[Velociraptor]

Many of you may have noticed The Hunger Games is about to be released as a movie. It’s a very entertaining book, but also sparked a lot of debate about violence or heavy themes in teen literature – young adult books are ‘took dark’, some say. I’ll be interested to see how the gory bits translate to the screen.

Personally, I read a lot of YA books, and don’t mind violence or dark themes at all but just wondered what others thought.

[Ianthe]

I think a lot of YA literature is dark. I think it taps into that angsty teen thing.

[livvie7586]

some definately are. there is one aussie author, whose books are supposedly some of the best out there, but they are some of the darkest books i've read (in one especially, the daughter is sleeping with her brother, and the father finds out, and shoots the son).

[Bluenomi]

Well considereing I was reading adult fiction at aged 13, I find young adult books pretty mild. I happily read Anne Rice's vampire books at 15 so Hunger Games seems like nothing to me.

It really does depend on the teen though. Some can cope better than others.

[la di dah]

I think that many of them have little respect for their teen readers to work out plots or deal with challenging vocabulary, so the only way to distinguish it from a "kid's book" is with dark themes.

[PinkSurvivor]

I'm reading The Hunger Games at the moment and I love it. I don't think it's too dark unless the teen has been fairly sheltered. It puts struggle and oppression into a bit of perspective. Most kids have ever had to consider where their next meal will come from and they take a lot for granted. I think it would be great for the average 15+.

As for things like Twilight, I don't believe its too dark. Its the genre, vampires and werewolves and pretty tame IMO. I would let my teenager read it unless they have issues with nightmares or take things too literally.

I am also one who read some Anne Rice at 12 so this stuff is pretty tame. When my Aunt found out I was reading Anne Rice at 12 it was taken away and forbidden but she found it after I finished reading lol

[MidnightDad]

Its not by accident that Disney discontinued trying to make money from fairy tales last year. 'Tween' is the new teen.

[Jip]

I was reading 'adult' literature when I was in my teenage years, so by my standards they are a bit tame, too. I've not really read any recent works (save for Twilight - biggest waste of time in my life), but I would think that it is just keeping in line with the thematic vibe of television shows and movies. As the content in these movies become more accessible, then the trend is going to reflect in YA Fiction too. You can get away with a lot more in YA as well, because it isn't so explicit as it is on a screen.

If guided (by a teacher, parent, etc), the average teen could read beyond the obvious questionable issues and delve into the messages that the book is dealing with, because that is the crux of YA fiction really, more than the actual story.

[MidnightDad]

At the risk of getting flamed OP, I will put on my armour and tell you what I think is happening.

Back in 1991 women who would struggle for feminism and equality would still take their girls to watch a Disney heroine like Belle, who was able to teach them the valuable lesson that you can still turn a beast into a man if he really loves you and your worthy of him... just dig deep enough girls and you can find that diamond in the rough. Ostensibly, rather than win the war for female-kind and declare the battle done, each generation would rather have seen the struggle continue to the next, so that it could be off-loaded and they could sit in judgement on its current state and lament past conflicts like old soldiers.

But then kids got the internet and everything changed. Boys pretty much disappeared from young adult lit ten years ago, and the remnant became predominantly a girls market. Boys went off to play computer games (but, newsflash, girls are now following them in increasing numbers). Adult lit matured. Girls have no intention of sucking down 'bright' fairy stories any more. What you consider 'dark' represents a real liberation of young women IMO, away from characters like Belle and towards heroines like Merida of Brave, girls who face their beasts with bow and arrow in hand and are dead-shots to boot.

Twilight (2005) was a transition piece, you wont get another heroine perplexed about having to choose between necrophilia or bestiality, you will get ones that know they have to kick ass and chew bubble gum at the same time or be stomped on.

[franklet]

With The Twilight phenomena a lot of young adult books have gone the whole supernatural theme. There are so many books about vampires and werewolves and 'undead' and ghosts. But if you look past that trend there are still quite a lot of really good other choices. I read a lot of YA books and I particularly love the dystopian genre, like Hunger Games and The Pretties (or the Uglies) series.

When I was a kid I read a lot of Monica Hughes and Victor Kelleher and Christopher Pike. These are pretty similar to the ones out now, they were fairly dark too.

But there are plenty of 'chick lit' teen books, series about girls in high school and lots of family drama type ones as well as plenty of comedic books. I also used to read Caroline MacDonald which could be described as having a theme of family but were also a bit intense at times.

And what was that awesome series about the girl who found her face on a milk carton? I think it was called the Face on The Milk Carton. That was intense too!

I don't think much has changed!