RAR #132: Books for Teens, and Why YA is a Genre (not a reading level)

Sarah Mackenzie (00:12): You're listening to the Read-Aloud Revival Podcast. This is the podcast that helps you make meaningful and lasting connections with your kids through books. (00:29): Hello, hello. Sarah Mackenzie here. This is episode 132. In today's episode, we're going to talk about why YA is a genre, not a reading level. YA of course means young adult, and if you've got teens or kids who will be teens before you know it, this episode is for you. We're talking today about that tricky section of your library or bookstore. I'm taking about the YA or teen section. We get a lot of questions from Read-Aloud Revival listeners about how to navigate this section of the library, how to choose books there, what to do when your child is ready to read beyond middle grade novels, but you want to make sure the content is still appropriate. Let's talk about it. (01:15): In this episode, I'm going to describe what YA is and what it isn't, which is going to lead us to a conversation about the issues that arise with YA books and whether it's essential for teens to read YA books on the way to adulthood or not. Of course, I'm also going to recommend some books, because, well, that's what we do here after all. I'll tell you what I'm not going to do in this episode. I am not going to tell you what to do. My hope is that this episode will help you make better decisions for your family, but you know your kids and your family best. This is just a family reminder right here at the top not to replace your own discernment for mine. (01:54): I hope the information you get from this podcast episode will help you make the best decisions you can for your own family, because that's the way it should be. Right? I also want you to feel free to disagree with me or to go an entirely different route. I hope this episode is a data point for you as you navigate the reading life with your teens. (02:13): All right. We're good there? Great. Before we dive in, I'm going to answer a listener question. Speaker 2 (02:19): Hey, Sarah. It's Patty in Virginia, and I had a question about summer read alouds for a wide variety of ages. I was thinking about reading aloud to some kids in the neighborhood as a summer book club, and we'd have a large group of... There's a large group of kids in our neighborhood, a wide variety of ages and background maybe between ages four and 14. I'd love to hear your suggestions for a fun summer read that's not too long that we could go through maybe a chapter a week or something like that. Thanks. Sarah Mackenzie (02:47): Okay, Patty. I love this idea so much. I have this vision of the neighborhood kids kind of circling around you on your front lawn, and everyone eating drippy popsicles while you read aloud. So fun. The challenge for me was coming up with books that are short-ish, because summer always goes faster than we expect, right? Here's what I got for you. Here's a few recommendations. Go look them up, read the descriptions, and see what you think will appeal the most to the kids you'll be reading to. My first suggestion is McBroom's Wonderful One Acre Farm: Three Tall Tales. They are in fact three separate tales, so you could read on each way. They're funny. Basically, Josh McBroom learns that has 80 acres of Iowa farmland are all stacked on top of each other at the bottom of a muddy pond, and he thinks he's been bamboozled. It is very funny, and I think it appeals to a wide range of ages. (03:36): Now, you could read McBroom's Wonderful One Acre Farm and then afterwards get Here Comes McBroom, which is a followup book that also has three tales. That would give you six separate read aloud sessions. I think that would be fun. (03:50): Another recommendation is The Prairie Thief by Melissa Wiley. I love Melissa Wiley, and this one is kind of people describe it as a mashup between Little House on the Prairie and The Spiderwick Chronicles, but I just think it's a fun mystery, prairie mystery, not too long, and I actually read it to my kids in a single day. We spent the entire day reading, but I think you could read it easily in a summer like once a week, a chapter a week, or a couple chapters. Actually, the chapters are short, so maybe a couple chapters a week. That's The Prairie Thief. (04:18): Another good one, this one's a classic, is Owls in the Family by Farley Mowat. It's a comedy. Basically, this young boy's pet menagerie kind of gets a little bit out of control when he adds a couple of cranky pet owls. It's funny, and it's got some summertime neighborhood charm in it. (04:39): The last one I would recommend is Homer Price by Robert McCloskey. Another classic. You probably know about this one, but if not, go ahead and read that description to see which one of those appeals. I hope, I hope, hope, hope, you have a wonderful time. (04:52): Hey, if you grab a picture of your summer book club, send it to us, because I would love to see the kids and you reading aloud this summer. That's way too much fun. (05:11): I'm going to be recommending a lot of books and suggesting different titles to you in this episode. As a reminder, you can get those all in the show notes. You don't have to scribble them down, or pull over if you're driving, or stop folding laundry, or going on your run, or whatever you're doing while you're listening. They're all at ReadAloudRevival.com/132. If you want the list of books that we're talking about later on, if you can't remember a title I mentioned, that's where you want to go. ReadAloudRevival.com/132. (05:40): How do we help our teens navigate their reading lives? It's tricky for a variety of reasons I think, not the least of which is that our kids often read faster and more than we do. We can't pre-read or even keep up with everything they're reading. Add to that issue that when you visit the library or book shop and head to the teen section, you might be, well, less than enthused, shall we say. (06:06): I need to define a few terms here at the top of our conversation, so that we're all on the same page. We're going to do a really quick lesson on the difference between chapter books, middle grade novels, and YA novels. First, chapter books. These are the book your child first starts to read on their own when they're gaining reading fluency. They indeed have chapters. They're usually pretty short chapters and pretty short books. They're targeted toward kids aged about seven to 10, although if you have earlier or later readers, then these same books will appeal to younger and older ages than just seven to 10. Chapter books think The Magic Treehouse Series, Nate the Great, Cam Jansen, The Rainbow Magic Fairy Series. I had a kid love those during that season of her life. The Boxcar Children, Encyclopedia Brown. These kinds of books are incredibly useful during that stage when your child's just becoming a fluent reader in that they allow, these kind of books, allow your kids to practice a lot of words without a lot of struggle. These are true chapter books. (07:09): Next are middle grade novels. I know calling the middle grade novels makes you think of middle school, but that's not what it means. The publishing world considers a middle grade novel any novel written primarily for kids age eight to 12. We're talking about more like third to seventh grade-ish. Middle grade novels tend to focus on themes around friendship, family. They often center around the main character's immediate world. Almost always the main character is going to be around age 10 to 13. As far as content restrictions goes, in a middle grade novel for the most part they have no or very limited profanity, graphic violence, or sexual content. That isn't to say that middle grade novels won't have any problematic content, or that they're just automatically going to be something you deem appropriate for your kids, but explicit themes are, generally speaking, not allowable in middle grade novels. (08:05): Young adult, or what is commonly referred to as YA. YA novels are targeted to kids age 13 to 18. They tend to focus heavily on themes that we might think of as angsty teen issues. YA characters are often discovering the world beyond their home and immediate life, and they're very often analyzing the meaning of things. Main characters in YA novels are most often between the ages of 14 and 18. A YA novel's going to be longer than a middle grade novel in a lot of cases, and a characteristic trait in YA, and this is something we're going to talk about more in just a moment, is the pushing of boundaries. Indeed, there are very few content restrictions on what is deemed "appropriate" for YA. Profanity, graphic violence, sexual content, from a publisher's perspective, it's all allowable in a YA novel. (08:55): This is a huge distinguishing point between middle grade and YA. Here's something important to consider. When we step from chapter books to middle grade novels, so that is we're stepping from Cam Jansen to Little House on the Prairie, we take a step up in reading level. Right? Middle grade novels contain more sophisticated language patterns, better syntax, a more rich and varied vocabulary. Reading a middle grade novel is a richer literary experience than reading a chapter book. It makes sense to assume that the same thing happens when we move from middle grade novels to YA. We're taking a step up in the beauty and complexity of the language and sophistication of the narrative, but that's just not the case. (09:41): You go from reading a middle grade novel to a YA book, and you actually aren't taking a step up at all. The reading level is often very similar. Sometimes you'll find that YA books are simpler in fact than a really well written middle grade novel. You're not getting more sophisticated language patterns. You're not getting improved vocabulary or syntax with YA, and this is something where I think it's important to notice because YA is not a step up in reading level. Actually, YA is not a reading level at all. (10:09): It's tricky, because YA is grouped at your library or bookstore in a teen section, so it feels like a level, but it's not. It's just a step into a different genre or a step into a different reading category. When we go from middle grade to YA, we're not going to a higher reading level at all. We're just reading a different kind of book like if you go from reading a mystery to reading a fantasy novel. It's a different kind of story. (10:34): Allow me to explain. What makes a YA book a YA book? It depends on who you ask, and the category itself hasn't been around that long, so we're sort of figuring it out as we go. Aside from what I've already mentioned, YA books have a tendency to push boundaries. They push boundaries in a few ways. One way is simply that sex, drugs, and rock and roll feel that you probably bristled at a few minutes ago when I told you that YA books have very few content restrictions on them. This is one of maybe, or maybe it is the, biggest difference between middle grade and young adult. It's not the level. Right? We're not stepping up in reading level. It's the content. It's PG-13 you could say, and in some cases, it's R. That might help you think about the difference between middle grade and YA. (11:20): Not always, of course, there are some YA novels that aren't edgy in this way at all, and I'll recommend a few later in the show, but very often this is the case. (11:30): Another stark difference between middle grade and YA is how hopeful the ending is, or how hopeful it isn't perhaps. Middle grade novels tend to end on a hopeful note, and YA novels oftentimes have less optimistic endings. I don't think this is a small discrepancy. I believe that all good books leave the reader seeing their world afresh, and I also believe that authors are duty-bound to tell young readers the truth. The truth is hope. I have serious concerns about books leaving readers of any age feeling depressed or bleak, but I'm doubly concerned when that reader is a teenager. I think there might be no worse time in life to leave a reader feeling hopeless or angsty or depressed than in the teen years. To my mind, this is possibly an even greater concern than the explicit content we were talking about before, which is also a concern. A book that leaves a reader feeling like, "Is this all there is?", that's not a good book. That doesn't mean that books have to have happy endings. Right? (12:32): Think about Kate DiCamillo's books. They're all middle grade novels, by the way. Books like Because of Win Dixie, The Tale of Despereaux, the Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, Tiger Rising. They don't have a happy ending in that everything turns out peachy. Actually, I'm pretty sure Kate's books never have happy endings in the sense that everything turns out peachy, but they do always, always leave the reader with a sense of hope, with this feeling of, "All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well." This is telling the reader a truth, and this is what a good book does always, even a book that tackles hard to weighty topics or goes to dark places. It always leaves you in the light. (13:16): Not too long ago, Kate DiCamillo herself was actually on the podcast, and I asked her about her story endings. Like I said, they're not all happy endings in the sense that everything turns out the way the reader hoped or that the main character hoped, but let me play back to you what she said about the way stories end. Kate DiCamillo (13:34): I, as a kid as a reader, when things were tied up really neatly, I felt condescended to, because I felt that, I mean, it's that thing where kids can look around and see the world and see how messy it is. I've always had an aversion to everything being just so at the end of a story, because the world is a messy place. Art is pattern, and life is chaos. There's pattern in art, but it doesn't necessarily... Everything doesn't need to be tied up neatly, which then goes back to why doesn't Opal's mother come back, which is the lament that I hear all the time and in really beautiful questions from kids. It's not a demand, but it's a lament. Things aren't perfect, and we wish for certain things, but there's a beautiful thing sitting right in front of us. If we're lucky, we'll look around and see what is here. (14:38): Opal, this happens beautifully in the movie version of the book, where she looks around and she sees everybody, and it's not what she thought she wanted at the beginning of the story, which was he mother. She'll always miss her mother, but look, here are these beautiful people, and she's in a room with them sitting around singing. That's grace. Grace is offered to us again and again, and it might not be what we think we want, but it's there, and we need to be present for it. Sarah Mackenzie (15:10): There's hope. There's grace. Gosh, isn't that beautiful? If you've found yourself wandering a teen section of a book store or library wondering why you can't find a single thing worth handing to your teen, it might help to realize that it's sort of like trying to find a romantic comedy in a stack of sci fi movies, right? Or finding a family movie in a stack of horror movies. The YA section itself is a category with teen characters, geared for teen readers, dealing with what made be considered "teen issues" with very few restrictions on content or appropriateness. (15:44): Now, I feel compelled to say not all YA books are edgy. In fact, I have read some YA books that are just downright wonderful. Shannon Hale is an author of YA that I consistently enjoy and love handing to my teens. This is not meant to be a diatribe against YA, but I think it's important that we realize that YA isn't a reading level as much as it's just a different kind of book, because if we know what the books are that we're looking at, then we're better suited to help our kids find good books to read, right? (16:14): There's a few ways to navigate this. Now, like I said earlier, I have no intention on this podcast of telling you what to do, but I do have a few ideas for how you can proceed knowing what you now know about YA. I'm going to offer them here. (16:27): One possibility of a way to proceed is just to stay with middle grade novels longer. This is my best suggestion I think honestly. It's what we do at our house. I am convinced that some of the best books ever written are middle grade novels. I mean, have you read Bud Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis? Middle grade. Echo by Pam Munoz Ryan? Middle grade. The Little House on the Prairie series by Laura Ingalls Wilder? Middle grade. The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis? Middle grade. All of these are considered middle grade novels. Now, remember that a book that has, and book really, that has a main character who's between the ages of eight and 12, and that the book doesn't have explicit content, is going to be classified as a middle grade novel. Just because the main character fits in this particular age group, and the book doesn't wander explicit content, it will very often be classified as middle grade. (17:21): Middle grade does not mean only eight to 12 year olds are going to benefit from this. In fact, I would bet that a lot of the books you remember having a big impact on your growing up would be considered middle grade. (17:43): If you've got my book The Read-Aloud Family, you'll notice that I have whole chapter of book recommendations for teens in there. It's chapter 15 for those of you following along at home. That chapter is packed with middle grade novels that I recommend for teens. I really think this is the best thing to do if you're concerned about the kind of book that a YA is, and you're not really excited about handing those to your kids. Stick with middle grade novels longer. Remember, we don't age out of middle grade novels when our kids turn 12. It's just that the main character of the book itself is probably under the age of 12. It's the way the publishers do it. (18:20): Here's a few middle grade novels that I recommend, especially for teens. You'll find links, of course, to all of these in the show notes. The few that come to mind right away Sweep by Jonathan Auxier, which I would name as one of the best books I've ever read actually, as an adult. Fever 1793 by Laurie Halse Anderson. Haddie Big Sky and Haddie Ever After by Kirby Larson. Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacquline Woodson. That book won a smattering of awards, all for good reason. A Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park. The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmitt. These are all wonderful, wonderful middle grade novels that are perfect for teens to enjoy. That's one option is just to stick with middle grade longer. That's what we do at our house for the most part. (19:06): Another possibility, we also do this at our house, is to navigate the YA section of your library with some help from reliable reviews. Let me give you a couple places to look for those. I like to peek at Common Sense Media for book reviews, because those books reviews will note problematic content. They're also pretty easy to scan, so you can review those, you can scan those reviews pretty quickly, even if you're at the library or at the book story to give an overall feel of a book's appropriateness for your child. The views are all available at commonsensemedia.org. We'll put a link in the show notes of course, but I often look there. (19:43): Another place I often peek at for reviews for YA novels is redeemedreader.com. They don't have every book reviewed there, but they are pretty good at keeping up with the new and notable stuff. You can often find books that are getting a lot of buzz here. I don't always agree with their reviews, but I use it as a data point, just like I was telling you to do with this episode. The Redeemed Reader writers will mention whether a book has possible problematic and will tell you what that is, and then they also give the book a couple of ratings. I use their information to make my own decision. It's been a very helpful resource for me. Again, that's redeemedreader.com. (20:19): Another handy resource to have on your shelf is Honey for a Teen's Heart. This is a book. You might be familiar with Honey for a Child's Heart. The same authors Gladys Hunt and Barbara Hampton offer book recommendations in an assortment of categories for teens in Honey for a Teen's Heart. There are actually 400 recommended books in this book. Recommended books in this book. It's worth owning, and you want to get your hands on that probably and have it just for your shelf. (20:46): Oftentimes if my teens say, "I don't know what to read. I'm looking for something," I will hand this book to them and say, "Find something in here, and I will get it for you." (20:53): A few specifically YA novels that I recommend, because I told that there are some that are just really well done, so here are a few that I really like. The Faithful Spy by John Hendrix. I read this recently, and it was astoundingly good. It is a biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer that reads like a suspense graphic novel kind of. It's an interesting reading experience. It's hard to articulate. I loved it. The Faithful Spy by John Hendrix. (21:20): I already mentioned Shannon Hale. She has a whole series called The Books of Bayern and The Goose Girl is the first. Those are fairy tale retellings with a YA flavor. Like I said, I really like Shannon Hale's YA style. (21:33): The Watson's Go to Birmingham 1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis is technically a YA book, and I loved it. The Book Thief, by Mark Zusak if you're wanting something for World War II era, that's technically YA. Red Scarf Girl by Ji-li Jiang. Oh my goodness. I loved this book, so did my oldest teenage daughter. This one tells the true story of a 12 year old girl being raised in communist China in 1966 under the authority of Chairman Mao. This is really, really good. Another one I really liked was called Piecing Me Together written by Renee Watson. This one won some awards last year as well, and I very much enjoyed it. (22:17): Something to keep in mind. If your child is reading YA or otherwise, if they are reading, they are going to run into some problematic content at one point or another. It's not a matter of it but when. This doesn't need to be a reason for us to fret or to worry or wring our hands. Instead, I think we can use this opportunity as a gateway for conversation, because we're hoping to raise discerning readers, right? Part of becoming a discerning reader is training in discernment. You've got to have something to discern to get that training. This is just another reason why having frequent organic, casual conversations with our kids about books is really, really important because those conversations can make finding problematic content in books, it can bring it to light, and it can also sort of redeem that situation and make it work for us, and help our kids become more discerning readers. (23:10): You can refer to chapters 10 and 11 of my book The Read-Aloud Family if you want more of the nitty-gritty on how to do that, how to have these organic conversations about books. For now, just remind yourself that part of your job, in fact a huge part of your job, is to help your kids learn to navigate sticky situations in their life. Right? Reading a book with an issue, a worldview, language that you're not excited about, it's not a failure. It's not a problem. It's just part of the journey. It's part of what we're helping our kids navigate. (23:52): You can stick with middle grade for longer, you can navigate your YA section with the help of some reliable reviews, and a third way to navigate is to move into good adult novels. Remember YA is not a level between middle grade and adult from a reading level perspective, so you don't need to read YA in order to tackle adult books. It's kind of a new category actually. We used to always just go from kids novels to adult. That's how it used to work. (24:19): Of course, you want to be cautious of content here, because there's not going to be any limits more or less on an adult novel. Let me tell you some adult books I'd recommend for your teens. First, classics. I mean, classics are a natural place to send a teen reader who is ready for something more. Anything by Jane Austen of course. Pride and Prejudice or Emma or Sense and Sensibility. Those are obvious choices. The Lord of the Rings series by Tolkien. The Screwtape Letters or The Space Trilogy by C.S. Lewis. They all make sense here, and they're also wonderful books being written today that are for adults that are good fits for teens. (24:54): A couple examples. I recommended before, and I'll recommend again, A Fall of Marigolds by Susan Meissner. Another one that I really like that is kind of similar in feel to that is called Whose Waves These Are by Amanda Dykes. God Smuggler by Brother Andrew, which tells the true story of a man who basically smuggled truth behind the iron curtain. It's kind of a page turner. Marilla of Green Gables by Sarah McCoy. I read that one recently, and I loved it. It's basically, and for any of your teenagers who loved Anne of Green Gables and Lucy Maud Montgomery's books in general, this is Marilla is Green Gables is the story according to Marilla. It's Marilla's story growing up, and it's extremely well done. (25:39): Another one I really enjoyed is Unbroken, but I actually recommend the Young Reader edition of that, so we'll make sure the Young Reader edition is linked in the show notes. That one's a really beautiful, touching, heavy book to read as well. (25:52): I would caution you though, in general, against moving into adult books too quickly, because there's really no reason to, especially with the abundance of truly wonderful middle grade out there right now. There's nothing an adult novel can give your kids that a middle grade novel can't. As far as the beauty of language, the syntax, the vocabulary, the richness of experience, the ability to watch a hero overcome obstacles, to be inspired to live with heroic virtue, to grow in empathy and walk a mile in another's shoes, there is nothing an adult book can give your kids that a middle grade novel can't. There's just no rush. (26:30): I think it's helpful to know that the New York Times, just as an example, is written at about the 10th grade reading level, and that none of us would think that... As adults, none of us would say that was below our reading level. Right? Actually, many of the popular blockbuster fiction novels for adults, and I'm thinking like Tom Clancy, John Grisham, I don't know. All of the paperbacks that you see at the supermarket, they are usually written around the seventh or eighth grade reading level. Not content wise, mind you, but just as far the complexity of language and the difficulty of reading goes. It's kind of funny. We don't have a problem as adults reading "below" our reading level, but we're very concerned about it with our teenagers. (27:12): Here's the thing. Once they're reading well, then we just want to give them good, wonderful things to read, and there's so much in middle grade. When you move into adult books, you aren't really taking a step up. When you move into YA books, you're definitely not taking a step up. You're just more often widening the context. Feel free to stay with middle grade novels longer than you expected. I think you'll be delighted by the riches there. (27:36): I hope that you have a clearer idea of what the YA section is, what a YA book is, why it's called YA, and I hope you feel more prepared to help your teens find books after this episode. I think it's a gift, right, to give our teens books that they'll fall in love with that help them see the world afresh that don't leave them with a sense of, "Is this all there is?", but rather a sense of, "All this is and heaven too." I mean, that's what it means to leave our young readers with hope. (28:04): I'm hoping that understanding that YA is not a reading level but is rather a kind of story will help you put wonderful books into the hands of the teens in your life. (28:21): Now it's time for Let The Kids Speak. This is my favorite part of the podcast where kids tell us about their favorite stories that have been read aloud to them. Speaker 4 (28:30): Hi. My name is [inaudible 00:28:30], and I am six years old, and I live in Coatesville, Pennsylvania. I want to tell you about Ice Skate Extraordinaire. It's a book called Fancy Nancy, and I really like it because it makes me happy and because I like it. Speaker 5 (29:03): What is your name? Owen (29:06): Owen. Speaker 5 (29:06): And where do you live Owen? Owen (29:07): In Pennsylvania. Speaker 5 (29:09): How old are you? Owen (29:10): Four. Speaker 5 (29:11): What is your favorite book? Owen (29:15): A Mommy for Owen. Speaker 5 (29:16): A Mommy for Owen. Why do you love this book? Owen (29:17): Because I like to watch. Jude (29:21): My name is Jude. I'm from Colorado. My favorite book is The BFG. Rachel (29:27): Hey, my name is Rachel. I'm from Colorado, and my favorite book is Wind in the Willows. Faith (29:34): Hi. My name is Faith, and my favorite book is the Betsy-Tacy series. Ben (29:41): Hi. My name is Ben. I'm from Colorado. I'm 11 years old, and I really like the Hardy Boys Series, because they're full of mystery, and they're really exciting. Megan (29:50): My name's Megan. I am four years old, and I live in [inaudible 00:30:08] in Pennsylvania, and my favorite book is [inaudible 00:30:08] and the Berenstain Bears and Secret Pizza Party. I love it. Owen (30:14): Hello. My name is Owen. I live in Burnside, Pennsylvania. I am seven years old. My favorite book is The Last Firehawk. My favorite part is when they have to find a pieces of a purple stone before an evil vulture named Thorn does, and they use the stone to defeat him before he takes over the island of Perodia. Adler (30:35): Hello. My name is Adler, and I'm from rural Arkansas, and I am seven years old. My favorite books are The Boxcar Children Mysteries. I like them because they are mysteries, and I like mysteries. My favorite author is Kate DiCamillo. I like her because she has written so many good books. Bye. I hope you like my recording. Speaker 13 (31:00): What's your name? Maddox (31:01): Maddox. Speaker 13 (31:02): How old are you? Maddox (31:02): I'm four. Speaker 13 (31:04): Where are you from? Maddox (31:06): Arkansas? Speaker 13 (31:06): What's your favorite book? Maddox (31:08): Winnie the Pooh. Speaker 13 (31:11): Why do you like Winnie the Pooh? Maddox (31:12): Because Eeyore gets knocked in the water by Tigger? Speaker 13 (31:16): Because Eeyore gets knocked in the water by Tigger? Maddox (31:18): Yeah. Speaker 13 (31:18): Who's your favorite author? Maddox (31:19): Mo Willems. Speaker 13 (31:22): Why do you like Mo Willems? Maddox (31:24): Because a lot of my favorite books I have written. Speaker 13 (31:29): He's written a lot of your favorite books you've read? Maddox (31:32): Yeah. Speaker 13 (31:32): Good job bud. Sarah Mackenzie (31:36): Well, that's it for today. Thank you kids for your book recommendations. Remember that all those books I mentioned are in the show notes, and those can be grabbed at readaloudrevival.com/132. We actually put this episode up as a blog post that same spot. If you have a friend or somebody who know who needs this information, is struggling with their own YA or teen section at their library or book shop, or just trying to find good books for their teens, you can send them there even if they're not big podcast listeners. They can read it, or they can listen to it. That's all at readaloudrevival.com/132. I'll be back in two weeks with another episode. (32:15): I mentioned on this show that one of the books, adult books, I recommend for teens is called Whose Waves These Are by Amanda Dykes, and Amanda Dykes herself is actually joining me on the podcast next time. We're going to be talking about sea-blown books. Seaside adventure type books for your kids, which are perfect to read for summer. We're also going to chat about how children's books helped her write her adult novel. It's a great episode, so join me in two weeks for that. Until then, go make meaningful and lasting connections with your kids through books.