John Green on Reader Appeal

John Green posted at his blog about reader appeal, and how conventional wisdom regarding teen books may not be quite bang on the mark. He then quotes some surprising statistics, and winds it all up by saying,

But none of this really distracts from what I'm trying to argue, which is that a LOT of teens REALLY LIKE the books that many people presume teens won't like, and that a lot of young people have more enjoyable reading experiences with ambitious work than they do with books that pander to their dreams and desires.

Of course, that's always been one of the challenges of an adult working with kids and teens, and something so unpredictable and individual as that kid's taste in books. We can only assume what kids will like, based on our own memories of childhood and our impression of the individual kid we're working with (which is about 1% of what's really going on inside their head anyway). I've settled on a professional philosophy of, "it's a crapshoot and they're gonna surprise you."