The Next Harry Potter?

So, I finished reading the final Harry Potter book yesterday. I know, I'm behind on the times. Everyone and their grandma and their dog read Harry Potter before me. But that's not the point.

I wanted to point out something that annoys me about YA books. Don't get me wrong––I love YA. I read it, I write it. It's wonderful. What bugs me is the popularity contest.

High school never ends, eh? It's like how one day, the most popular girl in school walks in wearing a green hat, and everyone says, "Oh, she's wearing a green hat and she's popular. Maybe if I wear a green hat, I'll be popular too!" And before you know it, everyone is wearing a green hat, so it's not new or exciting anymore.

With books, it's the same way. After the success of Twilight, everyone started writing vampire books and other such paranormal romances. After the success of The Hunger Games, everyone started writing dystopia books. And in both cases, the trends got terribly old. (I wasn't old enough to be reading YA when Harry Potter first came out, but I'm sure there were a lot of wizard rip-off stories as well.)

I read a Wall Street Journal article about James Frey that really pissed me off, in which he said something along the lines of, "Someone has to write the next Harry Potter. Maybe it will be me." Okay, okay. Just stop there. There are so many things wrong with this picture.

First off, James Frey doesn't even write his own books. He uses (and abuses) ghostwriters. "His" YA book, I Am Number Four, is part of a plot to make unknown writers crank out books for him, so he can then market them to movie producers––which is why the book and movie versions of I Am Number Four came out at practically the exact same time. (I didn't see the movie, but I read the book. And yes, it was terrible.) Did he make a lot of money? Oh, sure. But to compare himself to J.K. Rowling ... ? Ugh. I just want to throw up. (If you don't know this already, Frey is also the author of A Million Little Pieces, a notorious memoir which turned out to be fictional. And he lied to Oprah. So, shows what a great guy he is.)

Has Harry Potter made a lot of money? Oh, heck yes. Tons and tons. Have Twilight and Hunger Games made a lot of money? Yes and yes.

I'm not talking about the quality of any of these books, or my personal enjoyment or opinion of them, but regarding the authors ... None of them were trying to set up an enormous money-making scheme. They were all authors who just wanted to write and share their stories––and, beyond their control, they became wildly popular.

But being popular and making money definitely don't automatically put you on the same level as Harry Potter. It ticks me off when people say Twilight and/or The Hunger Games are "the next Harry Potter", because the three series really aren't comparable. And not just because Harry Potter is evidently the most popular of the three. It's also that Harry Potter is a much more beloved series––and I suspect it will remain that way, while the craze over Twilight and The Hunger Games will probably fade over time. J.K. Rowling put a lot of time and effort into her series, which involved very careful planning, world-building, and detailing. It's rare that a YA book series is so critically acclaimed and reaches such a wide audience of people––and that its popularity can remain just as strong for more than a decade. If any YA author hopes to achieve such success, he/she will have to work just as hard. But more than that, he/she will have to be just as original.

What's sad is that so many YA authors seem to sit down and think, "Okay, what can I write that will make me more popular?" And when they struggle to be more popular, it shows. (Like how, when all the girls at school start wearing green hats, they don't look cool ... They look like copy cats.) As I said before, authors like J.K. Rowling, Stephenie Meyer, and Suzanne Collins did not intend to be trendsetters. It just worked out that way. They wrote stories because they wanted to, not because they were trying to imitate someone else, which is what made their books appealing to so many people.

So what I'm saying is, don't write something just because you think people will like it. Write your own story. Write what you love. Write about characters you care about. You have to be new and daring. You have to be the first girl to walk into school wearing a green hat.

Or else, well ... You're just going to look stupid.

The Romance Rant

Greetings, writers!

I realize I haven't written on many "random" topics lately––besides my rant about the Wall Street Journal article. So today, I thought I would give my ROMANCE RANT!

I do a lot of (rambling, informal) book reviews (on Goodreads). And especially with recent YA books, I find myself ranting a lot about the romances. Especially because so many of them are the same ... and not very interesting.

Lately, the trend seems to be:

1) The main character is an awkward, and/or insecure teenage girl, who lives in a small town and thinks no one will ever like her and nothing will ever happen to her. In other words, she's a Mary Sue.
2) A mysterious, sexy boy moves into town from some weird foreign place and ends up in one of the girl's classes at school. (And for some reason it always seems to be science class––I guess because ... chemistry? Nyuck nyuck!) OR vice versa: the girl moves into a new town from some weird foreign place, and meets a mysterious, sexy guy at school.
3) Mr. Sexy stalks the Mary Sue for a while, showing up absolutely everywhere she goes. And she's like, "Hmm, that's kinda weird. Lolz. Whatevs." (Because it's not like he's a stalker or anything ... I mean, he's HAWT!)
4) They eventually start making out with each other, usually in a very short period of time. (No need to develop a relationship after all, because they're soul mates!)
5) Somehow the girl ends up mixed up in all the guy's weird problems, and he's all like, "Boohoo! I should have never brought you into this!" ... etc.

I think you get the idea. And we can all probably name about ten (if not more) recent books which follow this outline. But I don't want to seem like I'm pointing fingers here, so I won't. I also see a lot of teenage writers writing this type of story. No, these books/stories aren't necessarily bad ... but they could be less clichéd. And more realistic.

So why is this type of story so popular? Well, because it's what teenage girls wish would happen. I mean, hey––I'm an insecure teenage girl. If some random sexy guy appeared in my life and suddenly fell in love with me, that'd be pretty cool. (Although, I'm not sure I want guys climbing through my window and watching me sleep ... Errrm.)

I guess there's no harm in giving insecure girls hope that one day they'll be in relationships. The only problem is, these types of romances don't happen in real life.

Which is why I prefer much more drawn-out, developed romances. I don't like this idea of "soul mates"; really, it's just an excuse to not adequately develop a relationship between two characters.

I want to care about both characters involved; I'm tired of these stories where the guy is an object to be drooled over, while the girl is just a prop. They both have to have flaws and insecurities. They have to be unsure about their feelings. They have to struggle and argue like normal human beings do––yes, even when/if they officially become a couple. The more you make readers wait, the more badly they'll want the romance to happen ... which is why it pays off more in the end, when it finally does happen! If the two characters get together on page 50, it seems way too rushed and unrealistic.

Some YA books/series with great romances in them (in my opinion):

1) Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins
2) The Darkest Powers trilogy by Kelley Armstrong
3) The Percy Jackson & the Olympians series by Rick Riordan
4) The Chaos Walking trilogy by Patrick Ness
5) The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare
6) North of Beautiful by Justina Chen Headley
7) Graceling by Kristin Cashore
8) Just Listen by Sarah Dessen (Well, she has several good romance books, this one's just my favorite.)
9) Unwind by Neal Shusterman
10) The Uglies series by Scott Westerfeld
11) The Host by Stephenie Meyer

So, anyone else have an opinion about YA romance? Have an other reading recommendations? Please share! :)

YA Saves! (A Response to the WSJ article "Darkness Too Visible")

I thought I should bring attention to a recent issue. I don't normally do this kind of thing, but this time I just couldn't resist.

So, yesterday Wall Street Journal released an article, Darkness Too Visible in which they deemed modern Young Adult fiction "rife with explicit abuse, violence, and depravity". The author goes on to point fingers at books such as The Marbury Lens by Andrew Smith, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, Scars by Cheryl Rainfield, and Shine by Lauren Myracle.

The article suggests that you can't go into the YA section of a bookstore without being faced with "lurid and dramatic covers". There's one quote from a 48-year-old mother, who leaves the bookstore empty-handed because apparently the YA section "was all vampires and suicide and self-mutilation, this dark, dark stuff." Well, first of all, not all YA books are about vampires, suicide, and self-mutilation. Secondly, the latter two are a regular conflict in teen life––like it or not. What are you going to do, hide your kids in a box and never let them glimpse reality? Adolescence is a transition between childhood and adulthood––and how can you expect teens to become responsible adults, if they are never exposed to adult material?

"The argument in favor of such novels is that they validate the teen experience, giving voice to tortured adolescents who would otherwise be voiceless. ... Yet it is also possible—indeed, likely—that books focusing on pathologies help normalize them and, in the case of self-harm, may even spread their plausibility and likelihood to young people ..."

Seriously? The author of this article obviously does not understand the concept or purpose of Young Adult fiction. At least she's right in saying that YA fiction gives voices to the voiceless––but implying that books about self-harm encourage self-harm? What?

Look, Wall Street Journal. Just because something happens in a book does not mean that the author encourages it to happen in real life. In fact, usually it's the opposite. In literature, harmful actions result in consequences. That's what a story is. It needs to have a conflict. Furthermore, the purpose of dark YA literature is not to rape the minds of innocent children. Firstly, teenagers are not children, and they can make decisions for themselves. Secondly, YA fiction is not focused solely on darkness; it's about hope. I know I, for one, don't read YA books because I have some kind of morbid fascination with bloodshed and self-mutilation––no, I read these books so I can discover characters I love, so I can see how their relationships and their strength prevail even in the darkest of conflicts. I walk away from most books feeling inspired, not depressed.

I'm graduating from high school today. Somehow I've managed to survive the past four long years, and a lot of credit goes to reading and writing. Without both these things, it would have been near impossible to cope with stress. Reading has helped me become more knowledgeable about the world, to realize that life can be terrible but that things can always get better. Writing helps me release any of my inner turmoil, and to expose truths and issues that I care passionately about.

Maybe I'm a bit biased, being a teenager, and quite an open-minded one at that. But on the other hand, this Wall Street Journal article is extremely biased as well. Besides the first sentence in the above quote, there is almost no support for dark concepts in YA fiction at all throughout the article. There are no quotes from teens themselves, or even from YA authors––except a brief quote from Sherman Alexie, which the author of the article basically ridicules.

As a writer of YA fiction, this article made me very nervous at first. When my work is published, is it only going to be shot down by a terribly closed-minded world? Luckily, I was given hope by the wonderful Maureen Johnson––who is one of my favorite authors, and also a very awesome person––who immediately started a protest of this article via Twitter. She started a hashtag, #YAsaves, in which people share stories of how YA fiction has helped and inspired them. #YAsaves is currently the #1 tag trending worldwide, and has gained support from YA authors such as Scott Westerfeld, Cassandra Clare, Libba Bray, Laurie Halse Anderson, Malinda Lo, Sarah Dessen, Gayle Forman, and Shannon Hale ... and many others, I'm sure. I'm only naming ones I've seen thus far.

So in a way, the release of this article is almost a good thing. It started a very important conversation, and it also encouraged readers and writers everywhere to voice their love for YA fiction. I was furious at first, but seeing such a strong backlash against the article has given me so much hope.

Any thoughts? Opinions? Stories? Do you think YA fiction is too dark? And/or has YA fiction helped you any way? Please share! (Or better yet, share on Twitter! #YAsaves!)