Can a college student be the protagonist of the YA?

TechnoFusion said:

So I'm writing a draft at the moment for NaNo (2.5k words already!) and I feel like it'd work well and be more marketable as a YA. Not to mention I'm only thirteen and would feel weird writing for an adult genre.

The problem is, my protagonist is eighteen and in college. Is this allowed? I feel like the story's setup simply doesn't work as well with him in high school.

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I think some people may consider it more New Adult than Young Adult, but I'd say eighteen years old could go either way.

The biggest thing I think you have to work on is getting the right "feel" for university life if you've never been there yet. However, if most of the action takes place outside the university setting, I think you're OK.

Generally YA is about young adult characters dealing with young adult situations. Typically ages 13-18. While I can see a YA having a 18 year old in it, college starts to stretch that rather far. Age isn't the primary factor in figuring out if the book is YA, but it is one of them. When you enter college years, you start into adult situations.

As for NA, while on paper it sounds nice, the market shows otherwise; it's saturated with very sexual college romances. If that's what you're writing, might as well try for that.

I just have to question: Why college? Why 18? Young adults in high school, through certain programs, can enter college. I know several 16-17 year olds in college. 18 and college just pushes that limit too far IMO.

It depends on the age of the protagonist. The Morganville Vampires series is set on a college campus, but the MC is 16, due to being an advanced studies student.

Usually not, but a good writer can defy expectations.

Fangirl is an example (I think Cath is 18, could be wrong). But I'm guessing that was sold as YA because of Rowell's track record there.

it can be YA. Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell was YA and featured a protagonist who was just starting college, but I believe was still 18 at the time.

See, I was under the impression that Fangirl was NA, although I'm sure it's shelved as YA sometimes.

I've been told the general rule is that everything before college is YA, but I'm sure there are exceptions.

wampuscat said:

See, I was under the impression that Fangirl was NA, although I'm sure it's shelved as YA sometimes.

I've been told the general rule is that everything before college is YA, but I'm sure there are exceptions.

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I'm pretty sure Fangirl is the book that made NA a thing, though? Even though Cath is 18. It's the first big success I can think of that moved NA out of the realm of self-published erotica. So that kind of puts it in an odd place, shelving-wise -- it's "college", which isn't normally YA, but it kind of 're-founded' a genre that doesn't really exist?

Fangirl has some YA aspects, but it was mostly marketed as YA because of Rowell's previous experience there and NA not being an established category, especially in physical stores. I would not use Fangirl as a way to justify a college MC in YA.


I would say that a college MC is unlikely to work very well in YA. I'm not sure what the goal would be of trying to market a college student as a YA MC. Could you not just use a boarding school or something to make a similar environment. That's been a pretty popular method in the past.

I'm currently reading Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List by David Levithan and Rachel Cohn - the two main characters and most of their friends are in their first year of university, but I'm pretty sure it's considered YA. It definitely has more of a YA feel to it than NA or adult fiction.

Generally, YA ends with the summer after high school. That some books set in college are shelved or marketed as YA means nothing except that publishers and librarians don't know where else to put it, because NA is not really a generally accepted category (yet). If you write college age fiction, you put yourself outside of existing marketing categories. This is risky, as your book might end up where it does not belong and is not found by those that would want to read it; or it might make it a big hit, because everyone will push it as what they have been waiting for.

Think about it this way:

"Young Adult" is a marketing category. It is a label that helps readers find the books they want to read. Traditionally "YA" book are books for readers that have grown out of Middle Grade fiction. If you look at how publishers and librarians define "YA" it is usually by age: 12+. This means that librarians and book shop owners will put books on the YA shelf that are appropriate for readers aged 12 or older.

Yes, there are older readers of YA fiction, even adults read it, but YA fiction has to be readable for [the parents of] 12-year-olds. In this the YA label is similar to the movie rating system: "YA" means that a parent of a 12-year-old can buy this book and trust that the book does not contain "adult" topics and language.

Now, the problem with a college age protagonist is that this person will face developmental issues and external problems that the average 12-year-old cannot relate to. The librarian or book shop owner will therefore hesitate to put that book on the YA shelf, but will realize that it does not quite fit on the adult shelf either. Now what does she do? Since space in books stores is scarce and the budget of libraries is slim, the book shop owner and the librarian will rather order another book that clearly fits the existing categories, unless it has been praised by reviewers or already is a bestseller.

If you publish an ebook, categorizing your book any which way you want is not a problem. But if you want to sell a printed book, I have not seen any bookstores yet that have a shelf labelled "New Adult". Even Amazon only has "New Adult & College Romance", and if your book is not romance (= erotic), you don't want it to get misplaced there.

Are they doing college stuff? Or just happen to be a freshman when, say, they get abducted by aliens?

That could make a difference.

The core of YA are the kinds of issues teens usually face: who they are and how they fit into the world, relationships with parents and other adults, discovering their sexuality and how to deal with it, etc.

This is usually in the age range of 15-18 or thereabouts, but IF a writer is skilled and creative they can make a story work for a MC outside that range. I wouldn't handicap myself by being dogmatic about my character's age but I would certainly think hard it.

Write a good enough book and it will sell no matter what age the protagonist is. A lot of people will call college books "unsellable", but I honestly consider college to be part of the young adult experience (in most cases, not all) so I don't get why. I think it's because they've been pigeonholed into erotic romance, which is a shame. Nobody's really giving it a chance.

Now that NA is an established category, it really depends on the theme of the story and the protagonist's mindset and story goal rather than simply just whether or not they are attending college. If the protag is in their 20s, then yes, definitely NA--and the characterization and the story should reflect that. But when the character is still technically a teen, it's more iffy and it depends more on the individual character rather than what type of school they attend. Is it more a coming-of-age story, or is it more an adjusting-to-adult-life story? The former would be YA and the latter would be NA, and both could have a protag aged 18.

Hope that helps!

Write now, worry later.

College would be NA, though NA is often protagonists entering the work world and finding themselves and how they fit into society. From what I understand. I don't read much NA. Or at all.

NA (New Adult) is generally a book that has a Young Adult protagonist, but would deal with more adult themes.

YA (Young Adult) usually has a protagonist who is older than the target audience. Typically, the main character is a teenager. However, if you're writing a series and said character ages with each book, you can get up to early twenties with a character.

The setting doesn't really influence Young Adult. That's a bit of a myth. You could have someone who is out supporting themselves, and working, but they might just be seventeen. I don't think you should worry too much about the fact they're a college student.

To be perfectly frank, most people these days don't consider themselves an adult until they're about 21/22 years old. That being the case, I think you should focus less on the age of your character, and more on the narrative. Let's not forget that there are some books with young characters that are certainly not young adult. Elizabeth Bennett was only twenty in Pride and Prejudice, but that's not classified as Young Adult merely because she was barely out of her teens. Likewise, Lolita has an exceptionally young female leading character (admittedly she's not the one leading the narrative but she is the focus of the novel), and there's not way that's Young Adult.

So, I guess my advice here would be that you should let your book be what it needs to be. You are doing seriously well so far, don't get bogged down with little niggling issues like the age. Decide your audience when you're done, and enjoy the story writing process.

I mean, you're thirteen, and if you like it then that would make it totally suitable for your age group.

Besides, (as much as I hate pulling this as an example) Edward Cullen was over a hundred years old, and he was a YA main character.

natpenna said:

NA (New Adult) is generally a book that has a Young Adult protagonist, but would deal with more adult themes.

YA (Young Adult) usually has a protagonist who is older than the target audience. Typically, the main character is a teenager. However, if you're writing a series and said character ages with each book, you can get up to early twenties with a character.

The setting doesn't really influence Young Adult. That's a bit of a myth. You could have someone who is out supporting themselves, and working, but they might just be seventeen. I don't think you should worry too much about the fact they're a college student.

To be perfectly frank, most people these days don't consider themselves an adult until they're about 21/22 years old. That being the case, I think you should focus less on the age of your character, and more on the narrative. Let's not forget that there are some books with young characters that are certainly not young adult. Elizabeth Bennett was only twenty in Pride and Prejudice, but that's not classified as Young Adult merely because she was barely out of her teens. Likewise, Lolita has an exceptionally young female leading character (admittedly she's not the one leading the narrative but she is the focus of the novel), and there's not way that's Young Adult.

So, I guess my advice here would be that you should let your book be what it needs to be. You are doing seriously well so far, don't get bogged down with little niggling issues like the age. Decide your audience when you're done, and enjoy the story writing process.

I mean, you're thirteen, and if you like it then that would make it totally suitable for your age group.

Besides, (as much as I hate pulling this as an example) Edward Cullen was over a hundred years old, and he was a YA main character.

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I'm not sure where you're getting this information from, but Twilight is YA, because Bella is the true MC and is a YA.

The age of a protagonist in NA is usually between 18 - 25/26. These genres are specific in certain areas for a reason. So, that readers know what to expect (to some degree).

YA fiction can be very risqué, and often is. THE BOOK THEIF is marketed as YA. Heck, THE HUNGER GAMES is about teenagers being forced to brutally murder each other.

I suggest googling the difference between YA and New Adult. YA is someone 18 and younger. It is a trend that young adult readers read several years up. This has also become somewhat the norm because what sells is usually king/queen.

LaneHeymont said:

I'm not sure where you're getting this information from, but Twilight is YA, because Bella is the true MC and is a YA.

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I didn't say 'Twilight', I said Edward. Midnight Sun? It was his POV. Anyway, it didn't end up being a commercial release.

The point I made at the end still stands.

It's stupid to restrict a book from being all it can be due to a character's age or occupation. An audience can be decided later. Stifling the creative process so early is a surefire way to kill a project stone dead.

TechnoFusion said:

So I'm writing a draft at the moment for NaNo (2.5k words already!) and I feel like it'd work well and be more marketable as a YA. Not to mention I'm only thirteen and would feel weird writing for an adult genre.

The problem is, my protagonist is eighteen and in college. Is this allowed? I feel like the story's setup simply doesn't work as well with him in high school.

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If you want that sort of college feel but need to keep it YA, you can always go the Boarding/Boys Prep school route. Sorry if this is a repeat to what others already said. I didn't read the responses.

natpenna said:

NA (New Adult) is generally a book that has a Young Adult protagonist, but would deal with more adult themes.

YA (Young Adult) usually has a protagonist who is older than the target audience. Typically, the main character is a teenager. However, if you're writing a series and said character ages with each book, you can get up to early twenties with a character.

The setting doesn't really influence Young Adult. That's a bit of a myth. You could have someone who is out supporting themselves, and working, but they might just be seventeen. I don't think you should worry too much about the fact they're a college student.

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This is technically incorrect. NA does not have YA protags. You can have YA with older narrators, but most often it is someone 19 or younger, generally between 16 and 18 for Upper YA. NA has a protag almost always between 18 and 26. You can have slightly younger protags, depending on other factors; age is not sufficient on it's own to determine category. However, those are rare exceptions.


There's some reasoning behind the college thing, as well. Generally, most readers of YA have some sort of high school experience in common, but many people do not go to college. Further, when you hit Upper YA, most readers can no longer be classified as reading up. Rather they read pretty much any protag from a year or so younger to all the way into late adulthood. If there is a strong graded school setting, they may not read down, but for stuff like summer, or a lack of focus on school, it's not uncommon to read down a year or two among the majority of their age or older reading.


Several YA agents have explicitly said that not only can't you sell a college student in YA, but it's almost impossible to sell such a book at all through trade publishing. Only recently has the begun to change, but it's still basically un-doable for YA. There's a reason NA gained most of its current steam through self-publishing.

Liosse, I am in total agreement with you about YA. And that is a good point about College. I don't read much NA, but from my understanding it's about characters in the real/working world or the like.

As I said before,Nat Penna, genres are genres for a reason. Not stifling creativity is one thing, but in order to find representation or even a readership one must at least abide by the law of genres.

You cannot write a mystery, call it science fiction and expect to be able to accurately market it in any way.