August's Tips & Tricks for Self-Publishers

Writing For Children

If you have ever created a story for a small child, you know that it is not as easy as it first seems. There are as many rules for writing a successful children’s book as there are for writing adult tomes.

1. The first step in writing for children is to identify your audience by age. For a very small child (one to two years old), you may not even have any words on a page—often the pictures tell the story and plot. If there are words, they usually make up no more than one sentence per page. This type of publication is called a picture book, and does not have to have people as the main character(s).
2. Three year olds to six year olds also like picture books, but expect word counts from 300 to 600 words. There should be a simple plot, with artwork enhancing the story, but not the main focus. Since these books are for beginning readers, the vocabulary should be simple and easy to sound out.
3. Seven to nine year olds like chapter books, which are also called story books. These books are composed of short chapters with easy to read language and an interesting plot, which often is humorous. The words counts for such books range from 1500 to 3000 words. Illustrations are more limited and scattered throughout the book and often are small and in black and white rather than color. Chapter books are smaller in size than picture books.
4. Eight to twelve year olds like novels with more complex characters and plots involving some sort of conflict which is related to their own lives—family, school, and friendships are often main topics. Characters in the books are children and the ending is optimistic. The word counts for these books are from 10,000 to 20,000 words. These novels are rarely illustrated.
5. Overlapping the middle-grade novel above is the upper middle-grade novel, for ten to fourteen year olds. In these books, the conflicts are more mature and subplots may not end happily. The characters are still children, ranging from twelve to fourteen years old, and the word count may go from 20,000 to 40,000 words. However, at this level there are exceptions to the rules—with the Harry Potter books being a prime example of quality overruling word counts.

(Parts of this article are based on “Write for Children” by Melissa Stewart)