Major Character Deaths In YA Lit

IMG_3045I know we’ve all been shocked and upset when a favorite character unexpectedly dies in books and TV shows. I haven’t seen the TV show based on Cass Morgan’s The 100 series but I heard about one of the main character’s recent deaths’ and how enraged fans were (even though this character isn’t even in the books).

I know that killing off beloved characters isn’t new in books or TV series – but in the past it seems like it happened more infrequently – and characters weren’t always really dead. The “it was all a dream scenario” trope (like Bobby’s death in Dallas, yeah, I know, many of you weren’t even born then!) was used in many books and shows. Soap operas repeatedly reinforce the idea too.

Because of that, we’ve been primed to think that major characters won’t die but when it really happens in books and shows, we refuse to believe it and rail against the writers for killing off our favorite characters (Sean Bean as Ned Stark in Game of Thrones, or Will from The Good Wife) – even if that’s how it was originally written in the books that these shows were adapted from!

Even YA literature, where a majority of the books end happily or on a more hopeful note, is trending toward killing off more major characters than ever before.

I think it’s a reflection of the reality of the world we’re living in. More readers are also aware of it because of the prevalence of social media with its instant access to the news and the plot points from books and shows.

Is this a healthy trend? I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, when times are tough you want to escape reality by reading about positive things where good triumphs over evil. I know that’s why I love fantasy and science fiction. Superhero movies and graphic novels fulfill that need to believe that evil will be defeated and that the good guys may seem to die but aren’t really dead because they then come back to life.

Since we’re so used to superheroes that don’t or can’t die or books that have happy endings, when beloved characters do die, it’s even more of a shock and a betrayal. I don’t blame fans for going ballistic when a character dies, especially those who did not deserve it (Rue from The Hunger Games or Chuck from The Maze Runner).MazeRunnerCover

Yet we know that death is a very real possibility in our daily lives. Characters have physical and mental fault in our starsillnesses and they die or take their own lives. It’s a tough reality but it’s still heartbreaking when it happens, especially when it happens more quickly or to a different character than you expected (like Augustus in The Fault in Our Stars). That’s why I think a lot of teens like realistic fiction because it doesn’t lie or mislead, the truth is there in all of its starkness and finality – like it or not. There’s a catharsis that the reader experiences in going through what the character does. You’ve survived at the end, even though the character hasn’t, even if you do have a headache from crying your eyes out over their death.

Maybe we as readers have we gone soft in always expecting characters to survive? Supernatural fantasies may use reanimation to being characters back to life that really should be dead but what about other dystopian books that realistically portray the reality of a cruel, hard world where few will survive? Is it really fair to expect authors to keep characters alive because they don’t want to anger or disappoint their fans? I don’t think it is.

If you want to read a great teen guest Hub blog post about getting over a fictional character’s death from 2014, check this out. Up to this point, I’ve tried hard not to blatantly include spoilers of some readers’ favorite characters who have been killed off, including my own favorites, but now I’m going to be specific.

Stop reading if you don’t want to know!

(HUGE SPOILERS AHEAD)

Continue reading Major Character Deaths In YA Lit

What Would They Read? Temperance Brennen from Bones

bones season 11

It was just announced that the procedural drama Bones will be entering its final season this fall. I have been keeping up with Dr. Brennan and her gang of “squints” since the beginning, and although I think it would be difficult to convince her to read any young adult fiction, if she were to ask me for suggestions, these are books I think she would enjoy:

Ask the Dark by Henry Turner. There are boys missing in Billy’s neighborhood, and Billy wants to earn the reward for finding them, which will help his family keep their home. He may be in for more than he bargained, however.

Confessions of a Murder Suspect by James Patterson. Tandy wakes up to find police in her home and her parents dead. She was the last one to see them alive. If no one entered their apartment in the night, she or one of her siblings must be the murderer.

Fans of the Impossible Life by Kate Scelsa. Selby, Mira, and Jeremy are thrown together and attempt to survive high school as Jeremy discovers that Mira and Selby are keeping things hidden. Can they overcome their secrets together?

Guy Langman, Crime Scene Procrastinator by Josh Berk. No one is more surprised than Guy when his high school forensics club encounters a genuine corpse, but when Guy realizes his father’s mysterious past may have something to do with his current case, he might be in over his head. Continue reading What Would They Read? Temperance Brennen from Bones