the new teen fiction

Though Mira and I aren't exactly part of the target around for teen lit, we still avidly read them. They're light and quick and fun. The latest trend on the teen lit scene are books that have been dubbed "Sex and the City for the younger set." Gossip Girl, the A-List and other series like them feature rich young socialites in glamorous New York and LA settings. This isn't great literature by any measure. All of these books are pretty unabashedly superficial, which is fine for what they are: trashy guilty pleasures.

Today I noticed that the New York Times has published an article about these books (registration may be required to read). I thought it was an interesting article, which says that all the sex isn't so much the problem as the fact that these books have their characters be too adult and not young adult enough.

And you know, I kind of agree. I think the books are fun but I do wonder about real pre-teen and teenage girls reading this stuff. I mean, I grew up reading Sweet Valley (which is the definite predecessor to this new breed of teen girl novels) but even those books could be sincere at points and stil stressed things like family values and had it's fair share of standard coming-of-age topics. In these new books, the characters are mini-adults. College used to be the time where you could act like an adult but not have all of the responsibilities but now it appears that the time for that has been bumped back to high school.

So yeah, hopefully young girls aren't turning to this stuff as something to aspire to. There are lots of alternatives out there, like Cynthia Voigt and even the Traveling Pants and Princess Diaries books, that are probably more relatable but still fun to read.