Let's Discuss: Bizarre Categorizing Choices

 

Okay, so this idea just randomly popped up in my head today after I was strolling through the bookstore and then scrolling through Netgalley. And I was like...what were they thinking?

Bizarre Categorizing Choices

Yeah, a weird title there too! Lol. But okay, first I was the bookstore having a nice long browse through the shelves and tables, just looking at books and being happy! Lol. Then I was at a "romantasy" table and I saw a book that made me pause. Because I was like...this is not a fantasy. It's not romantic. I mean, yeah there were crushes going around, but it wasn't a fantasy. 

It was a YA horror/supernatural thriller read with a few threads of romance in the forms of crushes and kisses...on a table of adult heavy "romantasy" reads. It's like that old song, "one of these things is not like the other one..." because yeah, it soooo did not fit with the rest of the books there. And there were SEVERAL copies of this YA supernatural thriller read, so it wasn't just "left" there by someone. So yeah. Bizarre.

Now I was just on Netgalley scrolling through my favorite genres looking to see if there's anything I ought to request and I was in the YA section and paused. I paused a good long time staring at these titles and covers. They were in Spanish...I think. Obviously not English. And they were for an ADULT "romantasy" book that was HEAVY on the romance/sexual content. And I mean pretty heavy. Now there's a chance, a small, maybe slim, chance that the books lose some of their adult content in translation...but I kind of doubt it. I was like why are these books here? It'd be like letting a 13 year old into a NC-17 movie. Do they even still have that movie rating anymore? But it'd be like letting a 14/15 year old read 50 Shades of Grey. Let's put it at that distinction. I never read that book but my sister did and filled me in on some of those details! Lol. So yeah, it was a mind spin for sure!

I was also finding other YA "romantasy" titles in the adult "romantasy" tables. Now this probably isn't a huge deal. But I guess it could be misleading towards the adult looking for something that's spicy or whatnot. I mean the book could be spicy, possibly, in the YA sense. It wasn't one I read, so I really can't judge on it being there, other than the age level thing. Which yes, we adults go back and forth between the YA and adult titles, but I don't know. I just found it weird. Because then my sister's teenage daughter was picking up TikTok titles that she wanted to read and my sister would look at them and some she immediately shot down as NO. That she just wasn't "old enough/mature enough" for that kind of book just yet. I think she ended up on some YA contemporary one, when she looked at me, I just said, "no idea. Not my genre, not my circus." Lol!

But yeah. Talk about bizarre shelving choices! Have you ever encountered a bookstore or bookish site that just seemed to put the wrong age level books somewhere? I mean the YA supernatural thriller in the adult "romantasy" isn't scandalous, just misleading. But the adult "romantasy" in the YA shelves...even virtual shelves just seems like a possible recipe for trouble*! 

*again, this was a book that was translated into Spanish or something, so mayyyybe it lost some of its spiciness...but I can't say that with confidence either! Lol.