For the bazillionth time, what is this thing we call YA?

So there I was, reading Ysabel, (which is a fantasy, but also about history and family and coming of age and some other things*) when I had the thought that probably everyone else who has read the book has had: 

So.  Why wasn't this marketed as a YA novel?

Obviously, there's the... obvious, which is that the author is already a known quantity in the grown-up world.

But then there's also this:  Even though the main character is a fifteen-year-old boy, and even though his aforementioned coming-of-age is a big part of the story, Ysabel didn't really feel like a YA novel.  To me, anyway.  Maybe because YA novels tend to have more of a feeling of intimacy and immediacy and this one made me feel like I was witnessing the events from a bit of a distance?  I don't know.  Thoughts?

*Which I really enjoyed, by the way, and which I'll blather on at greater length later, probably for O' Canada Day.

Comments

[xemilyx]

I'm actually taking some time off from reading children's books to focus on adult lit, and I've been asking myself similar questions. I 100% agree that YA lit is more immediate. It's like, YA books are about what's happening, right now. And adult books are about what's already happened and trying to figure out why it happened and what it means.

[Mairi]

I think that adult novels appeal to readers because of how the character affects the events, with how the events affect the character (a common YA theme) rarely stated explicitly. It's a subtle difference, but often there.

[Colleen]

On this particular book it's not YA because the imprint doesn't have YA. I've run into this before with pubs where I've asked them why on earth a book was never sold as YA in the first place. They say it just happens - his editor probably fell in love with the book and just decided to sell it as adult.

I LOVED this book as well - it will be in one of my columns in the next couple of months.

[jocelyn]

I've not read this particular book, though it is on my wishlist, but I've noticed what you said about the immediacy of YA in other books. I wondered about Stephanie Kuehnert's upcoming book I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone, which is sold as YA, and if perhaps it really is an adult book because the story feels like it's being told from a distance, whereas most YA is very close and personal and now. I guess the whole experience of being a teenager is immediate--things are happening to you right now, and you don't have a whole lot of experience with really looking back on anything significant, for the most part.

[Brian F.]

Give it time. It took LIFE OF PI a while to come out in YA format.