What is the range for characters in young adult novels?

Discussion in 'Character Development' started by MilesTro, Nov 11, 2017.

  1. LostThePlot

    LostThePlot Naysmith Contributor

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    No arguments there, but I take issue with both the prose and the content. Because seriously girls, when you meet an emotionally abusive older man it's definitely true love.
     
  2. MilatheRose

    MilatheRose New Member

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    Well yeah, basically. That's how I chose my boyfriends. No potential crime, no interest.

    Its probably the first popular book about a pedo romance successfully being marketed to children though. Like, I guess its ok cause he is described as hot? I don't know, because if he had the same hair as in the movies I would beat him to death just for that. Whats with the dragon ball z hair. Put your hair down you old creeper! You look like you are charging your special finishing move.
     
  3. LostThePlot

    LostThePlot Naysmith Contributor

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    That is a... A complicated issue. I can't remember how old Bella actually is but she's definitely 16 and over here that's only illegal if you're someone's teacher. And I know that's a cultural thing, but it's why I didn't have a problem turning a 16 year old boy and a 40 year old woman into a couple (it's actually really sweet). Yes, it's weird that she's older, but it's that scruples thing of, well, it's legal and they are happy so what's your problem?
     
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  4. MilatheRose

    MilatheRose New Member

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    Well 16 and 40 isn't really the same as 16 and a 100 year old psychic who desperately wants to murder you. Its literally the relationship between Claries and Hannibal, except that was more fair because Hannibal wasn't a psychic, and he actually did make sacrifices for her happiness.
     
  5. LostThePlot

    LostThePlot Naysmith Contributor

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    Well Clarice was an adult too :p I do feel you about age difference, but I think the logic is that after a couple of years what does a few more make?
     
  6. MilatheRose

    MilatheRose New Member

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    Its not the first book with a sharp age difference that I have read. The age thing was secondary to the psychic struggling with Mariticide. Look, if I meet a kid that I want to bone, but also want to murder with my bare hands I feel like one of those impulses is more important. They never really deal with it adequately, and the story arc is basically that she throws a tantrum and he's like "Fine, we can risk me brutally killing you in your sleep because you get a bloody nose." Guro is hawt.
     
  7. The Dapper Hooligan

    The Dapper Hooligan (V) ( ;,,;) (v) Contributor

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    A lot. Not so much between 75-100 years old, but there is a huge difference in people between when they're 16/17 and when they're 20. When we're 17 years old, our brains literally haven't developed enough to accurately judge risks and we're pretty much a living embodiment of the Dunning-Kruger effect.
     
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  8. jim onion

    jim onion New Member

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    I hear voices, and I'm desperately after this one girl, so if I go jump off a cliff I'll get laid?

    Look for me on the news.

    Also, I recall the anime "The Garden of Words" getting some flak because of the relationship depicted in it. Didn't really bother me too much but some people got their feathers all ruffled over it. Basically this high-school kid falls for this babe of a teacher who's being bullied by her students. I don't think it ever explicitly states either of their ages, but she's basically twice his age.

    I know this is more about YA fiction *books*, but I thought it might still be worth mentioning. It does vary from culture to culture; what's acceptable in Japan may not be acceptable elsewhere.
     
  9. LostThePlot

    LostThePlot Naysmith Contributor

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    Again, that's a cultural thing. I'm not saying that over here we don't think there's a difference between 16 and 18 and 21, just that no-one's going to call the cops if you knock off a schoolgirl from time to time.

    I was both a 16 year old who went out with older girls, and a 20 year old guy who went out with sixth formers. And that was just normal. Honestly, the fact that I only started at 16 is close to surprising. I once held a friend of a friends hand when she went to get another pregnancy test when she was 14.

    I'm just saying that this stuff is definitely a cultural thing. If Bella wants to fuck someone a hundred years older than her when she's 17 that's up to her. It's literally everything else about their relationship I have a problem with. Age gap is just... Meh. If it's legal then why all the fuss?
     
  10. jim onion

    jim onion New Member

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    The times change as well. Incest at one time was totally cool.

    Nowadays we react like this

    [​IMG]

    Everything about that Twilight relationship is weird in my opinion. And some of it's pretty reprehensible.

    Anyway, thread OP: don't make your characters over 18. Don't make one of them an old vampire 10 times the age of your female protag. Make sure you don't promote abusive relationships. You'll be fine.
     
  11. LostThePlot

    LostThePlot Naysmith Contributor

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    I'm not that old man :p

    I think this point is relevant to the original question though. Because by the logic expressed here no YA book can have any sex in it, can it? Because by definition the protagonist must be under 18. And yet sex is in quite a lot of YA books. It's not even risqué to have your female lead have a fumble with some strapping lad. You can't write it graphically but it's still there.

    So what's up with this? How can we have sex at all in YA if it's automatically squicky no matter what?
     
  12. jim onion

    jim onion New Member

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    Where I live, you don't have to be 18 to have sex. However, if you're 18+ and the other person isn't, that might pose a problem. One's technically an adult and the other isn't.
     
  13. MilatheRose

    MilatheRose New Member

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    In Garden of Words Yukari isn't desperate to murder her love interest. She's more of a giant cry baby than anything. I don't think anyone could consider her even remotely abusive. Like, the woman is a figurative puppy. Like, they try to make her cool and mysterious, but she is basically a well read doormat.

    I'm not saying you can't, but the romance in that novel is like the preable to a murder mystery book I read once. Ah god, what is the name. Something heart. The cover has a heart with a bloody scar on it. Ah! Someone help me. Its about a serial killer who is killing bookish girls with brown hair because he loves the MC but also desperately wants to kill her.
     
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  14. jim onion

    jim onion New Member

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    Agreed, I feel really bad for her. I really liked Garden of Words. She's in Your Name as well.

    One thing I've noticed with Shinkai's works in general (besides being uncomfortably similar to one another) is that they all follow young-adult characters, and then the story skips ahead a few years. Usually it goes from high-school to university.
     
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  15. The Dapper Hooligan

    The Dapper Hooligan (V) ( ;,,;) (v) Contributor

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    Just because it's legal, that doesn't make it right. Let's say the Twilight books take place when Bella is 16-19. That means that she's dated someone that's older than her, make several attempts on her own life, got married, had horrifyingly painful pass-out sex, got pregnant with a child that was trying to kill her, and turned into a vampire all before she had the mental development to understand that her immediate decisions would have horrible, life long (or eternity long) consequences. The dude she was dating knew that this stuff could and probably would happen, but but instead chose to put her life at stake, cause her impossible amounts of pain and destroy her home life to date his immediate whims. It's ridiculously abusive, definitely not love, and horribly unhealthy. And a lot, if not all of it, could have been avoided if he'd simply waited a couple of years until she had the physical capacity to understand the difference between good and bad ideas and can figure out the consequences of her actions and then make the decision on her own. Instead, Edward makes sure he bags this girl while she's young, dumb and full of hormones and she's forced into a position that she literally can never escape from.
     
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  16. MilatheRose

    MilatheRose New Member

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    Sorry. I only read the one.
     
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  17. LostThePlot

    LostThePlot Naysmith Contributor

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    Yes, and I said above their relationship is abusive and fucked up and an awful thing to give to young women as an example of romance.

    My question isn't about Twilight. It's about YA books generally. If it's "not right" for someone who's 15 or 16 to have sex at all then how do we have sex in YA books, and indeed in books set in the states where this stuff is much more of a tabboo.

    ETA - Remember; people bought their daughter Twilight for Christmas. Million of them did exactly that. A present for their fourteen year old daughter knowing the conceit is that Edward is way older than Bella. So how do we reconcile the idea that it's just a hard no on age grounds when it was massively popular and at the very least agents and publishers looked at it and said "Yeah, this is fine for kids".
     
  18. The Dapper Hooligan

    The Dapper Hooligan (V) ( ;,,;) (v) Contributor

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    I'm not saying 15 or 16 year old kids aren't allowed to have sex (unless they're my kids), I'm saying that they should really only be having sex with people that are roughly the same maturity/brain development. Any adult that has leanings towards a 15 year old child should act like the adult they are and let that child finish growing up, or get their head examined.
     
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  19. MilatheRose

    MilatheRose New Member

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    I kind of agree with Foxxx though. Its just fiction and Garden of Words was pretty neat.
     
  20. ChickenFreak

    ChickenFreak Contributor Contributor

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    I think that there's a difference between depictions of two young people having sex, and one young person having sex with an older person. One is romance (or reckless foolishness, but they're both fools), one is prey and predator.

    Edward did look young, right? I'm assuming that's what distracted people from the predator/prey dynamic.
     
  21. LostThePlot

    LostThePlot Naysmith Contributor

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    Yes, he did look young. And that's part of why I don't care. But I don't ever see 'predator' in someone who is having a consensual relationship. I have problems with anything non-consentual; but that's not the issue, is it? We're talking about two people over the age of consent. So where does all the implication of abuse come from? Twilight is bad because Edward is abusive, not because Bella is young.
     
  22. ChickenFreak

    ChickenFreak Contributor Contributor

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    I think that there are states where the age of consent is tweaked slightly depending on the age of the partner. For what it's worth. But, no, I'm not going to do the Googling to provide cites. :)
     
  23. LostThePlot

    LostThePlot Naysmith Contributor

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    But that's exactly what I was talking about; this is cultural. There's places in the US with Romeo and Juliette laws, same as there are in Europe. There's places in Europe where the age of consent is 14 if their partner isn't more than a year or two older than them. And yet a lot of you Yanks just shudder at the idea of anyone under 18, even though the majority of the US has 16 as the age of consent. And that's culture, and by all means enjoy that. But it's just weird to look at that from over here, especially when we see that the standards for YA publishing kinda ignore that. After all the YA audience is mostly under 18 and are all getting steamy about older guys.
     
  24. The Dapper Hooligan

    The Dapper Hooligan (V) ( ;,,;) (v) Contributor

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    So if someone lived in a country where there was no legal age of consent, you would find nothing morally off about a 30-40-something year old man having a sexual partner that hasn't broached the double digits, as long that that person doesn't complain?
     
  25. ChickenFreak

    ChickenFreak Contributor Contributor

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    I don't think this is entirely accurate. I think that most Americans roll their eyes, rather than being horrified, at sex between kids who are both between, say, 15 and 18.
     

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