My recent rant “Stop Calling Books for Kids ‘Young Adult‘” got a lot of attention. Both from adults who read books for younger readers and weren’t understanding my frustration and from others who work with children and did. Happily, the New York Times sees it as I do and starting December 16th will be splitting their children’s chapter book best seller list into two categories, middle grade and young adult. They are defining middle grade readers as being between 8 and 12 years old. As for young adult, they are defining the category as books published for ages 12-18 while also noting that they are being read by many in their 20s and 30s. Thank you, New York Times Book Review, for recognizing this.
Recent Comments
Guy Bar-Nahum on Many Anne Franks ≫ Seven Impossible T… on The Sendak Fellowship Valerie on Hello
educating alice 
Congratulations. I am running your previous post on this subject (your Rant) as well as this good news about the NYT in our soon to be published December Barking Planet blog: http://barkingplanet.typepad.com.
Regards,
Robert McCarty
Barking Planet Productions
LikeLike
See my correction that the new lists will start appearing on December 16th, not this coming Sunday as I first wrote.
LikeLike
My library system has been separating the books into two categories: juvenile fiction and Y.A. fiction for years. I honestly didn’t know that there was any confusion over the two categories. It seems obvious to me that kids who enjoy, say, Superfudge just aren’t ready for The Book Thief.
LikeLike
It is a recent thing happening more in popular culture, read my post to learn more about it. I think the Times nailed it in noting that YA is being read by adults in their 20s and 30s. They are the ones that are then using YA as a catch-all term for anything that is not a picture book or early reader.
LikeLike
Pingback: for a 15 year old. « Coastline Books