Sex: is there too much of it in YA?

Ask Alice is an online column produced by the #LoveOzYA team, and written by our former Secretary, Alice Boer-Endacott, who has published several young adult fantasy novels and a non-fiction essay.

Ask Alice is designed to unpack all aspects of the Australian young adult literary scene, so if you’ve got a question, go ahead and Ask Alice!

Regular readers will note a thematic bent to the last Ask Alices: banned books and ‘problematic’ content, and now this month, sex. I promise this column isn’t sliding into an exclusive focus on salacious subject matter. Rather, each time I finished one column, I’d found an interesting thematic offshoot which merited its own in-depth examination. However, I promise the next Ask Alice is going to be about something nice and light. Maybe a Christmas gift guide.

But this month we’re talking about sex: is there too much of it in YA? To help answer this question, I’ve undertaken research, and consulted Esmé Louise James, author of Kinky History, and by the time this column comes out, Doctor(!).

Some history: In some ways, this question originates from observing the emergence, across my 15 months of PhD fieldwork on bookstagram, of ‘spice’ readers. ‘Spice’ readers are people who, in the context of the bookstagram community, are out-and-proud about the fact that they read and love romance which features explicit sex scenes.

One of my interviewees who went from reading YA romance novels to spice novels said she did so because, as she entered a phase of her life with a more mature relationship (not just physically, but in terms of certain experiences), she found the toned-down content in YA romances didn’t reflect her life, which meant she struggled to relate to these books. By contrast, novels which contain ‘spice’ – explicit scenes, as well as characters firmly in their adulthood (new or not so new) did. Totally fair.

What’s been curious to observe, though, is the way this more explicit sexual content has seemingly crept into YA books; something noted in previous columns’ discussions about banned books and the hierarchy of ‘problematic’ content in YA books. Esmé said of this: “The line between Young Adult and New Adult is getting undoubtedly blurrier. I think social media – places like BookTok in particular – play a large role in this.”

BookTok, the bookish corner of TikTok, is widely considered to have significantly driven book sales – especially amongst teen readers adult fiction, romance, fantasy, and, of course, romantasy (such as Sarah J Maas’ 2015 novel A Court of Thorns and Roses – ACOTAR).

ACOTAR might also be pinpointed as a watershed in sexual content see in YA novels. Previously, Maas’ work was firmly in the YA category (although, as her first series Throne of Glass progressed, the content did get increasingly steamier). Maas herself noted in 2019 that she didn’t necessarily want to publish ACOTAR as a YA, but her publisher pushed her to do so, leading her to agree, provided ‘her editor wouldn’t censor any of the sexual content.’”

Esmé observed, “Books like ACOTAR are a perfect example of how marketing and BookTok conversations can create confusion. [Yet] the distinction is crucial because the experiences and challenges of a 16-year-old are different from those of someone in their early twenties.” She did point out, “the overlap is understandable — people aged 17 to 21, for example, are still trying to figure out their identities, their relationships, and their place in the world. However, I think the concern around this differentiation comes more from the fear that explicit content will ‘age up’ the stories too quickly for a teenage readership.”

I think it’s worth pausing on how publishers have handled the increasing levels of spice in novels, and how the way books are shared on BookTok are leveraged by publishers to deliberately push novels with explicit sexual content to younger readers than is necessarily appropriate. I term this ‘Trojan horse spice.’

We can see this in the Icebreaker incident discussed in the August Ask Alice. However, this is not a standalone trend. As this article points out: “Many of the books popular with BookTokkers, such as Alice Oseman’s Heartstopper series, are aimed at teenagers. Other titles, such as the Maple Hill Series by Hannah Grace, The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood and The Spanish Love Deception by Elena Armas, have adult themes. […] These books have pastel covers with cute cartoonish drawings, so some adults might mistake them for young adult fiction and not realise exactly what children are reading.”

As we know, I’m not one to really say we should curtail what younger people read. I heartily agree with Esmé’s comment, “the responsibility lies with publishers, parents, and educators, etc. to provide clear guidance. As long as there’s transparency about what a book contains, there’s no harm in young readers having access to more mature themes if they feel ready.” Vitally, I’m not sure that transparency is there.

In fact, it feels as though from a publisher side of things, there’s a deliberate effort to remove that transparency.

This, to me, felt echoed by a story Esmé shared: “I was in shock when my teenage cousin saw my copy of A Court of Silver Flames (the most explicit book in the ACOTAR series) at Christmas and said she was about to start it – and doing so because she’d seen it on BookTok and now all her friends were reading it. […] We opened up a conversation that involved whether she really felt ready for the content, [and] the problematic portrayal of romantic relationships in the book […] This ended up being a really productive dialogue that helped to navigate her own thoughts on the book – especially re-shaping how she felt about the romantic interests which she had previously idolised. She hadn’t realised that the last book became as explicit as it was, and made the decision herself – once informed – that that wasn’t something she liked the thought of, at this stage. This interaction really brought home to me how differently this book had been marketed to her, and the importance of having these dialogues with younger people engaging with this media.”

Of course, that doesn’t mean the presence of relatively graphic sexual content in books for younger readers is bad. Esmé outlined: “The reality is that teenagers are already navigating questions of sexuality, whether through personal experience, social media, or conversations with their peers. Time and time again, studies have shown that not talking about sex doesn’t prevent teenagers from engaging with their sexuality – alternatively, it means they explore their sexualities in ways that are more likely to be unsafe and pose long-term risks. Books can actually provide a safe and guided space for these explorations. The key is not necessarily the presence of sexual content but how that content is presented. If it’s done responsibly — with consideration for themes like consent, healthy relationships, and emotional consequences — then these narratives can offer valuable insights into sexuality and relationships. Shying away from explicit content or pretending it doesn’t exist doesn’t stop teenagers from seeking it elsewhere. Books can offer a healthier and more nuanced portrayal of sex than what they might find online or through other less controlled sources. The fact it’s removed from physical consequences can also be a hefty benefit of this kind of exploration.”

Counterfactually though (and returning to ACOTAR), it’s worth considering this article’s comment: “Maas’s descriptions of sex do not depict the experience of sex realistically either. Unlike some other coming of age novels, Maas’s books describe sex in earth-shattering, dramatic language.” A younger reader encountering these scenes doesn’t necessarily have the experience to know this portrayal of sex is unrealistic, which in turn risks setting up problematic schema with respect to sex.

I should point out that I’m not actually trying to say ACOTAR = bad. In fact, I haven’t read the series, so I’m in a diminished position to comment. What I do want to return to though, is that this series is emblematic of a trend with which I have some beef: Publishers deliberately leveraging YA labels and the way books circulate on BookTok to present books which contain graphic sexual content, and often problematic relationships, as similar to YA books that don’t contain this material. Context is everything, and it feels to me as though there is a concerted effort by some to remove this context in order to cash in.

Stripping away that context deprives young readers – and those who help them navigate their reading, of what Esmé outlined as “giving them the tools to approach these themes critically, much like how English curricula introduce works with complex topics but in a structured, educational context.”

Indeed, some books on high school curricula contain explicit sex scenes (in addition to other, ‘mature’ content). For instance, across my time tutoring high school English, I’ve had students in year 12 studying This Boy’s Life by Tobias Wolff which has a line about “licking pussy,” and The Bluest Eye, which contains a depiction of a rape, which, even though the scene in question desexualises the act, actually makes it more confronting to read. These books were assigned to the year 12 exam syllabus.

However, because of the mediated environment in which these books – and the content within them – are read, younger readers are given the tools to evaluate and unpack these scenes.

This is a world of difference to a 13 year old seeing a BookTok recommendation which doesn’t indicate it has graphic sexual content. The surprise alone of turning the page to such a scene deprives that reader of being able to be prepared to read that content.

Esmé, whose responses were just so damn eloquent sums it up far better than I ever could: “We need to focus on ensuring these stories are told in a way that empowers, educates, and reflects the real emotional complexity of sex, rather than assuming that shielding young readers from these topics will somehow protect them. In many ways, it’s about giving teenagers credit for being able to handle nuance and complexity in the media they consume. By the same token, we also need to remember the tremendous impact that books can have on shaping young people’s views of romance and sexuality. We need to be able to open up dialogues about these topics with them, as well as ensuring they are able to make informed decisions about the books they consume, when marketers fail to do so.”

Ultimately no, I don’t think there’s too much sex in YA. But I do think we need to ensure we are clear about when there is sex in YA, if for no other reason, than to ensure readers know what they’re picking up, and can have ownership over that.

My eternal thanks to Esmé for providing such thoughtful, eloquent replies – and a congratulations on becoming Dr James!!