If It's Not a Trilogy, It's Not YA Fiction

I've talked about how I have a total writer-crush on Kristin Cashore. She's the author of Graceling and Fire, two of my favorite YA books of all time. I really, really love her writing. When I found out that she's only had these two books published, I was at first really impressed (I don't think Graceling reads like a "first novel" at all), and then totally bummed (I wanted to read more and more of her writing.) If you didn't read my reviews, just re-read this paragraph and you'll see that I clearly want to get literary-married to Kristin Cashore.

Sidenote: I'm kind of digging the phrase "literary-married." Holy Moses, there are so many authors I want to literary-marry. I won't even begin to list them. That's another story for another time. 

I've been on the lookout for Kristin Cashore's next wonderful, genius book, and today I found it! Well, I found a mention of it. But that's all I need to get superpumped and proclaim to the world that THERE IS A GOD AND HE LOVES YA FICTION. 

I was browsing my library's catalog of eBooks, and I saw that they had Fire. But next to the title there was something that set my heart afire (Pun! Ha!). 

TRILOGY?!?!!?!?!

Now that I think about it, it makes perfect sense. Not because the story lends itself to a three-part series - it doesn't. The books aren't even a series, they're more like companion books, only being related because they take place in the The Seven Kingdoms (hence the trilogy title). No, it makes sense because that's just how books (mainly YA books) are published now. It seems like you can't get anything published without making it have at least three volumes. I picture a YA author submitting a manuscript and the publisher saying, "Great! What do you have planned for the next two?" One thing I really like about The Seven Kingdoms series (still getting used to calling it that) is that each of the books can stand alone and still be completely understandable and enjoyable.  

The third book will be called Bitterblue, after a character readers will remember from Graceling. The tentative release date that I found is June 2012, but there's hardly any info out there. It's not even on Amazon, and we all know Amazon list books WAY before their release date. Even though there's very little information available about Bitterblue (at least that I could find), and a frequently delayed, tentative release date, the book already has a GoodReads page. And it has reviews. 

At first I was upset that people were criticizing what will be in the book when they haven't even read it. It may not even be finished, for all we know. But I've had a change of heart, realizing that these people are just fans that want to talk about the books they love. Look, I'm unashamed about my love for the Twilight series, but I can go on and on about how I hated Breaking Dawn and consider it fan fiction, and how the movies are comically ridiculous and LAME. Few people love every aspect of something they're a fan of, and that's ok. Although the only complaint I can think of about the Seven Kingdoms series is that it's 3 books instead of 20.