YA? Why Not?

The inimitable Ferrett Steinmetz, whose list of credits now includes a prestigious Nebula nomination, posted a link to a rather embarrassing New York Times piece that decried The Hunger Games as puerile trash.  Now, I agree with the columnist that The Hunger Games is worth about as much as a Thallid, but I fundamentally disagree with the contention that YA as a genre should be read only by, well, young adults.

This is a thallid, and no, it isn't worth anything.

Unlike the author of the New York Times piece, I've actually read most of the notable YA series, and the reason that Suzanne Collins' meal-ticket is bad is because it is sloppily written melodrama that has an infinitely superior contemporary work to compare to.

On Writing: Part Four

This next part is important.  When you think of the modern or contemporary authors that are going to be studied in the future—assuming that anyone bothers to engage studying such a quaint and curious notion as authorship in the centuries to come, given the inevitable proliferation of the Internet beyond rational comprehension—you are probably thinking of a few dead white guys, perhaps some middle twentieth century feminists and later post-colonial writers, and if you are extremely generous you might make a grab bag of some of the authors you find in the “literary” sections at Barnes and Noble.  More than likely, of course, you’ll end up being completely wrong.