Article on books for tweens

[notthatamanda]

I only skimmed it, because I'm not writing for that age range, but thought people might like to see it.

https://www.slj.com/?detailStory=MiddleGrade-Too-Young-YA-Too-Old-Where-Are-the-Books-for-Tweens-libraries

[okey dokey]

I think it's amazing that one series - Harry Potter - hit all the markets.

[Simon Haynes]

They didn't have high hopes for it though, did they? Wasn't the first print run 500 hardcovers?

[Bill Hiatt]

They didn't have high hopes for it though, did they? Wasn't the first print run 500 hardcovers?

Yeah, they underestimated the appeal.

[notthatamanda]

I think it was turned down by a bunch of publishers too.

[Bill Hiatt]

And only picked up by one because the young child of one of the editors got ahold of the first part of the MS and wanted to see the rest.

Or so the story goes. I've heard different versions of that part, suggesting it may already be morphing into legend. In some versions, the editor gave the pages to the child on purpose to see what the reaction was. It does seem clear, though, that a certain amount of luck was involved.

[notthatamanda]

If you could buy luck...

[Simon Haynes]

I think that was The Hobbit, wasn't it? Publisher's ten-year-old son loved it or something. Nobody else knew what to do with it.

[Tom Wood]

I think that was The Hobbit, wasn't it? ...

All signs point to yes: https://thearcanist.io/the-hobbit-how-a-10-year-old-boy-helped-unleash-tolkien-upon-the-world-f9c478358d1d

[Vijaya]

Thanks for the links. Some of my friends are writing for the tween group and they are really hard to place--most of the feedback they get from editors is to either make it MG or YA. And most YA is upper YA.