My MC is a fifteen year old city girl who has moved to the country. Not unbelieveable, hardly original, but down right difficult when you consider they way a fifteen year old girl talks nowadays. Very different from fifteen or so years ago. At the moment she’s caught between several decades of cliches, expressions and extremely out of date sayings. Poor love. I partially did this so that I knew what I wanted to say but would later find a more appropriate, ie. modern, way to say it.
At one point I have her starting to say the expression ‘In for a penny, in for a pound’. Although I’m sure there are more than enough teens out there who know or may have even heard the expression, I could almost guarantee that none of them would ever actually use it. My entire story is riddled with them but they will have served their purpose when I go through and change them all.
So I find myself having to find out how today’s teens talk. I’m sure I could eavesdrop but I want to make it to my next birthday. Needless to say, I’ll have to venture forth into cyber space (Am I showing my age?) and find sites that are loaded with teens so I can get an idea of how they sound.
Can anyone recommend some sites for this old fogey to visit? 
Livejournal – see fandomsecrets community for a start off point and click on any contributor, check their birthdate and read on.
MySpace is riddled with teens, as is Facebook. Also google for emo sites (no one is goth any more, sigh), anime fandoms. Look at who’s contributing, they should give you some slang/insight. Also google something like “geek chat” or “geek board” for how the more internet-savvy teens talk and interact. Being a geek is a good thing these days, well, sort of…
Join a board for a popular or cult US teen-oriented show such as Privileged, Greek, Dr. Horrible, Gossip Girl, new 90210 etc. Even just looking them up on the IMDB and checking the message boards will give you a picture of the younger teenage mind.
Groan! I’m seriously not looking forward to this. The idea of reading about all these moaning and wailing teens just does not appeal. :S
But thank you so very much for the sites. I’m afraid it’s just a necessary evil.
Well, I like teens these days insofar as they are a generation removed from our own generation and thus even more accepting of stuff like being gay, not white, female, trans, etc. Little by little we are actually building a generation of people who are not complete assholes…it will still take a while though!!
I guess it’s a matter of remembering our own transition and, well, it was hard.
Oops, now that I’ve reread it I was a bit harsh. I’m sure it’ll come good in a few generations – if Star Trek Next Gen and Voyager are anything to go by.
I must have been having a moment because I’m actually looking forward to browsing the sites and seeing how teens chat. Maybe I hadn’t had my coffee at that point.:S
Oh dude – there are many annoying teens, and reading their angst can definitely be painful!! But there are good points too.