Tuesday, January 26, 2016

Top Ten Tuesday: Ten Wishes For YA


Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. This week’s topic is whatever I want, so I chose ten wishes for YA. These are things that I want to see more of in YA literature.

Ten Wishes for YA


1. More books with unusual formatting/structures/writing styles. I want novels-in-verse, books with pictures, stories told in unique ways, anything that’s a little strange.


2. Short story collections. I love anthologies and collections, but there aren’t many good ones in the YA genre. I know they don’t sell well, but can we please have more?


3. Non-romantic love. Sometimes love isn’t romantic. I want to see characters who love their families or friends. Also, characters who aren’t interested in romance.


4. Physical disabilities and illnesses. I feel like we’ve been getting a lot of books about mental illnesses lately. That diversity is appreciated, but I’d like to see more characters with physical challenges.


5. Translations. What does YA look like in the non-English-speaking world? If it exists somewhere, I want to read it.


6. LGBT books that aren’t “coming-out” stories. I know that coming-out stories are important, but what happens after the coming-out?


7. Popular nonfiction. Most of the YA books I see on blogs are fiction. Where’s all the nonfiction?


8. Non-white protagonists. I think books are starting to get more racially diverse, and I would like to see that trend continue.


9. Dystopias where nobody saves the world. I love dystopias. I prefer the ones where the characters are just trying to live their lives rather than starting wars or overthrowing governments.


10. Realistic romances. No matter how good your romance is, it can’t cure all of life’s problems. I want to see characters working through problems rather than having the problems magically solved by falling in love.



What are your wishes for YA?




11 comments:

  1. What an awesome list!!#1,3,6,7,10 are really high up three for my wishes. Great topic choice!

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  2. Quote:
    "3. Non-romantic love. ...
    4. Physical disabilities and illnesses. ...
    6. LGBT books that aren’t “coming-out” stories. ...
    8. Non-white protagonists. ...
    9. Dystopias where nobody saves the world. ..."

    All great choices! I've been campaigning for No.3 and No.6 for a while now. But I do agree with the other ones wholeheartily.
    I'm also fed up with the hot-new-boy-at-school trope. Even seen it mentioned in a blurb gives me the creeps. I would like to read more books where there's already a relationship going (or in progress), and the boy in question is not necessarily hot ;D.

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  3. I'm with you on Non-Romantic Love. I love family and friendship books. I'm trying to think of an idea for NaNoWriMo this year, and I'm drawn to this type of story. We'll see what happens!

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  4. Number 5 is a great shout and something that is needed. My wish is for proper parents in YA books who actually do some parenting. I am sick of smacking my own head when parents go away for a weekend/are drunk/have gone AWOL. Let's have some representation of parents who actually care! Simon Vs The Homo Sapiens Agenda should be the benchmark.

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  5. Love your list :D
    I did a similar one. Totally agree with dystopia where it's not all happy ever after!
    Cora @ Tea Party Princess

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  6. Great list! I agree with this entire list but especially number 8. Also, I don't always need a love story in books so less of those would be awesome. Lol.

    -Jamie therebelliousreader

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  7. This is great! I definitely think it can be a little boring when every single YA book follows a recipe. I would love to see more books with LGBT characters just living their lives. And I LOVED the weird layout of Illuminae. I'd like to see more of that!

    Here are my Top Ten!

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  8. Love this list! Especially the structure one, my goodness I ADORE books with different formatting! And definitely the realistic romances, that one is essential- life is never ALL happiness and rainbows! An I totally agree about the dystopian thing! Like, it CAN be done, not everyone has to be Katniss ;)

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  9. YA is a very popular genre here in Indonesia, though I don't think any of them has been translated into English yet, which is a shame. I'd also like to see more non-romantic loves. It would be great to see families and friends take more of a central role in a dystopia.

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  10. #2 and #5 are really interesting on your list. I think to date I've only seen and read one YA anthology (My True Love Gave to Me) but yeah, it'd be interesting to see more anthologies in the genre. Same goes with translations.

    And super late but thanks for dropping by my blog last week :)

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  11. #2 and #5 are really interesting on your list. I think to date I've only seen and read one YA anthology (My True Love Gave to Me) but yeah, it'd be interesting to see more anthologies in the genre. Same goes with translations.

    And super late but thanks for dropping by my blog last week :)

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