YA BOOKS AT THEIR WORST 

We need more platonic relationships too X

What I've often found (lately in Six of Crows for example) is that the main characters in YA are often said to be around 17 years old but feel at least 21. I know that's not a huge difference in number but when I think about how I thought and acted as a teenager compared to now being in my 20s, I feel like that is a huge difference. And YA characters sometimes just don't feel like genuine teenagers 😅

Where are the parents?? Where are the other adults?? It's always the teenagers with no life experience or real knowledge that have to save the world, and these teenagers were usually just introduced to the magic system/other world and are suddenly experts with little to no training. Also, most books don't have consequences for the mc and when they do, the mc often gets out of them because of plot protection.

“I don’t want you to be together then, because one of you is so stupid.” True. Story.

I feel like the people who think adult fantasy is too long aren't usually the same people who want more worldbuilding in YA. Also, for the page count: I feel like a good length is around 450-500 pages. That's usually the length that later entries in YA series tend to have, and long enough to get a satisfying standalone as well. I think that's a perfect balance between "this book has enough time to worldbuild, focus on characters and develop its plot" and "I could still read this on one weekend if I had some other stuff to do as well"!

For "not like other girls": Clary from The Mortal Instruments and Celaena from Throne of Glass are the two that immediately come to mind, but I know there are definitely more out there!

I also feel like the new adult genre needs to be more clearly defined because now I'm seeing YA books that seem like the character are just teenagers in age for marketing purposes but it doesn't fit their storylines or the content matter of the book. Like Sarah j maas books have really graphic sex scenes but its targeted at young teens mostly girls. I feel like there needs to be an age range that better fits those of us who are in too old to fully relate to ya and to young to relate to adult. I still read both but it would be nice to have an in between

I hadn't notice the "when a ya gets inspiration from a classic we call it a cheap copy, but when a na does it we call it paying homage" thing until you mentioned it and you are so right!

I feel like Mary Sues are more common in YA. I remember reading the Divergent series, and by the last book it felt like it boiled down to Tris making very illogical decisions, people saying "no that's kinda crazy", bad things happening because they disagreed with her decisions, and then Tris is all mad at them and they're like " I am the worse person ever, I should have listened to everything you said blindly oh savior of mankind, can you ever forgive a disgusting wretch like me?". Of course, it's been over 5 years since I read them so it might have just been my teenage angst or something

The family of the MC being ignored! This drives me so mad! I get it when the MC has an abusive family but if they aren't I so want to have siblings and parents interactions. I think this goes in tandem with the romance thing everyone mentioned cuz this basically happens when there's too much romance, but I tried googling good family dynamics YA novels and all I found is the opposite, there are some classics but not many if any YA.

Hate when a couple breaks up because of a misunderstanding or a character doesn't disclose obvious information and it gets out some other way leading to anger and splits!

Honestly the worst part of YA is characters that are said to be around 16 or 17 but they just seem way older to me. In Cruel Prince Jude and Taryn are supposedly only 17, yet Taryn gets married while she is 17 and no one bats an eye. The characters in a lot of YA are made so young so they fit YA better, but in the end they act like they are around 20 or 21. And I feel pretty uncomfortable reading about sex scenes between two 16-year-olds to be honest, idk if that is just me? It seems like authors don’t really understand that there is a big difference between someone who is 16 and in high school and someone who is 21 and in college.

Characters are really stupid in YA, lie for no reason and get guilt tripped way too easy. Recently read Truly Devious and it was so refreshing to read a teenage girl who told the truth, and if she had a secret she kept! And told people why but still kept it. Her friends also understood and didn’t get all butt hurt for not being included.

The "not like other girls" trope used to be very prevalent in the paranormal romance era. On the many books that followed the Twilight formula, the protagonist was often described as smart, introspective, introverted, she was usually very into classic novels, or she'd be a bit of a rebel emo girl, dressing in darker colors, she didn't get kids her own age, but of course, she was still beautiful, just in a more "understated way", which usually made her feel insecure. She was meant to be the direct opposite of the blonde-popular-cheerleader that used to prevail in media. In order to make the protagonist seem better than other girls in the story, authors usually resorted to a lot of girl-hate and shaming of "traditionally girly" traits. The antagonist was shallow and stupid because she dared to enjoy shopping, getting her nails done and wearing high heels. It was ultimately their way of making very insipid main characters likable. She was, (literally described to be) not like other girls, thus special (in spite of no qualities) and deserving of the hero's affection. Nowadays, largely due to forth wave feminism, we spot these tricks more easily. More than that, readers of YA and romance want to see better-developed heroines that can maintain healthy relationships with other women. There is far less room for all the girl-hate that the "not like other girls" trope evokes, hence, it went downhill since circa 2015. However, it used to be so prevalent and so explicit to the point that even if those who don't call themselves feminists and don't actively seek better female representation, got tired of it. And that's how it became both a meme and something so dreaded that every time someone asks "what's the worst trope?" people will still think of it.

Concerning male protagonists in YA, this is definitely a problem between publishers and the market. A friend of mine was frustrated as a boy, transitioning from Hardy Boy’s mysteries to some insane horror novel about rats gaining sentience and eating people alive. It wasn’t the graphic content that bothered him, it was the dense style and difficult vocabulary that almost put him off reading altogether. Therefore, he made it his mission to write books for boys. He went through several agents and wrote multiple books, and almost got published a few times but the marketing department always shut it down with the same mantra; boys don’t read. If you want more middle grade and YA books with male protagonists and by male authors, you have to buy and review the ones already on market. Publishing houses worship money, and their demigods are algorithms and spreadsheets. Nothing else will persuade them.

I've tried really hard to read some YA, but almost every time I pick one up, I can barely get through it. The central theme always seems to revolve around teen romance. I'm just passed the point in my life where I enjoy reading about 15-17 year olds having high school "insta-love" crushes. Just doesn't appeal to me. I'd rather read about struggles I can relate to in a complex world, rather than "Johnny loves Suzy but she's dating Benjamin" kind of triangle.

For me, growing up, my problem with YA fiction wasn't necessarily the lack of male protagonists or writers, but more the lack of stories interesting to me, as most books for YA, at the time, seemed to be mostly romance novels, which didn't really interest me back then.

Yes, when there is a romance in YA I feel it becomes the plot and in adult it seems we stay on track with the actual plot. In the books I’ve read in both of those ages.

In YA books I hate: - love triangles... Boring and predictable... - love between two main protagonists ( specialy between chosen one, our famous young male villager that in 1 chapter was no one and the princess or some similar badass girl ) - Good protagonists. Why always main character is like some kind saint or angel? Most people aren't, even ( or specialy) the best ones. Good realistic person in fantasy based on medieval times should be more medieval. Bloody revenge on antagonist, who killed protagonist parents is much more realistic that forgiveness ( why is almost every protagonist having some kind of stockholm syndrome...) And it doesn't make protagonist bad. Justice is sometimes very brutal. Bitter-sweet ending shouldn't just mean thst good guys win, and one of them died. They should be bitter-sweet themselves. Good guys kill bad guys, not just sing a song about power of love and forgive... - From zero to hero... It is great when from young noble main character become great king. But most of writers don't know that main hero should be at least lesser noble, not just random peasant. You just can't learn how to fight in few weeks. It takes years. Most of nobles started fight learning when they were 7/8 years old. And they train untill 18/20 yo, when they became real knights. 12 years, not few weeks!

I feel like in some cases teenage characters are just poorly written... Sometimes there's way to much drama, sometimes they seem way to mature. Of course experience makes you wiser, so sometimes this earlu maturity makes sense, but other times it seems like the characters should just be older but were turned into sixteen year olds to be the same age as the expected audience. I like this new setting by the way!

For the bad world bulding one, I thought of the Divergent Trilogy.

I think my perfect page count is between 400-500 pages. That gives enough room to explore the world and deepen relationships, but not so long that it's daunting.

Ooo yes, romance is okay with me when it’s not a love triangle 😭😭

In regards to the last comment, I would actually be intrigued by a YA that had older characters in the fore. One of my biggest gripes with with fantasy in general is too many young protagonists, and YA is a pretty big offender of this. I don't believe it is antithetical to have a YA book with mature main characters in it, life doesn't start and end between 14-24 and it would be beneficial to all if this was reflected more in out literature!

That's one if the reasons why I dont usually read YA. I'm in my 30s and like to read with characters around my age with my age problems lol. I dont usually like to see a 16yr old fight and be badass and better than a grown man that is probably way stronger and has more experience. But when I was in my teens I liked that alot. So really I think things just change when you grow older. I also hate love triangles bc ppl are betraying and hurting eachother and indecisive. Why not just be a loving polyamorous relationship and everyone be together lol. Unless the character is not into that either then idk just no love triangles plz.

Not like other girls = Cassandra Clare books. Ugh! Not a fan of that author, for so many reasons. I feel like YA is such a tricky genre, because we have all these adults who are also reading YA, but then we complain about the YA books we’re reading because sometimes they don’t hold up to our adult-writing-standards. That’s the whole point of YA, they’re aren’t technically for adults! There are so many books that I don’t like anymore, but I loved when I was in the YA age range. There are also a lot of YA books that hold up well for adults too. But we can’t knock the poor teenagers for liking what they like... they are not adults! Lol

Regarding the YA label keeping people away, I do agree that’s true, but I think there are certainly fantasy books and authors whose prose is more sophisticated and advanced than what you find in YA and an average “adult” fantasy novel. Neil Gaiman and the Malazan books are the first things that come to mind.

Yes! I love reading YA books with male protagonists! I want more of them!

I think the worst part about YA is "the power of love" - not really about the romantic relationship but love overall (love for a parent, child, pet, whatever) because it just abolishes magic systems and plots. Oh a killing curse? Nope, power of love. Oh a dragon wants to eat you? Nope, because he saw the power of love. The government is gonna take the rebels down? Nope, they succumbed to the power of love. UGH!!!!! My ideal page count is around 400 pages! 650+ and I just question... why? Amazing books can pull this off, but usually those extra few hundred pages are just filled with fluff.

While there are certainly exceptions, I've noticed that a lot of YA books suffer from a lack of supportive adult mentor figures. This bothers me for a couple of reasons. One, I think that having these great characters can help teens relate better to the actual adults in their lives, or even provide a "role model" to those coming from less than ideal family situations. And two, I just find it hard to believe that a ragtag group of 15-20 year olds could save the world with no adult assistance whatsoever. But I know that YA is often designed with wish-fulfillment in mind, so I don't want to complain about that too much!

I as a 18 yo boy started really reading when i was 16, and I can tell you I had so much trouble with YA. First of all I was also going through a breakup and i did not want to read a love story, and i was having a very hard time finding a story without romance being more than 30%! Of the plot in the YA genre. I eventually gave up and read some (grisheverse and The Young Elites) and I liked both, especially Young Elites. One of the biggest gripes apart from romance was the lack of a male protagonist, and that frustrated me since it eas cool to read from a femae perspective or just smth i cant relate my life experiences to, but after awhile i wanted to read something relatable and i decided to mobe on to the adult genre after I read book 1 of Throne of Trash which made me lose all hope. Now i still think YA has great stuff in it, i’ve read some of it, and some of itni will read for sure but im only going by recommendations since the most popular stuff like CC or SJM i have huge issues with and dont want to touch. Now what i’ve realised in the adult grnre is quite the opposite; not enough FEMALE protagonist books. So im trying to balance the different perspectives by reading YA and adult giction simultainously, but it sucks that this is the case. Also what i’ve figured is that with adult fiction yiu dont get so many blatant rip offs of classic works, whereas in YA apperently a person i know who worked at a bookstore told me that as soon as Hunger games became a hit, they got sent a ton of books with a dystopian setting and a love triangle, like hundreds of them. And alot of those series took off since YA market is the biggest gor sure right now. These are just my 2 cents :D

Yes! I am a high school Librarian and it is so far for me to find books for my male students that are YA. Someone needs to write a YA equivalent of Percy Jackson.

We need more sibling relationships and bonds, I feel like I don’t see that as often. Also, I don’t always like how families are handled. Often, the character is sad for two seconds and moves on quick but I feel like the loss should change them a little more? Maybe not, idk!

The main characters from the Red Queen series by Victoria Aveyard are all “not like other girls/boys” so much that it drives the plot. America Singer from the Selection series by Kiara Cass, Linh Cinder from the Lunar Chronicles, and Percy from the Percy Jackson series are the few examples that come to my mind when I think of the “not like other girls/boys” troupe. (Don’t get me wrong, I love these books!)

To be honest I also avoid books because they’re YA, they rarely capture my interest. I’m planning to read Scythe and Ember in the Ashes though.

City of Bones is the book that made me stop reading YA. Realized how much i don't care about teenager problems.

I find it a bit funny how YA (in my opinion) has been somewhat of a reaction to adult(fantasy) so hard that it's gone completely the other way. I really love YA as a genre but almost all the books have either a female or a gay male protagonist. There's nothing inherently wrong with books with those types of protagonists, after all, it reflects the target audience. But, I wish I had more YA books with male protagonists (that are not so obviously made for female audience) to read when I was in high school. I loved, and still love, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, but it left me wanting for more. Not saying there aren't any, just saying they're super rare and I wish it weren't like that. Same goes for female-led adult novels.

I can’t lie, I don’t get that mad when YA fantasy usually has female protagonists, mainly because I think that up until recently, adult fantasy has skewed way too heavily toward male protagonists, and if there were female ones they were badly written, often by men. I don’t think it’s fair that female protagonists seem to have been relegated to the YA fantasy sphere, which many view as inferior to adult fantasy, but I’ll take what I can get.

Personally, I dislike most YA fantasy because it's character driven and often has really poorly written characters. I can't get behind a character driven plot if the characters are a bunch of Mary sues, inconsistent, or extremely shallow. The last one I read was Children of Blood and Bone, hoping it'd be great because of all the praise, and I think it's a great example of everything I hate in YA fantasy. The characters contradicted themselves constantly, the villain was a caracature of a cartoon bad guy, AND the plot was literally just a jump between every overdone trope (seriously, there was even a hunger games inspired arena battle! 😂). YA fantasy can often be a bunch of authors beating a dead horse by rehashing the same tropes in different settings, and that's why I think it gets so much hate.

When there isn't a map that you can go back to look at. For page count about 400 pages

in YA every little thing that goes wrong means the end of the world to them and then it is fixed by one conversation. The stakes are high but easily solved.

When two characters get into an argument or some sort of drama that is caused purely from miscommunication. Like just TALK TO THEM.

In YA fantasy with young protagonists, they are sometimes written in a way that makes them appear older than they are. Weather its the older love interest (which appears often and it grosses me out) lack of parents, fighting older and mire skilled antagonists without adult supervision, or the way other characters expect so much from the MC, even though are only 15 years old. I think that's what that last comment was portraying but i dunno.

I totally agree about the romance thing! I tend to really dislike having to read about romance, because it always makes me feel kind of... uncomfortable. If the romance is done really well, though, and doesn't take over the plot, I can get really into it.

I don't know if anyone already said this, but fantasy romance is a sub-genre of fantasy. The plot is going to center around the romance instead of being a sub-plot. Sarah J. Maas is a fantasy romance writer. You should expect it to be a big part of the story. I think the problem with YA is that it's hard to tell by the cover and/or synopsis whether it falls into this sub-genre. And then people get mad when it takes them by surprise. For me, personally, I love romance in my stories, so I don't mind when it becomes a main part of the plot, but I don't think it should be marketed as something it's not as it just causes a split of haters and non-haters.

I like your new setup. Did you move to a different part of your house or did you get new bookshelves?

I kind of hate most YA fantasy, and the popular ones are usually the absolute worst! I basically jumped from Middle Grade Fantasy to Adult Fantasy. The romance gets way too much emphasis, and it's almost always stupid and a love triangle. There's so much teen angst, I hated my own teen angst, I dont want to read about it. Honestly, even though I'm a woman myself, I've related to tween boys a lot more than I've ever related to a YA protagonist. There are so many "strong" female characters who are #notlikeothergirls. Something that I hate about *all* fantasy though is the whole "we have to save the entire world from the forces of evil" thing, the scale is way too big there, I can't care enough. The villains are boring. Plus there's all the stupid chosen ones, and the fricking prophecies. I like reading fantasy that's more mature, and I mean actually more mature, not just, "look how much sex, violence and swearing we have, it's so *mature* !"

Your hair looks amazing!!!!

My favourite page count for fantasy / scifi I find between 450-550 pages.

girl drop your curl care routine 👀 (loved this video btw!)

Any trope executed poorly can be dull and repetitive irrespective of the genre. The issue more specifically with badly written YA is that often it relies on those tropes to impress the reader but has no other strengths to fall back on. It becomes a parody of itself.

I love the curly-wavy hair! Such a change from the usual straight!

"I'm not like other girls" just off the top of my head, Bella in Twilight, Alina in the Shadow and Bone trilogy, Katniss in The Hunger Games trilogy, Tris in the Divergent trilogy. It's mostly mid-2000s to early 2010s YA fantasy/sci-fi lead female characters that are like this

I got you confused with Merphy Napier. Apparently I was not already subscribed to you. lol. Subscribed!

The worst part about YA to me is that yes the characters are meant to be 16-18 but they act like they’re full blown adults. Like they’re only teenagers so they can get away with being in the YA section and not have to delve into world-building and actual “good storytelling”, which is usually needed to make it in the fiction or adult sections, if you get my meaning. And the thing I’m personally sick of is the “fiery, female heroine who is spunky and can do no wrong”, “she’s a smart mouth and everyone either loves or hates her for it, there is no in between”, and “every man falls at her feet, every female wants to be her best friend or they hate her for arbitrary reasons, no in between”. Every female heroine seems to be a copy of the other these days, like different hair colors and skin colors are put onto copy-and-paste heros and it’s boring. It’s SOOOOOOOOO boring. And don’t get me started on the copy-and-paste love interests with the angsty, brooding, bad-boy persona (but, guess what, he has a heart of gold underneath because of a dark past that’s squashed it beneath the hardened exterior. Gag me.) But also, the lack of platonic friendships, be it girl/girl, guy/guy, girl/guy, what have you. Why can’t we just be friends and not want to screw each other all the time? What happened to being friends? Seriously. Not everything is about sleeping together and coupling up, guys, seriously. (Looking at you, Throne of Glass, why did everyone need to be paired up by the end of the series? Cuz that’s even remotely realistic in a series that tries to highlight the “realness of the characters”. Sure, yeah right.

Keep you videos coming please! And wow your hair looks amazing

I really like this setup,, that is a nice hutch behind you. I have to agree with not loving bad romance/love triangles/when the romance overtakes the plot.

I don't really have a page count preference when it comes to Fantasy, as long as it's well written I could fly through it (and sometimes shorter books could take FOREVER for me to finish because the writing is so tedious!)

America Singer is “not like other girls”

I don't enjoy reading YA recently because the characters are written so young that I can't relate to their thinking at all. Their decision making process usually makes no sense to me and they just seem stupid. Like was I that dumb when I was 16??

Your hair always looks great & I'm really loving it curly in this video! 😍

I actually haven't read enough YA to give feedback on this, but I'm working on that! Also, love the new set up! Your new shelves are so cute. It's so farmhouse chic 😊

As a 41M, I find that my Adult female friends (30-65) enjoy reading YA but my adult male friends do not read YA. Not sure what that means or the impact on what books are published in the category.

You look so beautiful today.

9:50 I felt that. I want my future sons to be able to read YA and not feel “left out” I guess kinda.

I’m not like other girls 👉🏾 throne of glass, crimson bound and ACOTAR

I used to read a ton of YA and I have seen the "not like other girls" in nearly every book I read, it's usually hidden in there somewhere. If you want an in depth video, The Authentic Observer made a really great video talking about this called The Attack on Femininity in Fiction. After seeing that I was able to really see this trope in tons of YA and especially YA fantasy, so I would definitely recommend it if you're interested!

One thing I like more about adult fantasy compared to YA fantasy is there seems to be a real lack of subgenres in YA. There are dozens of sub-genres in the adult space that don't seem to be there in YA. I guess that's why YA fantasy just feels more same-y than the adult. The majority of YA fantasy is high-fantasy with a smattering of historical and urban while there are so many healthy and active subgenres within adult fantasy. I think it's because YA marketing is more focused on riding trends until they're oversaturated and then completely abandoning them (paranormal romance, dystopia) while the adult fantasy is more willing to have small niches.

Personally while reading the Inheritance Cycle I saw more of comparison with Star Wars instead of LotR’s, at least regarding plot. Some of the names though are clearly LotR’s inspired. Eragon/Aragorn, Arya/Arwen.

Finding your one true love at like 16, 17, 18

I’m currently reading Emma by Jane Austin. It’s essentially about two teenage friends (Emma and Harriet) who are going through the late teenage years, maturing and learning from mistakes. Austin is praised, revered and study by University Professors. Her works are reflections on social stratification of her time. I personally think she’s one of the OG YA authors. I wonder if anyone else would think so too. ...I’m also old enough to remember when book shops only had a “fantasy” section, rather than separate fantasy and YA....showing my age here....

I think with ya and adult as well it can be hard when a book or series gets overhyped. Then you go into that book with crazy high expectations and end up not enjoying it as much. Also, I think it is very hard to find good stand-alones for YA fantasy as well!

1. I haven't noticed a shortage of male protoganist in novels or the fantasy genre, maybe everyone is referring to only the most popular books. 2. Many novels with a fantastical world are actually marked as Romance novels...technically a Fantasy/Romance, so the line has become blurry to some readers. Many novels are primarily romances that were staged in high fantasy setting. 3. When it comes to tropes they can be imitated again and again. Twilight had it's own plot that suited the characters...since it was a popular novel it's character's choices were imitated by other authors and became tropes. Readers may forget that plot twist were done best the first time but once the plot twist becomes a trope it is redone again and again, and can become a pet peeve for readers.

I think with YA the authors force romances into existence because they think the books need them to sell, and not because it benefits the story. My perfect page count is the bigger the better, as long as there's content to fill and I like the story, because I like to get my money's worth.

I like about 400 page books. Basically half of those dense high fantasy books. I ususally only read one book over 400 pages a month, the rest I try to stay around 400 or less

My ideal book size is about 350-600 pages- I don't mind if they're longer or shorter than that, but I do prefer books of this size

I really like YA fantasy, but I often find the lack of well-built friendships disturbing. Can someone recommend me a YA fantasy with good friendships? Great video by the way :)

My ideal page count for a book is usually around 5-600 pages. I feel that any shorter, and it can be difficult to not rush the plot, and any longer, it can feel a little sluggish.

Your hair looks amazing in this video! I'd say my least favorite thing about YA is the prose. It seems it's always very very boring, overly simplistic, and lacking in any kind of unique style, like it's meant to appeal to the largest audience as easy as possible. I really crave good prose in books so this is the one thing that bugs me about YA. I wish more authors trusted young readers with more unique styles. Another thing is when the characters are around 15-18 but have the personalities and mentalities of much much older adults. Like Six of Crows... how am I supposed to take 17 year old crime bosses who all have tragic backstories seriously, that's so ridiculous and immersion breaking to me.

I think a good page count is righttt about 600-700, BUT it depends on the book and the scope. Something like Red Rising that I'm reading through for example started out at 400 pages in book 1 with a more focused story, then it grows in scope and book 3 was about 500 pages and felt right. The next series or continuation of the story starts with a 600 page book and book 5 is nearly 800 pages! Mistborn Era 1 were all 600+ roughly and while long, I felt it was a great page count to explain everything that was going on and really feel like you could see the scenery and what was going on, and then of course you have tomes like Stormlight Archive which was behemoths. I just think it depends on the story being told, the scope of it and what the author is going for. I just realized this was entirely adult-fantasy focused so OOPS, lol I don't read YA really ever, but generally YA stories are probably smaller in scope/shorter because of attention span as well. I don't think the audience that YA is geared towards in general would WANT to read 1000+ page books. Just my opinion, but I can't really imagine too many young-late teens wanting to read something as long as Stormlight GENERALLY.

my main expample of Not like other girls is Lila from Darker Shades of Magic which I always considered YA but apparently most people say is adult. Also my ideal page length for any genre is between 300 and 600 pages.

nice bookshelf :)

Girl you hair looks so good! It looks so like natural 👍

That's very interesting,, in the YA fantasy I'm writing I'm trying to put a bit of everything and to insert a satisfying world building, but without exaggerating and to balance romance and plot! Fingers crossed!

I am from Germany and mostly read translated English books. The German translation often is much longer than the English original, just because the german language needs more words to say the same things. I love books that are around 500-800 pages long, because for me a good story does not fit in a 300 page long book. Everything more than 800 pages starts to scare me

Aye gotta let them ads play to support my booktube pal 😄🤘🏼💫💜 I love the way you styled your hair here too. Totally missed out on the Instagram interactions cuz i kinda been on break from there. However for this video, for me the worst thing about YA books is the grammar. I love the stories but bad pronunciation and words cutting off the page is a turn off. I do feel like YA is more character focused. I personally like the romantic aspects IF it's not forced. My perfect page count for a YA book is at 400 pages. Sometimes 300 something is acceptable. How about you? Anyways hope your day goes well Elliot

For me it's not really about page or word count, but about the pace of a book. A 300 page book can feel incredibly long if the pacing of the plot is terrible, while I can rip through a 700 page book thinking I wish the book were longer if the pace is right. I generally love fast paced plots, where there's not a lot of time wasted on descriptive stuff that isn't relevant to the story. Therefore I tend to avoid books that have a lot of non-relevant world building and prefer books where the world-building is an important part of the plot. My favorite YA series so far is Brandon Sanderson's Skyward series. I'm currently almost done with the sequel and these books are perfect to me in regards of pace and length and balance between plot, character and world building. A YA fantasy book I DNF'd recently because it was spending too many words on useless descriptions, dragging out the beginning and not progressing the plot is The Kiss of Deception.

Another issue I have is that the stakes aren't high in YA. This bothers me so much, especially when there's a huge fight scene and they all make it out except for maybe 1 minor character. The Mortal Instruments and basically any CC book come to mind... it just makes it feel cheap and there's really nothing that can go wrong because nothing is permanent.

I don't read YA. And by that I mean I don't go looking for it. Not that I specifically avoid it . I just hardly ever check what age range a book is marketed towards. It's a fluid thing anyway, plenty of adult books could just as easily be categorized as YA, and plenty of YA have all their bases covered to just be a good book. Ideal page count.. no such thing. Big doesn't equal better, small doesn't mean less impact. Unless you're using it as a blunt weapon

Dang how do I keep missing these!!

What's interesting is most of these things I also have problems with but when they're done really well I'm usually cool with them. As for my perfect page count, it somewhat varies by genre and whether they're YA or not. YA I usually like to be quick and simple and 350ish pages or under is about right in many cases. A good adult book I usually want at least 400 pages and I might be down to read over 1000 pages if it's the right genre and done well.

Girl, your hair looks SO awesome! Also, you don't know Polish, right? I was confused when I first saw that edition of Sanderson's book on your shelf.

honestly 300 to 400 pages is enough for me, i read a book for the characters and plot. the worldbuilding just has to be 'realistic' and i'll be good, i dont mind romance in fantasy as long as its well written (no insta love/love triangles and there's emotional connection)

Lift and shift world building - with a few words changed. It's as if the author has spent fifteen minutes on planning. Simplistic writing, no unusual words. Oh and... please, please, please, no more magic schools. Even thinly disguised ones: demon summoning schools, elemental control schools, superhero schools, zappy-power-sword schools... please, no more. Enough Parry Hotter and Larry Spotter.

I love a page count around the 800s because I spend less money on books in a month hahaha

perfect page count: 800 to 1000. Otherwise its only a book for a day or two, and it wont stick in my memory because of that, even if it has a perfect story. Thats why i crave long books.

Before even clicking the video, so much yes on a book (YA specifically) being advertised as fantasy when it’s straight up romance. As an aromantic, I HATE that shit. Most YA fantasy are actually romance stories in fantasy clothing.

When the book's plot relies on deliberate stupidity of the main character (s). Yes, that is obviously a bad idea. It's ridiculous, no one would actually do th-ah shit, here they go again, endangering themselves and literally everyone else around them for the sake of *pLoT mOvEmEnT*

I have a friend who also refuses to read anything labeled young adult and I’m like they’re soooo good though! My favorite lengths is definitely 400 -500 top

That there isn't as deep or extensive look at themes and their consequences for characters in a realistic way. I just found when I read more YA that I kept finding myself saying that "it just isn't going far enough", and that made me feel less satisfied with the story I was reading so that's why I prefer adult fantasy now.