Feature & Follow #9

Feature & Follow is back with a new look! This time, rather than a question, we've got a more open ended prompt. More of a struggle if you're not feeling creative, but luckily you get a pretty good prompt to get you thinking!

The Feature & Follow is hosted by TWO hosts, Parajunkee of Parajunkee's View and Alison of Alison Can Read. I've just started getting involved in these features and they're great fun! It's a really cool way to find out what people are reading and connect with other bloggers. Added bonus, the aim of a blog hop is to follow others. You follow me, I follow you. Wins all round! I'm happy for followers on GFC, Twitter, Bloglovin', Goodreads, whatever works for you. I guess I'd prefer Bloglovin' follows if I had to pick one. Make sure you leave me a comment so I know you're a new followers, I'm kind of scatty with keeping track of new followers on Bloglovin' and the like!

The post prompt:
Ten reasons you love your favourite genre.

In a move that will surprise no one who has even glanced sideways at my blog, I've gone for fantasy YA.

In a land far, far away...
World building scores big points with me, and there's usually plenty of that in fantasy YA novels.

Dance, dance
I don't mean the Fall Out Boy song (although that it is a tune!), I mean the inevitable learning to dance and going to the ball chapters. If there isn't an occasion for you to have a "She's All That" style makeover and go to a fancy ball, then you're not in a YA fantasy novel.

The prince and the pauper
He's a prince, she's some kind of commoner/assassin/apprentice in the kind of one-sided match up that would last about five seconds in the real world. But come on, who doesn't like to think they could snag someone who's way out of the their league given half the chance?

Magic
Because...magic

An ass-kicking female lead
Some, alright most, of my favourite book characters are from YA. I have a whole page dedicated to my favourite leading ladies.

World Map
I love world maps! Honestly, I'd make wallpaper of some of my favourite maps if I could, or at least frame them and put them on the wall. A YA book is off to a good start if I open it to a world map, and most of them do.

Escapasim
Come on, who doesn't like to think that they're Anne Hathaway in The Princess Diaries with a long lost kingdom waiting out there for them somewhere? Who doesn't love a rag to riches story? Fantasy is just that, it's endless possibility and about reaching as high as you can and dreaming without limits.

Down the rabbit hole
A lot of YA fantasy novels and series share a lot of common themes and DNA. Some people call them cliches, and I do too, but that doesn't mean I don't love them. If you find yourself with a severe book hangover when your favourite series comes to a close, there's a ton of new ones out there and you'll find your new favourite read in no time. Fickle? Me? Surely not...

Ready for the close up
YA fantsy cover art is, 9 times out of 10, gorgeous. I've done posts dedicated to beautiful artwork here and here, and I suspect there will be more to come.

The leading man
No YA fantasy novel is complete without a swoonworthy love interest. Some books get this more right than others (and a few get it so horrendously wrong that the book reads like a warningly pamphlet for abusive relationships) but if a book features the literary equivalent of Ryan Reynolds, well, that's at least one review star right there.