What I want to see more of in YA

This is a response to the lovely people of Paper Hangover. They usually do an interesting thing called Friday Fives, where everyone is invited to write a list of five things in response to their prompt. I thought this one was particularly fun, so even though it's not Friday, I thought I'd give it a shot:

Five things I want more of in YA:

1. Parents. Seriously, where are they?

2. Books with male narrators and strong female characters AT the SAME time! None of this manic pixie dream girl business. I feel like there is a weird dichotomy between "girl" books and "boy"books. It feels like most books with male main characters totally forget their female characters because they're trying to appeal more to boys. Give boys more credit, authors friends!

3. Science fiction elements a la When You Reach Me and Across the Universe. Who doesn't like time travel and space ships??

4. Boy/Girl friendships that don't lead to romance. Many of my friends in high school were boys, and I definitely had no romantic feelings for them. I wish there were more relationships in literature that reflected and encouraged that

5. Historical with foreign settings. I grew up in Asia and am looking desperately for something in YA that takes place outside of the standard US or England. Give me imperialist India, Meiji Japan, Communist China, Imperial China, Khmer Cambodia, WWII Singapore!