The Young Adult genre has recently achieved validation above and beyond the rather clumsy and gratuitous posturing of the lovesick Bella that invoked hordes of fans to choose sides and cast away all notions of credibility as angst and self-absorption reached staggering new heights. What, you aren’t a fan? Didn’t say that… Team Jacob. [Don’t judge me.] From wildly dystopian futures or alt histories, to coming-of-age, to the paranormal and dark urban fantasies, YA today takes us truly where no one has gone before. Its themes are often darkly ominous, dealing with issues like drugs, bullying, divorce, date rape, coming out … or worse. YA often pulls no punches. The Hunger Games sacrifices children on the altar of stability, and those who survive don’t necessarily triumph. Too often, the genre falls into the traps of tropes: the outsider befriended, the invariably female protagonist(s), instant love, the quirky best bud, love triangles, teen lives lived in a parentless vacuum… And while romance, love and insta-love figure prominently, often it’s devoid of believable emotional content: there’s an over-riding element of self-absorption which is to be expected when a neophyte struggles with that sense of becoming, a coming-of-age without safety nets and clear boundaries. With no frame of reference, the choices can and do devolve into all-or-nothing. The New Adult genre takes these tropes an additional step: into stark sexuality and graphic language—as if a switch is thrown and suddenly what had been vague and unformed suddenly achieves harsh clarity. Much of the NA I’ve looked at reads like Tourettes on speed, the dialog strident, in-your-face, the sex frequent, frenetic and nearly out of control. The NA genre has many detractors, for a lot of good reasons: Why I Hate the Genre Term “New Adult” focuses on the isolation and ageism inherent in this genre. The Problem with New Adult Books pins this genre with an unflattering “childish” sobriquet, calling it reductive, off-putting and a huge step backwards in the evolution of reading maturity. Why I Dislike the New Adult Genre has a nifty chart/graph that summarizes all the ways you might conjure for not liking/approving this “marketing ploy”: Back to that pulling-no-punches: what about sex in YA novels? The question is often asked: how much is too much? Sarah Alderson examines this issue here: Writing Sex in Young Adult Fiction: How...