As someone who is both young and an adult, I am very attracted to the genre of young adult books and movies. They're weird, quirky, and often slightly unrealistic or cliched love stories that I find to be incredibly charming. With that being said, there has been one weird characteristic that I have noticed that occurs in many of these recent young adult movies: the quirky female character is sick or dying.

I'm not looking to make a case on some underlying tone of misogyny (which I don't actually think is prevalent here), nor am I saying that these movies glamorize cancer or any other illness (because that's also really not my place to say). Rather, this comes as an observation that has spiked into a curiosity. Why is it that the new "quirk" for the female character is to be terminally ill or a victim of a tragic accident? Is it not enough anymore to just have their favorite Beatle be Ringo Starr and give them some obscure collection? Why is it that so many writers have been making their female leads ill?

The thing is, being sick isn't really usually "someone's thing" or the characteristic that makes them that manic pixie dream girl. It's just being sick and being sick is a thing that I'm pretty sure is a lot less fun than these movies have been making it out to be.

Some of these movies (or books turned movies) include "Now Is Good," "Me, Earl, and the Dying Girl," "If I Stay,"and, of course, my personal favorite, "The Fault In Our Stars." I'm discounting "A Walk to Remember" because, although it was great, it was depressing in its entirety and it's old while we're talking about a recent trend. What's interesting is that a lot of these books and movies that have taken over the indie-young adult genre claim not to actually be about the illness at all. "The Fault In Our Stars" is described as "a book about cancer that's not actually about cancer." However, it is impossible to ignore the health status of these quirky female leads because they're basically kids. This is what makes them different from other books with people dying in them. Along with that, many of these books and movies are meant to be uplifting, which they often are (except at the end, you have to know that any book or movie with a sick kid in it is going to emotionally destroy you at some point).

So where did this surge of dying female characters come from and why has it become so appealing to us? Also, what about it has become something that's used to be uplifting? When did dying turn into a quirky characteristic? Whatever the reason is, so many of these books and movies have been using it as a central theme, but they've also been turning these stories into something so much more than death and dying.