You Are Allowed to Read Young Adult Fiction
Because there are no ‘age laws’ determining what you can and cannot read
As sponge-minded children, our reading levels were advancing exponentially. From Biff and Chip to Michael Morpurgo, there was an undeniable sense of smug when the teacher promoted us to the ‘purple table’ (or some other superior colour).
Then we met Young Adult Fiction.
It was a beautiful chapter in our lives when we could escape the world that didn’t understand our side fringes and Tumblr humour. We felt independent, taking agency over the characters and stories that filled our imaginations.
Alas, we arrived at adulthood. This is where we tend to replace the structure of school with a self-implemented pressure to keep cranking up the page numbers, proceeding to the more ‘age appropriate’ shelves of the bookshop.
For some, this can have a negative impact on attitudes towards reading.
Combating The Pressure
If you’re a slow reader (like myself), thick books with dense fonts can be overwhelming, particularly if you find it difficult to dedicate time in your day to reading. Lockdown has gifted us a lot more alone time, and a common reaction to this has been trying to up the book count.
I like books. Political, biographical, pretty much every novel genre, and a cheeky dose of self-help now and then (because it is 2021, after all). But I can’t be alone in thinking that the idea of picking up a YA novel is much more appealing than tackling the latest from Stephen King.
I once read an article that deemed the act of grown-ups reading “literature written for children” as “embarrassing”. I also recently read The Henna Wars by Adiba Jaigirdar. Marketed towards teenagers and young adults, the story follows 16-year-old Nishat, a Bengali girl living in Dublin, who falls in love with the beautiful and charismatic new girl at school.
I reminisced my all-girls school days as an in-the-closet bi-sexual. I learnt a lot and laughed out loud. I gasped and said “No way!” to no one (more than once).
Above all, I enjoyed myself.
The Wider Appeal of YA
Despite the apparent ‘shame’ of it all, I sit amongst the 55% of YA readers who are adults. The stats don’t lie. Grown-ups like a bit of high-school dystopian vampire drama sometimes. It’s fun.
If you think of YA as children’s literature and something far too infantile compared to your mountain of 600+ page George R. R. Martin hardbacks, then remind yourself of the many blockbuster sensations that emerged from YA novels…
The Hunger Games, The Fault in Our Stars, Divergent, erm… Harry Potter? YA has a universal appeal whether you’re embarrassed by it or not.
Reading as Self-care
Let me also remind you that reading is not a competition. It is, however, great for things like mood, sleep, and general well-being. It’s an act of self-care and so shouldn’t be jeopardised for the sake of others’ opinions.
As author and anthropologist Ceridwen Dovey said:
“Reading has been shown to put our brains into a pleasurable trance-like state, similar to meditation, and it brings the same health benefits of deep relaxation and inner calm. Regular readers sleep better, have lower stress levels, higher self-esteem, and lower rates of depression than non-readers”
Regular reading improves self-esteem and lowers stress. So why would anyone not read something because it seemingly threatens their premium-reader status? I do not compute.
That First Time feeling
YA narratives circulate around teenaged protagonists, which may be the turn off for the more ‘mature’ reader. However, teenagers provide a lot more scope for higher-stake plots and an intimate reader-character relationship.
Best-selling YA author John Green said:
“Teenagers have a reputation for being jaded and cynical, but in fact I find them wondrously lacking in cynicism and wondrously earnest in their un-ironized emotional experience.”
There’s a unique solace in vicariously re-experiencing things for the first time (kiss, breakup, failure) through the comfort of fiction.
I personally love being able to dip out of real-life worry for 10 minutes and blink back into a completely romanticised yet addictive tale of boy meets girl, girl meets girl, or whoever meets whoever, and their whole world flips upside down.
It reminds me of when similar characters and dramas dominated by teenage life. Now I’m distanced from that reality, and I can enjoy the fiction from an adult perspective.
The Takeaway: A Good Story Is a Good story
The marketing of books is exactly that: marketing. There are no literacy laws denying you the right to purchase anything. The bookshop assistant will not ask for your ID.
A good story is a good story. So why not browse the YA section of Waterstones on your next visit?
If you like the look of it, read it and bask in it. No one will stop you.
