Anyone writing YA or Youth who <i>isn't</i> technically a 'youth?'

"It's as if you reach a certain time-spot in your life and are suddenly no longer allowed to muse about what would happen if zombies took over the earth (Starbucks would be the first place to go, by the way) and vampires rose from the grave to combat the undead drones before all of their blood-stock was eaten up. Or some such things."

No it's not. You still do that in college. You actually even do it MORE in college because there's nobody telling you NOT to have campus-wide nerf fights.

I mean, heck, my sense of adventure has gone up since going to college just because I'm completely free to just *wander* for hours and find things. I couldn't have taken a five mile walk into the middle of the woods just 'cause back when I was in highschool.

And most teenagers aren't really able to realize how full of crap they really are about, like, everything. I'm way more inchoate now then I was back then.

That's why I'm writing something that could arguably called YA. I want to recapture what it felt being in highschool so I can sort out my mind. Who was I then, and how does that affect who I am now, and what I will end up doing later?

Or something like that.

I agree with you about the whole college gone adventure wild thing. I've been there once and planning on going back for round two (graduate level) soon. It's being away from your parents in drones of other kids away from their parents ... possibly for the first time that does it.

Children are pure and inspiring. Then they become angst little bratty teens. Then wamm! (should of said No Wammy) they are adults. It's the way of growing up. With people always telling you what to do. Just as you age, different things become important or the center of adult's attention. By the time you're in college, it's your career success.... which only comes after college.

I am most likely not making sense. It's early or late or both here... and I just wanted to drop a line saying i'm not prepubescent and i like writing and reading children's and young adult genre labeled stories.

"Find a job you love and you'll never work a day in your life."
~Confucius

Hi, there. I'm 56 years old. What do you mean I'm not technically a YA? LOL

You don't have to be of a certain age to write for that age, but I suppose it helps if you inderstand it. I'm trying to write for YAs because I'm a Guide leader (Girl Scouts over there in Left-Pondia) here in England and I know that age group.
Having said that my work has nothing to do with zombies, vampires or their slayers, or homosexuality. So what do I know!

There's actually an entire group of us over at the old people writing for young people thread. "Old" being a relative term, I think most of us are mid-20s with a handful beyond that. Old enough to remember the Clinton scandal, at any rate.

How about those of us who are "young at heart"? (Or perhaps just immature, in my case. ;-)

I'm past the target audience age group that I write for, but I don't think that matters. It's the mindset.

And I applaud all the teens writing here (or anywhere). I don't care how straightforward their plots are or how much they're focused on things teens focus on. *shrugs* I'm glad they're expressing themselves through writing (and I hope it continues well past the teen years for all of them). I started writing when I was nearly a teen (and WOW, let me NOT think back to those plots of MINE--although I did get duly noticed and published as a result of one...).

Thanks for mentioning that other thread--will definitely check it out!

~Shannon Delany
Author of the 13 TO LIFE series (launching June 2010 through St. Martin's Griffin)

I'm writing a mid-grade novel myself, and I'm 31. I think it's natural for the young writers to write about characters their own ages or younger, since that's pretty much the only world they understand at all. However, I think that even at my "tender age" I'm a bit better at understanding what was _really_ going through my head during my teen years, and especially at seeing my flaws. After all, at that age most of us thought we were awfully smart and not prone to any serious lapses in judgement ;-).

Of course, it's also important for us to remember the feelings of being that age, how intense our emotions were, how we thought that all those things happening to us really _were_ the end of the world. I think it's a combination of the wisdom of hindsight and the ability to hold onto our youthful enthusiasm that can make us good YA and youth fiction writers.

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Terrell Sanders
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"When first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you!"

I'm 48. I've always loved reading YA, and my kids are 18, 16 and 10 so I have a good excuse! This is my 2nd YA novel (trying to get an agent for the first one.)

Pax,
Barb
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I am close to 19 years old. My character is in the late teenage years but the style is written for a young generation.

I'm 22 years old and this is just the genre that I'm drawn to and think I can really say something with. Even as I get older I really think I'll be able to stick with it. It's not a phase or anything just because I'm younger.

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I'm 22 and my protagonist is nearly 17. I don't think the protagonist is old enough to be appealing to adults (though I do have an "adult appeal" character showing up soon). The storyline centers on two teenagers, two twins, and deals with the wide swath of teenage emotions, especially as both are being controlled by adults in various, subtle ways, and they don't know how to escape it, even though they have been warped into a fantasy world where the rules play differently.

That's something that adults may not necessarily be able to get into. I decided it would be better off to play this as a YA instead of an adult novel.

Oddly enough, I tried a different form of this story nearly two years ago, with the protagonists aged up to being college-age and the roles reversed. It quickly transformed into a bleak and violent story that became so dreary that I couldn't write it anymore, largely due to emotional issues I had at the time. I think that's another reason why I flipped to YA after all this time, because there is a overwhelming sadness that chokes my adult work almost inevitably I hope that by forcing myself to appeal to a younger demographic my violent and melancholic tendencies won't come into play because they can't or the demo will get bored or disgusted with it.

I hope that makes sense. XD

I'm 28 (I think, I always forget my age...by the time I remember it the year has passed and I have to start it all over again), and I'm definitely writing from outside *being* YA, digging up whatever it felt like (not pleasant) and rendering it, keeping my current experience in mind (because I can't really avoid doing that). This is very different from the way I wrote when I was a teenager...and still, similar (at least when I'm in a teenager's POV).

I'm 21, i know it's not that old but it's old enough to not be YA anymore, i think i'm just drawn to this genre in particular because i can still remember going through my YA years and i feel like i can draw alot from personal experience. I really enjoy writing early-life crisis stories about a young person discovering who they are and who they will become for the rest of their lives.

I'm 22. I'd like to write for people about the age of my sister, who just started high school. Books aimed at the middle/high school crowd were the books I read from elementary school onward and still sometimes do. It feels like YA books are the kind focused more on excitement and entertainment than art. Of course a lot of adult books capture both, but I just want to write to give someone that same rush of excitement I got whenever I was in the middle of a book, walking into poles as I tried to read in the halls between classes. I want to make some kid somewhere get in trouble sneaking a book behind a math book. ....not that I've ever done that. >.>

39 years young here. It's funny because five years ago, I had the mindset that I had to "write my age." Then I had an epiphany - a MAJORITY of published YA novelists, are, in fact, grown-ups! The S.E. Hintons, Jennifer Barneses, and Christopher Paolinis are the exception in the industry, not the rule. :)

Plus I figured out around the same time that I believe I am emotionally stunted at age 16, which is why my 16-year-old characters have the GREATEST voices of any characters I've ever written.

So yes, though I might not be my target audience, I write (and read) YA and am quite proud of it.

2002 - Finding Home - WINNER!
2005 - Surviving Thirteen (YA/MG) - WINNER!
2006 - The Montegris Experiment (YA) - WINNER!
2007 - Don't Touch Me! (YA) - WINNER!
2008 - In Character (YA) - WINNER!
2009 - Senior Year Single (YA Romance)

I'm 18, but my characters are younger. I guess I'm writing YA because I wish I could go back to school and be a kid again. Also, my novel is semi-autobiographical, so it's a way of putting things in order.
And it's not simplistic in plot. And it's not mainly a romance. :P

"Nothing is easier than self-deceit. For what each man wishes, that he also believes to be true." - Demosthenes

I'm also eighteen, and two of my MCs are younger than I am. My story is about vampire hunters, and the main romantic subplot is between two guys, but in no way is my plot simplistic, or just a romance. The romance isn't even going to show up in this book.

And I really don't think you can attribute those simplistic plots to the age of their authors. Look at Twilight for example. Stephenie Meyer is definitely not a teenager, but her plot is as simple as it comes.

Well I'm almost 38 years old and writing a YA novel. I happen to like YA because it's more appealing and well there are more younger readers out there today. I personally find YA much better than some of the "adult" stuff written today. That's my take on it.

I am 26 and writing a YA novel. I do read some YA but not exclusively so. I like the genre because teenage years have always seemed the most volatile, the time when everything in your life is in flux and can change at any moment. That creates a great tension and vulnerability, which makes it a fun place to write from. (Not so fun to live though.) I actually hesitated before calling my "novel" YA, because it doesn't seem to have the most popular YA elements today, namely romance and the supernatural and of course romancing the supernatural. Bear in mind that I am very bitter because after 2 years of working in a bookstore I am so sick of Twilight and Vampire Diaries and House of Night and blah-de-blah I could spit.

Agreed! I used to read adult novels when I was a kid, but then went into YA novels because it's not as padded.

I'm 26, and almost everything I write has a teenager or young adult protagonist. I just find it easier to write a younger character than an adult.
Actually, it was the word "technically" in the title of this topic that made me click on it.

^w^

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Count me in as an older guy writing for YA.

I'm 46 and have 4 kids I'm writing for. Anyone else who reads these SciFi and Fantasy novels is gravy. But I suspect they'd like them.

I like YA because they seem to be cleaner and more innocent than the general fare out there today. That's a factoid that is trending slowly away.

Well, I'm doing my part. My work is a little edgy - there's death, and violence, and evil, and kidnappings, but they are handled more on the level of an ERB Fantasy novel, a little heavier than Nancy Drew or Hardy Boys.

I think there is a market for such things, books that depict the evil but choose the good, that see there's a little good in the worst of us, and a little bad in the best of us.

Read my synopsis and excerpt if you want an idea of how I write, and if you like that kind of thing.

ADHD Programmer Dad
YA Fantasy/SciFi Author

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32 here...and I love reading YA, more so than most adult novels.

I'm a high school teacher who hated to read as a teen but fell in love when I had to complete a project for my master's program. I read all kinds of books like crazy and couldn't believe what I had been missing all these years.

Anyway, my students loathe reading, and it's always been my goal to match a kid with a book he/she will like. Most of the time it works, it only takes one great novel for a kid to get hooked. So when I decided to write, there wasn't a question about what I'd write about. I knew it would by YA, and very edgy. My students are reluctant struggling readers so it had to be something that would catch and hold their attention.

When people read my first and only novel, they always say the MC is so me...me??? I crack up because I don't know if that's a good thing or bad. Do I really sound like a 15 year-old? LOL!

So I've rambled when I could have simply said, yes, I'm writing YA and I'm not a YA.

Happy Writing my not-YA friends,

Julie

Julie Prestsater
Author of "So I'm A Double Threat"-- YA Novel

I chose it this time because it seemed to best fit the general plot I wanted to use, and if I wrote it as if for a younger audience and with a younger MC, I'd be using less of my own experiences and be more character-driven and plot-driven with it. I'm 29 myself, so I'm well past the teen years, but not so far that the school stuff and situations I remember will be drastically different. Some changes, but recognizably similar in many ways.

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2006 - Embers
2007 - The Last Guardian
2008 - Plain Sight, The 400 Block , and The Island Dozen
2009 - Immersion, Hand of Winter, and (Untitled)

LOLOL um, yeah. I'm 33, and I've written several YA novels. I read almost exclusively YA. I'm completely drawn to the genre. It's what I love to read and write!

I work closely with my editor to make sure my slang, language, etc. feel appropriate (I'm a child of the 80s/90s, so there ya go...it's hard to fight sometimes. LOL). It's important for me, though, to feel like my stories are authentic. I also make it a habit of, uh, researching (read: eavesdropping on) teens. I also interview them, read what they read, listen to what they listen to, etc. so I can stay current with the times and keep my perspective fresh.

I believe there's no age requirement for writing YA--and thank God! Because I see myself staying in this genre for a long time to come.

Rhonda Stapleton ~ http://www.rhondastapleton.com

Stupid Cupid (book 1) -- December 2009, Simon Pulse
Flirting With Disaster (book 2) -- March 2010, Simon Pulse
Pucker Up (book 3) -- May 2010, Simon Pulse

I've always loved the YA genre, even before I technically was a YA (I started writing in that genre in 5th grade; now I'm 27. Where does the time go??) because the years from 13-19 are SUCH a wonderful time! Emotions are so much more vibrant and immediate, everything is a potential disaster (from the mundane like losing your favorite lucky sweater to the much more serious losing your best friend in a drunk driving accident).

Plus, I strongly believe that teenagers are often in desperate need of a little hope. I remember feeling like no one understood me, not really. My parents definitely didn't, my friends only sometimes could, and my boyfriends often had no stinking clue what was going on in the world beyond their groins. Apparently, that feeling of being "the only one" is a very common one for teenagers (which is why things like Harry Potter and Twilight are so popular; you may be the only one and totally left out of all the good things in life, but don't worry because someday you'll be an all-powerful wizard/vampire with a whole conglomeration of hangers-on, admirerers, and friends).

I love writing YA fiction. I love feeling like maybe someday, I'll put a book out there that will help a kid feel better about themselves in their mixed up, screwed up, totally ridiculous, completely dramatic existence... and maybe even help them make it to adulthood.

- E

2006: The Pack (won!)
2007: Lovely, Dark and Deep (25k)
2008: Unspoken Whispers (won!)
2009: The Seeking

I'm 26. YA isn't about being a youth writing, but writing for a youth (and typically about a youth). When you have passed the age of being a youth, it's easy to look back and take bits of all your experiences to write about and even expand upon that if the character gets older.

Nope, you're not alone (as you're finding out). I'm 42. I read a quote from another author that said, "Childhood is the one common thread for everyone." Something along those lines and sadly I didn't commit to memory who said it. But I thought it was very profound and so true. We can all relate to being a child or adolescent. ;o)

I'm in my 30s and am writing YA. I'm a Social Studies teacher and have taught both middle and high school. I like to read what the kids read, so I know what to recommend to them...that, and I think YA books are just better than the rest these days--more interesting, varied. Like an earlier poster, I'm spot on when it comes to matching a book with a kid. I've had a school librarian complain that kids frequent my classroom library more than hers. Oh, well! ;)

I'm 59, my protagonist is maybe 24, I haven't had her stepmother remind her of her age yet so I'm not sure of her exact age :-) But she's Me, "now" but as I would have been then if I'd known some of what I have learned in the last 10-15 years. I'm a slow learner, LOL.

I'm 22, which in my mind is still pretty young in the "adult" end of things, but not, of course, in the technical definition of the term.

My story is about a teenage girl, but it's set in 13th/14th century England, so perhaps it's more historical fiction. The style is geared more toward YA, perhaps even a little more simplistic than that.

I work with dyslexic children full-time, and I have to say that seeing them learning to read and comprehend is one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. I wanted to write something my kids - as I call them - would enjoy and understand and learn from.

Rachel Phelps

The pages are still blank, but there is a miraculous feeling of the words being there, written in invisible ink and clamoring to become visible. ~Vladimir Nabakov

I'm 32, so certainly not a teen. Like many of us (as I'm seeing) we aren't teens. In all reality the published YA novels are almost all written by adults, so it's not as uncommon as one might think at first.

I didn't set out to write YA, it kind of happened solely because of the themes it tackles and the age of the MC. I just follow the plots that the muse gives me. :)

'06: Flowers Of Blood (police procedural): Winner
'07: Fade & Remain (18th Century Historical): Winner
'08 The Art Of Dying (Mystery/Suspense): Winner