What is Young Adult Literature?
(from Literature for Today’s Young Adults by Kenneth L. Donelson and Alleen Nilsen)
Common Characteristics:
·
Conflicts are often consistent with the young adult’s
experience – strong, believable plot;
not predictable
·
Themes are of interest to young people – family
relationships, friends and society, racial and ethnic relationships, body and
self, sexual relationships
·
Protagonists and most characters are young adults
·
The language parallels the language of young people
·
The novels are generally shorter than “adult” fiction
·
The diction and syntax are appropriate for the age of
the reader