What Does Young Adult Fiction Mean in 2016?

 Is young adult fiction a forest cut down of all of it's riches? Have writers mined every idea in each genre? Are audiences saturated with all the romantically undead characters, magical plots and dystopian worlds one can possibly envision? Has Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey been taken so many times it has become the treadmill of entertainment?

Ever since the reinvention of young adult fiction with J.K.Rowling's Harry Potter the literary landscape that is enjoyed by children and adults alike has been plundered for every idea under the sun. From magical child heroes, through legions of Abercrombie & Fitch vampires and werewolves to the far reaches of dystopian futures and back again to play the strings of the heart, stories that tap into the metaphors of our time and what it means to be a single voice in a ever-shrinking, and increasingly crowded global village are now like so much white noise.

Sure, there are always the random gems among the thousands of copycats, which truly entice readers to restore their faith in innovative storytelling once more, but they are few and far in between. Even the sudden appearance of a movie quartet (based on a book trilogy) or a TV show no longer holds the same guarantee that the original material was anything but a slight variation on themes formerly explored.

So, what does it take to become noticed as an author? Do we strive for gimmicks, a catch on familiar concepts no one has properly explored yet? Or perhaps, we view familiar worlds and plots through an R-rated lens or a filter woven in equal parts of sarcasm and cliche-aware humor? Can we rope in a celebrity to co-author our novel or at least praise it as 'the next [fill in the most recent story success]?'

I have no answers.

The belief that one should not try and write towards the next big thing or what audiences might want to read still rings true to me, although the temptation is always there to jump on the trend bandwagon. I enjoy writing, not just because I like storytelling but also because it reveals a lot about who I am as a person. No matter what genre you write, autobiographical elements always sneak into the story. However, I love plotting even more. Currently I have ideas for two dozen stories, all of them flirting with-what I think are-original and interesting elements of storytelling. I love mixing up symbology and metaphors into my plots. I like to lay with my characters in ways I wished other writers did. Above all, I don't want to play it safe.

But what are your ideas? Where should young adult fiction focus on next? Is there room for the wild and imaginative? Or instead of spreading our wings wide and exploring new concepts, should we delve deeper into characters and ignore the world dressing?

Where is YA fiction going next?