Recently, The Millions published a blog post by Jiordan Castle about how YA books are just as much for adults as they are for teens. The original purpose of this blog, I believe, was to point out how everyone should feel comfortable reading YA books, how YA books are literature, and how we shouldn't shame people for their taste in reading. However, the post read as more of a justification for adult readers who have taken ownership of YA.
As a librarian, I agree with the premise that everyone should read whatever they want and that YA books have just as much literary merit as adult books. However, I disagree with the idea that YA is just as much for adults as it is for teens. As a public librarian who works specifically with children and teen patrons, we should fight for teens to have their own defined space, either physically in the library or within the literature. Adults already have this defined space, teens often do not.
The reality is, if you do not carve out a space specifically for teens, adults will take over and teens will no longer use the space. This is why, at my library, we reserve the teen sitting area for teens only. Children under a certain age and adults are not allowed to sit in the teen area (the vast majority of the people we have to ask to leave the teen space are adults). Kicking people out for the sake of inclusion may sound counterintuitive for some people, but the reality is that is the only way to keep teens safe and comfortable.
In publishing right now, teens are being pushed out of YA by adult readers. There aren't as many books that are written for the 12-15 age range as there should be, a vast majority of the teen books that are being published have protagonists that are older teens or younger adults(anywhere from 17-25 years old). Adult readers have money, something that younger teens do not have, and the adult readers are the ones who want to read about older teens or younger adults. If we let people who only care about making money run our artistic pursuits, we won't have books for younger teens, it is as simple as that. Ironically, publishing more books designed for younger teens is an investment in the future of reading and publishing, as it will help create lifelong readers, but business people are too short-sighted to care about these things.
It isn't really the adult readers' fault that we are in this predicament. Many of these adult readers probably want to read adult books, but because of sexism in the publishing industry, women authors, especially women fantasy authors, are often published as YA authors, even when they probably should be published as adult [see: Sarah J Maas]. Though, I would argue that sometimes it is the fault of the adult readers. Why on earth are you, a 45-year-old woman, asking for more smut in a book for and about teenagers? Teen books with sex scenes absolutely should exist for some teen books, but there is a rather large difference between something designed to explain or contextualize a common emotion/experience for teens, and a book designed to arouse the viewer (AKA smut, spice, etc.). Often the sex scenes in teen books are awkward, embarrassing, leave the characters with questions about their experience, or are designed to talk about consent in one way or another [Ex: Flamer by Mike Curato, The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo, and Looking for Alaska by John Green all have sexual content that fit into this category, and are also fantastic books to recommend to teens]. Adult books with sex scenes can do these things but are often designed to arouse the reader in some capacity. I don't care if a teen reads a smutty romance, but there is a very big difference between a teenager reading an adult book and an adult book being marketed toward teenagers.
And that's where the problem actually lies: the marketing. Many of these adult readers would read adult books but want books that are marketed in a more lighthearted way. The new trend of updating the covers of romance novels to be more cutesy is an example of this. I have a problem with this trend, mainly that these books are not as easily clocked as explicit, but that is a blog post for another time.
"New adult" is the latest trend of marketing pushes. New adult books are books that look and feel like YA books, but have adult protagonists and are designed for readers 18-30. New adult books have more sexual content and violence in them than YA books tend to have. I have my issues with new adult (I do not love the idea that NA presents, which is adult books are stuffy and for very old people when the reality is you can already find a wide range of adult books for basically any reader), but I also think that this trend of marketing would prevent YA from being overrun by adult readers, which is ultimately a good thing.
In short, teens deserve their own space in literature that they can call their own. Adults should be guests in this space. We should be polite guests and not intrude or make too much noise. If we feel like the space doesn't work for us, then we need to have enough sense to exit and find one that does. Read any book you want, but not every book will be made for you-nor should it be.
