Why New Adult?

So, I started in young adult. Like, I assume most. I started by writing my age, my first character Nathan was 14, because I was 14! As I got older I got more adventurous with how old my characters are. My youngest protagonist remains Nathan but my eldest (as of today) is McKenzie Jackson aged 28 – ironically, the age I am now!

It was around 2013 that I started bridging the gap between young adult, and adult fiction. I started with seventeen because what a weird age is seventeen. You’ve just left school (in the UK), either gone to college, or sixth form, or straight into work. You’re not quite an adult, can’t legally drink yet, but can join the army – it’s chaos and I struggled to find many books with seventeen year old protagonists.

I wrote a few then slowly got older because we all know school is a great backdrop for a story, it offers a lot of opportunities, and secure backdrop that the vast majority of teens can relate too, but what about those of us who’s love story didn’t happen when we were sixteen, what about those of us who aren’t the most popular kid, or the wallflower, who didn’t lead a rebellion, or make a name for themselves in school, what about those of us who just existed, who fought through every day, what about those of us who hadn’t come out yet?

That last one plays a huge part in all this, for me at least, because I didn’t come out until I was in my 20’s. I didn’t have any ‘book plot’ romance. I didn’t have any romance and when I tell you that now, at twenty-eight I feel like I missed out – a lot of that I blame on pop culture and this expectation that everyone’s going to get the love of their life by the end of school, High School Musical who?

For me, this shy, non-remarkable queer kid, I didn’t see myself in many stories – there was a lack of LGBTQIA representation when I was the ‘young adult’ age anyway but even now, even when I read young adult fiction, I don’t see my teenage self-reflected in it. In these brave, fantastic protagonists that’ll do so much good for those who can read them at the right time but I was never quite as brave. Although I wish I had been.

All this being said, my life really started when I came out. The ages between 21 and 28 so far, I have lived so many ‘firsts’ that most (or so we’re led to believe) would experience in their teenage years, so where is the fiction to go along with that? Where are the protagonists who are in their early twenties who are trying to figure out how to exist? How to work, manage money, how to navigate first relationships? Sex? Love? How to live as an adult whilst having teenage experiences?

I love finding new adult fiction, I love reading protagonists who are experiencing exactly what I am. Shocking isn’t it? It’s almost as if young adult fiction was made for that purpose too.

I’ve noticed over the last few year more new adult fiction slowly sneaking in, and although some are still placed on the wrong bookshelf it’s amazing to see the genre becoming more popular.

I will continue to write New Adult fiction, for myself primarily and if it resonates with at least one other person then it’s done more than I could have ever wish for.

My New Adult Books;

Kennedy is King

Cassidy is Queen

Just Like a Fairy Tale