Writing for Young Readers: Thoughts From Interviews
Read the full interviews here:
Geoff Herbach / Nicole Kronzer / Payal Doshi / Julie Schumacher / Alison McGhee
This year, I had the opportunity to interview five incredible writers from Minnesota. Each one offered valuable ideas, experiences, and reflections about writing for young readers (and writing in general). I am deeply grateful to each of these authors for their generosity. After reviewing the transcripts, I’ve decided to close out the year by gathering together the insights that stood out, changed my perspective, moved me, or made me think.
One common thread that resonated with me was a love for crafting characters. It’s an exciting process, but one that takes time and searching. Nicole Kronzer described how her characters are “waiting to be discovered, and it’s [her] job to get to know them.” Then there’s a moment when the characters are “unlocked,” and the story takes on energy. Julie Schumacher discussed the “restlessness” associated with writing until she understands the characters: “I have to know who the people are and develop an affection for them, a sympathy with them.” Then, “once something is going, I dream about it, I think about it while I’m driving. It becomes a living thing in my head.”
That moment of understanding, of unlocking your characters, often causes the fragments of a narrative to fall into place. Geoff Herbach talked about “searching for the way the character’s psychology gets translated through voice,” and how sometimes you have to write deep into a story before you truly find the voice. In Geoff’s words, “It’s mysterious. And it’s a pain in the ass.” The characters may not reveal themselves at the time or in the way you expect them to. Alison McGhee spoke to this idea as well, saying, “[the characters] always surprise me. They always do things I didn’t want them to do—well, didn’t expect them to do… You can’t force them.” As a writer, I try to approach the process with a sense of openness combined with intentionality. If the story is a collection of random impulses, it will lose focus and momentum. But if it is too focused, it becomes rigid, and the reader can feel the writer’s machinations. We need a degree of spontaneity, of knowing when to embrace the unexpected to allow for a more dynamic narrative that is authentic to the characters.
But what makes a character authentic? As Geoff Herbach says, “They can’t just be a set of attributes and quirks… they’re not characters until you can feel their response to things.” When creating the main character of her middle grade novel, Payal Doshi wanted readers to relate to the protagonist in a way that was deeper than her circumstances or identity: “I want them to connect with who she is on the inside and connect with her insecurities and her strengths… To dissolve those boundaries and those boxes we create. Especially for cultures that are underrepresented and the stories that come out of them.” Payal’s vibrant characters come from her skill in rendering complicated, funny, and passionate kids on the page.
Another layer to character development is the dynamic between the character’s outside and interior world. When someone is narrating their own story, we might think they are revealing more than they are to the outside world. But Geoff Herbach describes how interiority is still a kind of presentation: “They’re still telling their story and trying to convince the reader of who they are.” The narrator’s emotional landscape is evolving—they have more to understand, and the reader is going through that process with them. Often, these thoughts and emotions and are also performed through dialogue, perhaps in subtler ways. When it comes to crafting convincing dialogue—and voice in general—Geoff Herbach and Nicole Kronzer recommend reading aloud to hear the nuances and patterns in the characters’ voices. Nicole shared this beautiful thought about the power of reading aloud:
“As human beings, we can go through an entire life and never read and write, and it doesn’t matter. We send our children to school to learn this because it’s not an inherent skill we have. But talking, on the other hand, is. It’s in our bodies. The average human being just figures out talking. So when you take this non-human thing, writing, and you put it in your natural human body and say it out loud, major revision and magical things happen.”
It’s clear that crafting characters, and getting their voices right, is a primary and important step of writing a novel. But what about the plot, and the events of the story? Julie Schumacher described how that aspect can be a challenge: “How can I make [the characters] get out of their chairs and do something interesting?” As someone who also struggles with plot, I was intrigued by her story about studying Charlotte’s Web to understand what makes it a great novel: “I’ll look at how Charlotte’s Web is built,” she said. “Something happens in every chapter. There’s an event within the span of 5-8 pages, and it leads to something that will happen in the next 5-8 page chapter.” She then made a detailed outline for her project as an exercise in understanding plot. There can be immense value in reading like a writer, especially for books you find most compelling. Striving to understand why something moves you, analyzing the craft and artistic choices of writers you admire, is something that takes more energy than reading for enjoyment but can enrich your writing practice.
But there’s also the fact that, in Nicole Kronzer’s words, “Every book wants to be written its own way.” No formula exists that will work for each project. It’s also “easy to tell people what to do, and actually doing it is a separate thing” (Nicole Kronzer). Writing a novel is a process of learning not only about the story and world you’ve created, but about your vision as an artist, your patterns and catalysts and skills, as well as where you need to grow. Payal Doshi described how after drafting her debut novel, she realized she had automatically written all of the characters as white:
“When it hit me, it hit me so hard that I thought, I’m never going to write anything other than my lived experience and my country and my culture… It became clear to me that I wanted to write joyful stories, because again, underrepresented cultures like South Asian cultures, most of the stories you see in literature are stories of pain and struggle and grief and immigration and war stories and poverty. All very important, but there’s no balance… So that’s what I discovered about myself. To write and champion stories that are fun, empowering, and that showcase my culture.”
Nuanced, authentic representation of different identities is important for many reasons. It can transform a young reader’s perspective, challenge stereotypes, and build empathy for others. If they’re seeing themselves represented in stories, it can empower readers and make them feel less alone. Alison McGhee shared about the role of loneliness in her work: “I reach out in my words to the loneliness in other people in an attempt to be that unseen connection. Whoever is reading the book, this is my gift to you in our shared aloneness.”
Julie Schumacher spoke to this idea as well. Many of the books she read as a young person were dark, but “from the start they taught kids something about sadness in the world, and difficulty, and grief, and loneliness, all those things.” Literature for kids and teens can contain immense complexity and emotional depth. Payal Doshi discussed how including these topics and emotions is important because even if a young reader isn’t going through the exact same situation, “you’re still going through so much as just a general growing up process. You can relate and empathize at that time with the struggles the characters are going through because you’re going through some form of it or the other.” Alison McGhee expressed a similar thought: “Death, loss, a transforming world, difficult relationships with parents or people close to them, bullying—children are aware of those things whether we write about them or not, so why not write about life in a way that gives a child a feeling of comfort and that they’re not alone?”
There’s considerable debate about what kinds of topics belong in books for young readers. What kinds of realities should be reflected and explored? As Alison McGhee points out, “There are themes that just transcend all age.” Several writers I interviewed pushed back against the age categories for young adult, middle grade, and children’s books. Nicole Kronzer touched on the gaps they often create. “Publishing is fascinating because writing is art, and we’re telling this story, but publishing is a business.” She added, “it’s a disservice to call the genre “young adult” because teenagers are not young versions of adults. They are their own thing. And that thing is awesome. The genre really should be called “teen lit” because it is for teenagers.” These conversations fascinated me because they offered perspectives on categorization that I had not yet considered. On a similar note, Alison McGhee said, “these categories elide and glide into each other.” She goes on to describe how age divisions can be “stifling” and she rarely considers them during the writing process. At a later stage, the story usually matches with an age group, but she still sees storytelling as more expansive than the categories seem to allow:
“As we grow and change throughout our lives, and we’re trying to make the world more inclusive and more understanding and more welcoming, why narrow down? Why say, “This book is for this particular age”? Because they’re not, really. How else do we grow and empathize as children unless we’re reading all different kinds of books?”
Despite the limitations of categories, every writer I spoke to shared their love for writing for young readers. Payal Doshi said writing middle grade was an “intuitive” thing for her and she finds it interesting because “they’re not boxed in yet, all of their opinions aren’t solidified yet. They’re fluid, they’re figuring things out.” She also mentioned that there’s no need to talk down to young readers or overly simplify things. In fantasy, there’s an opportunity for fun and exciting adventures as well as deeper character development: “the root of the story is about friendship. It’s about discovering yourself. It’s about overcoming obstacles” (Payal Doshi).
Others shared how writing for kids and teens is appealing because of the potency and newness of young people’s experiences: “the emotions are often stronger and more poignant in YA fiction because those characters are encountering certain emotions—fear, rage, love—for one of the first times” (Julie Schumacher). Geoff Herbach also mentioned characters experiencing new situations: “Their responses to those situations are truthful, but also unreliable. It’s so fun to have them come into a scene with expectations, but be totally unprepared for the outcome of those scenes. And to have them be able to reflect on things they just don’t understand.”
A young person’s search for understanding and connection to the world around them is an interesting realm to explore as a writer. Their perspectives and ideas often evolve faster than adults, and there’s so much to learn: “I think YA narrators are unreliable, but totally sincere. They believe that they’re being honest. They’re not lying, they’re just reading the situation incorrectly” (Geoff Herbach). Julie Schumacher was intrigued by young characters because of “their imperfect awareness of things.” She went on to say that “young characters are often deliberately kept in the dark by adults. So there’s an incomplete knowledge that leads to a helplessness, needing to be involved or to understand something, but it’s being, in part, kept away from you.”
These characters may be searching for authenticity, in themselves or in the world, that they have yet to find. As writers, it’s an opportunity to explore the intricacies, both light and dark, that come along with that journey. Nicole Kronzer described teenagers as “people who can see their childhood from where they’re standing and also their impending adulthood. It’s this dynamic, dramatic time in a person’s life.” I couldn’t agree more—it’s a time rich with feeling, beauty, and conflict that makes for engaging and impactful stories. Childhood and adolescence are also things every adult has experienced, which is why I think young people’s literature can be compelling for readers of all ages. As Alison McGhee pointed out, “On the outside we age in this very linear fashion, but on the inside, we’re all the ages we ever were, combining and recombining endlessly.”
After speaking with these five authors, I’m gratified to be writing about young people. I believe wholeheartedly in the value and quality of these stories. Each interview both affirmed my love for these books and allowed me to see them in fresh, meaningful ways. And I am eager to delve into this upcoming year of writing with newfound wisdom and momentum. Thanks so much to those who have followed my posts throughout this year, to the authors I interviewed, and to the Minnesota State Arts Board for making this project possible. Happy writing and reading in 2024!
Natalie Martell is a 2023 recipient of a Creative Support for Individuals grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board. These activities are made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, thanks to a legislative appropriation by the Minnesota State Legislature; and by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.