Teen Books: Not just for, well, teens anymore

If you've been living under a rock, than you may not know that teen/young adult fiction is the fastest growing market in the publishing industry. Some people will say that this only happened in the past 5 to 10 years, but it started long before that.

My family shopped at Taylor's bookstore (my middle school years) when they were still around. Taylor's had a Young Adult area and, despite being a fan of more adult authors like Tolkien and Stephen King around age 10 and 11 (my dad should have hidden the Stephen King books better because I frequently scared myself reading parts of Misery and Pet Sematary), I latched on to books in the Young Adult section like crazy. It started with R.L. Stine's Fear Street series, progressed to Christopher Pike, Richie Tankerseley Cusick, and L.J. Smith (back when she first wrote the Vampire Diaries books!).

I witnessed the rise in popularity of young adult fiction firsthand and I get so excited every time I see an adult reading a young adult book. My mom reads every young adult book I give her and often passes them on to co-workers. And I see plenty of adults perusing our young adult section at the Woodland West Branch.

Here are some suggestions for some great young adult reads that adults will also enjoy:

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins	Little Brother by Cory Doctorow	Unwind by Neal Shusterman
The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness	The Love Curse of the Rumbaughs by Jack Gantos	A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray