How to use this Page

© Loree Griffin Burns


Colleen Mondor has put up a new post in her "What A Girl Wants" series, and it is a Must Read. The question this month is simple: what books of nonfiction do you wish your seventeen-year-old self could have read? There are some new women nonfiction writers on the panel (Tanya Lee Stone! Pamela S. Turner!) and you should check out what they and the other panelists have to say on the topic. Have a pad and pencil handy.

(And when you do, you'll know why I have decorated this post with that gnarly beetle up there.)

Add a Comment

The question this go-round was very simple - what novel (or novels) do you wish you had read the summer before your senior year in high school? (Consider this post a letter to your teenage self.) This is a question that hit very close to home for me. I spent that last high school summer working a couple of jobs and hitting the beach as much as possible. I read a lot of books, few of which I can remember now. My favorites were the same ones I had loved for years: Little Women and A Wrinkle in Time. Unfortunately, as I was not living through the Civil War nor seeking my lost father on the planet Camazotz, neither book was necessarily helpful to me. I loved them but as far as providing guidance on planning the coming years, they were sorely lacking.

There are many books I wish I had been able to read that summer including Pamela Dean's wonderful collegiate fantasy, Tam Lin (a title I still return to every year). Mostly though, I wish Sara Ryan's amazing Empress of the World was available in July 1985. For so many reasons I love this book but most particularly it is the way Sara shows teenagers working things out on their own - falling in and out of love, making friends, making academic choices and most importantly, viewing their parents with eyes both shrewd and wise - that makes me wish it was there for me as I was turning 17. Empress is a book about four teens finding their ways in the world and realizing that those individual paths are theirs to choose, regardless of the actions and expectations of others. The road might be tough and involve some bruising to the heart but it is still their road to choose.

That's what I needed help with back then - owning the choice of my future.

Sara wrote a sequel to Empress, The Rules for Hearts, which is also quite lovely and two companion mini comic books, Click and Me and Edith Head. I have copies of both the comics and love them but Me and Edith Head - well, that one is really special. Set before Empress this is all about the flamboyant character Katrina and how she learned to tap her inner fashionista and emulate the abundant creativity of Oscar winning costume designer, Edith Head. Seeing your parents as someone separate from yourself is a key element to Katrina's story. It is again about making your own choices and seeing where they take you. These are not stories about being wild or foolish (although there is a little bit of that, of course,) but rather being wild and brave and smart. Mostly though, Sara writes about being who you are. That last summer I didn't know how to figure that out and I think her characters would have helped me; they would have saved me many years of frustration until I finally got brave enough on my own.

Here then are the books the group wish they had read back when they were about enter the wide wide world:

Beth Kephart: "Dear Beth, The world doesn't conform to your own ideas about it. It leaks. It scrambles out toward unseen possibilities, and between the cracks, beauty lies. Read Michael Ondaatje. Read Coming Through Slaughter, his pastiche of a book about Buddy Bolden and New Orleans and crimes of the heart.

Add a Comment

In honor of the Winter Olympics (which were truly fabulous) and female athletes everywhere, I've been thinking a lot about teen girls in sports. This of course has led me to thoughts of sporty female protags in books and the enormous lack thereof. So I asked the panel to give a thought to literary girls and sports. This ended up being a tough one for many as they responded that they were not athletes and so had never thought about this. I hope that after seeing the books that those who did respond came up with that they will rethink their initial reticence. I think the point is that you don't need to be an athlete to love a book about athletic girls - just as I didn't need to be a downhill skier to love Julia Mancuso. Sports are just another way to be excited about being a girl and honestly the more ways we can encourage that, the better.

So the questions: What books can you think of about famous female athletes in history? Do we honor them on the same level as male athletes? And what about game playing girls in MG & YA novels? Can you think of some great ones and do familiar teen girl tropes (like mean girls and romance) play into those novels? In other words, is a book about boys playing ball crafted the same as one about girls playing ball? Is the sport enough when selling a book about girl athletes?

Jenny Davidson: "I don't know that I'm widely read enough in this field to give a very good answer, but I've approached the question of girls' books about sport with new interest in the past couple years as I have become increasingly obsessed with triathlon. I don't think there's a clear equivalent of, say Chris Crutcher's books if we are thinking about very popular young-adult books and wanting ones that feature female rather than male athletes. I suspect that there aren't a ton of great sport biographies for teenage readers seeking books about athletes of either (any!) sex, since a would-be biographer would almost certainly be wiser to write the book for an adult market and hope that it found its way into the hands of suitable teenagers. (Michael Silver's biography of Natalie Coughlin, for instance, would be highly interesting and enjoyable to a teenager with an interest in swimming or collegiate sport more generally.)

A favorite book of mine of recent years that would fit the criteria you describe, Colleen, is Catherine Gilbert Murdock's novels DAIRY QUEEN and THE OFF SEASON. An older book, about a swimmer, is Tessa Duder's IN LANE THREE, ALEX ARCHER. We think of Noel Streatfeild's series (which I grew up rereading obsessively) as being mostly about children who aspire to work professionally as dancers or actors, but she also wrote several ones about girls pursuing sports such as WHITE BOOTS and TENNIS SHOES. And then, of course, there are the copious books about girls who are serious about horse-riding...

In short, I guess if I have an 'answer' to this question, it's that there is lots of good stuff out there, but perhaps it's not collected under a single rubric - as I often want to say, it's children's librarians who can do the best work here, reading w

Add a Comment

No, I did not skip out on the conversation because it had to do with sex. I skipped out on the conversation so I could chase butterflies in Costa Rica. Honest. The panel went on without me, though, and shared their thoughts on books, sex, girls, and double standards. Check out the discussion at Chasing Ray.

Not sure what I am talking about? Read this introduction to the What A Girl Wants discussion series.

Passionate about girls and books? Check out the entire What A Girl Wants archive.

Looking for Costa Rica stories and pictures? Er, sorry. Not ready yet. Come back on Friday!?

Add a Comment

Feminist Is Not A Dirty Word is the latest in the What A Girl Wants series by Colleen Mondor at Chasing Ray.

What A Girl Wants began in June 2009, and is a series of interviews with authors about the "current status of books for teen girls and what it says about both what they want to read and what publishers think they want to read." Topics since then have covered everything from mysteries to favorite books to recommendations to the most recent entry, about feminism.

I cannot believe I haven't linked to this series before! If you've been reading it, you know how great and in depth it is, with an amazing array of authors. If you haven't been reading it, start now! You'll feel as if Colleen invited all these women to her house, and you're invited, also, and now you're sitting around drinking wine, eating good cheese, and talking about bookish things.

Amazon Affiliate. If you click from here to Amazon and buy something, I receive a percentage of the purchase price.

© Elizabeth Burns of A Chair, A Fireplace & A Tea Cozy

Display Comments Add a Comment

For the 11th question of her What a Girl Wants series, Colleen Mondor asked a number of us one of her typically challenging questions: What does it mean to be a 21st century feminist, and on the literary front, what books/authors would you recommend to today's teens who want to take girl power to the next level?

Lorie Ann Grover, Laurel Snyder, Loree Griffin Burns, Margo Raab, and Zetta Elliott all came through with reliably interesting responses. I was caught up in a series of corporate projects and could not respond in time.

Today, however, I'd like to put my two cents in by recommending Elaine Showalter's A Jury of Her Peers: Celebrating American Women Writers from Anne Bradstreet to Annie Proulx to readers of any age, gender, or race who wish to understand and celebrate just how hard women have had to work to put their voices on the page—and how women's voices have and will continue to shape us.

Anne Bradstreet, one of this nation's first women writers, entered print, in Showalter's words, "shielded by the authorization, legitimization, and testimony of men." In other words, Showalter continues, "John Woodbridge, her brother-in-law, stood guarantee that Bradstreet herself had written the poems, that she had not initiated their publication, and that she had neglected no housekeeping chore in their making."

No vanity allowed, in other words, and no leaving those dishes in the sink.

Showalter's book—which yields insight into the stories of Phillis Wheatley, Julia Ward Howe, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Emily Dickinson, Edith Wharton, Willa Cather, Dorothy Parker, Zora Neale Hurston, Pearl Buck, Shirley Jackson, Harper Lee, Sylvia Plath, S.E. Hinton, Grace Paley, Joan Didion, Lorrie Moore, Jayne Anne Phillips, Sandra Cixneros, Amy Tan, Louis Erdrich, Jhumpa Lahiri, Gish Jen, and so many others—is itself a piece of history, for it is, unbelievably, the first literary history of American women writers.

Showalter suggests that the development of women's writing might be classified into four phases: feminine, feminist, female, and free. Anyone who wants to know just how we got to free (and to ponder, with the evidence, whether or not we're really there) should be reading this book.

Display Comments Add a Comment

In late December I read an article in the Washington Post about Geraldine Ferraro's extreme disappointment over the young women who voted for Obama rather than Hillary Clinton. Her point was that all other things being equal (meaning you were going to vote Democrat anyway) then women should have put Clinton over the top as women should have felt the higher need to place a woman in the Presidency. Here's a bit:

Ferraro was livid, and distraught. What more did Hillary Clinton have to do to prove herself? How could anyone -- least of all Ferraro's own daughter -- fail to grasp the historic significance of electing a woman president, in probably the only chance the country would have to do so for years to come? Ferraro hung up enraged, not so much at her daughter but at the world. Clinton was being unfairly cast aside, and, along with her, the dreams of a generation and a movement.

What intrigued me about this piece was the notion that feminism means you inherently must support the best qualified woman, over the equally qualified man - at all times. So if I voted for Obama and not Clinton, I am not as "good a feminist" as I should be. This also made me wonder just what being a feminist means in the 21st century and beyond that, if teens today have any idea what feminism used to mean and why it continues to matter. Is feminism an outdated word today? Is it even a negative word? And yet Lily Ledbetter proved that inequalities exist and must be rectified and who can argue with her situation - demanding equal pay for equal work regardless of gender? But do today's teens see gender bias - and should they?

Basically, the question is, what does it mean to be a 21st century feminist and on the literary front, what books/authors would you recommend to today's teens who want to take girl power to the next level?

Lorie Ann Grover: "No way, should a girl vote for a woman just because she's a woman, Colleen! Both my girls would be upset to hear that they were expected to do so. Thankfully, they are not of my mother's world, but their own. They have the luxury of looking at issues over gender representation. That said, a hip young feminist blog is The F Bomb . This was recommended by iheartdaily, and it's a great, fresh voice for teen girls.

Girldrive by Nona Willis Aronowitz and Emma Bee Bernstein is compelling, both the book and blog. Here two young women hit the road and interview women across the country about feminism. Answers are different, current, and colorful.

Those two sources come immediately to mind. Other than that, I think reading broadly through YA lit will bring a great balance. The books of today empower girls to think for themselves and stride forward."

(ETA: Read a NY Magazine Q&A with Nona Aronowitz.)

Laurel Snyder: "What I cannot stop thinking about, as I ponder this question, is that no matter how much things change, teenage girls are still boy-crazy. For healthy natural reasons, of course, but this reality

Add a Comment

Finally, here is part 3 of our December feature on books recommended for teen girls. Be sure to check out Part 1 and Part 2 and please - PLEASE - buy books for the girls in your life this holiday!

Lorie Ann Grover says: "When Colleen asked for a book recommend for What a Girl Wants, I went back and scrolled through my goodreads. What have I read this past year, that I'd want to place in the hands of a teen girl? There are so many books! Certainly every readergirlz main feature and postergirlz recommended read. But what rises to the top for me, personally? I've chosen three:

Justina Chen's North of Beautiful because every girl should be challenged to discover her own definition of beauty. Teen girls will identify with Terra as she charts her path away from her constraining, abusive father. They will cheer when she finds truth and beauty through art, and she gathers insight through her new friend Jacob. The beautifully crafted sentences and rounded characters will hold readers with hope and call them to find their own north of beautiful.

Laura Resau's Red Glass is my second recommend. With rich, beautiful language, readers will join Sophie on her journey into Mexico during a summer road trip. An eccentric cast, cultural diversity, and a hint of magical hope infuse this work which will expand the scope of teen girls today. Whether they be touched by the Bosnian war refuge or the six year old Mexican boy who has crossed the U.S. border illegally, the readers' experiences and empathy will be broadened.

And Beth Kephart's House of Dance is my third recommend. The lyrical beauty of Beth's prose just may incite teen readers to reach out to an older generation. As Rosie is charged with tending to her grandfather dying of cancer, she uncovers the life that he loved. Through ballroom dance instruction, Rosie's confidence blossoms until she can stand and give back herself. The sense of community and family love found in this gentle journey will resound in teen readers.

So there are three books of hope, I just realized. As I say to teen readers, "There's hope. Look." (Loose Threads, 2002)"

CM: Oh Justina Chen! Oh Beth Kephart! Can I say how much I love their books? Justina's Nothing but the Truth (and a few white lies) remains one of the funniest and most normal books I've read in ages. And yet it is anything but typical it's just that any reader can see themselves in Patty's frustrations. And Beth's Nothing But Ghosts is a revelation, plain and simple. Such gorgeous writing and such a light touch when it comes to family drama and romance and coming-of-age. A book to sink into!

Laurel Snyder says: "Ah, the randomly-chosen holiday gift book! I remember (seriously, folks) my dad giving me a copy of Hasidic Tales of the Holocaust for Hanukkah one year, no lie.

And while that was kind of an intense experience, I'm going to argue for intensity today. I'm going to say that the

Add a Comment

And just as we did last week, here are some more book recs for 12 & up girls from the fabulous What a Girl Wants crew:

Loree Griffin Burns suggests: "My WAGW holiday book picks are a collection of truly fantastic nonfiction that I read this year. The books themselves cross genres and reading levels but are united in their exploration of one amazing organism: the mighty redwood tree. I think it’s fascinating how the different authors explored this single topic, and teenaged girls with an interest in science, discovery, or writing will surely enjoy a jaunt through their pages.

REDWOODS, by Jason Chin is not exactly written for teenaged girls, but it will interest them anyway. Chin takes the idea of a redwood forest and builds it into a grand, visual adventure. This picture book was actually my first introduction to redwoods, and it inspired me to learn more. (I love when picture books do that!)

OPERATION REDWOOD, by S. Terrell French. This middle-grade novel tells the story of three kids who take the preservation of a certain stand of redwood trees very, very seriously. The math is perfect: Kids = Heroes.

EXTREME SCIENTISTS, by Donna M. Jackson. This middle-grade photo-essay explores three different scientists, one of whom is Steven Sillett, the first scientist to climb up into the redwood canopy and explore. How he gets up there is just as fascinating as what he finds when he gets there, and the stunning photographs make this book a great complement to the others on the list. (CM: I reviewed Extreme Scientists in my feature on nonfiction titles in the new issue of Bookslut. Loved it!)

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC magazine is one of my favorites, and a subscription starting with the October 2009 issue would make a perfect addition to a redwood-themed holiday gift basket, because it features a cover article on these super-trees … complete with a pullout poster that is crazy amazing.

The last redwood book on my list is the one that intrigued me most, and since it was published first, I suspect that it might just have inspired the other books on this list. THE WILD TREES, by Richard Preston is creative non-fiction at its very best: intensely readable and full of information that is so interesting you wonder after reading it why you hadn’t explored the topic before. The book was primarily marketed to adults, but I think it will be equally interesting to teenagers; who can resist a book that inspires, motivates, saddens, and scares one witless all at the same time? [Parents will probably want to know there is a love scene in the book. And, yes, it takes place in the redwood canopy!]

CM: This is an inspired subject and some excellent choices for sure. For readers looking for other woodsy type stories I highly recommend The Wild Girls by Pat Murphy about two girls who meet in the woods, become frien

Add a Comment

We're taking a break from the heavy subjects this month with the What A Girl Wants series and instead offering up the group's collective wisdom when it comes to books and girls. Although we are mostly aimed at the 12 & up crowd, you will find in this post (and Part 2 next week) lots of ideas for what we think you should buy for the girls in your life. I've mostly left the choosing to the WAGW crew although, well, I do chime in with some additional ideas based on their suggestions. Happy shopping - and more than anything, happy reading!!!

Jacqueline Kelly suggests: "The Diary of Anne Frank. This should be compulsory reading for every girl. And for every boy. And every adult, for that matter. This haunting book will stay with you for the rest of your life."

CM - As it happens, there are two new looks at the diary out this year: Anne Frank: The Book, The Life, the Afterlife by Francine Prose wherein the author suggests that Anne revised her diary and planned to publish it after the war and Anne Frank: Her Life in Words and Pictures by Menno Metselaar, a visual guide to her life published this fall by Roaring Brook.

Melissa Wyatt suggests: "For girls who are looking for more supernatural romance, I highly recommend THE CHINA GARDEN by Liz Berry. A strong female protagonist who finds her own way to accept a seemingly inescapable destiny, a real live human boy for her to love, an intricate and beautiful mystery based in British folklore and enough steam to set off plenty of palpitations.

And this is the perfect time to catch your girl up on Megan Whalen Turner's magnificent Thief series. The fourth book, A CONSPIRACY OF KINGS, will hit bookshelves in March. (And psst! It's fantastic!) So gear up with the first three books: THE THIEF, THE QUEEN OF ATTOLIA and THE KING OF ATTOLIA. Set in a psuedo-Mediterranean/medieval world and full of political intrigue and complex relationships, these books are somewhat demanding, but will reward the sophisticated reader many times over. Give these books to fans of Diana Wynne Jones."

CM - If you are a fan of Turner's and have yet to discover Diana Wynne Jones then can I strongly - STRONGLY - suggest you get yourself right over to her end of the shelves and start ordering? My favorite of hers is Fire & Hemlock, a retelling of the Tam Lin ballad which is sadly out of print (why oh why??) but if you find it in a used store then give it to a teen you know asap. Or you could buy Pamela Dean's amazing version of Tam Lin set on a college campus in the early 1970s which I also adore.

Zetta Elliott suggests: "One of the most compelling books I’ve read recently was Marcelo in the Real World by Francisco X. Stork. Jasmine and Marcelo (who has Asperger’s syndrome) forge an intimat

Add a Comment

Another installment in Colleen Mondor's "What A Girl Wants" series is posted over at Chasing Ray. This time we are discussing socioeconomics in teen literature. Check it out.

Add a Comment

In question number seven of her fantastic series, What a Girl Wants, Colleen Mondor asked us to reflect on whether historic MG and YA fiction addresses socioeconomic status more effectively than contemporary titles, and whether or not readers need to read about people who are experiencing their same financial struggles, or prefer to live vicariously inside socioeconomic fantasies. As always, I had to think long and hard about this one. Check out what Jenny Davidison, Zetta Elliott, Melissa Wyatt, Laurel Snyder, Sara Ryan, Loree Griffin Burns, Kekla Magoon, Mayra Lazara Dole, and I had to say about the topic. As always, I wish that I could be in a room with these bright lights, talking the issue out.

Display Comments Add a Comment

© Kelly Connors


I know, I know…. I am supposed to be away from my computer all month. But the truth is that I am working a teeny bit, in between summer adventures, and part of that work this week is participating in another ‘What A Girl Wants’ discussion over at Colleen Mondor’s Chasing Ray blog. This week we’re discussing non-fiction, and I’m officially inviting ALL of you to join the discussion. So, if you are so inclined, head on over, hear what the WAGW panel has to say about nonfiction for teen girls, and let us know what you think about the topic. What great YA nonfiction have you read lately? What inspirational women* would you like to read about? Who and what did you read about when you were a teen? Come on over and have your say.

*Eleanor Roosevelt, whose statue from the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial in Washington DC is pictured above, inspires me constantly. I re-read parts of Russell Freedman’s ELEANOR ROOSEVELT: A LIFE OF DISCOVERY while writing up my WAGW response, and I was inspired all over again. Amazing woman, amazing biography.

** I submitted my WAGW response very late, so if you've already visited the discussion (ahem, Jeannine), then consider a second trip!

Add a Comment

This week's entry stems largely from my acute frustration after reading Tanya Lee Stone's Almost Astronauts. The book is fantastic - really really well done - and I can't recommend it enough (It will be formally reviewed in my September column which is all things Moon Landing). What bothered me is that I was raised on the Space Coast of Florida and watched rockets launch from my front yard and yet I had never heard of the women in the Mercury 13 - not once. They never showed up in college either, when I studied Aviation (including Aviation history and they were all killer pilots) or when I studied history (which included the Gemini, Mercury and Apollo programs). It's not that I would have decided to be an astronaut if only I had known about them, but rather that I had no clue that women did this then - before I was born. So I got to looking at nonfiction in general for teens, especially books written about real women and real girls and real subjects that would interest teenage girls who, like teenage boys, generally have no idea what to do with their lives, and what I found was monumentally disheartening. Lots of mythic history (hello Betsy Ross and Molly Pitcher), lots of dead history (poor Amelia Earhart and Marie Curie), lots of commonly known and celebrated but not likely to be repeated history (go Rosa Parks!) but books about women scientists and anthropologists and pilots (who didn't disappear) and marine biologists and artists and writers and museum curators and horse trainers and volcanologists and on and on and on?

Not so much. I should clarify that I'm looking for something more than the short standard biographies and NF titles provided in series for middle grade readers. What I'm looking for is something that dwells between child and adult (as teenagers do) and also offers insight into how ground breaking and amazing women traveled their paths from girlhood to woman. That's what I haven't seen so much of and what I long to discover.

So here is a discussion that has, surprisingly, proven to be the toughest for our panel. The question: How about the real girls? We all know that teen nonfiction is not a popular genre for publishers. The assumption seems to be that teens can jump right into adult NF for information they might need for reports, etc. To me though the adult titles are often densely written and more importantly do not address subjects teens would be interested in - or don't present them in a manner that would be more appealing to teens (more pictures, etc.) What subjects do you think should be addressed in YA NF that teen girls would want to read about and just as important - should read about? Who are the real girls and real issues we are missing and how would learning about them help the girls of today?

Beth Kephart: "I have had the great privilege of spending a lot of time with teens not just my own son, but young aspiring writers, the kids from church, the crowd of adventurous souls with whom I traveled to Juarez, and also, in that virtual way that all of us here understand, the younger bloggers who daily teach me so much. These kids are smart. These kids are outrageous in what they already know, in what they already reach for, in what borders and barriers they already cross.

They yearn, it seems to me, for place. They yearn to know more about worlds that are not theirs, about people they've not met. The anthropological. The sociological. The tribal. The vanishing. I'm not talking about guidebooks. I'm not talking about textbooks. I'm talking about books that respectfully, intelligently, seductively open worlds to teens.

Zetta Elliott: "While visiting my mother last month, I opened a drawer in my old desk and found a high school report I’d written on Wuthering Heights—on the front cover was a lovely image of Brontë, which I distinctly remembered cutting out of the musty encyclopedias we kept in the basement! As a professor, I began instructing my students not to use secondary sources because plagiarism was an issue, and I felt it was important for them to develop their own ideas and analyses instead of relying on theories developed by others. It can be hard for young people to develop their own voice and/or opinion when they’re told over and over that they lack the experience and/or expertise to come to their own conclusions. I’d like to see more nonfiction for teens that incorporates source material, like Tonya Bolden’s Maritcha: A Nineteenth-Century American Girl. I also believe nonfiction writers need to meet teens where they are—and that means incorporating lots of audio and visual content. I begin most of my classes with music because it’s appealing, accessible, and presents text (lyrics) in a different way. We study television commercials, films, essays, fiction, poetry…there are so many ways to approach a given topic. Teens need to understand that history is a story anyone can tell, so long as you substantiate your claims. "

Laurel Snyder: "Ooh! Ooh! Well, it seems to me that part of the problem with nonfiction is that teens are already being crammed full of "information" at school. So, even if you write a good biography of, say, Abigail Adams, who was an amazing woman, I can't help thinking it'll be met with groans of "Mooooore schoolwork?" Same with anyone likely to appear on an AP history test.

BUT! As an author, I wish all the time that I had the resources to research and write nonfiction that's off the beaten track. Biographies and histories of things that never make it into textbooks. I wrote a story for BUST a few years back, about the women of the carnival freakshows. Written well, a book about such women (or just one) would be a chronicle of an age, as it would touch on how/why these women found their way to the carnie world. Many were immigrants, or women of color. Many had disabilities. Some lived in partnerships with other women.

Likewise the dance world (I'd die to write about Anna Pavlova), the theater world, etc. Incarcerated women. I read a CRAZY biography of Tallulah Bankhead last year! WOW! I think dramatic stories like that, from outside the mainstream, would provide an alluring window on history.

Maybe I'll get around to it, once my kids are a little older and I can travel and do the research."

Lorie Ann Grover: "I do believe teens can access adult nonfiction without hesitation, Colleen. So, this hasn't been a concern for me, currently. However, with two teen girls in my house, I can say that when the perfect topic crosses their path in a YA format, that book is well-loved. A perfect example is Deborah Reber and Lisa Fyfe's In Their Shoes: Extraordinary Women Describe Their Amazing Careers. The work is toted about, read again and again, and shared with friends. The nonfiction is accessible and pertinent. In the same vein is The Great Jobs series by Blythe Camenson. Particularly in our house, Great Jobs for Geology Majors and Great Jobs for Anthropology Majors have been checked out repeatedly from the library.

Believing teens can access adult works, I ask myself what subjects are particular to teens that maybe could be explored more? How about: health for teens, more series on careers, dating and relationships, teen finances and savings, and goal setting as a teen. I'm thinking practical topics that are particularly relevant to the teenager.

I'd personally love to see a collection for teens about teen life around the world. Maybe that's a future endeavor for my cultural anthropology major...

Jenny Davidson: "I hear you on the need for accessible and interesting nonfiction books on issues that will be of interest to girls in particular - but isn't it possible that there just isn't a big enough market for it to make sense for publishers and writers to invest their resources this way? It is my strong opinion, as a reader and a writer, that a wonderfully well-written adult nonfiction book will be accessible to thirteen- or fourteen-year-olds who are fully fluent readers. What would be an example? Well, let's say Anne Fadiman: her book The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down is in no sense a YA title, and yet I think it would be of considerable interest to many high school students. Popular science writing, at its best, also crosses over in this way - the essays of Oliver Sacks, for instance (or I think of books like Armand-Marie Leroi's Mutants or Jonathan Weiner's Time, Love, Memory as books that would also be very suitable for this age group). So that in this case it seems to me librarians are the ones who have the most to offer, in terms of helping steer kids to the real treasures that exist out there but that will not always be clearly designated for teens. Well-written biography in particular can offer girl readers some of the pleasures of a novel but with access to or insight into various fields of history or science or what have you - but I would think that it will make more sense for most biographers, especially if they are doing original research, to write for the adult market in the first place..."

Sara Ryan: "This is another question I can't answer without thinking about my own reading choices as a teen. Here are three nonfiction titles I remember:

1. Our Bodies, Ourselves. It was put into my hands by an older friend who'd intuited that I would soon benefit from some of the information inside. I would never have taken it off a library shelf, but in the safety of her apartment, it was okay to read. 2. Color Me Beautiful. I wish I didn't have such vivid recollections of this title, but I was fascinated by the premise that if you just knew what season you were, everything else in your life would fall into place. 3. Medieval People, by Eileen Edna Power. I was also fascinated by the Middle Ages, and I appreciated that the book was actually about people from the past, as opposed to Important Historical Events.

None of these titles were written for a teen audience, but they were all about subjects in which I had a compelling interest. If I were a teen today, I'd be looking online for equivalents of the first two, since despite my fascination, I found health information and fashion equally embarrassing to contemplate.

The problem I have when I try to think about teen-girl-specific nonfiction is that so many of the subjects that come to mind are exactly the kind of things I wouldn't have wanted to admit I was interested in. And if the topic was innocuous, as with Medieval People, I'd have found a "For Teens!" treatment condescending.

So maybe teen-girl-specific nonfiction is more for parents, librarians, teachers, and the rare but vital Other Trusted Adults to buy, and simply leave somewhere the girls might stumble across it.

Mayra Lazara Dole: "My main concern isn’t educated girls who read. Soon they’ll have a myriad of YA nonfiction titles written by white authors filled with white successful women. I vouch for popularizing Latina/all women of color scientists and athletes while dispelling female myths in order to inspire girls who don't read. It’s my perspective that we need to update/rewrite history texts to include all Latinas and women of color scientists, politicians, athletes, etc., and LGBTQl’s contribution throughout history. Our stereotypes about Latina/women of color, and LGBTQI's tells us who we are as people, play a role in all our decision-making, in who we choose to interact and befriend or shun, and, in how we advance in life and in our careers.

Rain can erode mountains and boulders. As authors, let’s be the rain…

A silly last thought: in order to inspire teens who don’t read to delve into books, I suggest we consider hyper-manipulating titles:

TEEN SEX! = How to prevent pregnancy and STD’s

GO GREEN & GET the GUY! = Encouraging teens to take care of their bodies and the environment.

READ THIS and DIE! = Nutrition, eating healthy foods so you avoid heart disease, etc.

LGBTQI’s RULE THE WORLD! = text depicting gay characters in history.

WHO ARE OUR FOUNDING MOTHERS = ?"

[Post pics: Artist Frida Kahlo in 1931, age 24; Maritcha Rémond Lyons, first Black graduate of Providence High School; Russian dancer Anna Pavlova in 1912; anthropologist Ruth Benedict; author Anne Fadiman; astronaut Eileen Collins - first female shuttle pilot and first female shuttle commander; Cuban singer Celia Cruz]

Add a Comment

As many of you may recall, Margo Rabb wrote an article on being published YA in the NYT earlier this year that set off a bit of a firestorm about what it means to be a YA writer vs adult and if one or the other is better. This comes up again and again, if not from authors (although Colson Whitehead found himself in the middle of it just a few months ago after a casual remark) then from readers. There is a constant and continuous question over what is YA and if YA matters or should even exist as a separate genre. We aren't going to solve those questions here today but at the very least I did want to delve into just what subject areas might be more important for a teenage girl than an adult woman - in other words, if YA did not exist would teens still be getting the best reading experience?

Before I post the question though, I wanted to point everyone in the direction of a new blogger: Young, Black, A Reader. "MIss Attitude" is a Black teen reviewing books with Black characters and after the last WAGW discussion I can't begin to stress how important it is to support this young woman in her endeavors. If you want to get a good taste of what she's trying to do - and how frustrated she is - then read her post on trying to find teen books with Black characters at the local B&N. It's a good blog and an important voice in the blogosphere, so let's send her some encouragement.

Now onto our discussion of just what sort of subjects do teen girls need to address in their reading that they can not simply find in adult titles. In other words, I asked the group why do we need YA titles for girls in particular and what those books could/should include.

Sara Ryan: I was struggling with my response in part because, much like the last question, I feel like I could write a dissertation and not think that I'd covered the topic adequately. So I asked a couple of writer friends why they thought we needed YA titles for girls. Both of their answers had to do with respect: respect for a group of people, teenage girls, who are not, as a rule, respected in contemporary American culture.

It's easy to look at pop culture and think that teen girls -- white, thin, straight, rich teen girls, to be precise -- are held up as some kind of an ideal. But there are, of course, a whole lot of teen girls who do not fit into those categories, and besides, girls -- not to mention adult women -- are only supposed to look like teenage girls, not act like them. How do you insult an adult? One way is to accuse them of acting like a teenager; especially a "bitchy teenage girl." You can denigrate a piece of art or music or literature by calling it adolescent. I don't want to turn this into Identity, Round Two, but I do think that part of why we need YA for girls is so that girls can read books that resonate with what they're experiencing -- or take them very far away from it, depending. The point Alyssa made in the Girl Detective comments is well taken: "As far as the serious/meaningful stuff goes, we teenagers live with the 'hell' of high school and all the moronic teenage angst in general. I've noticed that many adult authors of YA want to 'give us something to think about' and 'change our lives.' Those are the kind of books the teachers make us read in school. But the truth is, when we go shopping for a novel and spend our money, we just want to be swept away and entertained."

So one day you might want the Victorian-style magic, ass-kicking, and wit of the girls in Libba Bray's A Great And Terrible Beauty. Another day, you might want to read about a girl with a messed-up family, whose family is messed up maybe along different lines than yours, but still in a way you can recognize, like Deanna Lambert's in Sara Zarr's Story of a Girl. On yet another day, the matter-of-fact competence and scientific smarts of Dewey Kerrigan in Ellen Klages' Green Glass Sea and White Sands, Red Menace might appeal. Or the torturous crush on a teacher in Jillian and Mariko Tamaki's Skim. Or the hilarious Quinceañera for the Gringo Dummy in Nancy Osa's Cuba 15.

Another reason we need YA for girls is that it can be a way into subjects you might not otherwise encounter -- or admit to yourself you want to know about. I've heard from many girls for whom Empress of the World is the first book they've read that features girls in love with each other. This is, of course, an aspect of YA that causes controversy, since many adults seem unable to understand that you don't necessarily read fiction as a how-to manual. (Otherwise, judging from the popularity of mysteries among adults, the homicide rate would be considerably higher.)

And there's something about voice in the mix, too. I think the YA authors who nail teen girls' voices credibly -- and part of that is recognizing that a monolithic Teen Girl Voice does not exist -- respect girls and their lives in a way that authors of adult books with teen girl characters often don't. The YA authors who get it don't treat being a teenage girl as the best or worst time ever, or -- as is perhaps most common with authors of adult books -- as a time of such excruciating awkwardness that they can barely stand to evoke it. Instead, the authors who get it present girls' teen years simply as a time when a lot is happening, some of it confusing, some of it exhilarating, some of it tragic, some of it amazing. Much like, you know, the rest of life.

Zetta Elliott: I’m new to the field of YA lit so I can’t claim to be an expert, and I don’t remember spending much time on “teen lit” when I was a teenager myself. I recall stealing my older sister’s teen romance novels when I was a pre-teen, but that had more to do with wanting to seem grown. I vividly remember reading Mildred D. Taylor’s novels more than once, and despite the protagonists' young age, the subject matter struck me as very adult; it was my introduction to life in the Jim Crow South, and was probably the start of my lasting interest in the US history of racial violence. I wasn’t learning that history in my suburban Toronto high school, so I suppose I’d say that YA lit should make accessible those topics made “unmentionable” by (well-intending?) adults. When I teach my course on lynching, my college students are often outraged that such vital history wasn’t covered in their school curriculum. But what’s the “right” age to learn about lynching? I’ve written a picture book story that touches on mob violence but no publisher has expressed interest, despite the success of Bird, which also deals with “sensitive” issues. I think any subject can be made comprehensible to young readers without being gratuitously explicit or traumatic, but you’d need to find a press with the courage to take on potential controversy.

The more YA lit I read, the more I’m struck by the split: novels that are about teens versus novels that are marketed to teens. The latter are often marked by “lite” writing and silly gimmicks that aim to make the novel seem experimental or innovative in terms of form. But real daring resides in the writing itself, and I think teens deserve novels on every topic, told from as many different points of view as possible. Books that offer narrative possibility (instead of filling in all the blanks) open the door for continued conversation, so I’d also say that we need adults who have the courage to face the daunting questions that teens need to ask.

Laurel Snyder: Okay, deep breath.

In some ways, this is the part of YA I have trouble with as a writer. It's part of why I don't really write YA (I write MG), why I steer clear of "issues" in my books. Because I haven't figured out how to do it right yet. I don't know how to find a balance, a light touch. I'll be interested to hear what the others have to say.

I worry about writing "about." I would, of course, like to think that young women would find any issues they faced in the literature we provide. That our books would be of use to them as they grow. But what makes a good resource doesn't always make a good book. Right? It's the very process of writing "about" something like cutting or rape or food issues that can get in the way of the story or the language. The sensitivity we bring to bear when we write for the young, the sense of ourselves as educators or mentors or good examples... can turn literature into propaganda. It feels like there's never the option of a tragedy. Like there's no room for nihilism when we're trying to deliver a hopeful message. And that feels limiting to me. I'm intimidated that.

I read Wintergirls this spring, and it KNOCKED MY SOCKS OFF. Because it felt so true. I danced as a teen, and struggled some with food and body image. And the fact that the books explores the death of such a girl, and the near-death of another, in such a poetic, real, painful way, shocked and awed me. I want to think I can write like that, but I'm not sure. And there's so much at stake in such a book, I'm scared to fail.

Whew.

Beth Kephart: We are perpetually in the process of becoming ourselves; when we are teens the yearning, the needing, the bending and unbending is all the more intense. We turn, then, to books that make us feel less alone, that articulate or validate our choices, that embrace our apparent differentness, that show us a way, that make it clear that there is not only one way, that yield, to us, context. I think we also turn to books that help us understand how stories work, that help us find the narrative in our own lives.

Is To Kill a Mockingbird a YA book? Is the Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time? I don't, in fact, care how they are labeled; they are books that are essential for teens. Beautifully written, searingly arranged, brilliantly instructive without for a second being didactic, they set down a path for younger readers - they broach the big issues, subjects, themes of identity, prejudice, toleration, and compassion. Can such things be found in adult titles? Of course they can. But books like these open doors to such issues; they open themselves freely to the hearts of younger yearners.

Lorie Ann Grover: I believe teen girls need stories that express their own voices and introduce them to new ones that speak outside of their worldviews. Any topic can potentially engage a teen if it's contained in a meaningful story. The teen protagonist is merely a conduit which connects the reader, with a shorter life experience, to the writer.

So, what can be found in the teen novel not found in an adult work? Nothing, aside from a guarantee of hope in some measure, even if it's small. At least today, I still find this to be true. Otherwise, there will be the same literary merit, engaging plot, and credible characters. There will be the same value.

At ALA, Libba Bray was recently telling me about her book tour in Germany where she found YA and adult works esteemed equally. I am hopeful we might reach this conclusion in the states. Let writers craft their stories and people from all walks find the words, regardless of age or place in life.

Jackie Kelly: Since I'm apparently the geezer in the group, I'm going to tell you all the things I couldn't read about as a young adult simply because they were not written about in any books. At all. Divorce, adultery, sex, pre-marital sex, sex of any kind, and I'm not kidding. Drug abuse, alcohol abuse, marijuana. Anorexia, bulimia, dieting, laxatives. Birth control, abortion, STD's. Periods, tampons, pads. Homosexuality, lesbianism, bisexuality, transvestism, transgenderism. Masturbation, puberty, body changes. Again, no kidding. Depression, anxiety, suicidality. Beer drinking, pills (although characters who smoked cigarettes were A-okay). Emotional abuse, physical abuse, sexual abuse. Shop-lifting, cheating, broken friendships. Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists. Native Americans, African-Americans, biracial characters. Asperger's, autism, mental retardation. Rape. Date rape. Murder.

All these things were forbidden, all these topics were locked away, so that any YA reader who had questions/concerns/anxieties about them had to look for the answers somewhere else, hopefully from an informed adult with good information delivered sympathetically, but more likely not.

Margo Rabb: The books that I read as a teenager were so incredibly important in shaping who I am, in figuring out who I was and who I wanted to be, that I sometimes wonder who I would've become without them. Anne of Green Gables, Jo March, Anne Frank, Scout Finch, Davy from Judy Blume's Tiger Eyes and Kate from Zibby O'neal's In Summer Light were as real to me as my friends and family. They were my role models and heroines, and most of all, they helped me understand all my complex and conflicting emotions--feelings that I didn't understand until I saw them on the page. I learned from Anne of Green Gables that my imagination and dreams were even more important than my reality; from Jo that I yearned to be independent and strong; from Davy that I could survive anything, even the very thing I thought I could never survive; and from Kate that I wanted to be mature and thoughtful when I fell in love.

Now that I'm a mother, I often think about the books that I want my daughter to read. I think that one of the best things my mother did--aside from raising us in a house overflowing with books--was always allowing me to read whatever I wanted. No book was off limits. I was allowed to read Judy Blume's Forever when I was ten years old, and it didn't scar me (if anything, I became the most chaste teenager on the planet.) Books helped me see what I didn't want to become as well, what I wasn't ready for, and what mistakes I wanted to try to avoid making.

What I'm trying to say (in a very roundabout way) is: I think that the heroines in YA fiction are even more important than specific subjects...I think girls need to see themselves on the page, and to see the strong girls they'd like to try to become.

The line between adult books and YA books has become completely fluid and often invisible (I wrote an essay about this subject here*)--while researching the essay, one publisher told me that "There is no subject that is off-limits in YA." I think that the incredible diversity and variety of the genre is amazing--and it thrills me to think of all the strong, complicated heroines in YA books today, and all the ones that will be published in the future.

Jenny Davidson: I am going to take a potentially contrarian view. I do not see why specifically YA fiction is necessary. It strikes me as a publisher's category rather than a writer's one, in many respects, and though I do see that so-called middle-grade books offer something that adult fiction can't mimic, this stops seeming to me true as far as the young-adult category goes.

Do I think that there need to be novels dealing with adolescence, figuring out of sexuality, what it means to grow up in a family, etc.? Yes. But I can't see a real difference between The Fountain Overflows (Rebecca West, published for adults) and Nobody's Family Is Going to Change (Louise Fitzhugh, published for children). There are "classics" that are suitable for teenagers to read (Jane Austen and Dickens come to mind, though I have always found it slightly perverse that people seem to think that Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre is a good book to assign to tenth-grade boys!). There is quite a bit of good contemporary fiction that's published for adults but that's highly suitable for teenagers (I'm thinking of specific examples like Danzy Senna's Caucasia, the novels of Tayari Jones and Joshilyn Jackson, Helen DeWitt's The Last Samurai, Richard Powers' The Time of Our Singing) - and if those are too challenging, well, there's a WORLD of genre fiction out there - whether you like romance or crime or science fiction or fantasy or westerns, there are books written in relatively accessible styles and narrative modes that will give the feel and experience of reading with deep enjoyment to people passing out of the years of childhood but not yet adults.

I'm not saying that YA doesn't make sense as a publishing category. To pick high-quality writers from two different subcategories of YA, Scott Westerfeld and E. Lockhart both have a real feel for writing for teenagers. But could their books be published for adults? Yes, with very few changes; and could the kids that love their books be reading books published for the adult market? Again, certainly.

Melissa Wyatt: What girls can find in YA that they will not find in adult books is an emotional experience more specific to where they are in their lives. But also--for teens more so than anyone else--a book needs to provide a safe place where you can try on emotions. A sort of emotional playground where they can take out ideas and thoughts that they maybe can't talk about with even their closest friends or are even embarrassed to admit and see how it all feels. A place where nobody is watching over their shoulder to tell them they're wrong to think or feel this way. It's the great hiding place and playground of the secret heart-of-hearts.

And it's tough, but I think this is where we have to trust girls and let them read where that need takes them, even if it's something that we don't think is obviously important--or we misunderstand what it is they are getting out of a book. Look at the enormous appeal of books like A Child Called It. I don't think this book is being read in an effort to develop empathy for children in such a terrible situation. I think it's the secret delight of utter utter horror and debasement. That sounds awful. It sounds callous. But it's important. It's a stretching of emotional muscles. It's not why I would read that book, but it's the way I would have read it at fourteen.

So I think this is something that's important to remember when we see girls responding to books that might trouble us for one reason or another. What they're getting from those books may not necessarily be what we--from our adult perspective--might fear. But it could be filling a need only they can define and one they ought to be allowed to pursue in that safe place of the book.

Add a Comment

Do teen girls need YA books? Is there something innate in the genre that shapes growing up like nothing else can? Colleen Mondor at Chasing Ray is asking that question today, and some really smart people are offering their perspectives. Here, for example, is Zetta Elliott:

The more YA lit I read, the more I’m struck by the split: novels that are about teens versus novels that are marketed to teens. The latter are often marked by “lite” writing and silly gimmicks that aim to make the novel seem experimental or innovative in terms of form. But real daring resides in the writing itself, and I think teens deserve novels on every topic, told from as many different points of view as possible. Books that offer narrative possibility (instead of filling in all the blanks) open the door for continued conversation, so I’d also say that we need adults who have the courage to face the daunting questions that teens need to ask.

I've contributed my two cents to the conversation as well, for what they are worth, and I encourage you to take a look—and to join in the discussion.

Display Comments Add a Comment

As a corollary to last week's What a Girl Wants entry on race and identity in YA lit, I've been thinking about the question of what it means to be white. When I was teaching (soldiers and dependents at Ft Wainwright, AK) we would discuss ethnicity as part of our survey of war in the 20th century. For a classroom exercise, everyone would identify their own ethnicity. It was always a United Nations in my classes: Native American, African American, Asian American (Cambodian, Filipino, Japanese, etc.), Hispanic (Mexican, Guatemalan, Honduran, etc.), Jamaican, Puerto Rican and on and on. Then we would get to the Caucasian students and always - without fail - the first response would be "I'm white". It always took a few minutes to explain to them that white was a color and really, means nothing at all.

My white students identified more with skin than ethnicity while all of my other students identified much more strongly in the opposite manner. It did not occur to any of them to say they were black or brown - they preferred to discuss how they were raised, where they were born or what their families taught them. There was a lot of head shaking as we discussed what it meant - and didn't mean - to be white. After the first few times I knew to expect it, and was ready to ask the questions about where their parents and grandparents were from and tease out the immigrant stories that everyone has (no matter how far back you have to go).

I've been thinking about my students a lot lately as I put together the post on minority characters in YA lit. While there is certainly a dearth of such characters in most teen novels (which is why I posed last week's question) there is also something very odd going on in novels with Caucasian protagonists. It has been ages since I've read a YA novel that is not pointedly about minorities where the characters are described as anything other than just white. There is no mention of a religion (even so much as a sentence about going to church, synagogue, etc.) or culture or any kind of ethnic clues at all. There is a blandness to these books - and these characters - that would seem to defy the way most of us live. It is not that I expect ethnicity to be part and parcel of every novel - plots do not need to revolve around it - but I can't possibly be the only person in the country who grew up with a parent that spoke endearments in his native language (my father first language was French) or enjoyed a cup of tea served the Irish way by my grandmother. Also, as someone half Irish and half French Canadian, I came from a very Roman Catholic background. While we may not have discussed God on a daily basis (please) we were in church every Sunday, every funeral is a Catholic Mass and every member of my family (except for my generation) carried rosaries on their person pretty much all the time. (I imagine my mother still carries some sort of religious medal or rosary in her purse somewhere, if for no other reason then to honor her parents.)(I do the same thing.) There is food that we ate, stories we told and sports we watched (the Montreal Canadians were my father's saints) that we all related to our ethnicity. And everyone I know lived this way to one degree or another. But that's not the world I've been reading about and I'd love to know why.

Author Alma Alexander raised something similar to this in one of her comments last week about white authors: "There is such a breadth of human experience out there. Just as I don't for a moment believe that there is a generic "black experience", I believe at the same time that a reverse error is often made when people speak of "white writers" - WHICH white writers? A Swedish writer? A British writer? A Greek writer? Someone from Sydney...? Rome...? Chicago...? Just what EXACTLY are all those wildly diverse "white" writers supposed to have in common to write about in terms of "white experience"?"

I see a similar catch-all of "white experience" for characters. There is a misconception that being white is a totality of experience by itself and yet, and yet, really that is not true. Again, in my classes I would divide the classes to break down what made us different and what made us the same. First we split by race (Caucasian and non Caucasian) as that was how the class saw themselves most different. But then I asked them to divide by who had given birth and who hadn't which led to a lot of comments from every mother in the class saying that unless you had done that you didn't know anything about pain. (This was usually a huge mood lightener which was the chief reason why I did it.) From there we split on region (westerners thought they were cooler, easterners smarter, northerners tougher, southerners claimed bbq - and no one could argue that.) We split on who had lost a parent, who had survived cancer, who loved Star Trek vs who hated it. Things always got a little goofy but the point, as everyone walked back and forth across the room, was that there were a lot of things we had in common that transcended race. Skin color was just skin color and in the grand scheme of things only part of who we are.

Which wasn't really news to anyone but something that became so obvious no one in the class could ignore it.

In reading most YA novels for girls these days the protagonist is some generic white girl whose parents do an indefinable job for a living, lives in a house or apartment that is easily paid for, and has nondescript features that are either beautiful, mousy, appealing, understated, or plain....depending on the book's message. She goes to school, she has friends, she has drama. She is sick or someone she loves is sick. She is in love or pines for love. She is bright and appreciated or shy and unnoticed. She is the obvious heroine or becomes one by the end. But regardless of all those plot points, she rarely has any aspect of her life that lets the reader know the slightest thing about who her people are or where they came from.

We might as well be reading glorified versions of Dick and Jane for all these books really tells us.

I bring this up not to suggest that white characters are in some sort of competition with minority ones, but rather to show that homogeneity is more the order of the day in our stories then we imagine. Part of why it might be more difficult for minority characters to break through is because white characters are so blank that any character with any ethnic sensibility (even when it is only descriptive and not the point of the story) stands way out. The point is to make the characters to identifiable to all readers (or who the publishers want them to appeal to) that they have become not everyone but no one. It's all about blonde and white and middle class. And beyond that, well beyond that you pretty much might as well be an illegal immigrant for all that these books tell us about ourselves.

I hated Dick and Jane, by the way. What bloody boring stories. That's not the world I grew up in and I don't understand why it still pervades our reading experience today.

[Post pic: my father and grandfather - proud French Canadians. Circa 1942. My father was the first one in his paternal family to be born in this country.]

Add a Comment

Colleen Mondor at Chasing Ray has inspired another interesting discussion about teen girls and reading. This time, Colleen asked us panelists to discuss how important it is (or isn’t) for writers to identify with their protagonists. Specifically, she asked:

Do you think writers and publishers address this identity issue strongly enough and in a balanced manner in current teen fiction?

Can authors write characters of different race/ethnicity or sexual preference from their own?

Beyond that, what special responsibility, if any, do authors of teen fiction have to represent as broad a swath of individuals as possible?

You can read the thoughtful responses of Colleen’s WAGW Panel here.

I tackled the question from a non-fiction point of view, of course, and only the issue of identifying with my subject as an author. I also linked over to a similar discussion that was started at the I.N.K. (Interesting Nonfiction for Kids) blog. If you feel strongly on these topics, do stop by and join in the discussions.


In the meanwhile, I’m rubbing my hands together in anticipation of reading three new titles in Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s Scientists in the Field series. Together these books share the work of five scientists, among them a female microbiologist/spelunker and an African American biologist:

Add a Comment

As a reviewer of MG and YA literature one of the things I have struggled with is to include diversity in my columns. It is difficult enough to include a balance of books between male and female protagonists but if you throw in having a fair number of titles with minority characters then it really gets tough. In the sea of titles with straight white female (blonde) main characters, there are disturbingly few that are African American, Native American, Jewish, Muslim, Asian American, Indian, LBGT and on and on. In some ways, it is a chicken and egg problem however - are their fewer teen books published with minority characters because publishers do not think they will sell or is the problem that writers capable of crafting such books from their own experience are uncommon?

In other words - are white writers (who are in the majority) afraid to write books with minority characters or are minority authors prevented from being published because the kids they write about don't have the purchase power of the white kids?

These are complicated questions and there are no easy answers. However no one can argue that there is a glaring lack of books for teens with minority characters. It is ridiculous how many books are published each season with characters who look the same, sound the same and come from the same economic circumstance. Something needs to change. The questions put to the group this time addressed this issue in several ways. Do you think that writers and publishers address this identity issue strongly enough and in a balanced matter in current teen fiction? Can authors write characters of different race/ethnicity or sexual preference from their own and beyond that, what special responsibility, if any, do authors of teen fiction have to represent as broad a swath of individuals as possible? Here are their very well considered, deeply personal and fascinating answers (please note the book covers depicted are either mentioned in their answers or titles with minority protagonists I highly recommend):

Beth Kephart: As a writer who began her published life as a memoirist and autobiographical poet, it took me some time to trust my ability to write authentically (in fiction) beyond experiences that I myself have lived through, seen, or dreamed so thoroughly that they seemed my own. It was not until I began to write the historical novel due out next fall that I trusted myself to move beyond the known—not just the physical terrain and the conventions of language, but the emotional entanglements.

We have many responsibilities as authors—to respect our readers, to respect language, to tell stories that are as fresh and emotionally true as we can muster. Part of this means that we must write that which most thoroughly, inexorably interests us. No topic is, therefore, beyond any one author’s reach. No voice should be considered off-limits (I’ve written a book in the voice of a river, for example, and I’ve written stories in the guise of a male, but I didn’t feel as if I were trespassing into another’s realm, or that I was reaching). But no topic or character type or voice should, I think, be embraced strictly because an author feels that that topic or type is currently underrepresented. We must be patient and allow the right people to write the right books. What, for example, made Marilyn Nelson the perfect person to write a YA book of poems about/sometimes in the voice of George Washington Carver? Simple: As a poet she had the language. As a woman who felt a passionate connection to Carver she had the right.

Kekla Magoon: As a reader, the characters I most identify with are not always those who are like me on the surface, in physical appearance, background, sexuality, economic status, etc. I absolutely think there should be more diversity on all those levels in teen fiction, and it excites me to find books that match me, but those factors alone don't dictate what characters will touch me deeply -- I loved Troy in Fat Kid Rules the World (K.L. Going), and Grady in Tribute to Another Dead Rock Star (Randy Powell) and both are white males. I woudn't want to be pigeonholed into reading only 'black books' and vice versa -- I'm deeply bothered by the prevalent assumption that books starring black characters will be of interest to those readers only. There is beauty and magic in identifying with someone who looks nothing like you do and acts nothing like you would, but still strikes a chord on a deep emotional level.

As an author, I feel driven to write POV characters of diverse identities -- black, white, biracial, latino/a, male, female, gay, straight and questioning. In fact, I think I've yet to write a character who's exactly like me on all points. Creatively, this excites me, but I do get nervous about putting such characters out in the world, because this society still tends to (perhaps subconsciously) view minority characters as "representative." I don't want to mess it up. But I also feel pulled as a minority author to build minority characters. I sometimes even feel guilty writing white main characters, in particular, because I wonder if I'm somehow shirking a responsibility that I carry as a black author. I try to shake it off, but the feeling lingers.

On the broader question of whether authors and publishers spend enough time on identity issues, my gut instinct says no. I've heard more than one colleague talk about shying away from a story they don't think they have the "right" to tell. Why? There's social and psychological value in, for example, black teen readers seeing more black kids on the front of books. There's value in teens of all sexual orientations seeing more LGBTQ teens in books. In my opinion, anyone can contribute to that effort. Literature is art, and artists have a responsibility to tackle controversy, and to push society toward the places we want it to go. But that can't be the only reason why we try to write outside our own experiences. We have to feel the stories first, and write from a place of passion. Above all, I believe that we shouldn't shy away from taking on these challenges because we fear a potential backlash -- be it censorship by others, or inadvertent perpetuation of stereotypes by us in our work. We should embrace the risky business of trying to get into someone else's mind and heart. I truly believe that kind of empathy is what fiction is all about in the first place.

Laurel Snyder: This is an issue I've bumped into myself recently. I realized that not only wasn't I writing in the voices of a broad range of girls, I wasn't even writing JEWISH girls (though I am a fairly engaged Jew, and write about it obsessively when I write for adults). But my own favorite books were all written long ago, and so written almost exclusively about WASPs, and I think that's colored my books to date.

This realization me start thinking about who populates the world I actually live in, and it made me want to paint those people into my work. The end result is that my new book has, as peripheral characters, a biracial girl, a little boy with 2 mommies, a Jewish girl, etc... it is by no means ABOUT the issues of those identities. But as my MC walks through her world, she sees that other people aren't all "like her." This feels like an important transition for me, a move toward writing more seriously "about" those lives.

But this is hard, and I've fought with people about the topic of who has a right to do that. I don't know. I don't like the idea of non-Jews trying to "capture the essence" of Jewish experience. That way lies simplification. I think there are real nuances to any cultural/family/growing up experience. Its hard enough to imagine and address and respect those nuances when you ARE entrenched. The idea of ME attempting to write in the voice of, say, a Dominican girl growing up in Washington Heights... or in the voice of a transwoman coming of age.... I would feel very nervous. I'd feel like there was no way I could get it "right."

Mayra Lazara Dole: We desperately need diversity in writing. There’s a massive discrepancy between the amount of POC (people of color) YA books/authors, and white books/authors. When white authors write realistic, multicultural stories, or fiction, from the POV of a main character of color, regardless of how many friends they have of that race, or how much research they’ve done on that culture, they haven’t lived it thus it’s not authentic. POC and Latina/o LGBT people of color are severely underrepresented in the publishing world. We need to tell our own powerful stories in novels. On the other hand, literature is enriched when white authors include diversity and when all authors have the freedom to create what we wish. But, how many YA books with diversity written by authentic POC are out there? How many white teen YA books written by white authors exist? Is the problem that publishers can't find POC authors or that POC don't write?

I write contemporary fiction with Cuban-American and LGBT characters (people of my culture and subculture) that I grew up with and have known all my life. Cubans are over-the-top and I’m always asked to drastically tone down my characters. I’ve been writing and submitting manuscripts since I was a teen. Not until 2003 were my critically acclaimed bilingual picture books published by an exclusive multicultural press (Children’s Book Press). Not until last year did HC accept my YA Latina/o LGBT novel. I’ve heard hundreds of stories about Latina/o writers who can’t get published. Imagine Latina/o LGBT authors? POC are marginalized and must work a billion times harder than white authors to get one percent of the recognition they receive and deserve. The question is this: Can editors spend the time needed to help first-time writers of color hone their craft?

We need to share our POV and identity in books in order to move kids to love and respect POC and LGBT’s. Unfortunately, not many of us are given the opportunity to publish our experiences and don’t have the chance to shine or make a living from what we love.

I understand how white authors could feel inspired and motivated to write from another culture's POV or LGBT perspective. I suggest that editors have them consider co-authoring with POC or LGBT author whose manuscripts were turned down. White authors who write POC books almost always say they want to help POC by exposing cultures that wouldn’t normally be read in American literature. If a white author refuses co-authoring to help a POC get published, then how about promoting the work of the culture you’re using? If you use POC in your writing for all the right reasons, then wouldn’t it be fair and a beautiful exchange to help YA authors of color (of the specific culture or subculture you used) achieve respect, a steady job, and accolades too?

Could Lawrence King, Mathew Sheppard, and other kids’ lives have been spared if their killers were exposed to POC and LGBTQ literature/novels in school depicting them in a positive light? Might 1.6 million homeless Latino and black kids (1/3 are homosexuals) not have been kicked out of their homes by intolerant parents if they’d been required to read novels with diversity in elementary, middle grade and high school?

The bottom line in this cut-throat publishing business is MULA (and rightfully so. In these times if publishers can’t be on top of their game, they sink). POC authors who didn’t grow up privileged (many do and are well educated doctors, lawyers and millionaires) will get poor kids to read because we speak their language. I speak the language of underprivileged Latino kids who hate to read and of educated folks. I want to help these children and teens by writing fun books they can relate to. The young adults of color, after reading Down to the Bone, write me long letters about their lives, about how they don’t read but that my novel spoke to them, made them laugh and cry. Some considered suicide until they read my book. They can’t wait till my next work is published. We need more authentic POC books out there.
Loree Griffin Burns: A reader over at the "> I.N.K.

(Interesting Nonfiction for Kids) Blog recently posed the following question to a panel of writers who specialize in books of nonfiction for kids and teens:

How closely do you need to connect with your subject matter to write about it? Do you need to be female to write about amazing women? An environmentalist to write about Rachel Carson? Do you lose all your credibility if you're writing about African-Americans and you're not African-American?

You can read the entire post, including answers from Susan Goodman

, Gretchen Woelfle and Rosalyn Schanzer, here.

For me, the answer to how closely I need to connect with my subject matter is this: very closely. But that doesn’t mean I can only write about bookish, middle class white women with a penchant for science and nature. It means I have to remember at all times that I am seeing my research and my subject’s world through my bookish, middle class white woman with a penchant for science and nature eyes … and react accordingly. For some projects, getting inside the story is more of a stretch than for others, but to some extent, at least in my opinion, it can always be done. Will I do it as well as another writer with a different life experience might do it? Who knows? In the end, my readers will decide if I've done the work justice. My job is to get inside the story and tell it as passionately and as truthfully as I possibly can.

Melissa Wyatt: Can a writer write about something they are not? Unless we are writing our autobiographies, we are all writing outside of our own experiences to some extent. Even if I write about a shy, nearsighted, Mid-Atlantic white girl from a bland suburb, unless I set it in the late seventies, I'm outside of my experiences. My two published novels have male protagonists. I've never been a teenaged boy. But I have also never been a teenaged girl in the twenty-first century, who texts her friends instead of slipping them notes, who lives in a post-9/11 world and to whom "safe sex" means more than avoiding pregnancy.

But the farther away from your own experiences you step, the more care you have to take not to rely on stereotypes--even positive ones--and assumptions and the more you have to examine WHY that story calls to you in the first place. When I start to consider turning an idea into a book, what I identify with is the "want" of the character, the longing, the universal emotions that are going to drive the story. If I can't relate to that, then it isn't a story I should be telling.

So I don't think the question is "can"--because I hate the idea of anyone drawing those kinds of lines for artists--but more like "how."

The simple answer to the responsibility question: the only responsibility I owe is to my characters, to treat them with as much honesty as I can and then secondarily, to the reader, to fulfill the promise I make at the start of the story. Other than that, I don't think I have a particular responsibility to put something into a story unless it serves the story I am trying to tell, or beyond my responsibility as a human being to be aware of the world around me and reflect that as accurately and sensitively as I can.

The characters that most spoke to me as a young reader were those who were least like myself! In fact, I remember distinctly reading a book that did reflect my experiences so well that I absolutely hated it. The thing is, it was a fine book, but I spent enough time feeling like that shy, nearsighted, ordinary white girl from a bland Mid-Atlantic suburb. Dear merciful goodness, I didn't want to read about it. The privilege of being able to reject what actually exists, I know.

Sara Ryan: We have a long way to go before we can say we're doing an adequate, let alone a good job representing the incredibly varied backgrounds and lives of today's teens. Institutional racism and homophobia remain significant influences on what, and who, gets published. But yes, I do think authors can write across boundaries, and I'd like to strongly recommend a book by Nisi Shawl (co-winner of the most recent James Tiptree Award) and Cynthia Ward on exactly this topic: Writing the Other: A Practical Approach. I recently read (for the first time, but not the last) Louise Fitzhugh's Nobody's Family Is Going To Change, and I think that's a fine example of a writer creating believable characters from backgrounds different from her own.

All that said, I get a little itchy at the word "responsibility." It makes me think of well-intentioned, earnest straight white liberal writers shoehorning one-dimensional Ethnic Sidekicks and Sassy Gay Best Friends into their books and feeling like they have thereby helped to Achieve Diversity. Please note that I'm not accusing anyone in particular here, just identifying a trend. And it's not restricted to books -- see also TV, movies, comics, games. Even though I think it's both possible and desirable to write about characters outside one's own background and experience, I think it's more important for authors from a wider variety of backgrounds to get published and supported than for authors from dominant cultural groups to write about minority characters. So am I putting the onus on publishers? To some extent, yes -- but also on readers, to be curious about, and buy books about, characters who don't look or act exactly like them. Elizabeth Bluemle recently blogged about The New Literal Mind, a disturbing trend she's noticed at her bookstore: "the tendency (of grandparents and parents) to reject a book for not being specifically, literally representative of their child's world." Readers (and the parents, grandparents, teachers and librarians of readers) need to understand that there's more than one way to identify with a character.

Garret Freymann-Weyr and I have talked about the identification issue in email. She writes: "If we only ask straight, white girls or Hispanic gay girls to read about people just like themselves, we don't just betray them, we betray writing. When I read Hamlet, I wanted to be Hamlet, not Ophelia. He had all the good lines. We should ask of the young what we ask of ourselves -- to seek out what is beautiful, truthful and haunting."

When I started thinking about my response to this question (and I have thought a lot about my response to this question), I started listing all the traits I could think of that have made me identify with characters. Some types I've identified with: smart kids, nerds, fat kids, queers, bohemians, tomboys, sophisticates, theater people, bohemians, musicians, writers. They could be different from me in any number of particulars, as long as there was one vector of identification. When I was in love for the first time, I identified with every fictional lover. And I remember reading a book about slavery in third grade, shortly after I'd dislocated my knee. When I learned that if you were a slave and you got injured, you'd still have to keep working, my knee throbbed. I can't recall the book's title, but I identified so strongly with that detail that to this day, I can make myself flinch just by thinking about it.

Race and culture aren't on the list of traits that have connected me to characters, but that's because I'm a middle-class white girl and I have the privilege of being able to read about characters with backgrounds similar to mine any time I damn well please. As Mary Borsellino said in a recent interview with Henry Jenkins: "As a queer person, or a woman, or someone of a marginalized socio-economic background, or a non-Caucasian person, it's often necessary to perform a negotiated reading on a text before there's any way to identify with any character within it. Rather than being able to identify an obvious and overt avatar within the text, a viewer in such a position has to use cues and clues to find an equivalent through metaphor a lot of the time."

Some specific characters and individuals I identified with as a kid and young adult:

L.M. Montgomery's Emily of New Moon, because she was a writer, and sensitive; Pauline and Petrova Fossil from Noel Streatfield's Dancing Shoes. Pauline because she was an actress, Petrova because she wasn't. (Identifying with characters doesn't always make logical sense.); Marcy Lewis from Paula Danziger's The Cat Ate My Gymsuit, because she was smart and fat; Dorothy Parker, because she was bitter and funny and wrote: "Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song, A medley of extemporanea, And love is a thing that can never go wrong, And I am Marie of Roumania."' Bilbo Baggins, because he liked his cozy home and didn't initially want an adventure, but rose to it; Maggie Chascarillo from Jaime Hernandez's Love and Rockets, because of her self-loathing, because she fell in love with Hopey Glass, because she was punk; Audre Lorde, as she wrote about herself in Zami: A New Spelling Of My Name, because she was smart and queer and let friends crash at her place even though they made long-distance calls on her phone that they couldn't pay for.

To sum up: in fiction, I think we need both mirrors where we can see ourselves and windows through which we can see others.

Zetta Elliott: I hate Halloween. It’s my least favorite holiday because it generates endless opportunities for folks to impersonate the Other. Every year my attention is directed to grotesque images posted online by frat boys who got plastered, smeared black grease on their face, donned an afro wig, and went to a costume party with either a noose or a gold chain around their neck. I hate Halloween because it reminds me of the minstrel tradition and the license that gave whites to impersonate their IDEA of African Americans. Always more fantasy than reality, minstrel shows allowed whites to distort, degrade, and dehumanize blacks—and then say, “It’s just entertainment!” When it comes to literature, I’m still a bit wary because I know that many members of our society are oblivious to this history of misrepresentation, and therefore write the Other as a distortion that merely serves the interests of the majority group.

Not too long ago I read two books written by whites about slavery during the Revolutionary era; both won prestigious prizes, but only one, in my opinion, was deserving of its award. The other book, I felt, used an African American character as a listening device; she existed only to observe and report on the more important activities of the whites around her; the girl herself was a blank.

Writing a convincing character takes more than imagination—and that goes for EVERY writer. Just being black and female doesn’t make me an automatic expert on everything having to do with black women. There are differences in class, sexual orientation, nationality, age, ethnicity, etc.

No one person can (or should presume to) speak for an entire group. I don’t mind if men write about women, though I find few do so effectively. I don’t mind if whites write about blacks, so long as they do their research AND enough soul-searching to be aware of their biases and blindspots. Also, because the publishing industry is so homogeneous, I’m not sure how many different pairs of eyes look at a manuscript before it winds up in print. I do, however, wonder about the overwhelming number of white authors who choose to write outside their race; according to the CCBC, in 2008 more non-blacks than blacks published books about black culture and history. I don’t think that’s right or fair, and it makes me wonder: are white editors more comfortable working with non-black authors? Is there something objectionable about the manuscripts black authors produce? Are they “too real” to handle? When I think about the character that resonated most with me, I think back to Jamaica Kincaid’s Lucy—a Caribbean teen working as a nanny for an upper-middle class white family in NYC. She delighted in making her employers uncomfortable with their wealth and privilege; she withheld the gratitude and affection they expected, and insisted that they confront the oppressive history that forced her to leave home and become a servant in their country. Lucy mocked their liberal politics by being radical and unrelenting, and I loved her for it…

Lorie Ann Grover: I do believe writers and publishers are bringing to the market a variety of story. With broad foreign rights sales, we are privy to an even wider range of storytellers in our country. To further unlock the untold, I believe we need to encourage writers of all walks to write their own stories well. At readergirlz we are constantly looking for unique voices to resonate in the field. What satisfaction to offer Rita Williams Garcia's No Laughter Here and discuss female circumcision and then Laura Resau's Red Glass and debate illegal immigration.

Authors can write of cultures and lifestyles beyond their experience, or we'd have no sci-fi fantasy, right? The challenge is to be faithful in full research and revelation. Red Glass is an excellent example of Laura Resau bringing to light a culture not her own. I also think of Laurie Halse Anderson's Chains, and Patricia McCormick's Sold. Why would we ever inhibit storytellers who have a burden to share truth, even if the story doesn't spring from their own immediate life experience?

Concerning publishers, initially, maybe the books aren't placed as quickly because of sales concern. In truth, there might not be broad sales at first as the experiences are foreign to American teens. Hopefully though, the books are published, purchased, and read, with connections made through shared desires and emotions. Is it the library market that feeds the groundswell until the books can crossover to the stores, maybe? I have to believe there are dedicated middle grade and YA editors out there who will bring these stories to light for the love of truth, regardless of questionable sales. I'm hoping to place one now myself!

As to characters resonating through my life from different places than my own, I have to say: Djo from Frances Temple's Taste of Salt, Liesel from Markus Zusak's The Book Thief, Junior from Sherman Alexie's The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, or how about Devon Hope from Nikki Grimes' Bronx Masquerade? My list could go on and on. These are characters who wanted the very same things I do and just happened to be reaching for them in a different place. Their courage empowers me. There are so many examples, and for that, I am thankful.

Jacqueline Kelly: Forty years ago, a well-known highly-regarded Southern writer called William Styron caused a big stink by writing a book called The Confessions of Nat Turner. There were many reasons why the book caused a big stink, but one reason was that Styron was a white man who was writing from the point of view of an African-American man. Today, as I write these words, they strike me as quaint. Today, I don't think anybody cares if you write in a voice that belongs to a narrator of a different race/gender/sexual preference/whatever. At least, I hope not. I think the only question is whether you have the talent to pull it off, and to pull the reader along with you in the waking dream that is fiction.

Add a Comment

The conversation continues in the most recent What a Girl Wants discussion, where the topic has now ranged to what a girl detective should look like and do and aspire to. I would love to see a girl spy (ala Veronica Mars) or maybe a historical girl spy series where a teen could actually work in the French resistance or something like that. I also love Zetta's suggestion about a Scooby gang dealing with urban crime. If anyone out there has been thinking of writing about girl detectives there are a wealth of suggestions in that post so please do check them out (and add in your own opinions).

In other lit news, I was fortunate enough to be invited to contribute a post to the LA TImes Jacket Copy blog which is celebrating post modernism this month. Honestly, as I explained early on, I did not major in literature so I found this topic to be a bit intimidating. But Carolyn was great to work with and recalled my previous interview with Scarlett Thomas who is often considered a postmodern author. There will be another essay from me on the blog in the near future on Canadian author Thomas Wharton.

The next What a Girl Wants post will be in early July (about 2 weeks from now) where issues of race, ethnicity and sexuality in teen fiction and who should write what will be discussed. Be sure to check back - the whole project is going great!

Add a Comment

A new installment of Colleen Mondor’s What a Girl Wants discussion series went live today at Chasing Ray, and its all about the decline of the girl detective novel: does it hurt girls not to have the teen girl detective in the 21st century? what does it say about us that she is largely gone? You can--and should!--read the entire post here. I'll paste my thoughts below; I hope they'll entice you to wander over and join the discussion.


I adored Nancy as a kid. It wasn’t the mysteries so much as the undeniable fact that she was different. She wasn’t interested in the sorts of things that most teenaged girls were interested in: boys and how to attract them. No, Nancy was more interested in uncovering the truth, most especially when there were people trying to hide it. Looking back, Nancy’s appeal for me is all wrapped up in this idea that she was different, that she knew it, and that she didn’t worry about it. Because I was different, and I knew it … and I worried about it endlessly.

I guess what I am saying is that I don’t think today’s girls need a girl detective so much as they need a girl—any girl—who is strong and capable (e.g. different!) and who gets on with life anyway. And there are female protagonists who fit this bill; they just don’t happen to be detectives.

As a writer whose passion is science and nature, I’d be remiss if I didn’t at least point out that one incarnation of the girl detective in our age is the female scientist. And although there are lots of nonfiction books available for teen girls about women who grew up to be scientists, I can’t think of many contemporary novels with scientifically-bent heroines: Meg Murry (A WRINKLE IN TIME), Dewey Kerrigan (THE GREEN GLASS SEA), Hermione Granger (HARRY POTTER series) … who else?

Add a Comment

Shortly after President Obama nominated Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court we learned that she was a fan of Nancy Drew as a child. An enterprising reporter at the NYT picked up on this and went looking back to see if Judges Ginsberg and O'Connor might have shared her girl detective love and found indeed, that the three women did have Nancy in common. Here's a bit from the resulting article:

“The real allure of Nancy Drew is that, almost uniquely among classic or modern heroines, she can follow — is allowed to follow — a train of thought,” wrote Sandra Tsing Loh, reviewing Melanie Rehak’s “Girl Sleuth,” a biography of Nancy Drew’s creators, in The Atlantic. “The plot opens ever outward for her, her speeding blue convertible a metaphor for the sure-shot arrow of her intellect, the splendidly whizzing shaft of the maiden huntress Diana.”

“For clever girls of all ages,” Ms. Loh wrote, “it’s a rare treat to read stories in which our heroine’s emotions come alive not with the love of a good man but with the pursuit of a bad one.”

While I certainly read more than my share of Nancy Drew mysteries when I was young I also enjoyed Judy Bolton, Trixie Belden (which Sarah is lately recapping) and The Three Investigators (who sadly all were boys but had the coolest headquarters ever), and thus didn't want to make this week's discussion Nancy-specific. In truth, she is not nearly as popular these days as she once was although there is a solid group of middle grade mystery solvers like Enola Holmes, Gilda Joyce and Kiki Strike & crew who are following in her footsteps. It is only as you age past the MG region that the girl detective falls off the face of the earth - only to return again in literally hundreds of adult mysteries. So, the question put forth this go-round is does the girl detective genre matter to teen readers today? Do we need her around and if so, what does she bring to the table? Are we missing out on a chance of future female justices by not having mysteries with teen girl protagonists? In a nutshell, should we care at all about the girl detective?

Lorie Ann Grover. I, too, was a Nancy Drew fiend, Colleen. I loved her intelligence, independence, and success. The Spider Sapphire Mystery was one of my most treasured possessions. Yes, there are middle grade detective mysteries popping up now. Michael D. Beil's The Red Blazer Girls: The Ring of Rocamadour launched in April to a Booklist starred review. But you are right. That's middle grade. However, here's a YA detective heroine: Kirsten Miller's Kiki Strike. She's amazing. There's one. Yay! It's interesting to note that she is younger when the series begins, and the series has fantastic elements that raise it above realism. Hm.

I see two scenarios. The first could be that our teens today generally won't pause to believe in the possibility of a teen detective. Is the concept too far-fetched? There may not be a tolerance for the fictional character, or is there?

The second possibility is that authors will be bringing mysteries to the table soon. Right now, we see a resurgence of sci-fi, after a gothic/horror fantasy trend. In the natural cycle, maybe authors are beginning to tap into their mysterious stories with girl detectives in one form or another, and we'll see the works hit the shelves in a couple years. Kiki will be waiting.

I've just thought of a third option. Maybe there are girl detectives in YA lit, but they take non-traditional forms. Aren't most strong female protagonists searching for answers in a mystery? Whether they be sleuthing like Nancy Drew or wandering through adolescence searching for their identity like Georgia Nicolson. Whichever, let's hope they inspire readers to take the wheel of their own blue convertibles.

Kekla Magoon. The "girl detective" does play an important role for girl readers. I loved Nancy Drew as a teen myself. (Full disclosure: I read many more of "The Nancy Drew Files" paperbacks than the yellow-spined classics.) I had stacks of them. They fell among my standard "feel good" stories, because they filled a void. Much of the fiction I was reading in those days included genre romance, books about people with terminal illnesses, tween series fiction about friendship, and your typical angsty YA. All of which I enjoyed, but was also difficult for me.

I could have loved Nancy simply as a strong female character, but beyond that, I identified with her easily in a way that I struggled to identify with characters in other books. I was inexperienced and clueless about dating; romance was close to a myth in my mind. No one I knew was dying dramatically. I was shy and bookish, so could only barely relate to corny friendship dramas, etc. With Nancy, none of that mattered. Her books did not make me feel inferior. Because I was confident of my cleverness, if nothing else, Nancy made me feel like I could play the game. I was jealous of her autonomy, excited by the dangers she overcame, and above all, relieved that I didn't have to try to glean social understanding from her life. Yeah, she had a boyfriend, and yeah, she had best friends, but that wasn't her thing. Her butt-kicking, name-taking attitude was a delicious fantasy that I could never touch, but also strangely seemed not so far out of reach.

I do wonder if the term "girl detective" is limiting, though. What I love about Nancy is more than her ability to solve crimes. We're talking about girl characters whose power comes from brains rather than beauty, from individuality rather than a peer group, from resourcefulness and independence rather than the ability to attract (usually) a man? These traits also spell the appeal of the girl warrior (Katniss in The Hunger Games) and the smart, problem-solving girl (Hermione in Harry Potter). We still see such characters popping up in YA lit -- girls who do not need to be saved, but often times do the saving. We need them, and they exist. But maybe they're too often relegated to the realm of fantasy -- is the problem that we need more reality-based stories in which girls act this way?

Beth Kephart. One of the most bold and (to my mind) endearing female protagonists brought to us in recent times is Liesel Memimger of Marcus Zusak's The Book Thief. Liesel has been robbed—-of her brother, of life as she knew it, of life as it should be—-and she robs back. She asserts her own judgment, declares and lives by her idea of right and wrong. She analyzes, she solves problems,and she waits for no one to rescue her. She also believes that she can and must rescue others.

A character does not have to be solving a classic mystery, in other words, to be all the things that I love in teen heroines. When I sat down to write Nothing but Ghosts, for example (and please forgive any hint of self-promotion, for I am merely reflecting on what went through my mind as I worked), I wanted, most of all, to write of a young woman who finds a way to live past the loss of her mother. I wanted her to be deeply reflective and smart, willing to name her fears and to work through them. The idea of her having a mystery to solve came along rather late in my process. Katie, my protagonist, already had the traits that would be required for such a task; the plot became far more interesting (to write) as she worked through a story that lay beyond herself. Because Katie, in Nothing but Ghosts, is reflecting on another’s story at the same time that she is processing her own, she acquired another trait that I seek in teen heroines (and in all people)--a broader world view and earned empathy.

Sara Ryan. "Why aren't we friends any more?" "When did everyone else stop wearing this brand of jeans, and why didn't anyone tell me?" "Are anyone else's parents like mine?" "He asked what I got for question five, does that mean he likes me?" "I'm tongue-tied and I can't stop looking, does that mean I like her?" Girls, or at least the sort of girl I was in junior high, are trying to simultaneously construct their own identities and decode everyone else's around them. They are endlessly engaged in largely futile attempts to solve the mysteries of their own lives. Enter the girl detective, focusing her analytical skills on deducing who stole the jewels, rather than on why the necklace she got from The Limited failed to bestow popularity. Though honestly, I read and loved girl detective books well before my teens. By junior high, I was much more a fan of Agatha Christie. By then, I didn't require my detectives to be girls, but I needed them to tie up all loose ends by the last page. I did not want ambiguity. I wanted resolution. I liked thinking that there was an answer to be found and that the detective was capable of finding it.

What do we lose when we lose the girl detective? Most importantly, we lose that sense of a girl using her intelligence to solve problems outside the realms of romance, family, and her place in the social hierarchy.

But I think the place of the girl detective may be taken by the girl spy. Exchange detection for espionage, and your clear (and reductionist) solutions and straightforward good versus evil framework are replaced by a world of ever-shifting motives and allegiances, with the constant possibility that you're being double-crossed. It's a less immediately comforting narrative frame, but a girl spy can have some of the same admirable characteristics as a girl detective: intellect, action, independence. And perhaps the moral greyness of spying more accurately reflects our times -- not to mention junior high and high school.

Melissa Wyatt. I'm not sure this is a gender issue so much as it is a genre issue. If you think about it, there are no successors to Frank and Joe Hardy, either. YA mystery in general is a sparse field. Look how far the Edgar Awards have to cast their net for nominees for their YA award. Is it because of lack of interest from those writing for teens or lack of interest on the part of teens themselves?

The YA novel we know today didn't exist in Nancy Drew's heyday, so that smart, savvy teen girl protagonist who can save herself has a broader field to play in than she did back then and doesn't have to be confined to mysteries. (Not to say there are enough teen girl main characters like that.) Or maybe there is something about that intellectual exercise of the traditional mystery that isn't as appealing at that stage of your life.

Famous literary detective Lord Peter Wimsey explains to his mystery-writing wife that the detective novel "contains a dream of justice. They project a vision of the world in which wrongs are righted, and villains are betrayed by clues they did not know they were leaving." They keep alive a vision of the world that ought to be true and feed a hunger for justice.

The MG-aged reader still believes in a straight-forward black-and-white form of justice. For the adult reader, they understand the complexity of real life but still hope justice will win out in the end. and still carry that hunger for justice. But maybe it's too much to ask of the YA reader, who is suddenly surrounded by injustices of a more immediate nature than distant crime, that can't be righted by the same means. Maybe it's just not the right time for that kind of intellectual escape.

That's a lot of "maybes" to say "I don't really know!" But it is fascinating to note that gap.

Zetta Elliott. I have to admit that I don’t remember any of the Nancy Drew books I read as a girl. I think I only read them because my best friend was a huge fan, and I’m glad to know that the racist content is gone from memory, too. I don’t feel the lack of girl detectives really impacts young readers since so many other genres can incorporate problem solving and conflict resolution. When I think of the teen girls I used to teach here in Brooklyn, they were a fairly cynical bunch; if a mystery was set in the city, with characters they recognized from their own peer group/community, then maybe they’d be interested. Mostly what they were looking for was realism, and that’s what I try to provide in my writing. I also think that solving crimes may or may not appeal to a group of readers who already have a complicated relationship with and/or distrust of the criminal justice system. It might be interesting to see a group of urban teens responding to the failure of cops to keep their neighborhood safe, but realistically that would involve a level of (potential) violence that makes me uncomfortable. I favor dramatic writing, with an emphasis on *dialogue* because that presents a model for negotiation that we often don’t see on TV or in film (where it’s shoot first, ask questions later). As much as I love the Jason Bourne films, I wouldn’t want to see a woman in that role; even watching Buffy was hard for me at times, because the (staged) violence was intense, and much more than an ordinary teen could handle (I believe in self-defense training for girls, but worry about the “tough chicks kick a**” image). I’d like to see more books where teenage girls learn not only to count on their rational, thinking, feeling selves, but to find allies who’ll have their back—and building alliances once again comes down to honest, open communication. Enough with the mean girls already.

Laurel Snyder. It's funny. My initial response to this question was to say, "Well, I was never really into these books as a kid anyway." But then I realized that's not true. I totally read Nancy Drew, and I loved Agatha Christie, and (though I wouldn't call Miss Marple a role model) I absolutely wanted to be Tuppence! I don't remember them as important books precisely because they were bedrock. There were scads of them around the house, and in racks at the library, and I read them all, and digested them as a kind of fluff. They weren't my favorites, they were just there. And they did inform my late-night activities, sneaking around with flashlights in bushes, "investigating" new places (beach houses, especially) for clues, establishing hideouts, etc...

So I think, now that I consider it, I think that the "girl detective" was something I understood, even in the 1970s, to be a caricature, a little ridiculous-- fodder for games and fantasy. I saw them the way I saw Dazzler, or Shadowcat. They weren't real to me, and they were already outdated, but they were ever present. So I wonder if the rise of fantasy is somehow related to the death of the girl detective. Like, all the girl detectives (or any girls with spunk) are now urban faeries. Or too busy battling demons and demigods to bother with old clocks.

In any case, for me, the thought of losing the girl detective is sad, not just because she saved herself, but because she was unabashedly nosy and kind of pushy, and that was a good thing! I think girls need to learn to be nosy and pushy.

Mayra Lazara Dole. The girl detective genre was released when females were second class citizens. Although it’s currently passé for the literati, I think poor, working-class girls need kick-ass girl detective stories so they can see themselves with zero limitations. These girls are always left behind, have a great fear of failure, and are encouraged to become hairstylists, manicurists, childcare workers, secretaries and maids by parents and teachers.

Girls who read Nancy Drew asserted their intelligence and autonomy and passed it on to their girls. They attended university--and so do their children--and yield the exact same amount of power as men (they know they can use their brain, not their body, to get where they want to go). Today, there’s plenty of detective girl lit and films with brave girls wielding swords that embolden educated girls who can afford books and movies, to become even stronger, more independent. Hermione of Harry Potter is a fabulous detective role model. However, in my perspective, it’s the poor girls from uneducated families who desperately need girl sleuth stories. Mothers who don’t read have low expectations of themselves and their daughters. Moms who read will tell their girls, “You can be anything,” not, “You can become a cleaning lady like me and work for a wealthy family.” Female detective stories encourage girls to pursue non-gender-appropriate work.

Rachel Simmons, author of Odd Girl Out, interviewed girls about how they perceive an “ideal girl” as opposed to an “anti girl.” "Ideal girls" are fake, dependent and manipulative. The "anti-girl" is seen as brainy, opinionated, strong, independent and bookish. I strongly feel we need Latina and black working-class girl detective heroines that will motivate barrio, ghetto, and poor white kids to read so they can empower themselves and rise above. I’m off to write my first girl detective story! Thanks Colleen, for the motivation!

Margo Rabb. I love everything about girl detectives--and I've always secretly longed to be one--which is partly why, years ago, I wrote a girl detective series about two Jewish sisters from Queens who run away and solve mysteries. I'd like to write another girl detective series someday, too...I think that one of the best things about the genre is that romantic subplots are just that--secondary subplots--and the main plots always highlight the heroine's strength, power, intelligence, and ingenuity.

One aspect of the girl detective archetype that I'm fascinated by is the missing mother--in Nancy Drew, the mother isn't often discussed, but her absence lends Nancy an even greater sense of independence, freedom, and power. Girl detectives have to draw strength from themselves; they have to be their own mothers.

Genres always seem to be going in and out of vogue in publishing--right now vampires and werewolves are popular; detectives are not. I'm sure the pendulum will swing back towards the girl detective again, down the road. In the meantime I'll keep writing in my Nancy Drew journal and watching my Veronica Mars DVDs.

Jenny Davidson. I read Nancy Drew compulsively when I was really pretty much just a little kid (age 5, maybe?), and moved on to adult detective fiction without a lot of delay! Agatha Christie first, because her books are somewhat simple-minded; and Dick Francis and Josephine Tey and Margery Allingham and Ngaio Marsh and Dorothy L. Sayers. As a teenager, I read all sorts of adult crime fiction, and I suppose that in most of the books I identified much more strongly with the male detective than with anyone female on offer. With one major exception: Sara Paretsky...

I guess I don't have a great sense of what's currently out there for teens explicitly - I trust your account of it, and I certainly had a conversation with a children's book editor last year in which she bemoaned the lack of middle-grade mysteries with real plot and suspense and urged me to write one! - but I think that there was in the 70s and 80s and continues to be a lot of great crime fiction that is suitable even for younger teenagers to read. Some parents will prefer their teens to avoid - some TEENS will prefer to avoid! - the serial-killer range of stuff, but I wonder whether in this case it really is necessary to have separate books being published when there are so many great subdivisions within the crime genre already. I can think of a lot of private-investigator-type crime fiction, for instance, that I'd recommend to an eager teenage girl reader (Sue Grafton's books would be an obvious place to start, or Liza Cody's, which are more favorites of mine); not so much police procedurals as the kind of book where a youngish woman asks questions and finds things out...

A lot of supernatural teen stuff is kind of built on a crime chassis (Buffy?), and the mystery-solving plot with a good question-asking female protagonist doesn't ever lose its appeal. I do think that some of the great odd girl-detective books of my childhood would bear republicizing - what about Ellen Raskin, not just The Westing Game but also The Tattooed Potato and Other Clues? And the detective protagonists of E. L. Konigsburg's Father's Arcane Daughter and From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. And, of course, Harriet the Spy. I hope I have not revealed myself as impossibly nostalgic by rehearsing these so-familiar names - they really are great books...

[Top pic via girldetective.net]

Add a Comment

What do teen girls want in a book? A discussion of this very question has started over at Chasing Ray, where Colleen Mondor asked a group of women authors to talk about the book that affected them the most as a teen reader. My choice stands out like, forgive me, a truly sore thumb. You can read the entire post here.

Got a favorite book from your own teenhood? Inspired by books already on the list? Check out the discussion inspired by the post and share your thoughts.

Collen plans to add to her What A Girl Wants feature twice a month, exploring with the same panel of women writers various topics relevant to young girls and books. The issues we'll talk about are important, and my fellow panelists are brilliant and articulate; do stay tuned!

Add a Comment