A Critique of Young Adult Historical Fiction

One true account of an event does not exist. The process of recording history is never objective, rather it is a product of the context within which it is written. While underpinned by historical fact, it is a re-versioning of the event. While historical fictions can be chronologically distanced from the history they convey, it is through the imaginative rendering of history, that the facts are rebirthed into the present. The re-creations constructed in historical fictions can shed light on history in a way that the facts never could. Historical fiction can give adolescent readers safe access into conflicts and ways of being that can prove more than merely escapism but can shed light on their own pathway to adulthood.