Dear Editor…
The “New Adult Fiction” category has recently entered the publishers lexicon. Please enlighten us by defining.
Thanks,
Peter
Dear Peter…
New Adult fiction explores the hearts and minds of 18- to 25-year-olds as they learn to live self-responsible lives. Its readers are believed to be those 18- to 25-year-olds, plus the 30- to 44-year-old crossover readers who love Young Adult fiction. The dominant genres of this category, which fits the gap between YA and fiction for adults, are contemporary romance and paranormal. But similar to YA’s expansion beyond stories of love and angst in high school, readers are calling for expanded NA fare such as thrillers, mysteries, or any adventure that can befall someone after graduation from high school or an adult-regulated life but before settling into marriage, career, and family. And authors are writing it. NA imprints include Entangled Embrace and Bloomsbury Spark, but NA does appear in YA and adult fiction imprints or is self-published. I’ll cover NA themes and sensibilities here in August, when I do a week of NA-centric posts and free edit giveaways to celebrate my new book Writing New Adult Fiction, which has insights from NA bestsellers and a foreword by Sylvia Day.
Happy writing!
The Editor