairs very well and the The Tripods not at all, in terms of 21st century kids actually reading them.

I think the category is even older than that. When was the last time you read Treasure Island? Not only is it nearly 150 years old, but it holds up very well.

 

[Azovka]

I had a difficult time getting into any of those YA fantasy series (Those with the Percy Jackson/Harry Potter formula, Eragon, etc.) when I was actually in the target age bracket for them. I really can't understand why so many grown adults treat them like the pinnacle of literature.

Among YA books that are oriented towards boys, there's the Alex Rider series . It's about a teen!Bond spy basically. I read them when I was about 10-11 years old, and it was fairly interesting as far as YA books went (better than Percy Jackson imho). Another one is The Edge Chronicles, which always keeps being labelled "children's lit", but should be YA, just like A Series of Unfortunate Events. And The Dresden Files should be suitable for older teens.

But yes, in general, there are very few books geared towards teenage boys in that genre. And I doubt there will be any in the foreseeable future.

 

[QuokkaCaptain]

Among YA books that are oriented towards boys, there's the Alex Rider series . It's about a teen!Bond spy basically. I read them when I was about 10-11 years old, and it was fairly interesting as far as YA books went (better than Percy Jackson imho). Another one is The Edge Chronicles, which always keeps being labelled "children's lit", but should be YA, just like A Series of Unfortunate Events. And The Dresden Files should be suitable for older teens.

But yes, in general, there are very few books geared towards teenage boys in that genre. And I doubt there will be any in the foreseeable future.

THANK YOU, I was trying to remember the name of the Alex Rider series. I had the book covers in my mind but couldn't place a name to them.

Young adult is just marketing language. I really think it was created by Harry Potter, simply because adults liked reading it so they created a "new" marketing term so they could separate it from the children's section. In the 90's a lot of these books would've been polished up more and either tossed specifically into childrens or adults.

For example: Tamora Pierce is now classed as Young Adult, but her first books were classed as Children's because there was no Young Adult section. For another: the EU Star Wars books. In a bookstore you generally see them in the Sci-Fi/Fantasy section with the other branded series, but in libraries they're frequently in the Young Adult section, and when I was checking them out as a teen in the 90's they were mixed in with the Adult section by author. The Redwall series is another that flip-flops between being Children/Young Adult depending on who is doing the filing.

I dunno. Maybe they weren't called YA, but stretching back at least as far as The Outsiders you've had stuff that is identifiably YA. And I would argue was marketed as such. Hell, a book like House of Stairs (1974) is probably the grandddaddy of the "YA Dystopian" type book at this point. The Tripods (1967- was even made into a BBC TV series...that was never finished, but okay.

FWIW, I think The Outsiders has held up reasonably well, House of Stairs very well and the The Tripods not at all, in terms of 21st century kids actually reading them.

I think the category is even older than that. When was the last time you read Treasure Island? Not only is it nearly 150 years old, but it holds up very well.

Harry Potter is still marketed as Children's literature. I can't be certain of every place, but I know some of the major book-related retailers in the U.S. (Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million, Amazon) market it as Children's lit. Even some smaller local bookstores in my area have Harry Potter in their kid sections.

Here's the thing: There is definitely a case to be made for YA having a lot of marketing value, because they are trying to appeal to that teenage group that parents want to shop for.

But, as the examples above show, there are profound examples of teen-directed literature pre-dating the YA craze of the early/mid-2000s. And whether it's marketing or not, the result of YA becoming a recognized genre of literature means that authors are writing with a certain target audience in mind. And that means that they are tailoring their writing to work for a young audience- young enough that some classics (War and Peace, Les Miserables, A Tale of Two Cities for example) might be a little too tough for their reading level, but old enough that books like Harry Potter aren't challenging enough for them.

When parents come into my store asking for help for finding a book for their kid- especially if it's "free reading" that they have to do for school- one of the biggest sticking-points I get for kids and teens is "but is it challenging enough for them?" A lot of teachers will push parents to get their kids to read things that are more challenging than Harry Potter and Percy Jackson, but that doesn't mean they're ready to dive into Edgar Allan Poe or Oscar Wilde just yet. Especially if the kid is a slow reader or an unenthusiastic one, there's a tricky balance to be found between "something that will challenge them" and "something that will interest them enough to keep them reading and developing their reading skills".

And often, YA is the genre for that.

Well, Paige Cee/LegallyPaige who is discussed at the beginning of this thread will literally DNF and one-star a book just on the basis that the main character is a cishet white male, regardless of the writing quality. And for some unfathomable reason she seems to have a lot of sway in the YA book community.

View attachment 1296316
And I will say that having a cisgender, straight male character be mentally ill or an abuse victim will not get you a pass from these people. Because, as we know, men's mental health doesn't matter because "male tears", and in the realm of SocJus, men can never be abused.

To be fair, these are the SJW lunatics on Twitter.

A lot of parents and kids neither look at nor care about these psychos. Holding Up the Universe has a split male-female POV, and the male lead of the book suffers from prosopagnosia, a disorder that causes him not to recognize faces (not a mental disorder, but still a disability); the book, to my knowledge, has done well. The Perks of Being a Wallflower (while not marketed as YA, it's done well with the teen/YA demographic) features a straight white main character with mental health/trauma issues, and has done super well. It's Kind of a Funny Story, Challenger Deep, Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock- to the best of my knowledge all of these books feature straight, white, male protagonists that suffer from mental illnesses or disorders.

Again, you have the loudmouth bigots on Twitter, and then you have the actual demographic that's scanning the shelves and going "Huh, that looks interesting". Unless the book does something unusually offensive, they're not going to stir up a frothing Twitter mob the way Lauren Myracle did by daring to open her mouth and suggest that straight white boys deserve a voice in YA too.

 

[Piga Dgrifm]

To be fair, these are the SJW lunatics on Twitter.

A lot of parents and kids neither look at nor care about these psychos. Holding Up the Universe has a split male-female POV, and the male lead of the book suffers from prosopagnosia, a disorder that causes him not to recognize faces (not a mental disorder, but still a disability); the book, to my knowledge, has done well. The Perks of Being a Wallflower (while not marketed as YA, it's done well with the teen/YA demographic) features a straight white main character with mental health/trauma issues, and has done super well. It's Kind of a Funny Story, Challenger Deep, Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock- to the best of my knowledge all of these books feature straight, white, male protagonists that suffer from mental illnesses or disorders.

Again, you have the loudmouth bigots on Twitter, and then you have the actual demographic that's scanning the shelves and going "Huh, that looks interesting". Unless the book does something unusually offensive, they're not going to stir up a frothing Twitter mob the way Lauren Myracle did by daring to open her mouth and suggest that straight white boys deserve a voice in YA too.

True, but to someone whom has never encountered a person like Paige Cee and her ilk, especially if they are a self-publishing author, having their book get hit with one-stars for a nonsense reason can be emotionally draining at best and damaging at worst.

 

[Mola Ram]

True, but to someone whom has never encountered a person like Paige Cee and her ilk, especially if they are a self-publishing author, having their book get hit with one-stars for a nonsense reason can be emotionally draining at best and damaging at worst.

My impractical dreams of violent reprisals aside, what really needs to happen to Paige is a smackdown by an established writer. Not necessarily a King or a Rowling, but someone with enough cachet to absorb the hit and enough reputation to force the shitheads who give her oxygen to listen. Come to think of it, that sort of smackdown might be even more effective if it came from an agent.

 

[QuokkaCaptain]

My impractical dreams of violent reprisals aside, what really needs to happen to Paige is a smackdown by an established writer. Not necessarily a King or a Rowling, but someone with enough cachet to absorb the hit and enough reputation to force the shitheads who give her oxygen to listen. Come to think of it, that sort of smackdown might be even more effective if it came from an agent.

Someone with enough Fuck You money to throw hands on Twitter and not be drowned under the "REEEEE"ing that ensues.

 

[Elwood P. Dowd]

From the Comisgate thread...Figured it might make more sense here.

First, Picolo isn't CG, in fact I recall he vaguely threw shade at Cyberfrog when his campaign made more than Cyberfrog at the time. It also crashed IGG which was funny.



Second, he's late with Icarus because he's been making comicbooks for DC. (I haven't read them but it looks like its in line with Gothem High: DC heroes doing boring shit like going to the coffee shop.)

81P3u1nB1XL.jpg81JPkBxL+ML.jpg

(Beast Boy is coming soon. Note Picolo has equal billing to the writer now.)



Third, you're right about the brazilian shipping but things are slowly opening again. He could luck out or he could not. We'll see.







Telling what others to do is exactly what the boss does. You must mean "You're not the boss if nobody's listening to you."

Kami Garcia is a YA author brought into comic books. Damn. Rainbow Rowell (Runaways), Melissa de la Cruz (Hapa Batman), and now her. And I feel like I'm missing a bunch, though maybe it just seems that way. Have any of the books written by YA authors brought into comics sold well? I mean, I don't see much in the way of an audience overlap, either by age or gender, yet here we are.

 

[SnarkySperg]

I'm honestly shocked that A Series of Unfortunate Events are children's novels, not YA books. They fit right into the YA demographic (once you take out the shrieking harpies from the demographic), and I never felt like I was ever once being talked down to even when the Baudelaire children were being talked down to by most of the adult characters. They still hold up nicely, too, I don't think an adult will ever feel embarrassed to be caught and silently judged for reading it out in public.

I dunno, might just be the nostalgia talking, but it was honestly the perfect transitional period for me by the time it ended right when I entered high school. I never saw them as something that's beneath me, but it was as if it grew up with me without sacrificing its identity to better "fit in". Harry Potter was like that, too, in that it felt like it grew up with the reader, but in hindsight I think J.K. Rowling was trying too hard to make it much more mature than it really should've been.

I'd argue the tone makes it more appropriate for YA. I read them as a kid and I think I didn't fully appreciate the dark humor as much as I would now (though I'm slightly out of the demographic now). It was a bit bleak and depressing and as a kid I wasn't really into that and it went over my head. Also I recall being confused by it supposedly being a true story, which wouldn't have gone over my head as much if I'd read it in high school or middle school instead of elementary.

Also, never forget that Paige has never written a book, has very predictable reviews, and majored in English but hates classic lit (and really all books other than YA). Her opinion is garbage and anyone who listens to her should not be taken seriously.

 

[Chan Fan]

I don't believe this has been talked about in this thread yet (and if so I apologize overlooking it) but apparently there is a new YA graphic novel about Harley Quinn called "Breaking Glass" that has her being sent to live with her grandmother in Gotham City but her grandma is dead so instead she goes to live with a drag queen named "Mama" who owns a drag night club. I guess somehow this is better than her being a gymnast and psychologist? And she teams up with the Joker to destroy corporations. So they made it her choice to be a delinquent rather than having the Joker manipulate her.

It seems like there is a story to HQ's origin than could be looked at as a cautionary tale - smart girl loses everything from crappy influences of an insane person, better stay away from people like that! vs. if you're a troublemaker just stay that way and keep terrorizing everyone. I'm not very well versed in the comics so if someone who knows more about them wants to weigh in I'd like to hear your take on this

 

[Piga Dgrifm]

A Series of Unfortunate Events was my favorite series as a kid, tbh. The books got a bit longer and some of the concepts towards the end were more complex with discussions of if it's okay to do an awful thing if it's for a good reason, and explorations of morality that go a lot deeper than kids' books tend to. It didn't suddenly try to take a hard left into darker territory (which is a main criticism I and others have with Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, etc.), it just went deeper into what was already there from the start. It felt like the characters in the book were actually learning and growing with the audience, and it's one of the few series I've seen manage to pull that off successfully.

The Hate U Give's author has got a new one coming out:

Last big drama I saw from her was when she got pissy and said that you should never say the author's name in a negative review:

"This book written by [REDACTED] was very poorly paced and the characters were undeveloped..."

I mean, you're gonna get negative reviews. Some of them, as we've seen in this thread, are going to be bullshit, but it's a thing that happens when you put your art out there.

 

[gata]

About the boys( or some girls) not reading YA books, I think many of them either don't read those or move on to adult/mature books, manga or web novels (isekai is super popular with boys judging from the amount of readers on asian novel translations, royal road , scribblehub or maybe wattpad.)
There's a lot of questionable quality on web fiction but at least people are not forced by the editor/publisher to change parts of your story or shamed/canceled by twitter "reviwer" blue checkmarks for writing "problematic" shit

 

[Someone in a Tree]

My impractical dreams of violent reprisals aside, what really needs to happen to Paige is a smackdown by an established writer. Not necessarily a King or a Rowling, but someone with enough cachet to absorb the hit and enough reputation to force the shitheads who give her oxygen to listen.

C’mon, Thomas Pynchon, do the Lord’s work.

Last big drama I saw from her was when she got pissy and said that you should never say the author's name in a negative review:

In her defense, it seems as if she is objecting to the practice of tagging the author in tweets that denigrate the book, and I’m obliged to agree with her on that. Yes, she’s a public figure and should know that not everyone is going to like her work, but tagging someone to let them know that you think their book is shit is an asshole move and another example of why Twitter is a cesspool when it comes to discourse.

 

[Kosher Dill]

So if you have gangster blood running through your veins, your fate is pretty much sealed?
That red pill came out of left field.

 

[Puddleduck]

"Fly"
"King Lords"
"Sling dope"

Jeez Angie, your age and middle class is showing.