Nathan Bransford - The Forums

I've long heard that kids have been resistant to reading e-books, but I found this recent NY Times article pretty interesting:

At HarperCollins, for example, e-books made up 25 percent of all young-adult sales in January, up from about 6 percent a year before — a boom in sales that quickly got the attention of publishers there.

“Adult fiction is hot, hot, hot, in e-books,” said Susan Katz, the president and publisher of HarperCollins Children’s Books. “And now it seems that teen fiction is getting to be hot, hot, hot.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/05/books ... .html?_r=1

What do you think?

Anecdotally, I know one mom in my office who bought her reluctant reader a Kindle for Christmas hoping to combine his love of electronics with her desire for him to read more. Since Christmas he's read the Percy Jackson series, the Hunger Game series, and the 2 books from James Dashner's Maze Runner series. So that's cool.

On the other side of that, there's a little unofficial kindle book club at my office that I'm in with 3 other ladies and we read mostly YA together, so the figures don't necessarily mean young adults are reading more on the Kindle, but that more Young Adult books are being read on the Kindle.

I know teens who use Kindles and enjoy them. However, I agree with Sommer Leigh that YA doesn't necessarily mean a teen reader. Many adults read and enjoy YA books, and many teenagers read adult books. As a teen, I read books in both genres, and continue to to this day.

I got my 11-year-old a Kindle for Christmas---it wasn't on his list, I just thought he might like it. I was right. He's not only using it a lot, he's taught me how to do stuff with mine. However, he was already my reading-kid. The one who doesn't like to read for pleasure wasn't the least bit jealous nor has he put one on his birthday wishlist, and normally ANYTHING electronic catches his eye. It might entice some reluctant readers into reading more, but I think it's still going to appeal much more to the ones who already enjoy reading. (Just for reference, the one who doesn't like reading as much is almost 15 and is an outstanding student, he just doesn't considering reading to be fun, and he never has.)

As far as YA purchases go, I agree, you can't tell what age the readers are based on the purchases.