It happened again. Goodreads, the website community for avid readers, just released its "Top 100 YA Books on Goodreads."
No, I didn't expect to see one of my books on the list. My "platform" for the RED RACECAR books is way too below their radar, even if I have a writer's page on the site. What I was looking for was any book that might interest the kids my books target. And as usual, this turned into a futile quest. The fact is, there was not one book on the list I would have had any interest in reading back when I was a YA.
What's on the list? Fantasy? Of course. Social issues? Outsiders facing existential questions? Star-crossed romances? Y'up, those, too. Regular kids getting a chance to do something special, something exciting, something a kid might want to know how to do? Like - say - sports? Music? Starting a business? A book that reveals a world of which they're not a part but about which they might be dreaming? A world that is not dystopian?
Nope. Not one. Not one book that presents a world a reader might want to enter. Not one that opens a door to one of those new worlds, worlds we as adults look to as an escape from the sorts of worlds in these "YA" books.
No wonder the kids I target don't read. Who wants to dredge their way through the worlds in any of these books?