As an adult writer, it isn’t always easy to write characters for young adults, even more so if your young days are a dim and distant memory. There are ways to do it and I’m going to present you with four tips to follow to get you back in your younger shoes and create the perfect characters.

Tip One – Know Your Audience

It really is quite simple; if your book is about and for young adults then you need to spend time with them. Their dialog, their actions, everything about them is different from how you were at their age. Listen to the way they talk, listen to what they talk about and why they talk about it. Read the dialog you already have to a group of young adults and ask them what they think. If they tell you that no 16-year-old would ever talk like that, ask them how you should reword it. Look at the Facebook pages, Twitter feed and Instagram accounts of young adults. Think of it this way – if you were writing a historical novel would you write it without researching first? Didn’t think so, and the same rule applies to YA fiction.

Tip Two – Don’t Make it Cute and Fluffy

Kids of today have seen more, heard more and, in many cases, dealt with far more than any previous generation. Parents may think they should hide their kids away from the ugly side of life but that’s not possible, not with the internet and school. Don’t shy away from a complex theme in your book; kids have seen most things. Don’t wrap your characters in cotton wool and don’t stop your readers from experiencing life’s brutalities. Talk about body image, the rape culture, alcohol, drugs, and so on. There’s a good chance at least some of your readers are experiencing them for real anyway so don’t hold back – but do be mindful of the genre you are writing.

Tip Three – Instalove is Real

So many older readers complain about the instalove concept but it is real. Two people meet, instant connection, it happens. Sometimes, it’s the one thing that your book is centered around. And, we all know that teenager who met someone and instantly became obsessed. Attraction is incredibly powerful and many young adults have not yet learned how to deal with these feelings. So long as your book has a bigger picture to it, by all means use instalove in it.

Tip Four – People Don’t Change, Only the Language Does

Think about your own teenage experiences; how did you identify? Were you bullied, popular, lonely? All the feelings you had as a teenager are the same kind of feelings that today’s teenagers have. You felt the pain of being a teenager and so do they. Use that pain in your work to make it real. And then go get a second opinion on how you were as a teenager. I bet you find it's totally different to how you saw yourself. And then use this to add a bit of depth to your characters.

It isn’t always easy to write a character that is out of the ordinary for you; all I can say is, research and research some more!