What Makes a Good Coming-of-Age Story || Let’s Talk Bookish

Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly meme, hosted by Rukky @ Eternity Books & Dani @ Literary Lion, where we discuss certain topics, share our opinions, and spread the love by visiting each other’s posts. It’s supposed to be posted on Friday, but being on time is hard and it’s better late than never.

This week’s topic is: what makes a good coming-of-age story.

It may come as no surprise that I absolutely love a good coming-of-age story. Who doesn’t love that moment when the protagonist discovers a maturity they didn’t know they possessed, when they officially grow into themselves and either shuck their awkward shell or embrace it entirely as just who they are? The trope itself is just *chef’s kiss*.

But what exactly makes a good coming-of-age story? Particularly in fantasy, which is what I tend to read and a genre that, I think, isn’t particularly associated with coming-of-age nearly as much as contemporary books.

What exactly *is* a “coming-of-age” story?

According to Google (whom everyone knows is always right, as our supreme overlord and benevolent robot dictator-in-training), a coming-of-age story is when a character transitions from the innocence of childhood to the maturity of adulthood. It can also be referred to as a bildungsroman, for reasons that make sense if you understand languages and etymology but which I am entirely unqualified to explain.

Most often, this is associated with the period belonging to tweenhood to young adulthood, when offspring are learning how to finally transition into being full-fledged people. Huzzah!

But … does a coming-of-age story always have to focus around children?

Common Themes in Coming-of-Age Stories

As with all tropes, there are often similarities between this type of story that make it wholly recognizable as a coming-of-age story. This includes, among others:

• A protagonist who starts out immature and grows up over the course of the novel.
• A marked loss of childhood innocence, to some degree, in favor of maturity.
• Inner conflict and turmoil, resulting in personal growth and development.
• Developing from a self-centered thinking to a more worldly, other-focused thought.
• Learning where one fits in the larger world.
• A tipping point at a character’s life, where their experiences can be divided into before and after.

Coming-of-age stories for older protagonists

Listen. I love older protagonists. They’re often surely, bitter, and entirely disillusioned with life, because they’ve been through things and realized things have a propensity for going wrong. Obviously, they’re into their prime and no longer qualify for the childhood innocence into adulthood maturity definition. They’ve shucked their innocence way before their story starts.

Who says that adult protagonists can’t have their own coming-of-age stories, though?!

While it’s true they can no longer go from childhood to adolescence, they can hit every other point on that list. So why not?

There seems to be an underlying cultural belief that once a human hits 20, they magically are an adult and have everything in their life figured out and settled and know exactly who they are.

Excuse me while I collapse from this chair and roll around the floor laughing hysterically. That’s a good one. I’m 30, and I’ve only just sort of maybe figured out what I want to do with one part of my life and have become vaguely comfortable-ish with who I am as a human-adjacent creature. I consider myself luck in that. There are plenty of people older than myself who I know are still trying to figure it out.

Coming-of-age stories are almost more important for older protagonists, to regularize the idea that we don’t have to have our lives figured out by the time we hit 20, and you’re never too old to gain more maturaity and insight about the world and your place in it.

This is one of the reasons I absolutely love these stories. Adults can be so set in their ways. Sometimes we forget that learning and growing needs to happen our entire lives.

So would this be considered a coming-of-age story? Maybe. Maybe we need a better name for it and we need a whole genre of these books. I certainly hope to see more of them!

Coming-of-Age Stories in Fantasy

This is particularly interesting, because fantasy (high fantasy in particular) is normally characterized by young protagonists that are more mature just by the very nature of the worlds they live in. Fret not, though! Coming-of-age stories are still entirely possible!

The coming-of-age stories in fantasy, especially high fantasy, tend to be more focused on overcoming big, traumatic events and personal development rather than the transition from childhood to adolescence.

I feel like coming-of-age is easier to see in, say, contemporary or historical fiction, where there’s a lot of things one can relate to childhood, and one can see the transition from that to maturity. Less so in fantasy, where growing up looks different from what one might expect in the real world.

Instead, in fantasy, coming-of-age tends to have higher stakes and more emotional growth, which I love!

Why I Love Coming-of-Age Stories

• The emotional struggle and complexity.
• In fantasy in particular, the overcoming of large, overwhelming obstacles.
• The journey of learning who you are and want to be.
• Discovering you can do things you hadn’t imagined.
• The self-acceptance and personal growth.

Great Coming-of-Age Books

Because I could never leave you without recommendations, right? If ever that day comes … send help. Something has clearly gone wrong.

For young readers:

           

           

For older readers:

           

           

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