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Why is YA Fiction Suddenly So Popular in the Christian Market? Two Theories

I’ve been around Christian writing circles long enough (from 2004-5-ish to present) to remember when Christian YA fiction was not a thing. I still recall speaking to a literary agent (about the time The Hunger Games were all the rage), who flat-out said

“YA is a hard sell in the CBA.”

Why, I asked. They floated multiple possible reasons. But as a parent of teens, this agent specifically noted the gritty, real-world (even dark) nature of most mainstream YA and how Christian fare was too sanitized to connect with today’s average teen reader.

But apparently things have changed.

Back in August 2012, Publishers Weekly declared that Christian YA Fiction [is] Coming Into Full-Bloom.

Christian teen fiction is coming into its own these days as sales rise for both digital and traditional books, and as publishers look for the next bestselling series. While Christian publishers haven’t found juggernauts that compare to Harry Potter, the Hunger Games, the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini, or the Twilight series, it’s not for lack of trying.

“YA fiction in general is a fast-growing genre,” says Don Pape, v-p of trade publishing for David C. Cook. “The YA reader can’t get enough story; they’re voracious readers whether in hard copy or digital download.”

Though many now see the Christian fiction market as “flat,” YA fiction still appears to maintain a decent share. The Christy Awards, the premiere Christian literary awards, provides a good sample size. The Christys added a YA category in 2007. Of this year’s nominees, at least five are marketed as YA. (Also, 2 of the 3 books in the Visionary — spec fic — category are YA, while 1 of the 3 in the YA category is spec-fic. I’ll develop the spec-fic connection in a minute.) This seems like a good sampling of the market. The Christian site Family Fiction lists almost 500 YA titles. This Goodreads page lists over 600 titles of “Clean Christian Fiction (Christian).” Also, Enclave Publishing, one of the premier Christian spec publishers, contains a significant amount of books marketed as YA in its catalog. (Anecdotally, after attending the 2017 Realm Makers Conference and seeing all the YA titles, I asked out loud, “Does anyone write adult speculative fiction anymore?” A conservative estimate would be that 1/3 of all titles represented at RM were YA.)

So how did the Christian fiction market go from YA being a “hard sell” to YA being so prolific? I have two theories.

Christian YA provides an alternative to overly-sexualized and existentially grim general market fare.

Indeed, much Christian YA sees itself as specifically aimed to counter the bleak, often overly-sexualized, stories found in much mainstream YA.

Blink, the new imprint from Christian publisher Zondervan, is clear to advertise itself as publishing “clean” YA fiction. In their About page, an entire section is devoted to defining What Does “Clean” Young Adult Mean?

Generally, the main characters in clean YA don’t swear, drink, or progress beyond kissing, and they only resort to violence when absolutely necessary. …this genre doesn’t take a gritty book and bleep out the swear words. These books are written with the intention of having clean language and content from the get-go.

One blogger described this alternative approach to young adult fiction:

…evangelical authors and publishers are offering their young Christian readers a surprisingly empowering guide to adolescence. Created as a “safe” alternative to mainstream fiction, books for Christian girls include wholesome heroines, lots of praying, and absolutely no cursing.

This reaction is understandable as much mainstream YA has indeed surrendered to nihilism, despair, and immorality. An article on dark themes in YA fiction in the Wall Street Journal (paywall) generated lively pushback. Nevertheless, the author rightly asked,

Contemporary fiction for teens is rife with explicit abuse, violence and depravity. Why is this considered a good idea?

It’s also worth noting that many Christian YA novels appeal to Christian homeschool groups… groups that are notoriously conservative. In fact, there may be a corollary between the continued popularity of homeschooling among Christians and the growth of Christian YA. It’s estimated that over 2.3 million children are being homeschooled in the U.S., most of them for religious reasons. Indeed, many Christian YA authors have found that homeschool groups are actively on the hunt for good, clean, alternative fare for their kids/students.

Of course, this intersects a topic of long-standing debate among Christian creatives — Do we write stories to engage the “secular” reader and the cultural zeitgeist, or do we provide “alternatives” for those seeking clean reads with Christian values? Wherever you land on that spectrum, the tension is still alive and well. And totally in the mix when discussing the state of Christian YA.

From the aforementioned PW article:

“Christian publishers walk a tightrope,” says Cook’s [Don] Pape. “We want to be real and deal with life issues, but also be redemptive and provide a light in the dark. We’ve had some parents return books because they’re dark, but when you look at what kids are into in the real world, you see the tension.” [Shannon] Marchese of WaterBrook Multnomah agrees: “There are [Christian market] constraints on how candid we can be with our teen readers. Parents want a good, clean read, but kids are saying that’s not what’s happening in their lives.”

“The biggest question we all face is how far we can go with YA,” says Pape. “We have to be true to our Christian values and mission, but we know what the kids are seeing in the media, in film, and in books.”

This balance between parents who “want a good, clean read” for their kids and kids who want books that address their “real world,” is indeed tenuous. And while seeking out “alternative fare” is understandable (especially books that offer hope rather than despair), reproducing another generation of  readers embracing a sacred/secular divide may prove problematic.

Either way, my first theory is that Christian YA has grown as a reaction to secular YA which is overly-sexualized and existentially bleak.

Christian YA appeals to teens and middle-schoolers who are more open to fantastical, futuristic, and speculative elements than adults.

As I noted above, much of the Christian YA catalog is comprised of speculative fiction — epic fantasy, superhero, and science fiction. (For example, this list on Goodreads of Best Young Adult Fiction Christian Books contains a significant percentage of speculative stories.)  In the graph above (cited HERE), the speculative genres — Paranormal, Fantasy, Dystopian, Steampunk, and Science Fiction — comprise over 50% of the YA deals of 2011-12.

This has both an upside and a downside.

Many have wondered aloud (including me!) why speculative fiction is so under-represented in Christian publishing… especially when the genre is wildly popular in mainstream culture. The fact that young Christian readers are consuming stories with speculative elements should be encouraging to long-time Christian fans of the genre.

Of note is how this trend is consistent with teens and middle-schoolers across the board. Young adult readers seem to gravitate to fantastical stories. Whether it’s the wizardry of a Harry Potter, the futuristic dystopian world of The Hunger Games, or the sparkly supernatural romance of the Twilight series, young adults pine for the other-worldly.

Much has been made about why this is. Some have speculated that our youth’s draw towards the fantastical is simply an issue of escapism. As the and its pressure grow increasingly grim, teens need an escape. Perhaps it’s a matter of the dehumanizing of technology. This generation lives in a world where science fiction is becoming reality. Speculative fiction is a way to plumb our humanity amidst an exponentially tech-centric world. This trend could also be an issue of the ripening of a postmodern, relativistic worldview, one in which the truth is squishy and the fantastical is permissible. Others suggest that this is evidence of a waning imagination in the adult populace, that teens have not yet surrendered to the stuffy materialism and grind of adulthood that has stripped their parents of their youthful wonder.

Of course, the downside of this, in Christian circles, is that adult Christian readers still do not gravitate to Christian speculative fiction in the way that middle school and young adults appear  to. Whether this has to do with the gender disparity or it has more theological roots — like skepticism about speculation, criticism of fictional magic, or suspicion of story in general — it could be concerning that the popularity of Christian speculative fiction has been fueled more by young adults and teens rather than adult readers.

So my second theory is: Christian YA is tapping into the hunger among young adults for fantastical stories with magical, futuristic elements.

Whatever the reasons, Christian YA, once a “hard sell,” is now a thing. So do you think my two theories have any validity? Do you think there’s some other reasons why a genre that was once not very popular in Christian circles, is now going fairly strong?

{ 7 comments… add one }
  • Kessie October 1, 2018, 10:23 AM

    Well, Dave Farland explains why kids and teens are drawn to fantasy, or what he calls “wonder literature”: https://mystorydoctor.com/writingtip-audience-analysis-part-one/

    But the homeschooler community basically only lets their kids read Little House on the Prairie, Narnia, and Redwall. And ripoffs of the above. Fairytale retellings are sometimes okay, which is how Stengl got so popular. But yes, teens want really good, immersive stories with teen protagonists, and that’s hard to find, or it used to be. Heck, most of the secular YA book pool is garbage, with authors netting a teen audience and then switching to New Adult and filling their books with explicit content (like Sarah J. Maas). I’m glad the Christian market is opening up to this genre. But I do cringe at the guidelines of squeaky clean or out it goes. I wrote a YA paranormal, and while my characters don’t swear, they do kiss occasionally. Instantly excluded!

  • Brent King October 1, 2018, 10:40 AM

    It was bound to happen. While Tolkien was talking about fantasy, I think what he said applies to all of the speculative genres. His belief was that, though fantasy is wholly imaginary and not reality, it provides a way to think about reality: it enables us to flee into reality. 

    In his essay “On Fairy Stories,” Tolkien deals with the charge of “escapism”, the objection that speculative stories like his merely provide escape or send us into a fantasy world. “The assumption,” he said, “is that escaping is always a bad thing. For someone who is imprisoned, the most healthy thing he can do is to escape the walls that shut him in.” 

    “Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisioned by the enemy, don’t we consider it his duty to escape?. . .If we value the freedom of mind and soul, if we’re partisans of liberty, then it’s our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as we can!”

    Speculative fiction awakens and nurtures us, using what Tolkien calls the “familiar device of unfamiliar embodiments.” He creates a world that is fictional, but that operates by the same moral laws as our own, and uses fantastic creatures and settings to illustrate moral conflicts with a starkness that is much more difficult to portray in “real” life. The stories lead their readers to conclude which outcome is morally desirable and why—even if they don’t realize it. With his moral senses thus sharpened, the reader is more likely to recognize the moral dimension of his own actions and experiences. Sometimes the truth can only be perceived or understood in this way. I love what Douglas Gresham said, “Imagination and the stimulation of imagination is the only way we have of getting beyond the evidence of our own eyes and reaching for God.”

    The power of activating our imaginations for good in this way cannot be overstated. With its unique and powerful way of mentoring, no wonder speculative fiction is on the rise!

    • Alexandra October 5, 2018, 11:46 AM

      Definitely agree with you. I absolutely adored “On Fairy Stories” myself. Definitely worth a read or ten.

  • Jill October 1, 2018, 12:06 PM

    Clean adventurous spec fic will have a broader appeal than either overtly religious or dark nastiness. That’s all I know. And frankly, I don’t vet too many books my children read, but my current teenage daughter does the vetting herself and gets tired of all the books in the YA section pushing transgenderism.

    • Darrick Dean October 1, 2018, 6:02 PM

      And there’s why I never liked the “YA” label. Publishers market the adult world to non-adults. Intentionally by some, no doubt. They have overreached to the point where YA by Christian authors have a huge opportunity here — even bigger if they don’t limit themselves.

  • Alexandra October 5, 2018, 11:42 AM

    Oh, my. This topic…

    I’m very glad you wrote about this, actually. And I’m glad to see a rise in Christian YA. I wrote about writing Fantasy as a Christian author years ago (before I switched blogs), if you’re interested: http://www.alexandralanc.com/-blog/christians-its-okay-to-write-fantasy

    I think there are plenty of reasons why it’s becoming more of a “thing”. It’s true that most YA fiction is bleak, depressing, demoralizing, etc. There’s little hope anywhere, and there’s plenty of hate (vaguely disguised as something else), and I know kids sense that. So of course they’re looking for something with a little more optimism, something they can really delve into to get out of the crazy world they really have no control over (yet). When I was a teen (not that long ago), I would have loved to have read something with Christian values that was still gritty. That’s what I write.

    I’ve always loved speculative fiction, but it’s true that growing up, SFF was considered…well, on the borderline of sinful, if not over it. And I don’t think that’s disappeared, though it’s hopefully gotten a bit better. And usually whenever I told someone from church (not my current church, but old ones) that I’m a writer, they would assume I meant I wrote devotionals, and when I told them Fantasy they would look at me like I was insane.

    I mention this in my blog post, but several years ago I was with a Christian writing guild, and I commented on a thread about SFF. It was discouraging, because so many people felt ashamed for liking fantasy, let alone writing it. Only a few of us saw it as okay. Somehow the others didn’t see it as “godly” enough, and felt like they had to apologize for it–or, if they wrote SFF, it had to follow certain, very stringent guidelines. I think that mentality still reigns, at least in some places, but there are writers like me who want to see these stories told, and are finally getting tired of “that isn’t okay to write because religion”, so they’re writing them anyway, following what they feel they need to be doing.

    The issue of content is difficult. Personally, as a teen, I wanted a dark story that reflected my world and how I was feeling, but with hope in it. Something more realistic, not sanitized. And (maybe because of the aforementioned view of Christian SFF) what I usually got was sanitized, as if life wasn’t hard or bad things didn’t happen or there wasn’t darkness anywhere. This may be what some parents want, but kids I want to see the world for what it is, and know how to function in it. They aren’t stupid. They know that in a few years they will have to be a part of the real world, and they want to be able to do something good with their lives, but they need direction. SFF is a great medium for that because it’s different enough to be fun and engaging, but the characters are still human in the end (or human-esque), and you can relate to them. You can learn from their struggles with real difficulties.

    I think it’s more a cycle coming round than anything. There have been mainstream Christian SFF authors in the past–George MacDonald, CS Lewis, JRR Tolkien, Madeleine L’Engle, just to mention some of my favorites–but not in a while. So I see it more as a part of the natural cycle of interests, which seem to be going more towards Fantasy in general, whether Christian or not (at least in YA).

    I can’t say why there aren’t more Christian adult SFF books. Probably because they’re usually boring? (Sorry…I’m a little jaded.) This is just my experience from when I was younger, but again it might be the “you have to write fantasy this way” constraint speaking, and not that the authors aren’t trying. Also, I think there’s not as big of a market for it. Whether that’s because “SFF isn’t Christian, unless done a specific way” was pounded into people’s heads as kids or not, I can’t say, though that was certainly my experience.

    Your thoughts on why this shift is happening certainly are interesting. As far as us as a society, it’s probably a mixture of everything you listed and more. Things are crazy, and one way or another SFF offers a way to search for truths…and answers.

    Thank you for the post. I definitely enjoyed it. Take care!

    • StephS October 9, 2018, 8:39 AM

      The shaming for reading fantasy in (often) Evangelical Christian circles is definitely a thing, and a shame. It is fear based. Growing up, there were adults in my church who said unless it was rapture fiction about the end times, it was wrong to read fantasy. Shutting out or banning creativity honestly only leads to rebellion anyway – those readers will find a way eventually to read what they want…or they leave the church. So many of my generation left the church because of banning and shaming of all sorts. You have to wonder what the incentive is to stick around when you’re constantly shamed, belittled, or told what you enjoy is evil.

      It’s about time there’s more Christian YA. If you want a certain product you aren’t finding in the market, create it. I’m baffled it took so long!

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