A lot of publicity has gone to the newly recognized audience of “crossover readers,” an audience that only really emerged into the mainstream with the success of Harry Potter. Crossover readers returning to (or discovering) YA fiction are now an audience to be reckoned with, and some publishers are even experimenting with marketing to an audience that might be outgrowing YA books and wants titles more reflective of those in-between years that exist now from the time at which you finish high school and the time you truly declare your independence.

It’s great that this crossover audience is getting some attention. But what’s interesting is that as we talk about adults crossing over to a genre aimed at teens, there is a group aged 10-14 (or, depending on who you talk to, 8-12) that most people refer to as “tweens” (which is a term I hate). And that group is crossing over to read not just YA fiction targeted at a teen audience of ages 15 and up, but adult novels. This isn’t new. YA fiction didn’t always exist, and the books that did weren’t necessarily the ones that rang the bells of these kids, who are maybe not quite ready to leave the children’s section completely (there are some extremely awesome books for middle grade readers)but are also ready to strike out for the books their parents have hidden in a box in the back of their closet. Today when we think of middle grade students and horror, Goosebumps is what usually comes to mind, but oh my gosh, do you have any idea how many kids between 8 and 12 have read Stephen King’s IT? I asked a group of women on Facebook what book had scared them the most as a kid, and one of them said IT, which she had read at age 8 (when asked if she would give it to her kids at that age, she gave me a resounding NO). Erin Morgenstern, on NPR’s Risky Reads, wrote about reading IT first at age 12 (link here). If you read through the comments, you’ll see how young kids often are when they start reading Stephen King. One commenter said “I went straight for Stephen King in fifth grade.” Another commenter started reading King at age 9. I myself remember reading IT when I was about 12… so, you see, those older readers in the children’s section of the library, are getting their books from everywhere. Morgenstern’s article appeared as part of a series by NPR called PG-13: Risky Reads, in which authors discuss the books that, as teens, changed their lives. Some of these are definitely YA, some would be considered adult fiction, but, in spite of the title of this series, many of these books were also read by kids much younger than 13.

This NPR series reminds me a lot of a book by Lizzie Skurnick, Shelf Discovery, that I read some time ago– it actually has covered some of the same books. Shelf Discovery was compiled from a column at Jezebel called Fine Lines (archives are at the bottom of the article), where she (and some others) write about fiction read by this same age group–middle graders and teens– mostly titles girls in that age group would have read as they grew up in the 60s, 70s, and 80s Crossing over directly from children’s books to adult fiction at that time really isn’t all that uncommon, and that may be why there are so many challenges to books for children and teens. It’s nice to pretend that each kind of reader stays sorted into their little box, and it’s true that some will take the path we expect, or direct them on, or that marketers try to push them on. But really, each reader is different, every kid is different, and there is no sudden revolution, just a world of books and assorted related media that lead in a multitude of ways to discovering who you are as a reader, and who you are in life.

Am I saying that as librarians, educators, and parents, we should be handing our eight year olds Stephen King? No, absolutely not. But many of you probably remember reading books like Flowers in the Attic and The Grounding of Group Six before you were fifteen, and it’s good to remember that kids aren’t getting their books just from the library, and to remember what it was like to be that age and read the books in that box under the bed, when you look at and think about your own young reader. And, as an elementary school librarian recently asked me (to paraphrase) “They’re beyond Goosebumps-, and ready for something more– what can I give them next?”