Here is the link for
"The Power of Young Adult Fiction." My question for you is, do you agree with Joel Stein that adults need to grow up and read only adult fiction? Is there any value to young adult fiction to readers who are not children or teens?
I disagree with Joel Stein. Different young adult fictions have different levels of character complexities and different background depths. People read what they find interesting, and the subject of a young adult fiction may be more appealing to an adult than the subject of an adult fiction.
ReplyDelete-Haley Horiuchi
I agree, Stein is some old foggy who think he has the right to decide what people should read. If people want to read the Hunger Games, then let it be. He should be glad anyone reading at all. Clearly young adult book are doing something right that the other genre arn't.
DeleteI disagree with Joel Stein. I don't believe there's a kind of 'development steps' in fiction. I believe any fiction could stimulate a person's imagination and have good impact on a person. For example, like Harry potter or the Lord of Rings, these are totally young teen's fictions, but it affects some scientists and the scientists got a success on their research of invisible materials.
ReplyDelete-Minsu Kim
I don't agree with Joel Stein. I think it is ridiculous that he is judging The Hunger Games without even reading it first, which is just stupid and ignorant. Also I wonder how much of that “3,000 years of fiction written for adults” he has even gotten through. There are some that are amazing literary works and very important, but a lot of them are long and slow reading, some even boring and clichéd. Young adult novels seem to be a lot more interesting, have more twists and turns in their plots, are faster to read, and aren’t always about the same kinds of things. I agree with Patricia McCormick’s article, “Authors Taking Risks Isn’t Kids Stuff.” Young adult authors are taking so many more risks, writing about so many different topics, so different from what’s been done in the past. They are much more interesting, and I love not really knowing what’s going to happen before the end, (whereas with a lot of “adult” novels, I know what’s going to happen in the end before I get even halfway through). I also love being able to talk to my mom about books that I find particularly interesting or thought provoking. I loved discussing The Hunger Games with her, and she’s the one that introduced me to the Harry Potter books after reading the first two to my brothers’ classes, (the last five she didn’t read out loud to any kids, but still loved reading them) and we loved discussing what we thought was going to happen next before another book came out. With that said, I know there are some YA books that are more geared toward teen stuff and wouldn’t really picture an adult reading it (like I really couldn’t see my mom reading the House of Night series or Red-Headed Stepchild), but I’m not going to judge what adults can and can’t read. I think people should be able to read whatever books they want to read, and judging them like that is just stupid and wrong.
ReplyDelete-Ashleigh Saunders
I also liked some of the other articles from the room for debate section. "Nothing's Wrong with Strong Plot and Characters" by Lev Grossman was one that I found myself agreeing with and thought there were some good points; I also thought it was cool that he has an adult book club that only reads young adult books. One of the things he said that I liked was that "Young adult novels can be as powerful as anything out there." He talked about a YA novel that was probably the most heart wrenching and emotional book he'd read in a while, and I completely understand that, there are some powerful stories that are written as YA novels. I also like the point he makes at the end, that YA novels are almost never boring, and that's important in the world today because with so much vying for our attention we don't want to be bored. YA novels seem to fit the world better in this day and age because there is so much more to do and we don't really have time to read great novels like The Lord of the Rings and other novels like that. We want something fun and interesting but also quick and easy most of the time now.
ReplyDelete-Ashleigh Saunders
One more article that I liked from the group was “Seeing themselves in Books” by Matt de la Pena. At first I wasn’t very interested in what it said because it was a guy talking about supposed to be being macho and not crying or whatever, but then he got to why he likes books and the point that “Tough shelled, ‘mediocre students’ can find characters whose lives reflect their own.” Or “who find themselves in books” and that’s when the article turned for me. I completely understand that, there are so many books that I find little bits and pieces of me in, or I completely see myself in the character; the personality and what they are going through is exactly like my life. There are so many experiences that YA writers write about that so many people can relate to, the trials that we all face growing up. School, friends, family, bullies, deaths, sickness, losing someone you care about, being afraid, moving, being the new kid, etc. are all different experiences that people go through all the time and they are usually a big part of YA novels. Everyone has gone through at least one, if not a few of these things in their life, and a lot of it takes place when we are young adults, when we don’t have a lot of control over our lives and have to deal with tough things. I also liked that he put that they aren’t exactly better than the classics (canon), “but because they identify with the characters, because they’re living the stories.” And that he believes that “many of tomorrow’s canon can be found in today’s young adult section.” I strongly believe that The Hunger Games and probably the Harry Potter books, as well as many other YA novels, will end up being the “classics” for future generations, because they are that incredibly good.
ReplyDeleteDid anyone else like any of the other articles in the Room for Debate section?
-Ashleigh Saunders