You may be a little confused about the headline above, especially if you recall last week’s post about the comics industry ignoring kids. Nevertheless, this feature from yesterday’s Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports fantasy and graphic novels are especially hot commodities during this current retail renaissance of young adult literature.
Kids are buying books in quantities we’ve never seen before. And publishers are courting young adults in ways we haven’t seen since the 1940s, according to Booklist critic Michael Cart.
What’s more the quality of the books being sold — this market has grown by 25 percent from 1999-2005 — is better, meaning books like Blankets, Fun Home, Bone, Abadazad and the like are indeed having an effect…
Is this movement to the YA universe a good one, or are you worried about younger children being left out of the comics mix, as I am? What say you folks?
March 8th, 2007 at 10:12 pm
As long as there are creators like Jimmy Gownley, John Gallagher, Andy Runton, Mark Crilley, Jane Fisher, and others around who create top quality comics for younger kids, you really don’t have to worry. What is needed is support of these creators by retailers. Libraries are already buying their books, librarian reviewers (such as yours truly) are getting the word out about these books. Library review journals are seeking out more graphic novels for younger readers and reviewing them so more libraries will buy them. I just don’t see as much happening in the retail sector yet.
Younger kids don’t necessarily have the freedom to purchase what they want the way that teens do, so marketing really needs to be done to libraries, and to parents.