Even after four years of blogging, I'm asked this question almost routinely. Since I spend more time at my office than I do at home right now, I've had any ARCs I receive delivered here and, in all truth, this blog was a big part of why I was hired for the position I've been in (and loved) for a year and a half now. They think it's awesome that I manage to keep up a blog while working a full-time career, but I know that they wonder exactly why I read the books that I do. And, in fact, many of my friends and coworkers have actually voiced these questions.
Here's the thing...I have always been a big reader. I've loved it since I could first make out a word in a book, and I vividly remember my first night reading past my bedtime, hiding under the covers so my mother wouldn't see that I was still up and reading. I am, however, acutely aware of the fact that a lot of kids didn't have the same relationship with reading that I did, and I'm often saddened when I hear people say that they don't like reading because they think it's a chore...especially younger people.
I am of the school of thought that books, when done well, can change lives.
They can make you think, they can make you feel and they can bring you into worlds that you might have otherwise never had an opportunity to discover.
Most of all though, they provide the purest, most beautiful and timeless form of escapism that there is.
That is why I read and review young adult books. Don't get me wrong. I read adult books for leisure. I read novels that, yes, bore me at times. I read scandalous romance that would make you blush, and I read autobiographies, biographies, documentaries and more. But there is this innate beauty to YA that makes it so wonderful...
Simply put, it captures youth in its rawest, most poignant form, and it doesn't back down.
I'm proud to be a 27-year-old married lady that's a teenager at heart. I'm proud to scan my shelves and see an overabundance of teen books that I readily share with other readers who show any bit of interest. And, most of all, I'm excited to someday pass on this love of books and reading to my children, and I hope that they'll eventually do the same.
Young adult captures a genre and an age that might otherwise not be interested in books, and turning just one or two readers onto a great book that means the world to me is, in essence, why I read and blog solely about YA books.
