My case against dystopias, and a few suggestions

Over last weekend, I went camping with my family. It was nice to be out in the fresh air and with people I love, and I got to play with fire a bit, so it was very fun. But it got me thinking about books, because lately, I’ve been reading a bunch of young adult (YA) and middle grade literature, and I brought a few amazing books on the trip to (re)read. And because the library’s Summer Reading Challenge starts this week and I realized just how many books I’ve actually read lately.

YA and middle grade books are two separate categories, but they overlap. Both are meant for kids or teens, but middle grade books are meant for kids ages 8-12 and YA books are meant for about ages 12-18. Middle grade books lack swearing, graphic violence, or heavy sexual/romantic issues; YA books are filled with those things. Middle grade protagonists focus on the world around them and how they fit into it, while YA protagonists try to step away from their little world and into a larger one. 

I mostly read fantasy or science fiction, with the occasional book that’s categorized into realistic fiction or historical fiction. I don’t like reading books about students in schools (with the occasional exception), because I don’t like things that seem too similar to events in my life. I like books that are set in far away lands or outer space, or at the very least involve characters doing something that’s unusual (fiction about teenage spies or something). 

However, one thing I notice in most YA sci-fi or fantasy is the dystopian setting. I hate dystopias. I don’t like places where nothing ever gets much better or where the protagonists have to defy the society they live in to even begin to have a chance of making a difference. 

Dystopias make me feel uncomfortable. They make me feel like there’s no point in reading, since the worlds I’m entering through a book feel worse than the real world (which is already pretty bad). I know that’s the point of a dystopia, that everything’s so bad and oppressive that you cheer for the rebellious protagonists, but I don’t feel comfortable with it. I like books with happy endings, or at least not-horrific endings. 

I have a friend who loves dystopian books for the same reason I hate them — because she wants to read a book and come out feeling like the real world is great in comparison. I see why she likes the books, but I disagree with her because dystopian books, lacking satisfying endings, always end in a way that makes me upset and unhappy. I support the right to read whatever you want. I just don’t like dystopian lit, and I don’t read it. 

So I thought I’d share a few YA sci-fi or fantasy books that aren’t dystopias, ones that I greatly enjoyed. There’s a couple middle-grade books too, and a few that aren’t SFF books, just not-quite-realistic-fiction. I didn’t include books that I couldn’t find in the middle grade or teen section of my local library, just because I felt like focusing mostly on YA stuff (which is where I usually see dystopias); if you’re not into YA, I’m sorry, but you should try these anyways. I recommend these to everyone, not just people in the age range for YA/MG books. 

• The Aurora Cycle, by Amie Kaufman and Jan Kristoff. There’s two books out so far, and the third one comes out in November 2021 (which I’m very excited for!). It’s sci-fi, and it’s set in a future where humanity discovered a number of other interstellar civilizations; each planet is mostly self-controlled, but the humans and a few other species joined forces to make a peacekeeping legion called the Aurora Legion that employs teenagers. Because the younger you are, the safer interstellar travel is. One squad of misfits discovers a girl who was in cryosleep for two and a bit centuries, and she turns out to be the key to saving the galaxy. It’s really well written, switching perspectives between different squad members and throwing in surprises occasionally. There’s a small amount of violence, but it’s not lingered on; there’s occasional curse words, usually when things go horribly; and there are multiple points in which characters contemplate their sexual/romantic attraction to other characters in sometimes obvious ways. And there’s aliens! I really enjoyed them and I’ve recommended them to a lot of people. 
• Catfishing on CatNet, by Naomi Kritzer. This was a fascinating read, and it’s sort of on the border of sci-fi. It’s set in the near future, where AI and drones and robots are common, but there’s no truly sapient AIs. The main character is Steph (aka LittleBrownBat on the internet), a teenager who’s always on the move because her mom is running away from an abusive husband. Her only real friends are on CatNet, an online community that her mom doesn’t know she hangs out on. The site turns out to be run by a true AI, CheshireCat, who loves cat pictures; when CheshireCat disappears, Steph, her CatNet friends, and her new friends from her recent move have to help. Most of the main characters are LGBTQ+, and there are some serious discussions of family/friend disapproval, but everyone important is supportive. There’s a little violence, but not much, and a little discussion of sexual stuff (in the context of a sex-ed class gone ... not great), but it’s really good. I loved that it made me think about privacy and internet sharing, and what if all the admins/mods/whatever on *insert website of choice* were one AI. 
• That Inevitable Victorian Thing, by E. K. Johnston. It’s basically two what-if stories combined together — what if the Victorian British Empire had expanded across the world, into the present day, and what if that empire used genetic matchmaking to determine marriages? I found it interesting, especially the main characters (there’s three of them: the crown princess Margaret, a geneticist’s daughter Helena, and Helena’s old-friend-slash-it’s-complicated August) and their relationships. It also handles queer issues really well; one character discovers when she analyzes her DNA that she’s intersex, and she grapples with what that means to her, and then two characters are very gay for each other and figure out how to handle it. It’s pretty romantic, but I enjoyed it anyways. 
• The Finishing School books, by Gail Carriger. It’s a four book series set in the Victorian era (but with steampunk werewolves and vampires), about Sophronia, a girl who gets packed off to finishing school. Except finishing school teaches her to be an espionage agent and to finish others off, as well as the things you’d expect in finishing school. It’s really fascinating, because it’s an intrigue mixed with the characters discovering themselves. I really liked the intricate plotting that went on in it, and I ended up reading the adult series in the same universe, the Parasol Protectorate, which this series is a prequel to. 
• Of Fire and Stars, by Audrey Coulthurst. It’s a gay romance in a fantasy world between two princesses, one who is betrothed to the other’s brother. Also, one of them has magic and will be marrying into a kingdom where magic is prohibited. Then they have to save the kingdom... I really liked it, even though I don’t really like romance novels, because the romance is only part of the plot. When you read it, you can focus on the romance or on the saving-the-kingdom part, and I liked that it didn’t sacrifice plot for romance. Also, PRINCESSES IN GAY LOVE!!!!!!!!!!!!! So I really recommend this one. 
• In Other Lands, by Sarah Brennan. This one comes pretty close to being a fantasy dystopia, but it’s not, because it does end well and although the protagonists go against society, it’s usually against only parts of the society. A teenage boy, Elliot, comes to the Borderlands, a land of magic and stuff, where he’s enlisted into the guard training and taught to fight and do fitness stuff — except he switches to the council track and learns diplomacy stuff. He meets two “friends”; Serene the elvish warrior that he has a giant crush on, and the annoying Luke, who’s a member of an old Borderlands family. Elliot gets where he’s going by sheer stubbornness most of the time, and in a world where things are on the brink of war a lot, it pretty often means he runs into places he shouldn’t be. There’s a bunch of bordering-on-awful violence and some pretty obvious sexual stuff, but it’s still alright. Elliot does a lot of politicking and grumbling, which is nice. 

There’s probably a bunch more I forgot about, but these were fascinating reads and ones I really liked. If you have a suggestion for more, please let me know!