Character Age and Target Audience

[MJRevell]

To what degree are these linked? And how important do you think it is to have a protagonist the same age as the target audience?

Do any of you have young adult/childrens fantasy novels currently being penned? Do you write the story from a young characters perspective?

Would you say it provides a greater link between reader and protagonist if they are of similar age?

 

[Thadlerian]

I had some advice here earlier on that the characters of a story might be a couple of years older than the target group; kids like to know what the older 'uns do, after all.

I have several YA novels; one finished and one near finishing right now. Both are written from the POW of characters in their early teens. I have found writing this kind of fiction more enjoyable than adult; as it allows me to spend less time on tiresome descriptions and more on character development; as most of the writers I admire excel in this area, and as it seems more plausible to write a setting in which characters are, as a rule, kind to each other

 

[ice.monkey]

Now I may be the exception, but when I was growing up I deliberately avoided any books where the protagonist was of similar age to myself or not an adult. I just didn't find them particularly believable. So I was reading Tolkien, Robert E. Howard, Moorcock at an early age.

About the only book with a youngun as the protagonist that I found believable was Le Guinn's Wizard of Earthsea. But, as it doesn't invlove a kid saving the world, more a YA saving himself, it works.

So, from my own perspective, I honestly don't think it matters. When I was growing up I wasn't the only one reading adult fiction instead of YA. For decent horror / fantasy / sf you had to read these as there weren't many YA books around. Other authors we read were Stephen King, James Herbert, Terry Brooks, H P Lovecraft, and so on.

So, I wouldn't get hung up on this if I were you.

 

[Sapheron]

It can create a link, yes. However, books can just as easily focus on older characters, or younger ones, than their target and still work.

The best example I can think of is His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman here. It's about a child, but it can work as a childrens, young adults, or adults story to an equal extent.

So, don't really worry too much, is my advice.

 

[vintagefury]

I'm not sure if I'm your target for this, but I'll answer anyway

I kind of read all over the place. When I was nine, I was reading Baby Sitter's Club and Goosebumps. One of my favorite books when I was younger, about fourteen, was Brave New World. I fell in love with Crime and Punishment at sixteen. At this same age I was also devouring Gaiman, Adams, Lovecraft, reading Star Wars novelizations, and I brushed up against Herbert and Tolkein but quickly winced away (the writing style just wasn't to my taste). I'm now twenty three and I read Harry Potter.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that age doesn't matter with compelling fiction. The reason, I think, that the inclination is there to write characters the age of your target audience, is that readers may have a higher chance of connecting with people their own age, thus allowing the author some wiggle room. This is a double-edged sword, however; write a fourteen year old who acts like he's twenty and you're boned.

 

[KSeriphyn]

A manuscript I'm trying to pitch is aimed at the young adult - adult audience. Although, your right, it doesn't matter to the reader.

However, it seems publishers and agents prefer you outline to them what audience your book is suited to, as it tells them you have considered your story as a "product".

 

[The Ace]

I can see the publisher's point, though. Enid Blyton, Susan Cooper, Richmal Crompton and C.S. Lewis in "Narnia," all wrote for children with children as the protagonists, the fact that all four are widely read decades after the deaths of three of the authors while the fourth is in no position to contradict the travesty of the filming of one of her books, does seem to bear out these opinions. These books are now being read by the grandchildren or the great-grandchildren of their original target audiences.

 

[Anthony G Williams]

I don't think it's the age of the characters that matters, so much as the style of the story. There are stories featuring children which are simple and nostalgic (Enid Blyton), those which are darker (Pullman's HDM - not actually written for children) and those which are horrific (Carrie).

I have always happily read stories featuring characters of all ages (or genders...). All that bothers me is that I need to relate to and empathise with the principal character, so he/she has to be well drawn and developed.

I have an aversion to stupid characters, though - I dislike it when the character does something which I would never do because it's so obviously stupid or wrong in the circumstances. I've stopped reading stories because of this.

 

[Mary Hoffman]

While I completely agree that it doesn't matter to the avid reader what age characters are, agents and publishers do have strong views about this. It is mainly the Sales and Marketing people who will determine where your books are shelved in bookshops and how they are listed in catalogues or on Amazon and here the received wisdom is that the main characters should be about two years older than the target audience.

And this is regardless of what else happens in the course of the plot or how old other characters are.

Mary

 

[lin robinson]

Interesting question.
One thing that pops to my mind is that the "old day" classics for boys were very often about guys in their twenties or late teens. Three Mousketeers, Robin Hood, etc. Young dudes in prime time for action and romance.

Nowadays it seems that the young are almost being force-fed "same age heroes". This may be natural, or it may be an industry machination like word lists and all the PC-friendly crap you see around the library with empty checkout cards inside.

Hard to say. I would say that kids tend to emulate those slightly older and disdain those slightly younger.

Since I'm currently finishing up a contemporary SF novel in which almost all the main characters are teenagers... but is apparently to rough to get an official publisher YA nod... this is something I've been looking at a bit.

This might be peripheral to the question here, but I've pretty much decided that the book will be pitched as an adult novel, but I will heavily promote it to teenagers...many of whom are all over the very sex, violence, and dope stuff that the YA publishers apparently avoid.

So I looked around for: how many adult novels feature mostly younger characters. (In other words: Exactly how screwed am I?)

What I came up with was, they are out there. Dune, for example. Catcher in the Rye. Count Zero. Mona Lisa Overdrive. Harry Potter, for that matter.

I think I'm okay. And ideally, since these characters will progress into middle age over four books, I can cover all the bases at once. Mostly I want kids who have outgrown Potter and like Grand Theft Auto, Matrix, Fight Club, and "urban fantasy" if I understand what the hell that is.

 

[Wyvern]

As what you might call a 'youngun' myself; (still a teenager but old for my age) I can say the age of the protagonist never bothered me especially; my favourite writer, Robin Hobb, had a brilliant character I adored who went from six to late thirties-mid forties over the course of the books, and it never altered my involvement with him. It's true that very small children tend to prefer young characters, but the majority of teenage readers don't care.

The only possible issue with a protaganists age I've ever found was wether or not it was believable. I've never been able to finish a book where the thirteen-year-old sounded thirty, etc. And I could never stand books where the children spoke like the Famous Five; 'having a gay time' and 'oh, rather' drives me up the wall. But that might just be my prejudice!

 

[Anthony G Williams]

And I could never stand books where the children spoke like the Famous Five; 'having a gay time' and 'oh, rather' drives me up the wall. But that might just be my prejudice!

It's a cultural shift. That's the way well-brought-up middle-class children used to speak, but it's fallen out of fashion. Probably helped by the fact that it's been lampooned so much that no-one can take it seriously now.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

While I completely agree that it doesn't matter to the avid reader what age characters are, agents and publishers do have strong views about this. It is mainly the Sales and Marketing people who will determine where your books are shelved in bookshops and how they are listed in catalogues or on Amazon and here the received wisdom is that the main characters should be about two years older than the target audience.

Yes, I've been saying this sort of thing around here for a while. I'm glad to have it confirmed by someone who can speak to the matter with so much authority.

(For those who don't know who Mary is, look up her bibliography. We are very lucky to have someone with her experience sharing what she knows on this subject.)

* * * *

Apart from all that:

If you look at some of the classic children's books by authors like C. S. Lewis, E. Nesbit, and Edward Eager, you find they feature groups of protagonists, with an age span of several years. I think that widens the potential audience, and also makes for a book that many readers will be able to read again with great pleasure several years later.

But I also think this probably works better with books for Juveniles than for YA.

 

[Lith]

I think the majority of avid readers ditch the kids books around thirteen (give or take a year) and simply start reading adult books. So marketing books to teenagers- off the top of my head, I can't even think of any from when I was a teen that were marketed to my own age group. Or perhaps I wasn't paying attention, since I was reading adult books. And then there are those books that started off in the adult section, but have been gradually shifted into YA, like the Redwall series.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

I think the majority of avid readers ditch the kids books around thirteen (give or take a year) and simply start reading adult books.

I guess it depends on what you mean by avid readers. Speaking only for myself, when I was that age I read whatever looked interesting, and I didn't discriminate between children's books and adult's books. That's a habit I haven't changed, and I'm glad of it, since there have been some excellent books for younger readers that I would never have discovered in time. (In some cases, the books weren't written in time for me to discover them as a child. A huge oversight on the part of the authors, some of whom -- with what I can only deplore as the most wretched timing -- weren't even born yet.) I read Shakespeare with pleasure at nine, and I can read C. S. Lewis with pleasure now, when I'm pushing sixty.

But I think for publishers of YA books -- much as it is with books for adult readers -- in order to stay in business they have to publish books that appeal to the sometime readers as well as the kids who spend their lunch hours in the library.

 

[bradHart]

Where to even begin that hasn't already been debated and tossed around.

It is fine to target a specific audience, there is money in that after all, but I think it is a very short sighted author who writes a book only for a target audience. One series that comes to mind off hand at the moment because I just saw the latest book at the library today is harry Turtledove's Cross Time series. He writes it targeted to a teen audience with some teen protags, but it is not a kids book by any means. He wanted to interest teen readers but they are good enough stories that I still want to read them. If the story had only been for teens with nothing to appeal to adults half the people who read Harry wouldn't bother buying the book.

If you want to write a younger protag then do so, but make them interesting on the whole spectrum of readers.

 

[Lith]

Well it doesn't hold true for everyone. I just don't remember reading much when I was a teen that was aimed at teens, and I think a lot of kids go through a phase where they feel too old for kids books and are more interested in exploring the adult world. A phase which passes, fortunately.