YA Recommendations for In-between Readers

Ally Carter recently tweeted about the dearth of YA books for in-between readers, or readers who have mentally and emotionally phased out of MG but aren't ready for or interested in the grittier, edgier stuff that takes up most of the space on YA shelves these days. As a reader who continues to be less interested in the grittier, edgier stuff, I thought I'd pull together a few of my favorite titles that fall into that in-between world.

Anything by Ally Carter

This topic was probably on Ally Carter's brain because she happens to write for those in-between readers, and she's long been one of the authors I'll pick up on the spot, no questions asked. She tends to write action-packed stories with a heap of quirky characters and snappy one-liners. My personal favorites are the books in her Heist Society series. I even recommended HEIST SOCIETY and UNCOMMON CRIMINALS a while back.

Anything by Lindsey Leavitt

Lindsey Leavitt is another of my go-to authors for fun--and funny--YA. Whereas Ms. Carter writes thrillers, Ms. Leavitt gravitates toward straight-up contemporary fiction. I honestly couldn't decide which of her books is my favorite, so I'll just say that SEAN GRISWOLD'S HEAD is the sweetest, GOING VINTAGE has the cleverest concept, and THE CHAPEL WARS is the most poignant. Take your pick!

Bloomsbury's "If Only" Series

In a YA market that skews older, this series specifically targets those in-between readers. As publishing director Cindy Loh puts it, "Every novel in the series provides a different ‘what-if ’ situation and fills in the blank. A hallmark of the line will be humor, which isn’t to say that every book will be a comedy, but there will be light moments in each novel. And every novel will be aspirational and ‘clean teen’--suitable for readers as young as twelve.” I've read several of these books, and my favorite is the one I just finished, Kristin Rae's WHAT YOU ALWAYS WANTED. Her main character loves old movies even more than I do, so it felt like this book was written especially for me.

STEERING TOWARD NORMAL by Rebecca Petruck

I'm cheating a little with this pick, since Rebecca Petruck's STEERING TOWARD NORMAL is technically MG, but it's upper MG, so I'm going to include it:) I posted an official recommendation after I first read it several years ago, so I'll let you check that out. Suffice it to say that I love this book now every bit as much as I did then!

FOR DARKNESS SHOWS THE STARS by Diana Peterfreund

I wanted to include a fantasy or sci-fi on this list, and Diana Peterfreund's FOR DARKNESS SHOWS THE STARS has been on my mind again lately. Though the themes are deep enough to appeal to older readers, I'm sure my thirteen-year-old self would have loved this book. Since I posted an official recommendation for this one, too, I'll let those words speak for themselves.





I could go on and on, but I'll leave it there for now. What are some of your favorite YA books for in-between readers?

What I Think of the Latest Attempt to Ban John Green's Books

You've probably heard about the latest attempt to ban John Green's books, but if you haven't, here's a quick recap: A teacher at Strasburg High School in central Colorado wants to teach an elective on young adult literature. The parents in Strasburg have taken issue with several of the books on the proposed list, so they've brought the matter before the school board, which plans to address it at a board meeting next month.

Curious about that proposed list? Here it is:

FEED by M.T. Anderson
THINNER THAN THOU by Kit Reed
DELIRIUM by Lauren Oliver
UGLIES by Scott Westerfield
TAKEN by Erin Bowman
THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE DOG IN THE NIGHT TIME by Mark Haddon
THE FAULT IN OUR STARS by John Green

FLOWERS FOR ALGERNON by Daniel Keyes
WILL GRAYSON, WILL GRAYSON by John Green and David Levithan
GO ASK ALICE by Anonymous
13 LITTLE BLUE ENVELOPES by Maureen Johnson
PAPER TOWNS by John Green
IF I STAY by Gayle Forman
BEFORE I FALL by Lauren Oliver
THIRTEEN REASONS WHY by Jay Asher
LOOKING FOR ALASKA by John Green
MISS PEREGRINE'S HOME FOR PECULIAR CHILDREN by Ransom Riggs
CLOCKWORK ANGEL by Cassandra Clare
THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE by C.S. Lewis

Other than the fact that this teacher wants to read pretty much everything that John Green's ever written, it's a pretty diverse list:) Of these nineteen books, I've read all or part of thirteen. Of those thirteen, I stopped reading four because I wasn't comfortable with the amount of profanity or the sexual content. (I've also put down books that I thought were too violent or gruesome, but for whatever reason, that doesn't happen as often.)

Now, several of the books I finished probably had the same amount of profanity or sexual content as the ones I didn't. Sometimes, I'm more sensitive, and sometimes, I'm just weak (which is to say that I'm too invested in the story or characters to put the book down, though I feel like I should). I really enjoy YA fiction, and I think I'll enjoy it for many years to come, but there are a number of books that I simply won't read because I find them too profane, too sexually explicit, or too violent.

In other words, while I applaud this teacher for wanting to teach current teen fiction, I also understand where the parents are coming from. But why are we always so concerned about the teachers and parents? What about the students themselves?

As a junior in high school, I was assigned to read John Steinbeck's THE GRAPES OF WRATH. I only made it a few chapters in before I gave up. I thought it was dull as dishwater, granted, but the way the Joads talked really grated on me. I was a sheltered teenager, yes, but I preferred it that way. I knew the world could be ugly and was often cruel, but I didn't see the need to willingly expose myself to its ugliness and cruelty. Even if a book uses that ugliness as an example of how NOT to be, there's something about bombarding the reader with it that seems contradictory to me.

I stopped reading the book and participating in class discussions (if we even had any, that is). My English teacher that year was less, uh, stringent than most, so she only ever gave us one quiz on the book. It remains to this day the only quiz, test, or assignment I've ever failed.

I like to think that if the stakes had been higher--if my term grade had been on the line, say--I still would have had the moral courage to put the book down. But I guess I wonder if I SHOULD have had to put my grade on the line if it had come to that. Should we make students pick between their religion and/or ethics and failing a class? In the case of Strasburg High School, is it enough to say, "Well, you don't have to take it, so if you're concerned about one of the books on the list, just don't sign up"?

On the one hand, I think there comes a point when you have to trust your kids to make the right decision, but on the other, I don't think kids should be penalized for choosing not to read something. What I'd love to see in a YA literature course of this nature is a two-pronged curriculum in which every book is studied in tandem with another and the students get to pick which one they want to read (or they could even read both). Then you could pair a gritty, true-to-life book with another that addresses the same issues in a less provocative way. I'm sure it would lead to some rousing discussions about the impact of profanity and sexual content in a book and what it contributes (or doesn't).

And I'm sure kids would come down on both sides of the fence.

I Can't Stop Reading This Book!

My little sister gave my kids SKIPPYJON JONES by Judy Schachner for Christmas. She finished a degree in Early Childhood Education last month, and this was one of the books she stumbled across while she was doing her student teaching. It’s charming, endearing, insert ten more cheery adjectives here, and I love it almost as much as--or maybe more than--my kids do.

I’m probably pretty awful at writing a pitch for a picture book, so suffice it to say that Skippyjon Jones is a Siamese cat who thinks he’s a Chihuahua. SKIPPYJON JONES chronicles his adventures as a great sword fighter in his bedroom closet Old Mexico.

Some picture books are a drag to read out loud. The artwork may be stunning, but the voice is lackluster, the writing is clunky, and you always find yourself stumbling over your words. Not so with SKIPPYJON. I think that’s the reason I love this book so much. It’s a delight--a delight--to read out loud with my kids (and a great way to practice my oh-so-authentic Spanish accent:) ).

If you have kids in your life who love story time, buy this book for them. Even if you don’t, find some random three-year-old to read this book with. You won’t regret it.

P.S. Sorry for going MIA for a while. The past week has been a little chaotic around here. (Sick kid + Crazy revisions = No time for blogging) You may have noticed that I didn’t post an agent interview last week, but that’s just because the holidays were so hectic and everybody's still racing to catch up.

This Friday, I’ll post my interview with Joan Slattery, the newest agent at Pippin Properties, Inc. Ms. Slattery may be new to Pippin, but she is by no means new to the publishing industry. Hope you’ll hop on over to check it out!

Books that I Grew Up With (and that Made Me Grow)

I first read Lois Lowry's THE GIVER in junior high, when I was just beginning to appreciate literary symbolism. I remember how gray Jonas's world was, literally and figuratively, and how he discovered the color red. I remember the ceremony in which he became the new Giver, and I remember the old Giver, his wrinkles and his age, and his weariness. I even remember the final scene, that image of Jonas whooshing away on his toboggan.

What I didn't remember was the baby, Gabriel--not until I reread it, anyway. I picked up the book again a few weeks ago to refresh my memory of its themes, but it was the baby that stuck out to me. I'd forgotten about little Gabe and his developmental struggles, his lack of perfection. I'd forgotten that Jonas flees the community with the baby to save his life. And I'd never even realized that, as he and Jonas are whooshing away on the toboggan, they're actually dying.

The ending's interpretation is up for debate, I guess, but as I read those final pages, tears dripping down my face, that was what they meant to me--this time. Interesting how the same words, the same scene, can communicate something so completely different to me now. Because although the book hasn't changed, I have.

My brother-in-law never reads the same book twice, but I read the same books over and over again for this very reason: to see how I see them now. And the disparity is never more pronounced than when I reread the books I remember from my childhood.

Take TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, for example. I also read this book for the first time in junior high (whoever decided fourteen-year-olds could grasp this one was a knucklehead), and when I read it again a few months ago, I was surprised at how little of it I'd understood back then. I remember my fourteen-year-old self saying something like, "Well, it was a good book [I think I mostly said this to sound intelligent], but what the heck did that Boo Radley have to do with anything?" But this time, as I stood with Scout on Boo's porch and saw her world through his eyes, all the subplots and the symbolism and the characters swirled together into one beautiful, complex whole. Tom Robinson, as it turns out, wasn't the only mockingbird in that story, just the more obvious one.

Does that ever happen to you? Do you ever pick up a book again and discover it afresh? Do you ever go back to your childhood in the pages of a book? And if so, what have you found?

I'm My Own Book Banner

That’s banner as in one who bans things, by the way. Not banner as in the long, wavy sign my high school strings across Main Street every time they put on a play…

At any rate, if you have anything even remotely to do with the publishing industry, I’m sure you’ve noticed by now that this is Banned Books Week. Awesome agent Nathan Bransford’s blog post on the subject raised some interesting questions, including whether censorship is even plausible in this digital age and the fine line between suppression and discretion. I don’t have much to say about that first one, but the second inspired the opinion that follows.

First off, let me just say that, in general, I don’t support governmental censorship simply because I wonder where it would end. Would the Koran, for example, eventually be censored because it engenders terrorist sentiment? (I am not suggesting that the Koran advocates terrorism, by the way, only that those Muslims who commit acts of terror often use a misinterpretation of its teachings to justify their behavior.) Not a pleasant path to start down. Indeed, the government does not have the right to make decisions about what we and our children read--but parents do.

In fact, it goes even farther than that--parents have not only the right but the obligation to make informed choices about the media that come into their homes. And that will mean banning at least a few of those things, books included.

You may call me unenlightened. You may call me a tyrant. But there are some books (and some TV shows, movies, and music) that my children will not read, watch, or listen to. I will not allow them (or myself, for that matter) to read, watch, or listen to anything with explicit sexual content. And until they’re old enough to handle certain themes, like murder, I will restrict their access to material with that content as well

Now I know what you’re thinking: How can I possibly expect to limit such things? They’ll have friends with access; they’ll find spare internet connections; they’ll have unsupervised time. And that is absolutely true. I cannot completely remove their ability to seek out such things, to choose for themselves, and I wouldn’t want to. But I can let them know what my standard as their parent is. And I can teach them why I want them to adhere to that standard.

So the government or the schools or the American Library Association can ban or not ban books all they want. The fact of the matter is, I don’t trust their opinions, anyway. And even if I did, their actions still wouldn’t change my responsibility as a parent.