Parents in young adult fantasy?

[cydare]

I'm currently working some YA fantasy and was wondering if people have any tips on avoiding the dead/missing parent trope that seems to be so prevalent in the genre, while still giving the main characters freedom agency?

For example, the current story I'm writing has two protagonists - teenage sisters. One gets spirited away, and the other goes to find her, both dealing with their respective adventures. Both their mother and father are alive and well and care about the girls, so I'm having trouble thinking about why they and the second sister wouldn't go on the search together (kept away from the danger by them).

 

[Ireth]

Maybe you could injure or incapacitate one of the parents (or both), so they're physically incapable of going on the search? I'm not really sure what else to suggest. My main YA project has the MC's dad and uncle as supporting characters who have their own subplot of searching for the MC after she's kidnapped by the villain and trying to make her own way out.

 

[visually_alert]

Could it possibly be some sort of secret that they need to keep from their parents? Maybe some sort of time sink or time altering going on that would keep the parents from knowing that the girls are gone?

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[Heliotrope]

I would make it a condition of the plot... So something like:

Janice and Jessie, twin sisters are notorious trouble makers. So when their parents promise them a dream spring break in Hawaii it is under one condition: the girls don't get into anymore trouble.

But when Jessie disobeys her parents despite Janice's pleas and ends up missing, Janice is the only one who can save her sister before it's too late... Or her parents find out.

You get her idea. Make it a bad consequence if the parents find out to keep them out of the loop.

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

Oops...both of my WIP's (the current one and the one on hiatus) feature this trope. (I write YA. I am a YA, so it's hard not to.)

There are a TON of possibilities. Here's something I do sometimes: write down 12 possibilities, even the stupid ones, and don't stop till you get to 12. None of them any good? Try 12 more.

If that doesn't work, here are my own suggestions (and my suggestions might help anyway)

Maybe the parents aren't able to go on the adventure. Maybe one of them is sick or disabled and the other has to stay to take care of the sick/disabled one.

Or maybe, as others have suggested, they have to keep it a secret for some reason.

Maybe the girls both end up separated from their parents prior to what happens to the one sister. Parents are on vacation, etc...something like that. And the sister who's left can't contact them. So they don't even know.

 

[cydare]

Thank you! I think I might end up giving the parents a little side mission of their own, or incapacitating them in some way as you guys suggested.

Also, the 12 possibilities trick sounds super useful for anything I get stuck in!

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

Thank you! I think I might end up giving the parents a little side mission of their own, or incapacitating them in some way as you guys suggested.

Also, the 12 possibilities trick sounds super useful for anything I get stuck in!

It's a super nifty trick. It'll catch about a quarter of writer's blocks too early for them to cause damage.

 

[skip.knox]

Why do you have to get rid of the parents? I know of kids who managed to do as they pleased despite parents. Had one of my own, in fact.

In addition, parental control in earlier ages was not what it is today. I remember summers, when I would go outside in the morning after breakfast. The only parental rule was: be home for supper. I also ran away from home, which simply consisted of not coming home for supper.

Parents are way easy to evade. You don't have to kill them.

 

[DragonOfTheAerie]

Parents are way easy to evade. You don't have to kill them.

This sentence, without context...I am laughing so hard. I must be tired.

Ooh! This could be a writing prompt...

 

[Caged Maiden]

With parents in YA (and I learned about this because one of my writing partners is writing Middle Grade and YA), there are set guidelines for how YA characters feel about parents and the concepts were really foreign to me before I researched them.
In YA, I think it's typical for the characters to not trust adults. see them as the enemy in a way.

Sticking to that concept, then, couldn't you use some sort of version of that? If you're writing a Medieval sort of story, perhaps the sisters were sent away to live with an aunt and uncle, awaiting a marriage proposal, and when the older sister was engaged, the sisters plotted to escape the horrible arrangement, and that's how they ended up in trouble?

If you're writing a later time period, perhaps one of the sisters was sent to work in a lady's household, and the sisters wanted to stay together, so the younger one ran away to be with her sister, and that's how she ended up in trouble? Or maybe the lady the sister was meant to work for was a horrible mistress, and she wrote to her sister begging for help. Of course, then they wouldn't be able to tell their parents, who just want the best for their children.

If you're writing a more modern time period, you could use a school (boarding or otherwise) to use as a backdrop for their problems. The parents believe the kids are alive and well, but trouble ensues unbeknownst to them.

If the parents are really involved in their kids' lives, it can be trickier, but what about a field trip to a big city? The girls get separated. Or, they're visiting their dear granny in another country/ city and the trouble happens there?


There's loads of ways you can have the parents blissfully ignorant while the kids are away.

Hope my ideas help.

 

[Saigonnus]

Maybe they simply don't know what's happening. Girls and boys both keep secrets. Perhaps they are "staying the weekend" at a friends' house or some other common excuse. Maybe the parents are so busy they don't even notice until after they were supposed to be back. Maybe add a side plot about police getting involved etc..


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[K.S. Crooks]

In my first novel my Y.A. characters go to a school for people with special abilities. They are away from their own parents, but the teachers at the school fill that roll. When my main characters decide to take it upon themselves to save a friend they spend a few days hiding items needed for a long treacherous journey, then take off I the middle of the night without telling anyone.

some other options- one or both parents are sick, one or both parents are injured, the parent s are made to forget their other daughter, a condition/threat is put on them to not look for their daughter, the parent try to look and fail, the seasons are changing and they feel it is better to wait before looking, they don't have the money or resources to look for their daughter.

 

[Gribba]

My initial thought was, if the parents know the sister is missing you can give the other girl freedom by making the parents so occupied in the grief and worry that they overlook what is going on with the 2nd girl, not intentionally, but as part of the emotional distress they are in.
They might be occupied with looking for the sister but in all the wrong places as they are looking in the conventional way and maybe a bit blinded by the emotional roller coaster they are dealing with.
No one, has to get hurt or die and this way they can be gone at times, looking in the wrong places (and even find some information that they do not understand, but the other girl finds useful. Maybe the idea is so crazy that she is not sure if she should share it with anyone or worry her parents even more).

 

[Darkfantasy]

I always used to complain about the lack of of parents in YA and how the parents were always dead or "other engaged" but now I understand why. It's so parents can't get in the way of the kids saving the day and putting themselves in danger. I think it largely depends on the world they are living in.

At ten the I was allowed in the back garden and outside the house to play in the street.
These days most kids aren't allowed outside the front gate.
My dad was let out to roam wild with "be back for lunch" - they was a lot less supervision. If they world isn't that dangerous or maybe you could include a nanny or a carer to keep watch over the girl's.

 

[Michael K. Eidson]

If the situation is one in which the parents would consider taking the second daughter along to look for the first (not realizing exactly how dangerous it would be to take the second daughter along), then maybe they could all go together to search. Something terrible (though not fatal) happens to the parents during the search but second daughter manages to escape it. Now second daughter must save not only daughter number one but the parents too!