South African Young Adult Literature in English, 2000–2014

This volume documents for the first time how postmillennial South African young adult novels interrogate a diverse range of belief systems and codes of conduct that correspond to South Africa’s diverse cultural landscape. One of the major achievements of the genre is its active promotion of an end of the era of silence and its arguing for a new era of debate and open exchange. The emphasis which contemporary South African young adult literature places on socio-economic injustice and the myriad social problems that follow in its wake can be seen as a seismograph of larger trends in South African society. The book chronicles how young adult characters are always on the lookout for alternative ways of appropriating their surroundings and how they continue to point to alternative ways of living together even when they falter. Thus, these novels decipher the now for their readers by not hiding the fact that the country has a long way to go to grow together.