(Note from Big Books, Little Ears – this post is from a wonderful guest contributor, YA author and agent Kristen Terrette. I’m so glad she’s here to teach us all about how to find clean YA books, because that section of the library can be wonderful…but also dangerous. Read on for her tips of WHERE to start your search for good clean YA romance books for tweens and teens. Heads up that “clean” means different things to different people, so do preview anything, and don’t just take a reviewer’s word for it…even mine!)
Young Adult.
Two words encompassing bunches of subgenres and millions of books. Millions. How are we, as readers—either teens or adults—supposed to navigate this HUGE genre successfully when our goal is to feed our brains with clean and overall positively transformative books?
Because let’s be clear, Young Adult spans all types of subgenres and ratings. As Kristin says, “YA is genre, not a reading level.” This means that YA does not denote a grade level or reading level it is written at. Instead, YA is a type of book, one where the main problem of the book is emotional or social.
This is an incredibly popular genre, but can include ANY emotional or social problem. Because of this, it can be difficult to search for books on our comfort level.
As a writer, and agent, I’m NOT for banning books at all, because stories have a right and a rightful place to be told. But as a parent and a reader, I want to be careful what I expose my young loved ones and even myself too. For me personally, this means I don’t want to read sex scenes, or a book with extremely foul-mouthed and crude characters.
When my daughter was young, and her reading level was way higher than her emotional maturity, this also meant shielding her from books dealing with things like suicide and self-harm. This was not because these topics aren’t an epidemic for our teens, because sadly, they are, but her young mind couldn’t grasp the enormity of that subject matter yet. As her parent, it was my job to shield her until she was ready. This was made extra tricky because she was such a precocious reader, so could handle the writing style and vocabulary of YA books before she could handle the content.
And whether we’re choosing books for ourselves or helping teens do this, it’s a daunting task.
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So where can we start to search for clean YA book?
My whole adult life I have worked with children and youth in education, ministry, and publishing. My latest endeavors with adolescents include writing YA and representing authors who write it. So, I’ve developed some skills for finding quality books in this genre.
Here are the best places to find clean YA books:
Goodreads Lists of Christian YA books:
You can search for keywords on Goodreads. Good places to start are by searching YA Clean, YA Christian, or YA Inspirational.
But Goodreads also has a special feature that will enable you to quickly find a large quantity of clean or inspirational YA novels. Readers can compile “lists” of books by theme, subgenre, keyword, etc. You can search these lists and find books that qualify.
For example, I searched “YA Clean,” and 79 lists of books pulled up to explore. Not just 79 books, 79 LISTS of books that were all clean YA. Other words to try would be “inspirational YA,” or “clean teen romance.” (Although, as always, we don’t take any Goodreads user’s word that a book is clean, and should still check it out.) Goodreads even has a landing page to search lists if you’re looking for something specific.
Publishers and imprints that publish only clean, positive, inspirational, or Christian Young adult fiction:
Here’s a few publishers and imprints that market themselves as only clean fiction. I’m sure there are more, but these will get you started!
Blink is the clean YA imprint of Harper Collins, so it only publishes positive YA fiction.
Monster Ivy also is specifically only clean YA books. Again, “clean” means different things to different people, so check out specific titles.
There are also publishers who produce YA novels, but it isn’t their sole focus. It might take a bit more digging to find appropriate YA titles on their websites, just because they don’t specialize in Young Adult lit, but it’s worth a look.
Faith market publishers who have YA books available include Tyndale, Elk Lake Publishing, Pelican Book Group, Enclave Publishing (also a great publisher to look for clean science fiction), and Shadow Mountain Publishing.
Amazon Categories:
Amazon has a powerful search engine, and the ability to classify books into extremely specific categories. As an agent, I rely on these Amazon categories to give me direction for comparable titles. It’s also a good way for readers to look for books!
Pull up the Amazon listing of an author or book you love, then scroll down until you see more info about the book. Pay attention to the listings in the “Products related to this item” and “Customers who
viewed this item also viewed…” These are always closely related in genre, subgenres, and style. Amazon wants to sell you more, so these should be good recommendations based on the title you are viewing.
Then check out the categories found at the bottom of the Product Details section. Some examples are, “Teen & Young Adult Clean & Wholesome Romance eBooks,” or “Teen & Young Adult Fiction about Friendship.” See how specific those categories are? A book may have multiple categories listed.
When you click on the categories, you will proceed to Amazon’s bestseller’s list for this category—there are tons of them! Now you’ll see the books that are the bestsellers in that SPECIFIC category. The bestseller lists are updated multiple times a day, so if a category didn’t give you any gems before, don’t be afraid to check it out again on a different day!
(Note from Big Books, Little Ears – I agree, Amazon can be SO helpful when picking clean YA fiction. I also think it’s a great place to find out if there’s anything questionable in a book. Read a few 1 star reviews on Amazon, and you’ll know if there’s objectionable content.)
Follow Instagram YA Book Reviewers:
I love following book reviewers! On Instagram, search “YA Clean,” “YA Book Review,” “YA Fiction,” or things like that. You can also try searching for those terms without the space after “YA.” For example, “YAclean” may show a few more relevant accounts.
Follow a few you like, and even more will pop up as suggestions for you to follow. This will keep you in the know of what’s fresh out there. I also suggest following all of your favorite YA authors and the above publishing accounts to see what they’ve got going on as well!
There you have it. Are my tips a surefire way to find what you’re looking for? Nope. But hopefully they’re a start. Clean YA lit is out there, and I know you can find it for yourself or your reader. It’s worth the effort to find great books for your precocious tween reader, or teen reader.
About Kristen Terrette, author of CLEAN YA books
As a reader, writer, and literary agent of Young Adult projects, I hope you’ll consider checking out my own clean, inspirational YA books and my clients’ titles!
My YA novel, See You Monday, is out now. It is clean and for the faith market.
My second YA novel, Fences Left Broken, releases fall 2023, and you can preview it now!
Also, check out the authors I represent, ranging from Kid Lit. to Adult fiction authors. Be sure to follow them to see what’s coming – we’ve got exciting things happening behind the scenes, and you won’t want to miss keeping tabs on them! (Including some clean YA!)
Christian clean YA books are out there, and with a little digging, you can find them!
