Sometimes you can get yourself tied in a knot about whether you should or shouldn’t write the story you want to write. When in doubt, my rule is simple. Just write the story.
Melina posted this question on my “Ask A Question For My Blog” page:
I’m new to your blog (it’s great btw!) so forgive me if you have already answered a similar question.
I would like to write YA fiction and I have an idea I really like, but I’m unsure about whether its concepts/themes will appeal to teenagers. The obvious solution would be to write it for adults, and I would be happy to do so, if it weren’t for the fact that my protagonist is a 16-year-old girl.
It will be speculative fiction set in a somewhat dystopian future, with themes strongly addressing beauty and the media. But as much as it will be a story about this world, it will also be a story about a teenager who’s just trying to find out who she really is and where she fits in the greater scheme of things.
As a 21-year-old, both appeal to me, but as I sit in the middle as a reader of both YA and adult fiction, I’m afraid this idea won’t fit in either market.
Should I abandon it, change it, or just write it anyway?
Randy sez: Write it.
Teens are a lot smarter than many people want to think. They don’t mind big issues. If you’ve read THE HUNGER GAMES or the Harry Potter series, then you can’t possibly doubt that. When I was in my teens (feels like about two years ago), I didn’t like it when adults assumed that I wasn’t smart enough or serious enough to get what they were talking about. Teens who read a lot are plenty smart and plenty serious.
Teens do like to be entertained, same as every other age group. So the same rule applies to writing YA as applies to writing every other category — write a good story. Make it entertaining. Make it move the emotions of your reader.
Other than that, there aren’t any rules that can’t be bent, bashed, beaten, or broken.
Just write the story. If it’s any good, then you should be able to sell it or self-publish it and gain a following of loyal fans. If it isn’t any good, then figure out why.
Then go write another story. Over and over again for the rest of your life.
If you’ve got a question you’d like me to answer in public on this blog, hop on over to my “Ask A Question For My Blog” page and submit your question. I’ll answer them in the order they come in.
Blog of the Day: Larry Brooks just posted Part I of a two-part interview that I did with him last weekend. Larry knocked himself out coming up with what I consider the best set of interview questions I’ve ever been asked. I knocked myself coming up with answers that were (I hope) worthy of the questions. I even used the tongue-in-cheek phrase “mentally impoverished scoundrels” but I won’t tell you the context. You have to read the interview, which you can find here: “Interview With a Superstar Writing Mentor — Randy Ingermanson.” I’m still laughing at the title, which Larry came up with, not me. Have fun!
Just write it. It’s advice I’ve read, I’ve told, I’ve even managed to get my writing buddy to follow, and yet it’s still very hard for me to do it myself. It’s become something of a mantre when the internal editor pops in ‘this isn’t good enough’ ‘this will never sell’ ‘this is too much like xyz’!
Just write the story. Just write it. Figure the other stuff out later, write the story first…
I cannot agree more with the statement that you should not underestimate teens. Furthermore, I hope and pray more YA authors will write more interesting and challenging fiction. The mind-numbing must stop! (I have a few big commercial titles in mind which I will not mention, as I don’t want to get “political”)
Hi Randy –
Right-brained, left-brained stuff has been pretty much left in the dust as being way over-stated. The brain doesn’t really work that way.
The process you describe in your interview as “visually picturing the solution and then coming up with the rational steps” is what a science-y book “The Imprinted Brain” would term as “mechanistic thinking” (which I have in spades) as opposed to “mentalistic thinking” which is all about intuitively knowing how people operate in herds and hierarchies. Stuff that is opaque to me comes easy as pie to my political theorist hubby who (poor thing) despite HIS fancy-pants PhD from Berkeley, doesn’t have a single, systemic, just-do-it bone in his hunky body.
This book explains why.
Great advice, Randy. I was getting myself tied up in knots over what might or might not be marketable a few years ago and a wise mentor pointed out to me that I was getting way too far ahead of myself. First write the story, the way you see it. Then think about who will want it. From about fourteen up I was reading more ‘adult’ books than YA as I was hungry to know the real life of adults. If it is a good story and well written, it will appeal to both YA and Adults. When I put well written I’m not talking Nobel prize, but well written to be read so as to lose oneself in the story and not notice the writing. That is another knot we tie ourselves up with that stiffles writing. So I can’t write like whoever, but maybe I can tell a story. Go write your story Melina and then another and some day folks will read your stories.
Years ago, I wrote a novel, THE STARLITE DRIVE-IN, that featured a 12-year-old protagonist but had an adult love triangle and other adult themes. A writing teacher at the time predicted I would never get it published because of the young protagonist. William Morrow released the hardcover edition and Berkley published two paperback editions. It sold to seven countries, and the American Library Association chose it as one of the 10 best books for young adults that year. It was optioned for film, named a Literary Guild alternate and chosen for Reader’s Digest Select Editions and the Barnes & Noble Great New Writers program. To my surprise, HarperCollins recently notified me that a new trade paperback edition will be released this fall with a cover that appears to appeal to young adults. Melina, I would encourage to write the novel you want to write.
Yes, teens can handle it, but will publishers think they can? That’s the issue I came across. I wrote my story because I was driven to and when I finished it, finding a publisher was…I don’t want to say impossible, and of course it’s always hard. Just be prepared for them to tell you that it’s too “serious” for young adult and not “serious” enough for adult! That’s the crack that I fell into.
Just write<<
I don't now what I need to say.
I have some thing wrong in my life.
I work very hard, but I lose every time in the end.
I don't now, is that luck? or what?
In last 15 years, I lose about 10 times just when I think I win directly.
BUT
I have some thing make me keep trying and stop me when I want to kill my self.
I have believe with '' allah'' ,and that just enough for me.
Islam is good ,
Thank you..