![]() ![]() “The assertion that New Adult is just sexually explicit YA feels confrontational to me-as if the person doing Sara Megibow, an agent from the Nelson Literary Agency, also strongly disagrees with the public criticism of the genre. They’re targeted for those adult readers who really enjoy YA, and for 20-somethings that haven’t always been able to find a lot of novels taking place during the college years.” “To me, New Adult is a more specific name for what we would have called adult novels with strong crossover. “A few of the New Adult books I’ve read could have arguably been called angsty, sexually explicit YA, but I would say that’s the minority,” Townsend says. But there’s no evidence it’s being marketed to young teens: Carmack’s website even specifies that the book is “recommended for readers 18 and up.” And her agent, New Leaf Literary & Media’s Suzie Townsend, says that in New Adult, as with every genre, the range of subject matter is huge and sex is only a small part of it. It’s the story of a 20-something college student determined to lose her virginity before graduation-and its HarperCollins cover design is certainly sexually charged. ![]() On the heels of the Fifty Shades of Grey phenomenon, it’s more obvious than ever that sex sells-but many in the industry view the prevalent accusations of New Adult being erotica for teens as overdramatized and sensational. There has been public criticism that the genre is merely “sexed-up YA,” and that unscrupulous marketers are using erotically charged themes to entice teens to buy their New Adult books. There’s one other prominent area of debate about the growth of New Adult fiction, and that’s the question of how much sexual content is appropriate in a genre that could so easily hold crossover appeal to the younger YA audience. “When bookstores eventually find a place for NA novels, it will be because the category has been so popular in the electronic world,” she says. Traditional publishers are following suit using many of the same techniques, relying on targeted packaging and social media marketing to reach the New Adult audience in the absence of designated shelf space.īut Grove is optimistic that dedicated New Adult sections are on the horizon, in large part thanks to the Web. What started as a largely grassroots phenomenon driven by readers and the savvy self-publishing authors willing to give them what they’re looking for is becoming increasingly mainstream. And newer co-op websites such as NA Alley ( ) and blogs such as A Tapestry of Words ( ) are helping to give voice to both traditionally published and self-published New Adult writers. Leading online book hubs such as Goodreads reveal spikes in numbers of authors, publishers and readers categorizing books as New Adult. New Adult titles are finding their audience largely through word of mouth-many successful authors in the genre credit their success to social media and bloggers. ![]() As reader demand for more books in the genre has become clear, big publishers have since snatched up other indie New Adult authors, such as Jamie McGuire and Colleen Hoover, both of whom had also cracked the bestseller list on their own. The deal landed the New Adult genre its first headline in The New York Times. In November 2012, newcomer Cora Carmack signed a six-figure, three-book deal with HarperCollins based on the chart-topping success of her self-published New Adult e-book, Losing It. ![]() Online venues have allowed writers with New Adult novels that were being shut out of the market to create their own place. In fact, independent e-book publishing has been the driving force behind the genre’s rapid growth. While the lack of physical space for the category has been a marketing roadblock for traditional publishers and brick-and-mortar bookstores, it’s a nonissue for e-books, among which New Adult titles (many of them self-published) have been creeping onto digital bestseller lists. ![]()
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