When I was a kid there was no such thing as “Young Adult” fiction. You were expected to transition from Children’s books to Adult literature whenever and however you could. Because of this, I still can’t help thinking the category is the result of a marketing schtick. Don’t get me wrong. I love YA. I worked in the Teen Fiction section at BookPeople for six years while being paid almost nothing for a reason. The problem is, I feel that Children’s books are extremely important — too important for us to leave it to people who are only in it for the money. Children’s and Teen’s is where Readers are born. Real Readers — not people who might read one book a year because Oprah says so. When I worked at the bookstore I felt it was my mission to hook up kids with THAT book. You know the one. The one that you started reading one rainy afternoon and couldn’t put down at the dinner table in spite of your Mom yelling at you. The BOOK you hid under the covers and read with a flashlight for hours after lights out. The BOOK that swept you away from your problems and into the lives of characters with far greater problems that pumped your veins full of adventure and new knowledge and new worlds and magic and never let you go. All real Readers can name that book without hesitation. (Although, sometimes it’s more than one book.) Real Readers are a precious resource. Ask any Writer, Teacher, or Librarian. (Which is why I’ll quote John Waters now: “If you go home with somebody, and they don’t have books, don’t fuck ‘em!” 
)
I started reading Adult literature when my father read Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury aloud to me. I was twelve. To this day I don’t know why he did it. He’d never done so before. I find it funny that each of my parents read exactly one book aloud once I grew old enough for school. My mother read J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan. Well, part of it. As fate would have it, she stopped at the point where Wendy is shot by the Lost Boys. (I knew where the story went from there. It didn’t matter. From that point forward, I had this idea that females absolutely were never allowed in Boyland — upon pain of death. In a way, I was right. Funny what things kids will pick up on.) I started with the Classics: Twain, Dickens, R.L. Stevenson, Wells, Bradbury and such and was reading Joan Aiken, Zilpha Keatley Snyder, and Kin Platt at the same time. (This, in spite of the fact that I was a slow reader. I had my nose buried in a book every waking moment.) Books saved my life. I was a very skinny, depressed kid who was bullied. I loved learning and hated school. I guess that’s why books mean so much to me to this day. Anyway, Young Adult books are important. They’re where kids learn to be human beings without having to bear the consequences of mistakes. They’re where kids learn to think for themselves. They aren’t easy books to write and should never be. I believe that’s part of what appeals to adults so much. It isn’t just about a reconnection to childhood. It’s the magic of learning the complex stuff that day jobs, economic recessions, crazy politics, crime, and traffic jams leech out of you in the mundane adult world. It’s remembering that everything isn’t what it seems, that you really can fly if you wish hard enough; that you can start over even if you’re beat down; that you can beat the evil overlord even if the odds seem impossible — if you’re smart about it, are persistent, and have good friends; that being honest does win out in the end; that the person next to you can be the one that saves you; that people are worth helping and loving; that sharing milk and cookies is fun; that science is exciting; that beauty and magic lives all around you even during the darkest times (especially then) — you just have to stop and look for it. That’s the stuff that we all should remember — and not just once a year in December.
Read More...
As a kid, I never cared about age-related book categories. I only wanted to know one thing: is it SF/F? If yes, I read it. I haunted the children’s section and adult SF&F shelves with equal frequency. Honestly, that hasn’t changed now I’m adult. I’ve always felt that if a book is truly good, it’s ageless in appeal. I still read middle-grade and YA fiction just as eagerly as I do adult fiction.
owe thanks to, I could be here the rest of the day and y’all would stop reading around about page sixty-zillion, if not before.
From our friends.