So You Want To Write A Young Adult Series

It’s not a bad idea, really.  These days, it’s easier than ever to publish a book, and it’s conceivable that you can create an amazing novel and publicize it into the hands of readers entirely on your own.  It’s also an exciting prospect for many – creating a story from nothing, building a world all your own, and using just your pure talent and skill to create it.

But before you leap into a creative endeavor, it’s important to look at what’s out there already, and especially what’s incredibly successful – not so you can copy it, but so you can understand it.  Although, there’s no shame in copying.  After all, “good writers borrow from other writers; great writers steal outright.”

So, what do you think of when you think of the incredibly popular contemporary YA fiction?  I came up with my Big Four – you can quibble over the selections, but I feel that they’re fairly universal: Harry Potter, The Hunger Games, His Dark Materials, and Twilight.  You may not like all, or even any of these books.  But there are still some important lessons to be learned.

Let’s look at each book individually for a few things the writer does indisputably right, techniques that you might want to learn, and then look at the overall picture for similarities these books share with each other: the DNA of an incredibly successful novel.

Harry Potter: Strength – Doing a lot with a little.  Whatever you think of J.K. Rowling, she’s a masterful storyteller.  And that means she has the ability to tell you a whole lot about a character using both concise and precise language.  Consider the first time Harry meets Hermione in the early going of Book 1:

He had just raised his wand when the compartment door slid open again. The toadless boy was back, but this time he had a girl with him. She was already wearing her new Hogwarts robes.
“Has anyone seen a toad? Neville’s lost one,” she said. She had a bossy sort of voice, lots of bushy brown hair and rather large front teeth.
“We’ve already told him we haven’t seen it,” said Ron, but the girl wasn’t listening, she was looking at the wand in his hand.
“Oh, are you doing magic? Let’s see it, then.”
She sat down. Ron looked taken aback.
“Er – all right.”

Excerpt From: J.K. Rowling. “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.”

Consider what the reader learns about Hermione from this short exchange.  Hermione is helpful (helping Neville with the toad), curious (asks about magic), and forthright (asks to see the spell right off), sometimes to a fault (asking to see the spell without much tact) and likes to be prepared (is already changed into her robes).  These traits will be repeated – often – throughout the books but are established early .

And look at how Rowling describes her appearance: “lots of bushy brown hair and rather large front teeth.”  That’s it.  No paragraphs about the length of her hair and texture of her skin, no arias about the intricate patterns and style of her clothes, no epic poems about the depth and wisdom of her eyes.  Rowling leaves all of it to the reader.  She sketches a bare-bones outline and lets the reader’s imagination and the character’s personality imply the rest.  Lesson: Trust your reader.  Don’t use ten words when one will do.

Strength: Symmetry.  Human beings like stories to make sense.  Not everything has to be tied up in a nice little bow by the end, but we want to feel a kind of satisfaction with the outcome.  We want the story to feel like a story, that it had meaning.  One of the ways you do this is by repeating themes and making certain aspects symmetrical.  Consider the first book and the 7th book.  In book 1, Harry is taken to Privet Drive for the first time by Hagrid in Sirius’s flying motorcycle.  In book 7, Harry leaves Privet Drive forever with Hagrid on Sirius’s flying motorcycle.  In book 1, Harry sees his parents for the first time using a magical object (the Mirror).  In book 7, Harry sees his parents one last time using a magical object (the Resurrection Stone).  One of the key elements of book 1 is Harry thinking Snape is the bad guy and finding out that he was actually on Harry’s side the whole time.  One of the key elements of book 7 is Harry thinking Snape is a bad guy and finding out that he was actually on Harry’s side the whole time.  Lesson: Know where you’re going and where you’ve been.  Know how to bring in old elements in interesting, satisfying ways.

The Hunger Games:

The Hunger Games is all about one thing – The Hunger Games.  Book 1 leads up to Katniss competing in, and eventually winning the Games and sparking a rebellion.  That’s all it’s about.  Every move Suzanne Collins makes goes in that direction.  It’s like watching a master craftsman at work – there’s no wasted motion.  Everything from the seemingly innocuous mockingjay pin to Peeta’s cake decorating skills has something to do with where the story is going.  It seems obvious, but it’s tough in practice to keep a story this focused.  Writers want to write.  Frequently, they want to write about whatever’s on their mind.  Lesson: Think about it like rock climbing.  Plan your moves ahead of time, be economical with your story, don’t waste moves.  Don’t write in detail just for the sake of world-building.

His Dark Materials: Strength –  Keeping complex concepts relatable.  Dealing with topics like religious extremism, original sin, the existence of god, betrayal of family, innocence vs. experience, mental illness, dimensional travel – these would be easy to make too complex, or to over-explain.  The hardest thing to do for a writer is to trust that the reader will get something without the author saying it implicitly.  Lyra and Will are children, and they experience these issues as children – immediately, emotionally, and most importantly, unequivocally (sometimes in a bad way).

There’s a tendency we have to go on author tracts – insert our own views in a long, compelling speech by our favorite characters, maybe have the bad guy throw up some opposition only to be ruthlessly shot down by our resident badass.  Lesson: Don’t do this.  Have your perspective, have your passionate issues, don’t shy away from controversy.  But don’t strawman.  Let your characters be characters.  Don’t ride roughshod over them to over-explain your agenda.

Twilight: Strengths – Yep, I’m going there.  Let’s call it “wish fulfillment.”  As easy as it is to bash Twilight (and as much fun as it can be, inspiring some pretty brilliant pieces of comedy), let’s take a step back and admit that it was a wildly popular franchise.  That’s not great for humanity, but it’s a valuable lesson about what people get out of a story, what they’re looking for, and what they’ll get obsessed about.

To wit: wish fulfillment, in a really specific way.  Twilight hits a very resonant nerve with a big subset of readers: being a part of the outsiders but also the cool kids all at the same time.  The Cullens are everything you wish you could have done in high school – aloof, beautiful, rich, but good-natured.  And the relationship between Edward and Bella is pure in that kind of moronic Romeo and Juliet way where they just love each other because reasons.  The only threat to their relationship, ever, is either external factors or misunderstandings based on feeling that the other party couldn’t possibly be in love with them as much as they are with the other, if that makes sense.  And oh, are there misunderstandings.  Another key facet is that their relationship really takes its time to become at all stable.  Yes, vampire/human blah blah blah,   Yes, it’s not realistic or healthy, but as a fantasy, it’s compelling.  Lesson: Give the readers something to root for, and take your time getting there.

Putting it all together

Your main character doesn’t need to be perfectly likeable.  In fact, perfect in any way is actually a bad thing.  Consider:

Stubbornness, or more precisely the “never say die” mentality that keeps fighting well beyond when reasonable people would quit or give up, seems to be a key element.

Harry is not the best wizard ever; wins by outlasting people and not giving up (Basilisk – 12 year old with sword against snake the size of a school bus, most of the battle is his own fear.  Voldemort in the graveyard, doesn’t do anything magically amazing but holds on in the battle of wills)

Katniss mostly outlasts people; surviving fire and hallucinogenic bees and homicidal children.

Lyra is incredibly stubborn and keeps trying to save her friend even when it means going to the ends of the earth.

Bella, for all her passivity, is rock-solid on decisions once she makes up her mind.  Deciding to become a vampire, and keeping her baby are big choices that she won’t be moved on.

And each one has a specific, mostly unique skill that is admired by others and useful in their adventures as well as a gifted talent that they didn’t work to achieve.

Harry has amazing reflexes, helping him be awesome at Quidditch and also helping him immensely when he battles the basilisk and dodging Death Eaters in the graveyard.  He’s also marked by Voldemort and prophecy, giving him the ability to speak parseltongue, see into Voldemort’s head.

Katniss is tops with a bow, and her survival/hunting skills translate nicely to the format of the Games.  She’s also a symbol of the resistance, which she didn’t earn so much as fall into.

Bella’s mind is supernaturally protected. (I’m not sure she’s got a skill she’s earned, unless it’s tolerance of stalkers or ability to quote 10th grade English SparkNotes).

Lyra is a talented liar, and she’s able to full-on outfox the king of the polar bears, manipulate angels and intelligent scientists.  She’s also gifted with the ability to use the Alethiometer.

Each character also has some very specific heroic flaws having to do with inflexibility, passivity, and inability to empathize.

Harry rushes into danger without considering consequences, and when not directly motivated to action, is mostly content to let Hermione and Dumbledore do the heavy lifting in terms of strategic thinking and planning.

Katniss simply cannot ever see the forest for the trees.  She’s all about short-term solutions, and each problem she overcomes seems to lead to a new one because of that.

Lyra’s lying is incredibly frustrating when she uses it casually and destructively in that way kids do where they have no idea who they’re hurting.

To sum up:  Each main character shares a penchant for stubbornly outlasting everyone and winning confrontations based on sheer cussedness and bravery, a unique or gifted skill that sets them apart from others, and a suite of flaws that make them relatably fallible.

Using these lessons, go forth and create.