“No man is an island….” When John Donne wrote that, he did not take into account the needs of literature. Literature in general—and Young Adult literature in specific—makes a habit of forming men, and women, into islands. Indeed, writers go to great lengths to isolate their characters. So common is the trope of isolation that critics and teachers often overlook it when discussing books. Isolation has been used as a structural and thematic tactic in every genre. Hamlet is written as an outsider, a professional student who has been permitted, or urged, to separate himself from his his country, his family, and his inheritance. The Pevensie children have been sent away from their home, parents, and friends. The orphan Oliver has been separated, at birth, from his family, as have fellow orphans Frodo Baggins and Harry Potter. My own Rosi Carol has lost her parents and been uprooted from her hometown and sent to a place that is alien to her. This is no accident. Nor is it a coincidence. The very nature of reading a book requires an element of isolation. Music is often listened to in a group. Plays and movies are intended to be consumed by masses…