History

When it comes to the history of murder mysteries catered towards young adults, we also have to look back at the origins of the term “young adult literature”. From the American Library Association, they describe its beginnings as follows: “The term ‘young adult literature’ is inherently amorphous, for its constituent terms ‘young adult’ and ‘literature’ are dynamic, changing as culture and society — which provide their context — change. When the term first found common usage in the late 1960’s, it referred to realistic fiction that was set in the real (as opposed to imagined), contemporary world and addressed problems, issues, and life circumstances of interest to young readers aged approximately 12-18. Such titles were issued by the children’s book divisions of American publishers and were marketed to institutions – libraries and schools – that served such populations” (Cart, 2008). The sub genre is more of a recent occurrence in literature and has had a large rise in popularity the 2010’s and into the 2020’s.

More alongside the mystery side of things, the subgenre had its humble beginnings in the The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew novels from 1927 and 1930 respectively, as the two main series of what we could consider today to be YA mysteries (including murder mysteries!). These novels were ghostwritten, with authors hired by the leader of a network of freelance writers and editors, Edward Stratemeyer, of the Stratemeyer Syndicate (Gross, 2015).