Purple Hearts

Honorary Heartlette – Tina Ferraro

Why YA?

My fourteen year-old niece recently read my work-in-progress and commented to her father (my brother) that “Aunt Tina really understands how teenagers think.” My brother, grinning, responded, “That’s because Aunt Tina still is a teenager.”               

This story greatly amuses me. For on one hand, I’m a responsible adult who manages my writing career, the comings-and-goings of my husband and our three teenagers, and some community service projects. But strip all that away, and I’m a person who is giving herself the happy teen years now that she was too cranky to appreciate the first time around.               

For ever since I made the change from writing adult romance to YA romance, I’m having more fun than an adult should be allowed. There’s nothing better than shutting out my real world of property taxes, laundry, and my impending Empty Nest Syndrome and letting myself sweat the small stuff: my complexion, my grade on a test, or what hero’s text message REALLY means. I love the idea that my whole life is still ahead of me, and is full of endless possibilities.  I could still make my first million before my first wrinkle, “hook a hottie,” and look fantabulous in tight jeans.                

Because when I’m writing for teens, I *am* a teen. Not today’s teenagers, necessarily, not trying to get inside my kids’ heads and live parallel lives. I float back to those thoughts and feelings of my own day, and I write from that perspective–while trying to create storylines, characters and sometimes odd things that would have appealed to me (like uses for an unworn prom dress, a hexagon to define romantic compatibility, and 26 much-needed tips on ways to kiss your next boyfriend). Naturally, I use my kids as sounding boards on slang, present day electronics, and trends, and occasionally a subplot or scenario will arise from something I see or hear from them. But that’s all secondary to my own creativity. The elements of my books start and end with me.                

So that’s my good news for those of you without kids or teens who are interested in writing YA. Don’t feel that put off by a lack of teen contact. You can always find one to read your first draft, chat with other YA authors, or research teen trends through books and the internet. Most important is tapping into your inner teen and remembering what intrigued you, scared you, thrilled you. And to create those characters and storylines. Times have changed, but teenagers really haven’t.                 

And if you’re like me, you’ll find yourself completely engrossed in your stories, laughing out loud at the keyboard, and looking at the world with a revitalized, fresher view. Nothing wrong with that. So excuse me if this sounds like a cliché, but when people ask me, “Why YA?” I am tempted to say, “Why not?”  Because writing YA fills me in a way no other genre does.                

And I am, like, toh-tally okay with that, okay?                                             

Tina is (very generously) giving away a copy of her new book How To Hook A Hottie to one of our commenters at the end of the week- Just let us know what you’ve done to hook a hottie to get in on the giveaway action!