Throw the Book at 'em

One of the most often whined laments I here about teens today is the “fact” that they are wasting all of their conscious hours playing video games. This common knowledge has been spouted in support of everything from teen violence to teen obesity. Now, according to a March 7th story in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, we finally have confirmation of what teens are squandering both their time and money on, and the result is that we may need to find a new lament. As it turns out, a record number of teens today are spending their hours in the deviant, mind numbing, anti-social act of … reading.

Booklist magazine critic Michael Cart, a leading authority on young adult literature, is quoted in the article as saying; “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.”

Teen book sales are soaring, up by a quarter between 1999 and 2005, and we’re not just talking about Harry Potter and trashy novels. An industry analysis showed that the quality is soaring, as well. It specifically indicates that older teens are enjoying a surge of sophisticated fare, and identified the growth in popularity of young adult literature as a “global phenomenon”. Declared Cart; “We are right smack-dab in the new golden age of young adult literature.”

Of course, the cynic in me eagerly awaits the panicked stories of scary looking teens hanging out in the aisles of your local Barnes and Noble …