Y/A FICTION: Only For The Young Adults?

“Y/A Fiction is for Kids”, I am sure Every Y/A Reader has come across this comment at least once in their Lifetime.

Y/A is considered to be for the little teens who read books for fun when they do not have more sophisticated resources available to them. Y/A readers are generally termed as Angry Teens or Kids who read stories.

But before we assign stereotypical generalizations on the most famous category of Fiction in the world currently, It is important to know about it.

What Is Y/A?

Y/A Literature refers to Young Adult Literature, these books are mostly marketed towards People in their adolescence.

Young Adult Literature was termed as a new part of Literature in the early 1800’s. That’s when the Books for children and books for Adolescents got differentiated into their own separate entities.

In Y/A Literature we usually see protagonists who are adolescents and the themes mostly explored are First experiences, Discovery of yourself and Exploration of the world through innocent eyes.

We Also get to see some dark themes of going astray from yourself and new traumas you overcome.

How Is Y/A literature Different?

It is fascinating to see how there are some staggering differences in the same genres of Young Adult and New Adult Literature, but at the same time there are unique similarities too. This is highly visible in some of the most common Genres like Contemporary Romance or Fantasy.

Funnily enough Some of the Genres the “Elites” claim to be unique to New Adult or Adult literature like Historical or Psychological literature are also explored In Young Adult literature, with the unique Y/A flavor added to them.

Coming back to the Argument that Young Adult Literature is just as relevant As the New Adult and Adult Books, when we look at the statistics that states more than 55% of the Audience for Young Adult Literature are actually people belonging to the age group of 18-30, It's fasciating because these books are not marketed for this age group at all.

If we Pick up a random Y/A Book like “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee or “The Outsider” By S. E. Hinton, which are required reading in most literature courses In Highschool, It is surely obvious that these books are for adolescents.

But surprisingly enough, These are some of the books considered to be one of the most famous among the adults.

We could also say the same thing about most of the new age Y/A Books. The Most Common being, Lord of The Rings OR Harry Potter.

This raises a question, Why Would any Adult want to read books Written and marketed for teens?

Why Y/A?

The most obvious generalization we come across is, We just do not know how to read Mature Books.

It personally irks me when I hear comments Like, Y/A Fiction serves only as a tool to enrich Imagination. And gives you no necessary help to grow as a person.

Which is clearly a Foolish notion. There is no book in the world that does not provide you some kind of personal enrichment.

So, after a lot of consideration and Research albeit with unofficial data from google and personal friends.

The Answer turns out to be the psychological wiring of our Brain.

The Influence of the entertainment medium we are exposed to in our teen life plays an absolutely immense role in our psychological development.

It also applies to other forms of entertainment like Movies or Music and in our Case Books.

It means that, the books we read in our teenage years form the basis of our Personality. And it seems completely logical to read books that reflect our personalities. What’s so wrong in reading the books you can relate to on a personal level?

We are constantly exploring and stumbling along without direction in our present life which, trust me is absolutely No fun. This is also why most of us relate to stories which are a reflection of our own Youth. Young Adult Fiction provides us a platform to be reminiscent of our past, which leads to our growth as a person in our future.

The other significant reason Adults tend to Love Y/A is the themes we come across In Y/A Fiction. Which Include the most obvious ones like Coming of Age, New exploration of Love. In Fantasy, the Chosen one trope which is the most common trope (Which sadly gets a very bad rapport) where the protagonists realize their destiny and grow to accept their worth.

These themes are slightly different to the themes we see in New Adult or Adult Fiction which traverse through motif’s like, growing into yourself or settling into your place in the world. Which comparatively invokes less challenge to readers than crashing into the unknown.

Young Adult Fictions are just as meaningful, Just as Worthwhile and Just as educational as any other book you choose to pick up, But they are just a tad bit more enjoyable, which our Elite Readers do not like, As they passionately believe that you have to take the enjoyment out of anything to be able to gain knowledge.

In Conclusion,

To People who say YA Fiction serves as nothing but a tool to improve Imagination, I would say, please read some YA Fiction, Maybe the Right Kind this time.

This Prejudice against Young Adult Literature has been on a Rampage in the world right now, and it is high time we accept that our reading choices are not supposed to be regulated by our Age but instead because of our choices.

As we Say, MY READING CHOICES ARE MINE! AND NOBODY’S BUSINESS.

There is no need to be ashamed of our reading choices. Let’s Be Unabashedly Proud of What we read, and Let’s Own It.