I have, over the years, taught preschool, elementary school, middle
school, high school and adult students. This has resulted in what can
only be described as an illness when it comes to acquiring books for the
classroom. That is to say, I pretend they’re for the classroom, but
really, mostly they’re for me. The sheer, vast number of books that I
own has become epic and now that I am no longer in the classroom (as of
last Nov., I’m working with teachers more than students in my district)
all those books had to find a home inside my (very small) house. As a
result, I declared a moratorium on purchasing picture books, middle
grade books, YA books, educational books and anything else that had to
do with adolescent literature. Then, I signed up for a picture books
class last semester and a YA lit class this semester. This ended the
moratorium, of course, for I now an excuse to buy some more books -
they don’t count because I needed them for class, you see. (The illness
is becoming more apparent, isn’t it?)
The truth is, it’s very difficult for me to resist purchasing kids’
books because I love them all. I particularly love YA literature,
though I do think the industry lacks clarity when it comes to what
constitutes a YA novel. This results in a lot of books being marketed
to 12 year olds and to 18 year olds, as if they should both be exposed
to the same ideas and content. As a result, I think that authors of kid
lit in general, but particularly of YA lit, must be conscientious, not
only of the overt messages their books contain, but also of any hidden
messages they may not intend, but that readers absorb anyway.
This is the beginning of the semester (my 2nd semester at Seton Hill
University in the Writing Popular Fiction program) and my Readings in
Genre course this semester is YA literature. I plan to continue writing
my reviews / book journals for the books we read in class as part of
this blog. We’ll see how that goes. Now I must head off and acquire
some of the books we are to read this semester (so excited to add to the
plethora of books currently overtaking my household).
