Growing Up in the YA Community: A Five Year Blogiversary Reflection

Today, curlyhairbibliophile turns five years old.

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My book journey first begins like all great and embarrassing stories do, in seventh grade.

Let’s set a little bit of the scene. At the time, I was living in a suburb of Minneapolis, attending a TINY Lutheran private school. On a whim, I ended up picking up a copy of THE FAULT IN OUR STARS at my local Barnes & Noble. And I thought it was the SHIT.

A relic deep in my Instagram archive.
Circa 2013.

Upon further reflection (as a 19 almost 20 year old), I maybe wouldn’t love it as much now, but back then thirteen year old me thought it was the best piece of literature ever produced. It was the first book I had read in a long time where the characters weren’t cats, and they had similar hopes, fears, and ambitions I did.

Regardless of my 2021 thoughts on THE FAULT IN OUR STARS or other adjacent books, I was bit with the reading bug. It was late 2013, the prime era of book-to-move adaptations and dystopian YA books. I ate up every moment of it. I remember DEVOURING books between school and my seventh grade basketball practice. I remember having sleepovers with my friends and ending the night with us both engrossed in the books we were reading. I even remember dressing up as the different factions to the DIVERGENT midnight release (I thought I was Dauntless…are you KIDDING ME?).

Me circa June 2014.

As I look back and cringe at my old Goodreads reviews and reading tastes, I can’t help but smile at the same time. These 300 page tropey YA dystopian stories began my love affair with literature. From a young age, I had always been a writer but never a reader. This new found love for books was the last part I needed before my brain just clicked. Reading became a big part of my identity and still is to this day.

Flash forward to January 2016. Five years ago today, exactly. I had just completed my first semester of freshman year of high school, and I was in the midst of my winter break. And I was miserable.

I moved earlier that year from Sioux Falls, SD to a rural town about 30 minutes away from the Texas border. I hadn’t made any friends at my new high school, and no one really seemed in a rush to be one towards me. I felt incredibly isolated and lied to: high school was marketed to me as the best four years of my life, and I was spending my weekends sitting alone in my bedroom.

I had no one to talk to, and I lost the outlet I had with my book friends the past few years. The friends that had been my reading partners at sleepovers were now thousands of miles away, and FaceTime wasn’t cutting it. I truly can’t recall what prompted me to open WordPress.com and create an account five years ago today. I can only imagine that I wished to have a similar outlet I had the past few years. And, well, I got way more than I bargained for.

I began to meet people from all over the world through book Twitter and this blog. I had unlimited access to other people with similar–or contrasting– feelings to mine, and I was in paradise (as cheesy as that sounds). I remember pumping out SO MUCH content the first few months because I was so excited to finally be talking about books again to someone and getting the same energy back.

I attended my first “real” book event a couple months later, The North Texas Teen Book Festival. I remember being in awe but so intimidated all at the same time. I was a fourteen year old with big clunky braces surrounded by authors and book people who knew who they were and what they were doing and I…was not. Despite this, I think of NTTBF as a big turning point in my reading and personal life. It was the first time I was in a tangible place where everyone was there because they loved books, not just because we all had to read the same book in my English class.

My first ever NTTBF in 2016.

I lived in Oklahoma for two years out of my high school experience, but I still reflect on that community so much. Being a part of the North Texas book community really solidified that this whole “book thing” is what I wanted to do with my life. I knew I was a storyteller and wanted to work with books, but I didn’t know how or in what capacity. Meeting authors, working with publishers for ARCs, and talking about books all the time made me realize how much I LOVED this industry.

This goes without saying; but while I do love publishing, I know of the many faults within it. Publishing is very white and middle class, and it often priorities profit over marginalized voices. Throughout the six years I’ve been reading Young Adult, there has been progress, yes. I am always so thrilled when I see book deal announcements for marginalized voices, but we are FAAAARRRRRR from where we need to be. I am so proud of all of the book blogger, booktubers, other book influences, publicists, editors, and marketers who put in the work to uplift marginalized voices and stories. I am so consistency proud, and they truly make this industry and community a better place.

TBR picture for an old blog post (2017? maybe?)

Five years later, here I am. In a way, I feel like the YA book community watched me grow up, from a nerdy brace-faced teenager to a young adult. I’m nineteen years old. I just completed the first half of my sophomore year at Emerson College studying Writing, Literature, and Publishing. I’ve already done two publishing internships–one for North Star Editions and one for Wunderkind PR–, and I can’t even begin to express how grateful I am for this blog for helping me in my publishing adventure. I truly don’t think I would be anywhere close to where I am now if if was not for this platform.

Most of all, I am grateful for you. I’m going to assume that if you clicked on this post and read this far down, you’re a friend of mine or you’ve been a long-time supporter of me and this blog. From the bottom of my heart, thank you. This blog been one of the safest places for my creativity and passion to exist, and you’ve welcomed me with open arms. You cheer me on in all my life changes, and you’ve followed along with me as I’ve grown up. I am grateful for all the love, accountability, and friendship.

The YA online book community will forever hold a spot in my heart. While my reading tastes grow and adapt, I always fall back to Young Adult books because that’s where my heart has and will always be. I am so inspired by the spirit and tenacity of ‘young people’ today, and I love that we have this weird corner of the publishing industry that reflects that.

Thanks for five years. Here’s to another two, five, or ten. Whatever the future may hold.

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