So You Want To Write YA High Fantasy?

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So this is the first entry in a new series I'm starting here at Writability! Yay! If all goes well and you guys like what you see, I hope to cover many genres and categories, including ones I don't write, which should be interesting. I hope you all enjoy! :)

“So, high fantasy isn’t dead. If you say it is, you’re not looking in the right places. Perhaps the good stuff doesn’t get as much attention as it deserves, but it’s out there, changing perspectives and broadening imaginations, reminding us of what it is to be human, and daring girls who love nail polish and boys to dream of something more.” —Sarah J. Maas ("Is High Fantasy Dead? (Um, No.)")

What is it? 

Royalty, medievalism, magic, sword fights, evil wizards, elves, orcs, trolls, dragons and very little technology are a few of the elements you’ll see when reading high fantasy. In Young Adult, it often means princes and princesses, or young powerful people (whether highly skilled, gifted with magic or otherwise special), lots of action, great pacing and romances. What’s not to like?

Pros/Cons of Writing YA High Fantasy: 

Pros: 

• You can do just about anything. Everything should fit in the world you create and make sense for your book, of course, but other than that, the sky’s the limit. Want a dragon made of fire? Go for it. A character who can control lightning? Write it and it’s yours. 


• Medievalism is the bomb. Let’s face it, sword fights are often way more fun to watch than shootouts, royalty never gets boring to read or write about (to me) and that low-tech I mentioned before means you have to work around lack of technology obstacles, sometimes with magic, sometimes without. 


• Young adults tend to have more independence. This varies, of course, but in medieval times, young adults were often viewed as mini-adults—they have way more responsibilities and pressure on their shoulders than teens today. And that makes for great book fodder. 

Cons: 

• World building is tough. To me, this is kind of a pro, too, because world building can be insanely fun. But it can also be a massive headache. You’re building an entire world from nothing, and it can get complicated and exhausting, but it’s also pretty rewarding. 


• A lot of it’s been done already. This to me is also in a way a pro—I’m starting to see a call for high fantasy based off non-western European cultures, which I think is fantastic (i.e.: The Girl of Fire and Thorns by Rae Carson, Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo and Prophecy by Ellen Oh). There are so many cultures out there who each had their own medieval-like periods and mythologies that I think could be really interesting in high fantasy. So while it’s a tougher market because we’ve seen a lot of similar high fantasies, I think it also pushes us to try new things, which isn’t such a bad thing after all. 


• It’s a tough market. Yeah, well, so is the rest of YA. If you love high fantasy, this shouldn’t deter you. 

Recommended Reading: 

Reading is important! Really. Whatever genre you’re writing in, you should be pretty well versed in what’s out there.

Note: I’ve read and enjoyed all of these except for the last one—but I’ve heard good things about Finnikin.

• Shadow and Bone (The Grisha trilogy) by Leigh Bardugo
• Graceling (Graceling Realm trilogy) by Kristin Cashore
• The Girl of Fire and Thorns (Fire and Thorns trilogy) by Rae Carson
• Eragon (The Inheritance Cycle) by Christopher Paolini
• Throne of Glass (Throne of Glass series) by Sarah J. Maas
• Cruel Beauty by Rosamund Hodge
• Finnikin of the Rock (Lumatere Chronicles) by Melina Marchetta

For more, check out this Goodreads list of YA Fantasy novels, which includes books that aren't High Fantasy, but Fantasy nonetheless, and this Goodreads list of High Fantasy novels, which includes books that aren't YA.

Helpful Links: 

• What Makes a Good YA Fantasy (And How to Spot It) by Laura Crockett at QuirkBooks
• YA Common Clichés series: Fantasy/Urban Fantasy by S.E. Sinkhorn at Maybe Genius
• Diversity in Fantasy by Erin Bow at Diversity in YA (tumblr)
• On Eurocentricity in Fantasy Fiction by Cinda Williams Chima at Diversity in YA 
• 3 Tips for Writing Watertight Fantasy, Science Fiction & Time Travel Stories by Roz Morris at Nail Your Novel

Do you enjoy reading or writing YA High fantasy? Share your experience! Also, should I continue this series? Let me know what you think!

Twitter-sized bites: 

Thinking about writing YA High Fantasy? Writer @Ava_Jae shares some tips, recommendations and more. (Click to tweet) 

Do you write YA High Fantasy? Share your experience at @Ava_Jae's new So You Want to Write series! (Click to tweet)

How to Make Your Readers Believe Anything

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I’ll admit the title sounds a little ominous, like I’m about to spill the secrets of world domination, and in a way I suppose I am—dominating the world of literature, at least.

Regardless of however the title may or may not sound, I’m not really referring to mind control—I’m referring to suspension of disbelief.

As writers, you have the unique ability to make anything possible. You aren’t bound by laws of physics or reality or even time—whatever you can imagine, you can create on the page. Dragons, zombies, angels, horned beaver-goats—writers set the rules to the worlds that they create.

But as Aunt May so famously told a young Spiderman: with great power comes great responsibility.

With every book (or series) you write, you set up the rules of that reality. Whether it’s literary fiction, epic fantasy, sci-fi, paranormal, etc., it’s your job as the writer to establish some form of boundaries and guidelines. In the Harry Potter series, for example, J.K. Rowling established early on that even the most powerful wizards prefer performing magic with wands, while in Eragon (Christopher Paolini), magic was performed without the use of any wands whatsoever and in The Girl of Fire and Thorns (Rae Carson), magic could only be performed with the aid of the rare Godstone.  

The key is to set up rules that fit with whatever genre you write in. Readers of fantasy expect a certain amount of, well, the fantastic—whether its dragons, magic, elves, all of the above or something entirely different—there are expectations within the genre that you as a writer in that genre have to adhere to. If The Lord of the Rings ended with an alien invasion or a stampede of pink squirrels made of sugar, readers would riot because it completely breaks the rules that J.R.R.Tolkein so carefully established.

Beyond world rules however, writers have the important job of ensuring that their characters don’t act out of character, and thus break the readers’ suspension of disbelief. If Katniss, for example, started flirting with Cato because he was cute, or Harry Potter decided to join Voldemort and become a Death Eater, to say that they’d be breaking character would be a huge understatement.

There are two very simple things writers must do to ensure suspension of disbelief:

1. Set up the rules. Establish (or hint at) world rules quickly, as well as the rules (or personalities) of your characters.


2. Stick with them.

It’s ok to occasionally break a rule, but make sure it’s justified—establish a new rule that renders the broken rule obsolete, or give a character a motivation for his otherwise unbelievable action, but make sure it’s fully explained in your book, or risk losing that suspension of disbelief.

Have you ever read a book that shattered your suspension of disbelief? What do you think caused it? What’s your favorite example of suspension of disbelief? 

Time is on Your Side

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At the beginning of my writing career, I was racing against the clock.

I read about authors like Christopher Paolini who wrote the first draft of Eragon when he was 15 and had it published traditionally five years later at the age of 20. I devoured books and read so-called “instant” best-sellers and wondered what they were doing that I wasn't.

I worried that I was taking too long.

It wasn’t until much later, after rounds of rejections and trunking novel after novel that I realized that time wasn’t working against me—it was working for me.

The fact of the matter is it takes time to hone your craft. It takes years of practice and writing and reading and getting feedback and writing and reading until your skill level matches your passion. Stop running and take the time to enjoy the ride.

Don’t rush the writing—the process of discovery, of improving, of falling in love with your characters and the world you’ve created is beautiful. Take the time to marvel at what you’ve created.

Don’t rush the editing—as they say, writing is rewriting and there is just as much to be learned from the editing as there is from the writing.

Don’t rush the submissions—take the time to make sure your book is the best that it can be before you send it out. Research agents and guidelines and take the time to personalize your queries—it makes a difference.

Don’t rush the publication—I’ve said this before, but I’ll say it again: please don’t publish for the sake of publishing. Go indie if you think it’s the right choice for you, but don’t slap your book up on Amazon just because you can.

Slow down and remember that time is on your side—the more time you take to improve your craft, the better prepared you’ll be when your time to shine comes.

Have you ever been tempted to rush through part of the process? Share you experience in the comments!