Edgy Young Adult Fiction

Comment

Comment by Kat Heckenbach on August 18, 2009 at 1:44pm

Hm...advice...you mean other than "strap yourself in for a long ride"?

Despite the tremendous success of authors like Donita K. Paul, Bryan Davis, and Wayne Thomas Batson, there's not a lot of action in Christian publishing when it comes to YA fantasy.

Are you looking for specific writing advice? I noticed on your page that you already write sci-fi--is that for adults or youth? I haven't written sci-fi before, but I do read it, and it seems like the writing process would be similar to fantasy--world building, lots of description (but not too much :), etc.

As for writing for teens, the biggest piece of advice I can give is don't dumb it down. The most successful YA books are those written at a level adults enjoy.

Comment by Kersley Fitzgerald on August 18, 2009 at 1:23pm

Help!

My writing mentor is encouraging (OK, not strong enough--compelling?) me to write a Christian YA fantasy novel. I have the start of the background and main character, and various YA series by Anne McCaffrey, JK, and Donita K. Paul.

Any advice?

Comment by Kat Heckenbach on June 8, 2009 at 7:36am

You're welcome, Rachel, and I'm glad to promote it. I actually picked it up from the library, but it's now on my Amazon list to buy because I know I'm going to want to read it again and share it with people I know.

I can understand that it's a difficult subject to read about, even without specific reasons. But I found it well-written and handled the topic in such a way that you see both sides of it. He wrote me a personal thank-you for blogging about the book, which I thought was really nice. I could tell from his email that his heart is so into connecting with and helping teens.

Comment by Rachel Marks on June 7, 2009 at 10:30pm

Kat, Jay is from my area and belongs to my SCBWI chapter. He's a wonderful guy and a great author! I still haven't read the book (I have a hard time reading about suicide for various reasons) but I've only heard spectacular things about it. Thanks for promoting it on your blog! I think the more teens that read it the better!

Comment by Kat Heckenbach on May 27, 2009 at 5:23pm

Have any of you read the book "Thirteen Reasons Why"? I just read this--yesterday--couldn't put it down and read it in one day. It's about teen suicide. There's nothing about Christianity in it, but, as I said, it's about teen suicide. This isn't exactly a subject hit upon often.

I blogged about it at www.kat-findingangel.blogspot.com. I was really, really impacted by this book. I'd highly recommend it to anyone writing for teens. The author's (Jay Asher) characterization skills are great. I found myself begging for the ending to be that the girl faked her own death. Icared about these characters.

I mentioned the lack of spirituality in my blog, and the author wrote to me and explained his reasonings. He really didn't need to. I agreed that he should have left it out. Read my blog and you'll see why. But he added to my comments, by saying that he did not want the character's religion to "get blamed" for her taking her own life. He wrote as though he does not include himself under the label of "Christian" but he wrote with complete and total respect for Christianity and Christian values in his email to me. I was very much impressed.

Anyway, check out my blog, and check out the book. It's story is powerful.