A thought on YA

This week I ordered books! I'm going to have a reading marathon during fall break next month, and I wanted to buy some new books for it. I ended up getting three:

The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer by Michelle Hodkin
http://michellehodkin.blogspot.com/p/books.html



Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi (Pre-Order)
http://stiryourtea.blogspot.com/p/books.html

Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver
http://laurenoliverbooks.blogspot.com/p/books.html



There was a list of new-releases I wanted to buy, but I narrowed it down to two. (Part of my being a "responsible adult.") Then Amazon told me if I spent $3.01 + more, I'd qualify for free shipping. So I added Before I Fall, which I've read before and LOVE and have been wanting to buy. It was the responsible thing to do, guys. I had to. Think of all the money I saved on shipping.

Anyway, I showed my mom the books I was thinking of getting (before it was narrowed down to two) to see if there was one she'd want to read, too. This led to an interesting discovery.

She thought all the books were weird.

I mean, I know YA isn't the child development and faith development books she reads for her work. It's not that weird, though.

Her problem with them? She thought they were all about girls in distress situations, who had to be saved by a love interest. She also made fun of me because each one had a love interest.

Which made me think, YA does have a lot of love interests. When was the last time I read a YA novel that didn't have romance?

I disagreed about the whole damsel-in-distress angle she claimed they had, though. (The Pledge, Shatter Me, Daughter of Smoke and Bone, and The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer are the books she's talking about.) I'm a girl, gosh darn it, but I don't need to be saved by some guy. Neither do the girls I read about.

After looking at more reviews on-line, she decided maybe they're not just damsels being saved. (Maybe she was just trying to placate me, though.) She still though Daughter of Smoke and Bone looked really weird. She picked out Shatter Me as the one she'd read.

So, anyway, I got an outsider's view on YA, and now I'm going to try and find a YA that doesn't have romance. (Romance is one of the things that is often done poorly in YA, anyway.) Think it's possible?

My books are being shipped in one package, so I won't get them until Shatter Me comes out in November, right before fall break. I can't wait to read them, and see what my mom ends up thinking about Shatter Me.