CREATING A CORE YOUNG ADULT COLLECTION FAQ

FAQS

You don’t read every page of every book here, did you? And if not, how you can include them? A fair and very important question. It is obvious which books and authors are held in high regard by librarians and teenagers. We need not have read Robert Cormier’s Rag and Bone Shop or every title by Chris Crutcher to KNOW they belong in a core collection: reputation matters. That reputation is based upon the book’s appearance on other best lists, in particular those produced by the Young Adult Library Services Association. Just as important is the reputation of the book among teenagers. The main source of that are reviews and lists created by teens on library and bookstore web sites. Yes, the list by a fifteen boy year old of favorite graphic novels certainly could in reality have been compiled by a fifty year old female, but we’re going on blind faith here that the reviews and lists from teens on Amazon, among other web sites, do reflect real teen interest. Again, this is not science, but more often than not we found the same titles listed again and again when we examined teen produced reviews and lists.

Okay, but how you can annotate something you have not read? During the spring of 2002, we put an inquiry on the YALSA-BK listserv with the subject line “the ethics of annotation.” We asked if people read every book they included on their own library or class booklists. Shock upon shock, most folks answered that they did not. Instead, they relied upon catalogs, reviews, and other sources to complete an annotation. The intellectual act isn’t describing a title; it is the decision to include it in the first place. That stated, Patricia, Kirsten, and the guest annotators did read (or had read) most of the books they annotated. The same cannot be said for many of those with the initials with PJ at the end of the annotation. Patrick relied very heavily on reviews from the professional journals, customer reviews from Amazon and the Hennepin County Library Teen Links web site (http://www.hclib.org) and book descriptions from the publishers to compile the reviews. The idea was to read everything possible about the book, and then a few sentences summarize what made the book special. There are some quotations from reviews and some from Amazon “teen” reviewers, but for the most part, the annotations are synthesis of what people thought was significant or special about the book.

What is a core collection? Let's start with what it is not. It is not a Hall of Fame to honor books. There are many important books in the canon of young adult literature that don't show up here because as important as they may have been to the history of the field, the development of an author, or vital at their time, they are sometime books that contemporary readers just won't want to read. It is also not a catalog; it is a very selective list trying to pull out the best of the best. We selected titles that have strong reputations, that remain relevant, that are readable and accessible, and thus are books which teens should expect to find on the shelves of school and public libraries serving young adults.

How does a book make this core collection? Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart wrote in reference to pornography “while I can not define, I know it when I see it.” You might say the same thing about this core collection. In many cases, the call to include a title was a “gut” decision based on a book’s author, subject, style, or graphic appeal. That stated, our selections are backed-up by the opinions of others in the field. It is also based on observation and conversation with both teenagers and the librarians that serve them. A large part of the selection criteria arose from the totally unscientific test: was the title a book we could visualize a teen holding in her hands and telling us it was “cool.” Just as important is the knowledge that teenager may not find the book in the library’s young adult section. This is a core collection for young adults, not a core collection of young adult books. It is not just a matter of semantics, but a shift in thinking about who drives collection development and the role, in particular in a public library, of the young adult librarian. We serve teen customers, not young adult collections.

So, this is not a core young adult collection? This represents a core collection of books for young adults; maybe they are in a library’s young adult area, but maybe they are not. Novels like Fight Club, graphic novels like The Sandman, or nonfiction like The Hot Zone were not written, marketed, or even intended for the teen audience. You can say the same about almost every Stephen King, Dean Koontz, or Orson Scott Card novel as well. But you cannot deny that teens do read these books. This collection is customer focused: it does not matter that much to the teen where the book is located, just that the library owns it. If you are a young adult librarian, your goal can’t be just to develop a young adult collection, but to make sure that adult and children’s collections contain those items that teens want and need. We have noted books that are aimed at mature readers: a loose term to describe any book with more than its fair share of four letter slang, sex, and/or graphic violence. For every title, we’ve provided the suggested grades. These suggestions come via the Book Wholesalers Inc. database as well as our own knowledge of the titles.

Okay, but The Onion? Psycho? Are you psycho? Many of these titles are going to challenge us to think about that age-old “censorship versus selection” question. Many older teens, especially the “hip and well read” are going to want edgy stuff with adult themes or humor books that are beyond Garfield. That is going to make a lot of folks very nervous. The Onion is funny in a very mean, dark, and often dirty way: their version of Neil Armstrong’s first words when walking on the moon are “Jesus. Fucking Christ, Houston. We’re on the fucking moon.” Does that belong in a young adult collection? Does it belong in a middle school library? A high school library? That is your call based on your community, but if it is included here, it is our belief that titles like these teens do (or do want to) read, and that the titles have worth other than pure popularity. In that way, it is like any best list. YALSA’s Best Books for Young Adults is exactly that: a list compiled by members of a professional organization represents the best books in one year for the young adult audience. That may or may not indicate that they are the best books for the young adults in your library. This is what we feel is a core collection of books for young adults generally; it is your role to determine if they are the best for the young adults you serve, or want to serve.

You did you consult those other best lists, didn’t you? The process of compiling the book was to examine just about every “best books’ list available (see reference points section) in print or online. We also looked at genre lists, subject lists, and lists produced by teenagers. We looked at every issue of VOYA since 1992 for titles which got positive reviews, as well as looking through Booklists for starred reviews. The working plan was to compile a database of all these books. Once we had a book in the database, we would then note every time it appeared on another list. That sounded good in theory, but in practice just didn’t work for a variety of reasons. Thus, the selections were more “art” than science.

Didn’t you have any criteria? As we were looking through reference books, lists, and web sites these are the questions we were asking. If we found we could answer ”yes” to most of these following questions, then the book is included:

ü Has the book won awards and/or been included on other best lists, in particular those compiled by the Young Adult Library Services Association?

ü Does the book primarily appeal to teens for use NOT related to school?

ü Have teens recommended or praised the book with a review on Amazon or other sources recording teen reader response?

ü Is the book significant, groundbreaking, or have “cult appeal”?

ü Does the book represent a quality reading experience?

ü Is the book relevant to the experience of 21^st century teens?

ü Is the book in print (as of August 2002)

We can’t say that every single book here hits seven for seven from the floor, but most of the titles do, and those that are not included, fail on one or more of this criteria. For the most part, Patrick selected the books for inclusion, with Patricia and Kirsten making suggestions for inclusion. The first rough draft list was twice as long, but many titles were dropped because as we stated looking at reader reviews, we realized that while these were good titles, maybe even great titles, they were not core title. Also, we dropped a lot of book simply because they were out of print.

Why does it matter if it is print? We want this to be a practical volume for developing a collection, so there is no sense in listing lots of a great book (Crosses by Shelly Stoehr) that is out of print. But a book's in print status also says something about the reputation of that title. While there exceptions, core titles should be titles that are in steady demand from librarians, teachers, and teens. Thus, that a book from the 1980s remains in print (and in stock) demonstrates there is a demand. By the time you are reading this, many titles may have dropped out of print, in particular nonfiction self-help titles. In non-fiction while we believe the titles we have selected are strong, even more important are the areas of the collection which they represent.

So, if you didn’t read every book, then why are the three of you qualified to write this book? At the end of the book are short biographical statements listing each author’s background. The “three viewpoints” chapter should also give you each a good idea of what each person believes. In addition, this team is balanced. We are from different generations and from different parts of the country and have very different reading interests. For example, Patricia quotes from Milton; Patrick wonders why she is talking about a toaster, and Kirsten won't even get that 70s pop culture reference. We have worked/are working with different population of teenagers in different settings. For years, Patricia was a high school English teacher in Houston; Kirsten is a young adult librarian working in suburban Seattle, while Patrick has worked with teens in a variety of locations, from the suburbs of Cleveland to inner city youth in Houston. Unlike lots of the other lists and books out there, this wasn’t done by a committee, which sometimes leads to group think and gray annotation writing so as not to offend. We have no such restrictions or reservations. The main thing the three authors have in common is we are very opinionated about books.

Who wrote what? Patrick wrote most of the text outside of the core collection, like this FAQ. Patricia edited those sections, improving on them greatly. Within the core collection, Patrick annotated most of the young adult nonfiction and fiction. He and Kirsten split duties on the graphic formats. Kirsten did a little young adult fiction, but her expertise is in the area of speculative fiction, so she annotated almost all the fantasy and science fiction. Patricia’s reading interests are all over the place, so you’ll find PT’s initials on everything from the Where the Red Fern Grows to Jane Eyre. For the most part, she handled the adult fiction titles, in particular the classics which teens seek out on their own. The guest annotators can be found throughout adding their two cents about books they included in their desert island collection. The annotations here, unlike those you might use for your booklists, are NOT reader annotations. These are aimed at professionals working with teens, not teens themselves.

Who is the audience for this book? Any librarian in a school or public library that works with teens. Parents and teachers might also be interested. Of course, teens might find this book of great interest to guide their reading, as might education/library school students studying young adult reading.

Why is this book needed? Lists of materials are what everyone wants at conferences (“do you have any handouts with these titles?”) While there is more information than ever about books, given how busy everyone is with technology, they might not be keeping up on building book collections. Also, while many public library systems are increasing their commitment to serving young adults, they often are unable to back up collections with staff: thus untrained staff need guidance on what to purchase for teens.

Aren’t there lots of other books like this for other publishers? There is nothing totally similar. Wilson does the fiction, public library, high school, and junior high catalogs but they seem very ‘standard” with few graphic formats and a heavy emphasis on young adult literature. Bowker does something similar in its best book series but those titles are very focused on homework books. The Books for You series from National Council of Teachers of English are very good, they use a thematic arrangement which means there are perhaps some titles that we would not consider “core” but fit into a slot. Also, since it is a continuing series, new editions focus on new books: for example, Ender’s Game isn’t included in the latest edition. There are lots of really good thematic bibliographies, like Hearing All Voices, but the specialized focus means lots of titles are excluded just by the design of the book. Our goal is to pull from all of these books the best titles to create a core collection.

This book is not the same as sources such as Wilson’s Junior High Catalog or Senior High Catalog (for which I consulted), aimed just at one setting, but a core collection which is looking primarily at titles NOT tied to, or purchased in support of, a school curriculum. Instead, this core collection might be used as an “opening day” collection for a public library with a new young adult area or a secondary school library desiring to increase the amount of recreational reading. Finally, while the Wilson and NCTE sources have editors and most of the annotations are, by nature, primarily descriptive, we have tried to be more prescriptive and hope you find annotations entertaining as well as informative.

Where are the nonfiction series books? While teen readers were not directly involved in creating this book, we like to think that we are building a true customer driven connection based on what young adults would want to find to read for pleasure or for personal information, not to complete an assignment. Thus, we decided not to include most nonfiction series books. Those are books published by the “big” names in the library field, such as Chelsea House, Rosen, Watts, etc. Those books are not included primarily for three reasons. First, many of the books from these publishers are primarily aimed at support curriculum which is outside of the scope of this book. Second, those working in the library field very well know books and/or series from these publishers. They are reviewed in the major journals (Booklist, School Library Journal, and Voice of Youth Advocates), plus almost every librarian receives a catalog in the mail from these publishers. Our intent here is to include, in particular in nonfiction, those books which have escaped, for a variety of reasons, the radar screens of many of those working with teens. They are not reviewed in our journals, except perhaps in VOYA, and they are much more likely to be found on the shelves of Borders than most public libraries. But the primary reason those titles are missing is books here are those which will provide a teenager with a quality reading experience based on personal interests rather than school assignment. The function of many of these books is to provide information within the context of a strict formula and set numbers of pages held tightly together by library binding. There is nothing wrong with this type of book. Not all, but many, of these books fulfill a function of providing information or entertainment (not that there is anything wrong with that) but they do so in a very functional (and rarely fun) way. These books have a purpose and an audience, but for the purposes of this collection, they are outside our scope. We would like to think that most of the books included here might also be included in a teenager’s own “core collection” of books they own and/or check out frequently. While it is possible that some teens might include series nonfiction in library binding, that would be more than exception than the rule.

What else isn’t here? In addition to books which didn’t’ fit the criteria listed above, there are some notable exceptions. First, the focus is on books. The proposal for this volume and some of the early ad copy promoted audio books, magazines, web sites, and other non-book formats. After getting more into the research, it was obvious that to include all of those would be a book much bigger, longer, and more involved than we could do. Second, there are no series books here. While you will find fantasy trilogies or books with sequels, the numbered series aimed at younger young adults are not included. They should be in a core collection, but they do change so rapidly, that the chances are many listed at this writing would be out of print or unavailable by the time you are reading this. Also, there are some of the big fantasy series missing here and authors like Margaret Weis, Robert Feist, and Mercedes Lackey. While we didn’t have a “budgeted” number of titles, some books just didn’t make the cut. If we included titles by every author that might have an audience among young adults, we would have a catalog, not a core collection.

Another exclusion is that the materials here are English language only. While almost any collection in a public library for teens should feature materials in languages other than English, that was far beyond our expertise. Our cut off date was April 2002. We picked up the various list announcements from ALA midwinter and some spring books, but had to set a cut-off date, although there are a few exceptions. There are no books on the events of 9-11 listed here. While there were some fine books to emerge soon after, in particular the graphic format collections, it is unclear which titles really belong in the collection. That leads to the final and most important exclusion: your customer. This is not a core collection for the Hennepin County Library, the King County Library, the Houston Public Library, St. Agnes Academy High School Media Center, or the Flint Public Library. This is a collection of materials of interest generally to young adults; what belongs in your collection depends on what those young adults need and want.

How many books are included? There are about 1200 titled listed. The breakdown is 60% fiction, 30% nonfiction, and 10% graphic formats. This roughly mirrors the results of the reading interest surveys we looked at which asked a question regarding favorite reading formats. It is a big collection, but it is still just a small, small subset of all the possible books of interest to teens when we expand beyond just young adult literature.

Isn’t that quite a lot for a core collection? Yes and no. When you consider that the audience is teen readers with their wide range of interests, that we are not limiting ourselves just to young adult literature, and that we are including graphic formats, that is actually a manageable number. While we don’t grade or rank every book, from the others lists included in the book, it should be obvious which are the core of the core.

How could you not include (insert your favorite book here)? We hope in this FAQ that we’ve explained WHAT we included, WHY we included, WHO made the decision, and HOW the selection process took place. If you have question or concerns, email us at ya_core@yahoo.com

If this is core collection of “great” books, what does great mean?

A 1999 survey of teens related to reading interests found that most teens said they would read more if they had more time, while anecdotal evidence suggest that teens might read more if they only knew what to do read: if they could find the good books. These are the good books; this is an oversized good book box. These are books which represent the best of the best, but not only in terms of literary quality. In fact, this intersection of quality and potential quantity of circulation (aka popularity) is the main interest of this collection. There was one over-riding criterion: the quality of the reading experience. By that we mean, titles which were not merely easily and quickly readable (series titles, easy nonfiction) but also titles that would stick because of a level of quality, interest, or often experimentation. The core collection also demonstrates the wide range of the young adult reading experience. There are works here by Dr. Seuss and by Orson Scott Card, as well as Chris Crutcher and Cynthia Voigt. There are books which appeal to 6^th graders and those that might appeal to 12^th graders. We think that is strength of the book is that instead of focusing only on young adult literature aimed at 6^th graders, we wanted to look at a wider spectrum of books to connect young adult and libraries. We hope you like the results.