In June 2011, Meghan Cox Gurdon wrote, in the Wall Street Journal, about how Young Adult fiction has taken too dark a turn, has unnecessarily exposed young readers to complex, difficult situations before they are mature enough to make sense of those situations. … She is correct in noting that there is darkness in some Young Adult fiction, but she largely ignores the diversity of the genre and the countless titles that aren’t grounded in damage, brutality, and loss. More troubling, though, is the suggestion that somehow reality should be sanitized for teen readers.
… I learned a long time ago that life introduces young people to situations thay are in no way prepared for, even good girls, lucky girls who want for nothing. Sometimes, when you least expect it, you become the girl in the woods. You lose your name because another one is forced on you. You think you are alone until you find books about girls like you. Salvation is certainly among the reasons I read. Reading and writing have always pulled me out of the darkest experiences of my life. Stories have given me a place in which to lose myself. They have allowed me to remember. They have allowed me to forget. They have allowed me to imagine different endings and better possible worlds.
—Roxane Gay, from “What We Hunger For”
Transcribed by me from pages 144–145 of my paperback edition of Bad Feminist: Essays, © 2014 HarperCollins Publishers.
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