Yesterday I had the opportunity to visit my local Barnes and Noble, which is a rare occurrence for me. I wasn’t there to scout out the YA fiction but I remembered the anecdote Meghan Cox Gurdon wrote about in her controversial article “Darkness Too Visible”, about a parent who went to the bookstore and couldn’t find anything to read that didn’t have dark themes.

I had to get past a large display of Ally Carter’s books to reach the YA fiction shelves. Ally Carter writes the Gallagher Girls books, which are a lot of fun, and not what I’d describe as dark. I saw other displays of contemporary teen fiction as well, before I reached the shelves marked for teens.

So, what are Barnes and Noble’s categories for teens? There’s teen paranormal romance, teen science fiction and fantasy, teen adventure, some contemporary stuff, chick-litty and soap opera-ish stuff, fiction on “the tough stuff”. The fiction on “the tough stuff” is emotionally intense, realistic fiction that often includes explicit description, and can be very disturbing. This is the “darkness too visible” that seems to bother Ms. Gurdon the most, which is understandable, as she’s a mother to teenagers herself. In her article, she related that her experience has been that the average teen doesn’t deal with these issues. That hasn’t been my experience. But let’s say that she’s right. What about the kids who aren’t average teens? Where are they supposed to go for support and information when they feel alone or unable to help a friend?

Well, there is a nonfiction section for teens at my Barnes and Noble, jammed into a corner. If I needed help with a real life problem, I’d look in nonfiction. What’s in the nonfiction section at my local bookstore? Memoirs (like Farewell to Manzanar), the Bible for teens, style and fashion, puberty, and the teen versions of Chicken Soup for the Soul and Stephen Covey. This is supposed to be helpful and supportive to teens dealing with cutting, sexual abuse, domestic violence, rape, drug abuse, mental illness, divorce, sexual identity, suicide, and disability? Teens who may, at as young an age as fourteen, soon be parents themselves?

Nonfiction isn’t filling the need. It’s the writers of teen fiction who create support communities, include 800 numbers, and offer resources to kids who need more. It’s these writers of teen fiction who are saying to teens that they are not alone.

Here’s what the nonfiction section at Barnes and Noble did offer me: a book called The Notebook Girls. It’s a true story of four “average” privileged fifteen year old girls who passed a notebook around to keep connected, because their schedules conflicted. I looked it up and discovered that it was a source of controversy at the time of publication, and I can understand why. In just the first few pages, the mentions of casual drug use, stereotyping, and nastiness were so appalling that it made me ill. A major publishing house apparently decided it would be a good idea to publish this notebook, uncensored. It would be hurtful to be written about by these girls in this way even if the notebook were from 20 years ago, but these girls were still in college when the book was published. These “average teenagers” clearly had a lot going on under the surface that Mom and Dad weren’t noticing.

Is there darkness too visible in young adult fiction? Maybe, for some kids. But it’s the darkness not visible, the guidance and support that’s not provided to teens of many kinds, in nonfiction and in life, that really concerns me.