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Writing Young Adult Fiction For Dummies Cheat Sheet

Writing young adult fiction for dummies.

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The elements of storytelling are the same for young adult fiction and adult fiction, but writers of young adult fiction must come at those elements with a wholly different mindset. After all, this category has its own rules, its own quirks, and its own very opinionated audience: teens and tweens.

Young adult fiction categories and age ranges

The two categories of young adult literature — young adult (YA or “teen fiction”) and middle grade (“MG fiction”) — are split into several age ranges to help book buyers and readers judge the age-appropriateness of the content and the writing. The shift from tween to teen begins around age 12, and standard age ranges reflect that.

Writing young adult fiction: creating a youthful narrative voice

Narrative voice — what your narrator says and how he says it — is a defining feature of young adult fiction. Here are five ways to make your narrative voice teen-friendly, whether your narrator is your young main character or an all-knowing omniscient being:

Embrace your inner drama queen. Use hyperbole, or words and phrases that suggest an overly dramatic view of the situation, its extent, its implications, and its impact on the protagonist herself. “It was the best day ever.” “Mom was going to kill me.” Many teens lack the experience to put things in perspective, and their stress and frustration often show up as exaggeration.

Relax your grammar. Let sentences purposely run on, double-back on themselves, repeat, and end prematurely for a natural flow. As long as you keep the meaning clear, the grammar police won’t come after you. Creative grammar lets you selectively deviate from the rules for a more casual, off-the-cuff, and ultimately youthful quality.

Match sentence structure and paragraphing to your audience. As young people’s emotions, intellect, and interests change, a writer’s word choice and sentence structure must adjust. Generally, use shorter, more declarative sentences and frequent paragraph breaks for tweens and younger teens so the pages don’t seem dense and daunting; slip in longer sentences for rhythmic variety as long as they’re direct and active. More complex sentence structure and longer paragraphs tend to convey a more mature voice for older readers.

Embrace immaturity. Young tweens are typically focused inward, with conflicts stemming from that. They’re struggling to find out who they are, first and foremost. Don’t let young narrators sound too self-aware by analyzing themselves or others. Let them judge and act quickly, harshly, and wrongly — and then face the consequences. Teens are starting to look outward as they try to find their places in the world and realize that their actions have consequences in the grander scheme of life, affecting others in immense ways. Your narrator’s observations and commentary must reflect the appropriate youthful outlook for your protagonist and audience age range.

Don’t preach. Let the characters embody your message and live your lessons.

Creating teen dialogue when writing young adult fiction

Writing dialogue that sounds like it spilled from the lips of teens makes your young adult fiction novel more believable to your audience. Use these five tips to defy your age and write dialogue that’s both young-sounding and youth-pleasing:

Blurt things out. Teens often talk first and think second. And their tact filters aren’t fully developed yet.

Choose simple words. Young people don’t generally break out the 50-cent words in normal dialogue unless they’re fascinated by words or maybe want to show off how smart they are.

Exaggerate. For emphasis, teens and tweens often talk in exaggerations, revealing their still-developing perspective of the world and their tendency to overstate in times of high emotion and frustration. Think, “I’m a total loser.”

Lighten up. Ditch stiff, proper grown-up delivery and embrace casual syntax instead. String your words together in a more footloose fashion, and maybe throw in a little bad grammar while you’re at it. Few people implement grammar precisely when they’re in a back-and-forth. After all, when you’re trying to get the words out, why bother sorting out sentence structure just so you can use “whom” properly? Loose syntax is more effective at conveying youthfulness than depending on slang, which can date your book.

Make the conversation about the speaker. Teens are a self-absorbed lot, and that can come out in their words. Frame teen dialogue from a perspective that focuses on how the circumstances affect the speaker. Thus, instead of “Tom seemed sad today. I wonder why?” use “Tom blew me off today. What’s up with that? What did I do to him?”

Evaluating character and plot in young adult fiction

As you write your manuscript for young adult fiction, edit your work by evaluating characters and plot. Self-editing lets you address story issues even before you ask someone to read your young adult novel. Here are five questions to help you decide whether you still have some character- and plot-shaping to do:

Did you force your protagonist out of their comfort zone at crucial moments?

Has each obstacle pushed the plot and characters forward?

Are the consequences of failure dire enough at each stage of the plot?

Does each scene in each chapter contribute to its chapter’s overall goal, and does every chapter contribute to the character’s achievement of their story goal?

If you take your protagonist as they are in the final scene and drop them back into the first scene of the story, have they matured enough to handle the initial conflict so well this time around that your novel wouldn’t even be necessary?

If you’re confident answering yes to all, you may indeed be at word-tweaking stage and perhaps last draft.

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The Ultimate Guide To Writing YA Fiction [2022]

September 28, 2020 12 min read Character Fiction Guide Mackenzie Belcastro Publishing Tips YA Young Adult 5 Comments

This is a comprehensive guide to writing young adult (YA) fiction, designed to help you form your thoughts into a shape that will hook your readers and keep them flipping the page!

In today’s guide you’ll learn:

• What YA fiction is
• How to make your readers care about your story.
• The role of character progression and growth.
• How to write authentically for young adults, even if you aren’t one.
• The 1 ingredient your story’s ending MUST have.

In short: if you have a story that’s bursting to get out into the world, you’ll love this guide. 

Unlike other guides to writing YA, we’ll be using detailed examples at each step. 

 About the Author

Mackenzie Belcastro is a freelance writer and the author of the low-fantasy, YA novel The Play House. 

About So You Want to Write

Affectionately acronym’d SYWW, we are a member-led, professional development community of writers established in January 2017. 

We partner with literary agents, editors, and published authors to create great content & workshops, and offer coaching that helps writers improve their craft and publish.

Chapter 1: The basics

While many of you may be seasoned writers, well-versed in the publishing world’s lingo, we also know that some of you are bound to be brand new to this world. If you’re part of the first camp, feel free to skip ahead. 

If you’re in the second group—you’ve stumbled on this guide because you have a stellar story bouncing around in your head, but no idea if you’re even writing YA—don’t fret. You’re not alone. So many writers started where you are, in total darkness when it comes to industry terminology. Stick with us here as we pull you out, and get you crystal clear on what YA fiction means.

What The Heck Is Young Adult Fiction?

YA fiction is a category of fiction written for and about teens between the ages of 12 and 17. When compared to adult fiction, it’s quicker-paced and more plot-driven. 

Young readers tend to have a short attention span. They crave immediacy. Keep this in mind with every word you lay down on the page. There’s no room for lofty contemplation here. Save any waxing and waning for your adult, literary novel. 

Tip : writing in the present tense will feed that sense of urgency teens are hungry for.

As a rule of thumb, a YA book excludes any insight that a typical teen would not yet have. This is to maintain the integrity of the character. 

Imagine if Leigh Bardugo wrote in  Shadow And Bone  that Alina Starkov had the wisdom of a senior citizen. It wouldn't make sense, given Alina is a teenager. (Unless, of course, this was a part of her story, and she was, for example, aging backward, à la Benjamin Button .)

So, what about those novels written from the perspective of an adult protagonist reflecting back on his/her youth? Those are considered adult fiction. 

Take Stephen King’s novella The Body , for example. This is a story about a group of 12-year-old boys that set out to find a dead body. It is told through the lens of Gordie, one of the central characters, all grown up. Reflecting back on this adventure, Gordie breaks the storyline here and there to insert thoughts from his adult perspective. 

While this is appreciated by an older reader, it wouldn’t fly with a teen. Think about it. Teens do not read novels to be verbally slapped on the wrist by a “wise narrator.” They read to understand their friends, their frenemies, and, most of all, themselves. They’re looking to become empowered in their personal stories through story. 

YA writers take note: your goal should be to empower teen readers, not patronize them.  

Now that we know what YA fiction is, let’s get clear on…

Why The Label Matters

In a nutshell: sales. 

When your book goes to market, your publisher will need to be able to define your audience clearly. This is so they can go on to target it effectively, and sell your books!

Many writers say they "don't care" about sales, that they're only concerned with the art, and that if their books are meant to find an audience, they will.

And while that may be the case for you (how could I say otherwise?), most writers, when they face the music, do care about sales. If not because they want to be the next Victoria Aveyard, then because they want their stories to reach as many readers as possible. 

This can be scary to admit, because as long as you put it out there that you want your book to sell well, therein lies the possibility of failing to accomplish said goal.

But fear should never prevent you from going after what you want. 

Plus, who says you'll fail?

Labelling your book appropriately will help ensure the opposite effect: your book's success.

Yes, there are adults that read YA, and teens that read adult fiction. But those will be the outliers—the readers that are coming to your book through recommendation, not targeted marketing. 

In order to get your book into the hands of the readers that will most appreciate your story, it needs to be labelled appropriately.    

A Note On Word Count

On average, YA fiction lies somewhere between 47,000 and 80,000 words. The only genres where it’s considered “acceptable” by most to write past 80K are science fiction and fantasy, because of the world-building required. 

Writing above 100K is a risk, especially for debut authors. Unless you have a large platform that can be leveraged to help you sell your book, or social proof through Wattpad that your story is a page-turner, prospective publishers are going to be weary of investing in your book. 

This isn’t because they’re bad people. It’s because publishers are the ones shelling out for each page printed. The lower your page count, the less of an upfront investment it is for them. Remember, you want to make your book an easy sell. So, steer clear of whoppers. 

At least, until you build your cult following. 

And on that note…

Chapter 2: How to make your readers care about your story

For readers to be invested in your story, they need to be able to see themselves in your characters. Books with characters that are too perfect or too flat are usually abandoned. 

They don’t resonate. Teens are experiencing all sorts of difficulties in their day to day lives—from bullying, to gossip, to drugs, to assault, to deep depression, isolation, and so on. They don’t want overly polished plots and people. They want the messy, real deal.

Think of  A Court of Thorns and Roses .  Sarah J. Maas's main character Feyre is far from the polished, prototypical female lead. She is tough. And not just tough in the heroic sense. Tough, too, in the I-have-a-dark-side-so-you-better-not-mess-with-me kind of way. Us readers are exposed to her underbelly. And we are drawn to it, because we see ourselves reflected in it. We're not perfect, and neither is Feyre. We love her for this. 

Avoid Stereotypes

The first step in creating characters that your readers can relate to is in the details. Dig well past stereotypes until you find traits and backstories that take your characters into the grey zone.

Here’s what that means.

Rather than paint your antagonist into a two-dimensional black hole (think: an out-and-out psychopath), give your antagonist some redeeming, even likeable qualities.

Like, for example, as  Sarah J. Maas did with her character  Manon Blackbeak in her novel   Throne of Glass . Manon is, at the outset, ruthless, killing men to drink their blood. But, over time, readers come to see she has a rather tender heart—exposed when she risks everything to save  Elide, Asterin, the Thirteen, and Dorian . 

On the flip side, when it comes to your protagonist, you'll want to give him or her deeper flaws. These will have your reader questioning their own support for your protagonist.

Look to Caroline Kepnes. She does this well in the book You . Readers are at once sympathetic to Joe Goldberg and disgusted by his behaviour. They can't figure out if they're on his side, or not. Confusion aside, it's virtually guaranteed, when you do this, your readers will be intrigued. And glued to the page.

Quit Protecting Your Characters

If your characters still aren’t connecting to your readers, you may be “protecting” them. That is, you may be keeping them from getting too hurt. This is a problem because what that translates to is you are creating lives too shiny for readers and their gritty reality to identify with. This causes a disconnect, which leads to a lack of interest for readers.

Guilty of this? Don’t kick yourself. You’re in good company. Early drafts of Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian were, well, boring. Characters were indifferent when they should’ve been angry, and overly generous when they should’ve been selfish.

So, how did McCarthy write the lean nightmare that we know and love today? He stopped steering his characters away from the dark alley. He let them stumble and feel pain.

Follow his lead. Take your characters to a place that scares you. You probably already have something coming to mind right now as you read this. Don’t you?

Focus On Emotional Truth

Teens want to read stories that show them they aren’t alone, but this doesn’t mean they need to lead the exact same lives as the characters in your story. They just need to see their struggles in the characters. 

Look at Mateo Torrez in Adam Silvera's  They Both Die At The End , for example . Many of us can relate to  his having  anxiety, and his resultant decision to spend the majority of his time in the blogosphere.

And, I'd venture to bet, we can all , especially in the day and age of the Pandemic, relate to Mateo's parallel feeling: that the online world isn't enough, and that he needs to socialize in the real world, in spite of his anxiety.

So, while we may not all receive calls from  Death-Cast telling us we're going to die today (let's keep our fingers crossed on that one, anyway), we can relate to Mateo's feelings, his emotional truth. 

Or, look at Harry Potter . Most of us can relate to Harry. Even if we’ll never be involved in a duel with Lord Voldemort, we can still understand his pain. We’ve all lost people we’ve loved and have, at some point or another, felt like a misfit.

Take note: most teens struggle with identity. They’re asking, either consciously or subconsciously, all the time, “Who am I?” “Who should I be?” “How should I behave?”

If this doesn’t resonate with you, think about what does. What are some pain points you’re familiar with? You’ll be powerful when you can zero in on these.

Don’t be afraid if they’re “heavy.” Embrace challenging subject matter. As long as you’re not trying to be “edgy” or create cheap shock value, you should be well received. Come from a place of honesty. If your mind is drawing a blank on your past struggles, stay tuned for a number of techniques you can use.

In sum, the key to making sure your readers care about your story lies in exposing the full spectrum of your characters’ emotional truth, and allowing them, like any good parent, to fall down, get hurt, and then get back up again. 

Authors come off as authentic and likeable to YA readers when they accurately capture their readers’ range of thoughts, feelings, and experiences in their day to day lives.  

Chapter 3: The role of character progression & growth

Personal growth is a big part of what differentiates YA and adult stories. Why? Think back to when you were a teen. For most, this was a period of exponential growth because life was a minefield of firsts. 

Throughout your book, your protagonist should be growing up, actively transforming in front of the reader. As he or she learns, grows and changes, because of the events experienced in your book, your reader should be gaining insight, too.

How do you highlight this growth in your plot? Create complications and then use these as opportunities to facilitate your protagonist’s learning. If you need ideas, think about where tension came from when you were young. Common culprits are identity, but also relationships and change.

A fight with a friend, for example, can be insightful for your character—especially if it’s caused because your character blew a comment out of proportion, and is forced to reflect on why he or she did that. This can unroot a suppressed pain point your protagonist now has to confront.

Or, you could have a character that meets another character that mirrors back what they've been unwilling to look at in themselves. For instance, maybe your main character is queer but has been hiding from this truth. Having said character meet an out and proud queer character will encourage your character to, perhaps unconsciously at first, begin to discover this hidden aspect of self. 

Another example is your character being forced to change schools. Moving away from friends is a trigger for many teens who tend to use this as an opportunity to “start fresh”— to consider how they want to show up in their “new life” and reflect on who they want to be.

Scenes like these are powerful for your readers. They show how a collection of moments like those plotted in your storyline make an impact, shape us into the people we become.

With that eye opening, readers are encouraged to look inwards, at themselves, at what the plot points of their unique lives look like, and who they’ve become as a result. This is a large part of the power of story.

Don’t forget to be concise with your character’s reflections. Remember that YA is meant to be plot-driven. To ensure you’re keeping your story from getting too fatty, ask yourself of every scene:

• What does this bring to the overall story?
• Is this conversation/reflection necessary for the development of my characters?
• How can my characters develop here? What are they learning?

Chapter 4: How to write authentically for young adults (even if you aren’t one)

As mentioned earlier, a YA novel cannot be told from the point of view of a wise, full blown adult. It has to be told from the point of view of a teen(s) to maintain integrity. 

If it's been a long time since you've been a teenager yourself, read on. The following is what the authors of the best YA books nail, which keeps their fanbase intrigued, loyal, and growing.

Embrace Your Inner Drama Queen

Most teens exaggerate. A lot. Like, one thousand times a day. Teens live in a heightened state of emotion, and exaggeration showcases that, compounded by their tendency to blurt things out before first thinking and putting them into perspective.

Say Adios To The Grammar Police

Dialogue not only can run, be cut short prematurely, or repeat senselessly in YA—they actually should . Teens aren’t precious with their grammar. Reflect that.

Be mindful of adjusting to your target. If you’re writing for younger teens, shorter, more declarative sentences work best, split up into many small paragraphs. For the older set, complex sentences and longer paragraphs are fair game.

Embrace Immaturity

We mentioned it once, but we’ll say it again. Avoid infusing any adult wisdom/analysis into your YA novel. Though typically self-absorbed, teens aren’t often too self-aware, nor do they consider why others may be acting the way they are. Portray them honestly. 

For example, your character would likely have an emotional reaction to her friend ignoring her. She’d get angry or feel hurt. She would not thoughtfully ponder what may be wrong in her friend’s life causing her to behave this way. 

If you’re feeling unsure of your portrayal of your characters, get in touch with your young, awkward, vulnerable self. The one that felt unsure, insecure, and/or naively invincible. If you can find a memory that cracked you open and made you see the world in a new light, dig into it. Write from this place. Let this experience show up in your work.

If you have them, unearth old diaries and read your entries. If you don’t, try people-watching. Studying teens out and about can help you remember what it’s like to be one of them. At the very least, take notes and put them to use.

Choose Simple Words

Lots of authors resort to slang to connect with their readers. Don’t. Slang dates books. Instead, use simple words. Ask yourself if a person the age of your characters would really talk in the way you’ve just written, and if a reader who’s your protagonist’s age would be able to understand. 

Chapter 5: The 1 ingredient your story’s ending MUST have

Ah, the kernel of hope . 

While no teen today wants to read a book with a boring, fairytale ending, optimism must exist in your book’s close. For instance, while your main character may not sky rocket from an anti-social leper to being the most popular kid in school, you’ll want to give him/her a friend or two by the end. 

Consider the popular School For Good And Evil series. It opens portraying Agatha as grumpy, friendless, and insecure. Over time though, we see the humour in her grumpiness. We see her find a friend in Sophie. And, slowly, we witness her gain self-confidence, too.

Another example is found in Thirteen Reasons Why . The story ends with Clay being unable to save the protagonist from ending her life. Although we feel his intense regret for not having tried harder to help her, there is a silver lining.

On the novel’s final page, Clay encounters another classmate that he is worried about. Unlike before, he doesn’t let the chance to help slip by. Motivated by Hannah’s story and his hope for a better outcome, he seizes the moment, and saves a life.

This optimism is crucial because your readers are impressionable. As an author, you’re a figure of indirect authority in their lives. It is your duty to give them a reason to wake up tomorrow, to know that although things get difficult, there is always light at the end of the tunnel.

Chapter 6: Final Words

We hope you found this guide insightful and actionable. Now, it’s time to gather your notes and take a well-deserved break. 

After that, don’t hesitate. Take what you’ve learned here and apply it to your story. If you need more direct help with your particular book, we’re here to support you. 

Here’s how we at So You Want to Write? can assist:

• Enrol yourself in one of our intensive  coaching programs 
• Take a  workshop , or 
• Arrange a  1-on-1 meeting with one of our literary experts

Or, if you’re just in need of regular motivation and helpful tips, you can start simply by joining our  email list .

Either way, we hope to hear from you soon.

5 Responses

May 09, 2022

I’m new. Very new. I’ve only begun to write what I hope will become a shed out YA series. I am writing from several characters points of view and want to use one of the main characters father as one of them. He isn’t very well spoken or a genius or anything and I wanted kids read something from an adults perspective and learn why we may do the things we do. Is this wrong?

January 19, 2022

Can an entire chapter of 6.5 pages have only narrative or should there be dialogue in each and every chapter of a YA novel? There’s lots of action, it’s just described in narrative. There’s a tiny scene of dialogue at the very end. Is that okay or should I rewrite it to have way more dialogue? Thanks.

So You Want To Write

January 06, 2021

Thanks for your questions. In response…

1. The reason people say 1st person, present tense is “best” comes down to the fact that most of the time this creates greater immediacy, which young readers (esp. these days with the shortening of attention span) typically prefer. 

That said, some prefer third person, past tense for the richness this style can lend. We see this more in the European markets, especially with readers who grew up on classics.

So, it isn’t cut and dry. It does depend ultimately on your market. Go with your gut, and with your editor/beta readers/agent’s feedback.

2. Yes, this is acceptable. There are lots of YA books that do multiple POVs, including the School For Good And Evil series, Six of Crows, Eleanor and Park, A Step Toward Falling, An Ember In The Ashes, etc.

Some things to ask yourself: Why am I writing in multiple POV? Does the story necessitate this? If so, all good.

If not, ask: Why have I structured my story in this way? Am I too scared to dive into the one character’s POV? Why?

January 05, 2021

Thank you for the helpful advice. I have two published novels and one finished but not yet published novel, all in different genres. I am working on the third draft of my first YA novel. I have two questions: (1) I have been told that typically a YA novel is first person and present tense. Does that mean my MS with third person and past tense is less marketable? (2) My YA protagonist is a fifteen-year-old girl with the dominant point of view, but the story is told from several points of view. Is this acceptable in the YA marketplace? Jim Lee

Laurayne Bryon

October 26, 2020

I was on the fence about whether my trilogy was YA fiction. After reading this wonderful guide, I know I’m closer to the mark of YA fiction than I thought. Thanks so much for this. It is a light in dark places.

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Your Complete Guide to Young Adult Fiction: What It Is, Examples, How to Write

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Young adult fiction, or YA, is one of the highest-selling types of fiction , worth billions of dollars annually. Much of the success is due to the widespread appeal of these books, being read and enjoyed by people of all ages (even though this genre is targeted at teens) who want to get lost in the fantastical world of the characters. Some of the top YA novels have even been turned into popular movies.

For example, think of these famous YA book titles and series: The Hunger Games Trilogy by Suzanne Collins, The Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer, and The Shadow and Bone Trilogy by Leigh Bardugo.

Many make a full-time income as authors of young adult fiction (you can calculate your book royalties here ).

But getting started can be intimidating. It's important to have a clear vision, align your book correctly within the genre, and develop a story that's both appropriate and entertaining for young readers. To help you do just that, we're going to clearly define what young adult fiction is and share a step-by-step guide to writing a successful book .

Need A Fiction Book Outline?

This guide to young adult fiction includes:

What is young adult fiction.

Young adult fiction, often abbreviated as YA fiction, refers to a genre of literature primarily targeted at teenage readers, typically between the ages of 12 and 18. This genre is meant to act as a buffer to prepare readers for the leap from children’s literature to adult books.

So what makes a book YA?

The protagonists in YA books are typically teenagers dealing with teenage problems. These books include the experiences, emotions, and challenges faced by young adults as they navigate adolescence and transition into adulthood.

It's important to note that young adult fiction covers a broad range of genres, including contemporary, romance, fantasy, science fiction, dystopian, mystery, historical fiction, and more. YA dystopian books and YA romance novels are some of the most common, and some authors may even experiment with mixed-genre books that may blur the lines between genres.

YA books can also be just about any length. Depending on the story you want to write, you could opt to pen it as a YA short story , novella , or full-length novel .

Related: Should You Write a Novel or a Novella?

The controversy around the YA genre

While the original target demographic of YA fiction was teenagers, that age group only makes up about half of the readership of YA. The other half is composed of adults who would like to hang on to the fun and easy world of young adult literature – perhaps feeling a sense of nostalgia from the writing .

This shift in ages has muddied the waters of what exactly constitutes YA.

When YA was exclusively for young adults, the genre's subject matter revolved solely around teenagers' experiences. It appealed to their interests, life experience, and understanding.

With adults moving into (or clinging to) this space developed for children, books classifying themselves as “young adult” are now featuring more mature story arcs and concepts to feed the interests of an older crowd.

The genre was developed to transition readers from children’s books into adult literature, but now it often skews further to adult literature, which was not quite the point. Many adults are now complaining that most young adult fiction books have too many mature themes for children.

As a result of these conflicting views, we’ve seen the rising of a new genre: new adult.

What is the new adult fiction genre?

New Adult, or NA, is a spinoff of the young adult fiction genre, meant for readers between 18 and 29, though it is not formally recognized by most traditional publishers .

While the Young Adult book age range includes pre-teens and teens up to 18, the New Adult book genre typically follows college-aged teens and young adults. Often NA books can also be categorized into YA or the standard adult genres depending on the framing and content.

The genre doesn’t have many strong examples to defend itself right now, but there is certainly a reader market for it, and some editors and publishers are eyeing its potential. Expect New Adult to flourish into its own official genre in the coming years.

The difference between young adult, new adult, and adult fiction

Many authors imagine themselves writing young adult fiction, only to get into the story and realize they actually have a new adult or mature adult book on their hands. That's totally fine!

But, due to the young audience, it's very important to understand the differences and market your book correctly.

The writing style in YA fiction tends to be accessible and engaging, capturing the attention of young readers. While YA fiction is primarily aimed at teenagers, it is not limited to this audience, and many adults also enjoy reading YA novels for their relatable themes, strong character development, endearing romance tropes , and engaging storytelling.

Meanwhile, new adult fiction bridges the gap between young adult and adult fiction. It targets readers in their late teens to early twenties, usually between 18 and 25 years old. NA fiction often delves into the challenges and transitions faced by characters as they navigate the period between adolescence and adulthood. The themes and characters in NA fiction can be more mature and explore topics like college life, career choices, independence, and the complexities of early adulthood.

Finally, adult fiction is intended for anyone 18 years old and above. You are more likely to see more adult-aged protagonists in these novels. And the themes explored in adult fiction can be more complex and deal with a broader range of life experiences, relationships (such as marriage, divorce, having children, etc), societal issues, and mature content, such as what you might encounter in spicy romance or dark romance books (neither of which are suitable for younger readers).

How to write a successful young adult novel in 6 steps

Regardless of which audience you write for, the process will be largely the same.

The first step you must take is actually deciding to write the book.

Then, you'll want to work toward two of the most important milestones of any book journey. You must finish the outline of your book and the first rough draft .

Most of the differences of writing a YA novel comes to the content and tone in the writing . So here are a few steps you can take to write a book young people will love to read.

1. Know your audience

You can’t write for an audience you don’t understand. As with any book, you need to know your ideal reader and write for them.

If you’re writing young adult fiction, you should know what teens are interested in, how they think, and how they communicate. If you’re far removed from your teen years and don’t have young people you frequently socialize with, you might consider finding opportunities to speak with teenagers.

Another method is reading popular young adult fiction (ones that teenagers are actually reading).

Take notes on content, tone, voice, character traits, and tropes that you notice pop up in multiple popular books.

2. Age the characters correctly

As a general rule, characters should be in the age group of your target demographic, so your character cast should mostly consist of teenagers.

There’s also a huge difference between 12-year-olds and 18-year-olds (and what they’re interested in), so it's important that you are precise when aging characters.

A great tip many YA authors incorporate is aging the characters a year or two above the age of their ideal reader because children look up to older kids.

For example, as a 5 and 6-year-old, my favorite reads were in the American Girl series, which featured 9-year-old protagonists. And when I was 10, my favorite books were The Babysitters’ Club , which featured girls 11 to 13 years old.

You can include many types of characters, so don't just think about your protagonist but also the ages and characteristics of the people they will interact with. You can also use a character bio template to help you map out the character development of each person in your story.

3. Be real, and write real characters

Young people can smell the difference between authenticity and fakeness from miles away. If you’re not being genuine, your characters and story will not be likable or relatable.

Teens speak in particular ways that constantly fluctuate. It’s important to find a balance between being modern but not being so trendy that your book will be a complete cringe to read within a couple of years.

There’s a lot of controversy around “dating” a book by including references, but I tend to disagree.

Do people read Jane Austen and think it’s irrelevant because of the times and customs we have very little personal context for? Of course not! They’re good books! And they act as fascinating social time capsules.

So maybe you reference TikTok but avoid referencing specific TikTok trends.

Maybe you do use slang words, but you use ones that are currently being recycled from ten or twenty years ago—those have more cultural context than using slang and references that will obviously be short-lived and likely never return to relevance.

Work to build a realistic world with realistic characters that real teens can relate to.

4. Nail the voice

Writing teenagers might be one of the most difficult writing tones and voices to master.

Some writers of young adult fiction absolutely excel in this—like Meg Cabot, author of The Princess Diaries . She takes a casual and relaxed tone to voice her main character, Mia:

“Like everybody doesn't already think I'm a freak. I'm practically the biggest freak in the entire school. I mean, let's face it: I'm five foot nine, flat-chested, and a freshman. How much more of a freak could I be?” — The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot

Some other YA autors have found wild success, but their writing voice is under constant critique—like John Green, author of Looking for Alaska, Paper Towns, and The Fault in Our Stars . Many readers find Green’s prose to be too elevated for teenagers, but he defends this by saying that teenagers are smarter than most people give them credit for.

“I must talk, and you must listen, for we are engaged here in the most important pursuit in history: the search for meaning. What is the nature of being a person? What is the best way to go about being a person? How did we come to be, and what will become of us when we are no longer? In short: What are the rules of this game, and how might we best play it?” — Looking for Alaska, John Green

As you can see, different authors take wildly different approaches to writing teenagers. Finding a balance that suits your writing style and appeals to teenagers can be difficult, so don’t be afraid to experiment. Seeking opinions from your target demographic can also help.

5. Don’t drive a moral too hard

No one wants to be preached to, especially teenagers. If your heart is in writing young adult fiction, you probably have an affinity for young people. You likely want the best for them.

But turning your YA novel into an opportunity to lecture them about sex, drugs, and rock and roll isn’t going to help young people. It's going to repel them.

If you still want to weave in some wisdom, try to do it naturally. Maybe you include a sexual experience, and instead of having a whole dialogue about safe sex, contraceptives, and abstinence, you have a quick line about condoms from one of the participants.

When instilling morals in teenagers, tread lightly, if you tread at all.

6. Don’t water it down

If you’re writing for young adults, you have to understand their emotional intelligence and general perception of the world. While they usually have less experience than adult readers and are still learning in many ways, they are not stupid.

Every generation is smarter than the last, so there’s a good chance your young audience has equal or greater capacity than you do—try to keep that in mind.

If you belittle your teen readers by watering down your stories because you think they can’t understand it, here is a list of things they will pick up:

And here is a list of things they will not pick up:

• Another one of your books (ever again)

Writing young adult fiction isn’t so different from writing for any other genre. They have the same fundamentals of all fiction books. Respect your readership, remember their life experiences, and write good stories!

Examples of some young adult fiction subgenres

Young adult books come in all genres. Mystery, action-adventure, romance, literary, comedy, contemporary, dystopian, sci-fi, fantasy series … Nearly every adult book genre has a corresponding young adult fiction subgenre.

Let’s look at some famous examples of young adult books in some major book genres.

Young adult mystery books

Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson

A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson

Sadie by Courtney Summers

Young adult action-adventure books

Beasts of Prey by Ayana Gray

Raybearer by Jordan Ifueko

Young adult contemporary books

The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas

All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven

Looking for Alaska by John Green

Young adult dystopian books

Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard

The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau

Young adult romance books

Reputation by Lex Croucher

Kiss Her Once for Me by Alison Cochrun

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Write across the ages – from junior fiction to young adult

Guest Writer

• August 12, 2020

By Nicole Hayes 

When I started writing, I thought I would only write for adults. But when I shared an early draft of my second manuscript with beta readers, one of them rang me, declaring, ‘I didn’t know you wrote YA!’

Until then, neither did I.

That manuscript eventually became my debut Young Adult novel, The Whole of My World , and launched my publishing career. But I think we can all agree that the author probably shouldn’t be the last to know what sort of book she’s writing!

When I turned to writing Junior fiction, I was determined to approach writing for this new age group fully informed on the conventions, and having read shelf-loads of successful (and less successful!) Junior Fiction.

Here are some things I’ve learned along the way.

How to decide Deciding whether a story is YA, Junior Fiction or Middle Grade comes down to the fundamentals of all writing. That is: story, idea, setting, language, character, voice, structure, length… All these factors help shape what sort of story you’re writing. But in making this decision, possibly the most important thing to decide is… Who is your reader?

All about the reader When writing for children, the most fundamental aspect of determining your reader comes down to their age. There’s some scope and variation here, because these categories are all largely marketing concepts, but a commonly cited guideline is that Junior Fiction is for readers 5 to 9 years, extending to 12 years. (By comparison, Middle Grade generally refers to the upper primary group up to Year 7: readers aged 9-12 or 13 years, while Young Adult is generally recommended for readers 13 years plus.) 

Junior fiction is also often recommended for upper primary school readers identified as “reluctant readers”, which accounts for that extended upper range. But also, kids read up and down. Just like adults, they respond to what interests them, not what they “should” be reading. Which is why this is a guide for the author, rather than the reader!

What’s the story, morning glory? While it’s ideal to have a strong sense of your reader early, maybe you’re still sorting out what the story is? Sometimes that’s where you want to start. Junior Fiction covers a range of themes and scenarios, including and especially: friendship, school, hobbies, sports, pets, and family. While this is true of all kidlit, in Junior fiction there’s usually one thread, or one central idea driving the story. In Middle Grade, by contrast, it’s expected to have a B and/or C plot. And in Young Adult, that can expand further again. (And, of course, the expectation for is the additional and requisite inclusion of romance.)  

Whose story is it? And, of course, we need to think about character. As a general convention of writing for children, the expectation is that your protagonist(s) will be slightly older than your readers. In my latest books, the Little Legends series (co-written with Adrian Beck) , the protagonists are from the Little family; Ellie and Oz are twins, and their cousin, Sanjay are a similar age, 10-11 years old. They play for the Under 11s Fresca Bay Falcons. Remember that the protagonist’(s’) school year level is important too. Ellie, Sanjay and Oz are all in Year 5 at Fresca Bay Primary.

You’re the voice (try and understand it!) Voice can mean different things depending on context, but in this case I mean tone, style, and energy. Popular Junior fiction is frequently funny, action-packed, and full of adventure. You can still handle “bigger issues” within the themes listed above, but the focus is on fun and movement. In Little Legends , because the backdrop is AFL, the action is often a short passage of play from a footy match. But we’ve also loaded the books up with pranks, classroom activities, schoolyard games, and cooking! Ellie, Oz and Sanjay have their own separate loves – Ellie is a maths whiz, Sanjay is an excellent dancer, and Oz loves arts and crafts. The more visual you can make these actions the better. The key is to think about movement, visuals, and energy. But most of all…

Be funny If you’re writing Junior fiction, humour is key. The most popular Junior fiction books right now are laugh-out-loud funny to their readers. Your job as a junior fiction author is to ramp that laugh quota up – and turn the volume up high while you’re there. If you can do that, you’ll find an audience.

  Pictures And don’t forget to think about pictures! Most Junior fiction has illustrations. In fact, even the text can be presented as a visual treat. In Little Legends , our amazing illustrator, James Hart, brought our characters to life with fabulous, silly, and detailed pictures that draw on the bigger “visual” moments in the text. There’s another reason why you want to think visually – it makes the illustrator’s job much easier.    

Junior Fiction is a fast growing and much in demand category of kidlit. So keep the above tips in mind and give it a shot.

Nicole Hayes is an award-winning author of books for children and young adults. She is also a writing instructor who has taught with the Australian Writers' Centre for more than eight years, as well as at universities, TAFEs and schools around Australia. Her latest project, a collaboration with Adrian Beck on a Junior fiction series, Little Legends (Hardie Grant 2020-2021), celebrates the great game of AFL, a sport Nicole loves. 

Her other books include the young adult novels A Shadow’s Breath ( Penguin Random House 2017), The Whole of My World (Random House, 2013), and One True Thing (Penguin Random House, 2015) — winner of the Children’s Peace Literature Award, CBCA Notable Book, and shortlisted for the WA Premier’s Literary Award, WA Young Readers Book Awards and YABBA Awards.

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The 8 Habits of Highly Successful Young-Adult Fiction Authors

Best-selling writers including John Green and Veronica Roth share their strategies for crafting authentic, relatable teen characters—even in fantasy worlds.

Young-adult fiction, commonly called "YA fiction," has exploded over the past decade or so: The number of YA titles published  grew more than 120 percent  between 2002 and 2012, and other estimates say that between 1997 and 2009, that figure was closer to  900 percent . Ask a handful of young-adult fiction writers what exactly makes a YA novel, though, and you’ll get a handful of conflicting answers.

At their core, YA books are for and about teenagers and pre-teens, usually between 12 and 18 years old, but sometimes as young as 10. Yet more than half of all YA novels sold are bought by older adults 18 or older, and certain titles published in the U.S. as YA are considered mainstream fiction for adults in other countries. Some authors believe the intent to write for young readers is a prerequisite of YA fiction; others don’t even realize their books will be labeled as YA until after they finish writing.

Many successful authors say there’s no secret to writing for teenagers. Good writing is good writing; believable characters and compelling plots are crucial regardless of who’s picking up the book. But many YA authors will also tell you there’s something particularly fulfilling and rewarding about writing for teenagers, who often respond to stories they identify with more intensely and gratefully than adult readers do. I asked eight writers and editors how they create characters and stories that feel real to teenagers, even when their world—and the world of the YA books they read—can feel like another planet. Below are eight of their most successful strategies.

Think Like a Teen Rainbow Rowell never set out to be a YA author. Her first book, Attachments , was for and about adults, and though Eleanor & Park is a teenage love story set in 1986, her approach to writing younger characters was the same. It was only after the novel was finished that she learned it would be YA, and even then, the decision was debated. Because Rowell got her start writing for adults—and because the story’s relatability defied many adults’ expectations of what a “book for teens” was—some readers and reviewers questioned whether the YA label was applicable.

But what clearly makes Eleanor & Park a YA book, a fellow author told Rowell, wasn’t just that the main characters were teens. It was that the novel actually saw the world through their eyes. “The perspective was so firmly rooted inside of these teenagers,” Rowell says. “You’re not looking back or looking down. The narrator is not observing things the people themselves are not.” It’s the same quality—a lack of narrative distance —that’s led many writers to call J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye the seminal YA text: Readers experience Holden Caulfield’s version of events solely through his jaded, smart-alecky point of view.

“I think everyone’s got a little teenager inside of them still, and you just have to work to help yourself access that teenager,” says Veronica Roth, the author of the Divergent trilogy, whose final installment, Allegiant , is out now. “Every now and then I find myself having a character make a decision that feels very adult without having them earn it, and I have to go back and make sure I’m letting the characters make mistakes they would in real life at that age, like a parent.”

When the adult perspective creeps its way into a YA book, readers notice, too. “It’s a huge red flag,” says Rachel Cohn, the author of the acclaimed Gingerbread series, who says she’s vigilant about editing out the grown-up voice in early drafts of her writing. Cohn, who is often asked to review other YA books, calls this distance one of her biggest pet peeves.

“The books I turn away are when the dialogue reads false to me,” Cohn says. “It’s not that the words are wrong, because that’s subjective, but the feelings are wrong to me. It’s like an adult observing something.”

Find the “Emotional Truth” of the Teenage Experience John Green’s hilarious and heartbreaking The Fault in Our Stars is not a post-apocalyptic, dystopian novel like Divergent or  The Hunger Games . But the lives of its protagonists, Hazel and Gus, hardly mirror the lives of their readers, who probably don’t have cancer and generally don’t fly to Amsterdam to track down reclusive, alcoholic authors. And yet, the book has been a New York Times bestseller for 46 weeks . “I get emails every day from people who are like, ‘I’m just like Hazel, except I don’t have cancer, I’m not 16, I’m not white, and I’m not female,’” Green says. “I’m like, ‘Well, you’re not just like Hazel.’”

Readers also probably don’t directly identify with A, the main character of David Levithan’s Every Day , who wakes up each morning in someone else’s body and is defined only by the thoughts in his head.

But they don’t need to. “The defining characteristic of YA literature is emotional truth,” Levithan writes in an email. “Even if we’re not the same as the characters we read, they are all dealing with things—issues of who they are, who they should be, what they should and shouldn’t do—that we all deal with, in their own ways. With The Hunger Games , even if we will never be in Katniss’s shoes, the decisions she makes make emotional sense to us—even when she makes the wrong ones.”

That might be why readers find themselves so drawn to Hazel and Gus, whose relationship and health struggles offer avenues for teenagers to examine the bigger ideas they’re grappling with in their own lives. “Maybe some of what’s universal is the intensity of the experience, the intensity of falling in love for the first time, the intensity of asking questions about mortality and meaning for the first time,” Green says.

But even if YA books aren’t tackling issues of life and death, the best among them still capture the gravity of the teenage and pre-teen experience, whether it’s the sparks of a first crush or lunchroom gossip and bullying. “When you’re in that time in your life, the trials and tribulations of friendships, romantic relationships, it's all very crucial and vital,” says Kristen Pettit, an executive editor at HarperCollins. “That is one way the author presents themselves as authentic to the YA community, by nailing that keenness of feeling and emotion and high-stakes nature of the interactions they have with people every day.”

A Good Pop-Culture Reference Goes a Long Way One reason The Fault in Our Stars ’ Hazel feels so familiar to YA readers is the fact that she, like so many of her peers, is a sucker for America’s Next Top Model marathons. But Green didn’t include multiple mentions of Tyra Bank’s long-running reality show just for fun—the references teach us a lot about Hazel as a character and as a teenager. In the book, she’s obsessed with An Imperial Affliction , a made-up, highbrow novel very loosely based on David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest , yet her taste in TV shows is anything but sophisticated.

“One of the things I love about teenagers is they don’t make those distinctions between high culture and low culture like we do as adults,” Green says. “It’s not uncommon for teenagers to list their two favorite books as Gossip Girl and The Great Gatsby . They don’t think its weird to say, ‘I love Toni Morrison, and I also love Justin Bieber.’”

Rowell uses pop culture to ground her stories in reality, too, but she also knows the references don’t always age gracefully, or in ways that can be predicted. Attachments came out in 2011, but it takes place in the 1990s, where a Tom Cruise reference means Tom Cruise the movie star, not Tom Cruise the Scientologist divorcé of tabloids. Rowell’s latest book, Fangirl , about a prolific fanfiction writer who goes off to college, includes references to Taylor Swift, the Twilight series, and Kanye West, whose public perception, though she only wrote the book in 2012, has already changed significantly: He’s engaged to Kim Kardashian , his music took a dark turn, and his select interviews are more colorful than ever.

“I try to pick things people will recognize four to five years from now,” Rowell says. “I don’t think it hurts to add those. It adds to our cultural literacy. It adds to what we know about ourselves.” Technology and Internet culture, however, change even quicker than our pop-culture lexicons, so Rowell says she avoided references to Tumblr, Fanfiction.net, and some of the fanfiction community’s terminology—like shipping and slash fiction —out of concern that too many brand names or esoteric details would trip up unfamiliar readers.

Green, on the other hand, is confident America’s Next Top Model will be a timeless reference: “Even if you haven’t heard of the show in some beautiful utopia 30 years from now, the entire show is encapsulated in its title,” he says. “You know everything you need to know from the four words used to describe the show.”

Get Input From Real Teenagers New York Times bestselling author Jodi Picoult has written close to two dozen novels, many of which—like My Sister’s Keeper and Nineteen Minutes —focus on memorable teenage characters. But it wasn’t until last year that she wrote a book specifically for young-adult readers, Between the Lines , which she co-wrote with her teenage daughter, Samantha van Leer.

“Having a co-writer who was a teenager was like having a built-in B.S. meter sitting next to me,” Picoult says. “Every now and then, Sammy would say something out loud that was such an apt metaphor. It wasn’t something I would have thought of, but it was something she was living every day because she was in high school when she was writing this book. The example I always think about is a group of popular girls in the book who are described as being like a bunch of grapes because, honestly, do you ever see just one of them alone? I thought it was hilarious because it was so true.”

It’s not the first time Picoult used a real-life teenager to make her writing more accurate. When she was writing The Pact , a 1998 novel about a teenage suicide pact, she picked up some pizza and soda, called up her babysitter, and interviewed her and her friends. “I just listened to them talk to each other and tried to hone in on where their minds were about that topic,” Picoult says. “I think if you’re a writer, you do your research and do your due diligence. It sounds funny to listen to teenagers as research.”

Not every writer takes this approach—Rowell didn’t need to investigate online fan communities when crafting the characters of Fangirl . “I’m addicted to Tumblr, so when I was writing, I had read so much fan fiction and spend so much time in fandom places on the Internet, a lot of it I had internalized,” says Rowell, a former newspaper columnist. ( Fangirl , unsurprisingly, was the first pick for Tumblr’s official book club ).

But Rowell did draw on those communities when she needed feedback. “I had friends in fandom who I would say to, every once in awhile, ‘Tell me how you feel about this, does this ring true to you, talk to me,’” she says. “I write from what I know, and if I write something I don’t know, I’ll go out and talk to them. It doesn’t feel like an expedition to find out what the teens are doing. Because I was a reporter for so long, it makes sense to me.”

Use Slang Words at Your Own Risk The more authors try to capture the exact idiosyncrasies of how teenagers talk, the more they risk alienating or distracting readers.

“The problem with that is your book has a shelf life of two to three years,” says Kathryn Reiss, a veteran YA author who also teaches young-adult fiction-writing classes at Mills College in Oakland, California. “It won’t be a classic because the coded language of teens changes every four years with every high school generation.” Unless they’re aiming for historical fiction—in which case, bring on the groovy! and the radical! —authors who pepper their YA writing with “modern” vocab can easily seem like they’re out of touch, or, worse, trying too hard.

Some writers can pull off slang successfully: Rachel Cohn’s debut novel, 2002’s Gingerbread , introduced readers to punk-rock protagonist Cyd Charisse, whose youthful vocab brought her to life on the very first page and made her one of the most memorable YA voices in recent years:

My so-called parents hate my boyfriend, Shrimp. I'm not sure they even believe he is my boyfriend. They take one look at his five-foot-five, surfer-shirt-wearin', baggy-jeans-slouchin', Pop Tart-eatin', spiked-hair-head self and you can just see confusion firebombs exploding in their heads, like they are thinking, Oh no, Cyd Charisse, that young man is not your homes. Dig this: He is.

Though the book earned plenty of praise, not every critic was charmed. “I remember at the time being really offended, reading that it had an overuse of slang and made-up words and was just ridiculous, over the top,” Cohn says. “I remember being so offended on behalf of my character. ‘Screw you! You don’t know what you’re talking about! That’s the way I talk!’”

But when she reread the book five years later, Cohn had a slight change of heart. “It was kind over the top! I like it, but I think as I’ve evolved, I wouldn’t write it that way now, for better or for worse. And probably for worse.”

Keep It Moving When Goosebumps author R.L. Stine went to a recent YA reading, he noticed far more 20- and 30-something women in attendance than teenagers. He was puzzled, so he asked Pettit why this might be. “I said it’s because of the way [these books] read, because of plot,” Pettit says. “So much of adult literature has become so precious that sometimes what you just want is the ride. I think YA authors are freer to take you on a ride instead of constructing overwrought sentences and impressing you with their skill.”

One of the enduring misconceptions about YA fiction is that it’s dumbed down, that writing for young readers means writing in a way that’s easy for them to comprehend. Cohn estimates that about 60 to 65 percent of YA fiction is written in the first person and present tense, but not because YA readers can’t handle complexity—take a look at the average high school or AP English reading lists for evidence to the contrary—but because the simplicity and immediacy of that particular style helps writers develop the voices of their characters.

“You settle down in a character’s head and just go,” Cohn says. “I do some teaching, and I always recommend changing the tense, changing the perspective, see what happens. If I’m stuck, and I’m not writing in first person present, I’ll start writing in that because it’s easy to tap into.”

Similarly, Roth describes the process of finding the voice of Divergent ’s heroine, Tris, as a writing exercise. “I had been trying to write in this more poetic, flowy sort of way, and I was noticing I wasn’t doing as well as I wanted to in terms of controlling my language,” says Roth, who was inspired to write Tris after reading a line (“My will is mine, I will not make it soft for you”) from the Greek play Agamemnon . “Tris came [to me] at a really big point in which I needed to work on being more concise, and her voice was concise—a little repetitive, but definitely stark and straight-forward.”

It’s Okay for YA To Get Dark There’s nothing off-limits when it comes to YA fiction, which frequently dives into unsettling territory like death, drugs, and rape across all of its genres and styles. Jay Asher’s Thirteen Reasons Why is about a high school girl who commits suicide and mails cassette tapes to classmates explaining her motives and who drove her to it; Francesca Lia Block’s 2003 novel, Wasteland , features an incestuous relationship, and it’s one of a handful of young-adult books that do so.

For Picoult, who has written about murder, abuse, and school shootings in her books for adults, this was news. “I went into the domain of YA fiction completely unschooled,” she says. “I assumed that if we were going to be gearing it to a younger reader, it should have a feeling almost like a Shrek fairytale. Sammy was the one who said no, it should really be dark so Happily Ever After has much more at stake.”

How authors present that subject matter depends somewhat on which ages they’re aiming for. A number of YA books take place during the Holocaust, for example, and they all take different approaches to the subject matter: The Book Thief by Markus Zusak—marketed for ages 12 and up, but published as an adult book in Zusak's Australia—is narrated by Death; The Devil’s Arithmetic , marketed for ages 10 and up, takes a modern-day teen back to Auschwitz through time-travel as a way of somewhat removing the reader from the horrors of that time period. Depending on the author’s audience, putting some distance between the characters and the issues they examine can be an effective way to address difficult topics.

“ Go Ask Alice [a fictional diary of a drug-addicted teen girl], a book like that, it’s a safe way to have the experiences that are in that book, a way of exploring the darkness out there without being in danger or acting irresponsibly,” Pettit says.

Find the "Kernel of Hope." Not every book has a Happily Ever After. For example, S.E. Hinton’s YA classics, The Outsiders and That Was Then, This Is Now , which deal with drugs, drinking, and gang violence, don’t offer easy answers to the questions they raise in the end. Today, decades after they were first published, they’re still taught in schools. But there's almost always an underlying optimism in YA, an identifiable maturation or development that Reiss calls “the kernel of hope.”

“There’s a sense that it’s worth waking up tomorrow,” Reiss explains. “Things are dark, things are terrible, but tomorrow’s another day. Ninety-nine percent of books for teens have that at least at the end.” This change doesn’t always unfold in ways that are explicit or conventionally heroic. In The Hunger Games , Katniss ends up winning the deadly, titular tournament she enters, but it’s not the victory itself that’s important—it’s more about how she wins on her own terms of integrity and empathy. In realistic YA fiction, a friendless, social outcast may not become the most popular kid in class, but it’s unlikely he or she will stay a total loser for a whole novel.

Including this perspective isn’t sermonizing or making an after-school special of what young readers experience as they grow up, as these authors see it. Rather, it’s just part of presenting an authentic story.

“That's life, isn't it?” Levithan says. “Shit hits the fan. The abyss opens up. But then you get through it. You wrestle it down. You find a way to survive. YA only reflects that. It’s not about being preachy or pragmatic to say that most people find a way out of the maze of adolescence. It’s only being accurate.”

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Creative Writing Prompts for Young Adult (YA) Fiction

Say what you want about YA novels, but they have an ability to capture the formative nature of teenage years that I’ve yet to see elsewhere.

Take Stephen Chbosky’s “ Perks of Being a Wallflower ” for example. It’s the quintessential story of the high school misfit finding his place. But by adding a history of sexual abuse and mental illness, Chbosky writes a story that shows the impact our teenage years have on our lives.

John Green does this in “ Looking for Alaska ” and “ Fault in Our Stars .” One chronicles the average life of a guy in boarding school who’s in love with the girl he can’t have. The other is simply a love story of teenagers who understand the importance of living your life. Yet somehow, Green takes seemingly straightforward plot lines and puts into words the unexplainable feeling of being an invincible teenager.

Of course, YA is done poorly as well. Just look at “Twilight” or “Divergent.” “Twilight” is about an unhealthy dependent relationship and “Divergent” is remarkably similar to other YA dystopian novels.

YA lit should be both a comfort and a challenge.

There’s nothing like a finishing a book like “ My Heart and Other Black Holes ” or “ Made You Up ” to find you’re not alone in your mental illness.

It’s great to read something like “ None of the Above ” and “ Ready Player One ” that force you to consider you beliefs.

But how can you make sure you fall in the category of successful and not reductive?

By writing a story that is relatable, not sentimental. By giving careful thought to the development of your characters and plot.

This is easy to read, but putting it into practice can be difficult. Sometimes, you just need that push to get you going.

Here are 50 creative writing prompts for YA that are sure to help you on your endeavor to write a meaningful story. Mix them up if you think that works best for you, but make sure that in the end, you have created something that has helped you and your writing.

Two helpful links for YA writers:

• 41 Top Agents for YA Fiction
• 30 Best Publishers of YA Novels

50 Creative Writing Prompts for YA Writers

• A brother and sister discover their dad has been having an affair with their favorite counselor at school.
• A girl is looking through old family albums with her mom and finds a picture of her as a child, sitting on the lap of man she doesn’t remember. She decides to find out who the man is.
• In the span of one week, a high school senior in the heart of Los Angeles is dumped by his girlfriend and told by his parents that they’re separating. He decides to live with his dad and they move to the place he grew up, a very small farming town in central California.
• A group of friends go to a party one night but wake up the next morning in a white tiled room with a one way mirror on one of the walls. They’re dressed in hospital gowns and each of them has a red scar on their right forearm.
• After her mom has died from cancer, Rylie finds a bundle of envelopes addressed to her in her mom’s handwriting. She opens the one on top and finds a slip of paper that reads: Summer of ’77, 142 Brooks Ct, WA.
• Josh is the only one who doesn’t pass the aptitude test, so when everyone else his age is moved to their new home, he is forced to stay with the Forsaken.
• It’s been 7 months since the accident and 3 months of physical therapy. On his last day of therapy, Chris is told that the person who was the prime suspect in his case has been cleared of all charges.
• The girl that Jordan’s been in love with for the past year gets into a major car accident, putting her in the hospital’s ICU.
• After a memorial service ends, a daughter lingers at her dad’s spot and leaves flowers for him. When she comes back the next day, more flowers have been added by someone else.
• When Kristin arrives for the first day of her new job, the store has been boarded up. She notices a note tucked under the doormat instructing her to go out back. When she does, she finds a door emitting a glowing green light.
• Alyssa is diagnosed with Asperger’s the same month she starts high school.
• Charlie heads back to his locker after class is let out but stops when he sees Marley, the girl he’s had a crush on throughout high school, standing beside his locker.
• A group of kids who have been friends since first grade leave their senior prom and decide to go on a road trip before going their separate ways for college.
• Ever since he was a little boy, Luke would spend every night in his backyard, lying on his back with Ashley and trying to name the constellations. But he can’t do that anymore.
• Zac lined up with everyone else in their black gowns and mortar hats. Just as the procession was about to begin, he remembered his first day of junior year English, when she walked into class after it had already begun.

If you like these YA prompts, check out all the other creative writing prompts here at Bookfox.

• photo writing prompts
• musical prompts
• creative nonfiction prompts
• first line generators
• While her roommate is out of town, Hannah is woken up by the sound of someone in her room.
• The Collective only sought after teenagers between the ages of 15 and 17, and tomorrow was David’s 15th birthday.
• September came and that meant it was time for the annual trip to the family cabin.
• He woke up to excruciating pain and a blinding white light.
• A month before graduating, a senior gets shunned by all five of her closest friends, and she can’t figure out why.
• A guy live broadcasts a Ouija board session on Periscope, and though the people present don’t see anything special, his lone friend who was watching goes insane.
• In his junior year, the high school quarterback is told by his doctor that because of several concussions he’s received, there is a risk of permanent brain damage if he plays football his senior year. Does he decide to play or not?
• A male teenager who loves video games and organizes the chess club struggles with how to tell their parents that he wants to become a female.
• After being together for 5 months, a high school couple decides to have sex for the first time.
• A teenager with a 4.0 GPA is rejected by all twelve of the colleges she applied to, and decides to go to each college and confront each counselor who rejected her, demanding to know why they ruined her future.
• The “it” couple on campus is forced to break up when one of them moves across country for college.
• A teenager who has spent their entire life on a boat learns that there are other people in the world and they live on land.
• A 14-year-old teenager who is a musical protege is diagnosed with stage 4 brain cancer.
• A teenager makes candles and delivers them to the senior center where unbeknownst to her, her estranged grandfather lives.
• A teenager in the foster care system who is relocated seven times in seven years finally finds a family which is loving and functional, until he discovers the father’s dark secret.
• After being kicked out of their high school, a teenager is enrolled in the same boarding school his older sibling attended, and discovers there is a mysterious club there that he wants to join.
• A high school basketball star is the prime suspect in a murder trial of his ex-girlfriend.
• While all their friends are away for the summer, a soon-to-be senior spends his summer vacation working at the community pool, and falls in love with a girl in eighth grade.
• A teenager thinks she has it made when she lands the hottest college guy, until he dies in a fiery car accident and she learns about all his other girlfriends.
• After attending their first high school party, a freshman goes to school next week to learn that a video of her drunk and saying racist things is circulating around school.
• Two days after finishing up his first year at college, a teenager realizes he’s in love with a girl who just graduated and moved back home to a different state.
• While on a family vacation in Hawaii, Andrew tries surfing for the first time and receives help from one of the other surfers. It’s not until he gets back on shore that his brother tells him he just surfed with Kelly Slater.
• On Natalie’s first day on the job as a white water rafting coach, she loses one of her rafters in the waves.
• Instead of getting off on his exit, Charlie kept driving up the west coast until he hit the Canadian border.
• After being teased throughout middle school, a teenager decides to lose weight. But he’s really doing it because he’s ashamed of his overweight parents.
• After three failed suicide attempts, Liz’s doctor recommends she transfers to a new school.
• A teenager keeps a book full of intimate conversations she has overheard at her school. One day it goes missing and little by little, the conversations are leaked to the entire school.
• A teen’s mom abandons their family one night and leaves no trace of where she’s gone. But her children are determined to find her and learn why she left.
• In the middle of the night, Nate receives a call from his best friend’s mom informing him that her son had committed suicide.
• Lucy didn’t want middle of the night visits from her dad anymore, and the only way she knew how to end them was to run away.
• While house sitting for his neighbors, Stephen invites some friends over to hang out and watch a movie, but when they see the Porsche in the garage they decide to take it for a drive, even though none of them has their license.
• Emily has been trying for years to get recognized by a recording label and decides she’ll play one last show before calling it quits. When she takes the stage, she sees an executive from a Nashville label in the audience.
• Jake has messed up one too many times and his parents have sent him to a behavioral correction school. If he messes up again, he goes straight to juvenile detention.
• Jess spent every day after school writing in her journal about a world she had created and could escape to. One night after writing, she dreams of her world; but if she doesn’t wake up before sunrise, the dream will become reality and she won’t be able to get back.
• A teenage werewolf grew up in a world filled with witches, vampires, werewolves, and mermaids. But then she comes across a book that tells of a world full of only humans, and it changes her forever.

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59 comments

I don’t like the wording of number 11. Asperger’s is not a disease. It is a neurological disorder on the autism spectrum.

I love the ideas(so much creative energy). However, as a person with Aspergers, I also didn’t like the wording of number 11. Aspergers is a pain sometimes, but it’s actually a blessing in disguise.

What sucks is that now Asperger’s isn’t in the DSM anymore.

What do you mean by that.

Secretly, yes it is. I also do not appreciate the wording of 11.

D is correct. Asperger’s is no longer in the DSM, the diagnostic manual for developmental disorders and mental health conditions. In its place there is a diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder, in which the individual is further classified as high or low functioning- the former being previously labelled as Asperger’s

I love the ideas. But I agree with you guys. I don’t like the wording for no.11. My brother has Aspergers and ASD – Autism. And he is especially amazing. What P said is true.

Same Candie. My brother has autism and people treat it as a disease. He is normal just like everyone else and deserves to be called a kid.

Your Ideas are AMAZING! I have never felt my brain flooded with creative ideas. 🙂

I know I’m three years after all of these comments, but these prompts really inspired me to keep writing again. Thank you!

Hi – this website is quite good. I love number 34 and within a minute or two after seeing it I’ve got a story in my mind based on that! Thanks 🙂

I love these ideas, I think they will really help me. I also love reading your blog its so great. Keep it up:)

The 2nd number 18 should probably be edited. An age gap in minors of 5+ years is way too many, and it could definitely be taken as glorifying pedophilia. A high school senior would be 17/18, maybe even 19, whereas an 8th grader is around 13, barely entering puberty. That also comes with an unhealthy power dynamic in relationships that can easily become abusive. I don’t want this to be misconstrued.

Well if each of them were say…10 years older then would it be okay then? Because now they are 23 and 29. That’s only a six year difference. At least he isn’t like, a 40 year old man or something…just saying

Are you serious? Yes, a six year age difference probably won’t mean much where two sexually mature 20-somethings are involved, but does that then, make it ok for a 9 year-old and a 15 year-old to hook up? I’d hope you’d say not. And it’s not much better with a 13 year-old since like ASPEN said, they have barely entered puberty, and cannot even consent to 16+s in many places. I had to do a double-take on that passage myself, because we’re approaching almost American Beauty/Lolita territory here. Inappropriate.

@ASPEN – It does not need to be edited. How someone interprets the prompt is their decision. Saying that this needs to be edited because it could be seen as glorifying pedophilia is basically saying, “This prompt is potentially controversial and therefore should not exist.” Also, do you know how many people find themselves in a situation similar to this, but never actually act on it due to the outlook individuals like you have? Of course, I do understand what you’re saying and I respect your opinion, but it’s definitely a rather one-sided opinion.

@JFON – Are YOU serious? You can’t compare a nine-year-old and a fifteen-year-old to a thirteen-year-old and a seventeen or eighteen-year-old. You also cannot assume that a senior in high school is sexually mature while an eighth grader is not. Puberty can happen extremely early for some and extremely late for others. This could be taken into consideration if using this prompt. Also, please note that the plot does not say ANYTHING about them hooking up. It merely states that the senior falls in love with the girl. The plot could go multiple ways depending on the writer. Unfortunately, the first thing everyone probably assumes when reading that prompt is, “Oh my god! They had sex?!” *rolls eyes* Okay. Again, you also can’t compare this prompt to “American Beauty” or “Lolita” because (although you ironically tried to invalidate what Genevieve said), both plots involve MIDDLE-AGED men being sexually attracted to minors. The prompt above is no where close to approaching such territory. Also, keep in mind that the prompt states that the senior FELL IN LOVE with the eighth grader. The men in the two tales you mention NEVER loved the young women they preyed on; they simply lusted after them.

** TLDR: Whether the prompt is approached in an innocent or controversial manner is ultimately up to the writer. If it doesn’t float your fancy, simply do not add it to your repertoire.

@Genevieve and Mickie: As an 18-year-old senior, there is absolutely no reason why someone my age should be “falling in love” with an eighth grader. It’s honestly disgusting how a bunch of grown adults can argue over this. I don’t care about puberty, this is a CHILD. Her brain is not fully developed, regardless of physical maturity. Imagine how ignorant you were at thirteen. Imagine if an 17 or 18-year-old “fell in love” with your childish, eighth grader self. Not to mention the fact that if they had sex, it would be considered rape under the law. You’re a worthless pedophile apologist and you need therapy.

You’re being rediculous stop exaggerating. It’s just a story idea, you have no reason to call someone that.

the age gap is what makes the story idea controversial and also, sort of interesting. No one here said they were going to hook up. It could just be him meeting a really funny girl and kind girl and later learning she is only 13. He knows he can’t have her because, um, pedophilia much? But maybe he becomes really good friends with her. Btw, kids are evolving. I have a younger sister who could be mistaken as the same age as me because of her personality and looks, but she is actually three and a half years younger

I agree with Amber. A seventeen/eighteen year old falling in love with a thirteen year old child? disgusting. if that prompt is used I hope it’s not romanticized and the high school senior is exposed and condemned for being a predator

This argument is pathetic. Grow up!

As an 18 year old senior, your brain is not fully developed. So, as a person whose brain is still developing, you are bound to make mistakes or bad calls. Same with a fourteen year old. “Relationships” like that one happen all the time, and those sort of struggles are a good thing to write about. See, writing is a way to explore the ways of the world. We don’t live in a perfect world. We have growing teens. We fall in love in impossible situations with bad timing. Maybe you have to be mature to be able to write about those things, but writing is how we can express our thoughts and opinions. Also, please be respectful. It’s no fun to have somebody calling people nasty things on the internet, especially if those people are innocent.

@AMBER no one ever said they had sex. If they did that’s a whole different story and is extremely disgusting and creepy. BTW i’m 10 so saying an eighth grader is childish makes me feel like a one year old baby.

I completely understand what you’re saying and it all is true, but I think the reason it would be a good story is because of the age gap they would have difficulties which is what would make it a story. otherwise, it would be like every other love story. I hope this isn’t coming off as rude these are just my thoughts.

I agree with Grace and Santana L – look at it in a different way and it is not so bad – and if you don’t want to look at it or don’t agree with it, then just ignore it for goodness sake.

This is a quite dumb argument, but I’d still like to weigh in my opinion. The prompt does not state anything about the two being in a relationship. The 17 year old may fall in love with someone, but also be completely ashamed of it because of how the 8th grader is well, 13-14. But the writer could choose to have them not act on anything, just have the controversial showings of how someone could love someone but do nothing about it because of the age gap. I’m 13, going into 8th grade, and judging from a lot of people in my grade I’ve talked to, they say the most age gap they’d date is a year (13 year olds would date 14 year olds, etc). Most 8th graders are more level headed than some would think (sometimes .. definitely not always…) If the protagonist has no intention of doing anything about it, except potentially waiting without doing anything about it, than I don’t see anything wrong with it. If the 17 year old was trying to be in a relationship with the 13 year old, it wouldn’t technically be illegal and all but it would seem a little creepy (modern day wise), depending on motives. Like when they turn 18-19, and they’re dating a 14-15 year old, that’s where it gets a little unlawful. But depending on the direction the writer takes, this prompt could be executed finely. I understand the concern and all, but it just depends on the write honestly. I don’t think Mickië was too far off, in a sense. Thanks, stay respectful of everyone’s opinions 😀

I mean yeah its disgusting and could possibly be dangerous but it could also be okay. Besides its just a story. And by the way 13 isn’t always “barely entering puberty”. It can start as early as age 8 or 9. btw if you don’t like the idea then just don’t use it.

Okay. I’m going to get all of this straight and try to be unbiased here. First of all, like @LINDSAY said, it never says they had sex. Yes it would indeed be illegal if the guy was 18 but it just says senior. I understand how you guys think that is weird for a senior to fall in love with an 8th grader. I mean, hell, I’m a junior and it’s fine to fall for someone a year younger or year older but an 8th grader just doesn’t pass for some people. Sometimes things like that happen but you can honestly make the story anyway you want. For all you know, the guy was so smart he jumped 2 grades. I don’t know because these were just ideas. The purpose of this was to give you an idea for a story and our job was to make endless combinations of it. It’s our imagination and it will take us where ever. As you can see, this argument spiraled when someone mentioned sex, even though it never said that on #18. I agree with everyone so I’m trying super hard to be unbiased right now. But anyways, my point is, some of ya’ll chose to make it to where they have sex, or some of ya’ll may choose to make the guy smart and jump grades, I don’t know. You choose. But, Bottom line, it never said they had sex, it may be weird for them to fall for each other depending on how you make the story. Remember these are just ideas and you can make them however you want. PERIODT. I feel like a broken record, I’m sorry for repeating myself so many times but yeah. That’s what I had to say. This argument has lasted since 2017. I hope this finally puts an end to it and I hope everyone is safe during Covid-19 and uh yeah. 🙂 have a great day person, also if you are in H.S or Middle School, here’s a message for you.

Middle Schoolers, I honestly hated Middle School. Some people liked it, which probably means I did something wrong. The way you can make Middle School the best years of your life is, choose your friends so wisely. I swear to freaking god that’s the only way school will be amazing. Choose real friends, and it’ll be so fun. Don’t focus on being popular or whatever because that crap will mess your H.S years up so bad. I mean if you’re popular, everyone who isn’t gossips about the popular kids. SO yeah. Be a kid while you can because it’s the best thing you can have.

High Schoolers, I mean, I don’t even know where to start with us. Like honestly, all I have to say is don’t vape or smoke. That shit ain’t cool. It’s nasty. But whatever. No one will listen to me anyways but don’t come crying when you’re on your hospital bed trying to get new lungs. That shit messes you up so bad, so don’t even touch one. And one more thing. If someone offers you vape, and you don’t wanna seem like a loser and say no and you think you have to accept it.. DON”T! Just ask them what vape flavor it is and whatever they respond back tell them you don’t like it. ~fax.~ So yeah.. I learned all of this from experience, (except I never vaped or smoked). I hope my lecture and words of wisdom get you somewhere in life.

love, Sadie

Thank you… These are great ideas. But the one about the Forsaken sounds similar to the Divergent trilogy that you criticized. I like the Divergent trilogy… I was surprised a prompt had a similar plot.

Aspen, the idea of the senior and 8th grader sounds great – it could be written in a really interesting way and they probably wouldn’t end up together, since it is a big age gap. The fact that it’s a big age gap seems like a really interesting premise but I’d want to see regret and/or what the girl learns from this.

I liked the 34th one. I got an idea, and I am working towards it.

I really like #2, I hope i can use it to aid my writing!

I love #14! It gave me a huge idea and I hope that idea gets me an A.

I REALLY like these. I do not think the second number 18 needs to be edited because I think it could be a really interesting story without them getting together. Also, we cannot assume that the senior is a 17-18-year-old and the 8th grader is a 13-15-year-old. The 8th grader could have stayed back, or the senior moved ahead. Let’s not forget many, for example, freshmen girls would have crushes on senior boys. (I just got an idea for that story where it turns out the girl is his half-sister whom he never knew existed!) Feel free to use that! Anyways, I am a 6th grader looking for prompts for my school paper, this definitely helped spark my creativity. (I can think of prompts, just never ones that fit the assignment brief! Does anyone else have that problem?) Thank you so much for those great prompts!

LOVING THIS

So West, I am VERY experienced in the world of mental disorders, and I believe that that is not accurate. While Asperger’s is not a disease you would still use the word diagnosed for any mental disorder.

I Love these ideas! I’ve been writing since I was 9 and have never had so much trouble, thinking on what I should write. BUT now, I’m ready to get typing and writing. THANK YOU –

Loved the one about Forsaken. Working on it..

I love # 26! It actually reminds me of my crush Liazabeth i call her liz and she suicidal i try helping her the best i can but she just recently moved to another school cause the people at school where such bitches toward her. I miss her a lot. We were gonna be the best lesbian couple ever… pls dont hate that where bisexual.

I love the prompts, but I’m having the hardest time writing about any of them. I just can’t get the words to flow.

just picture something like one of the stories happening in your head and just let your fingers do the typing. you just need to make the words make sense to you then reread every sentence, sentence by sentence and reword it.

i agree with u other amber…

I love these ideas for books i might start writing 1. Second paragrah

These are some of the best ideas I have ever heard.

Some of these are great but in my opinion, the vast majority are a very slight variation on the same thing. Boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back. Or – boy/girl x is in love with boy/girl y but they don’t know it. Or – my first love died in a horrific accident/became terminally ill….and finally – my highschool boyfriend/girlfriend split up with me and my life is inexorably changed forever.

I would have liked to have seen more variety of genres represented here. Not all YA stories have to be about forbidden / unattainable love or breakups. Nor do they all have to be set in this timeline/century. Most genres can be adapted to fit a YA story. You really should add more variety here. Just an opinion.

Adri of course you don’t recognize the problem of number 18 because you are only sixteen yourself. When you are older you’ll (hopefully) realize how immoral it would be

I love your ideas, they are so great and creative.

great article might be fun useing one of them in story

i’m trying to find writing prompts for a gift i’m giving my mom for christmas. these give me a lot of inspo!

I really like these. Whenever I start to write something I can never finish it, I just doubt myself. Good luck to everyone writing their stories.

The second number 8 is worded innapropriately. If the MC wants to ‘become a woman’, we can assume that the MC is a trans woman. The correct wording would be “A teenager assigned male at birth who loves video games and organizes the chess club struggles with how to tell her parents that she is a transgender girl.”

While I agree, I do not like the phrase “wants to be female” when describing trans folk, I understand the complications and easily confused language of a prompt such as “A teenager who loves video games and organizes the chess club struggles to come out to her parents as trans” because, in this version, one could interpret it to mean either an FTM teen or an MTF teen. Although, it does allow for more options.

The ideas are great, but the only problem is, how do we know that the topics we chose is not yet chosen by anybody?

I understand how you would see this as a problem, but it really isn’t. Multiple people can choose the same prompt, and every version would turn out different from the rest. So you really do not need to worry about if anyone has already chosen and started working on a prompt that you yourself want(ed) to choose.

i love the creativity that is emitted into these prompts.

To those suggesting that things should be edited and changed, because you didn’t like this or that rubbed you the wrong way, please realize that this person was kind enough to offer brilliant prompts. If your talent truly lies in writing, they would’ve sparked something within your imagination instead of igniting criticism over your sensibilities, mental disorders, and proper vs. improper. I have to say that I was trying to find a spark, which is how I found your site. Thank you because what you’ve provided got me moving in the “write” direction. I won’t be copying any of the ideas, but they did get my wheels grinding. Thanks again.

It’s 2022 and I’m planning to write a story

SO now everyone has a problem with no11 it’s very obvious that the point is gotten

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• I want to share my tips, tricks and SECRETS with you!

What’s special about this course?

Over the past few years I’ve been studying… ME!

I’ve broken down my personal method for writing Junior Fiction and formed it into easy, highly accessible video tutorials.

• This is not your average run-of-the mill writing course taught by someone who’s not at the coalface.

Basically, I’ve devised a fun and super informative system for teaching you what I do FOR A LIVING!

Spoiler alert

Along the way, while I was learning to write, there were lumps, bumps and potholes full of sludge.

I don’t want you to feel stuck and frustrated.

I don’t want you to keep stuffing around, wasting time, getting rejection after rejection and not knowing why.

That’s the poop and sludge.

Let’s get you through that FAST.

Here’s How It Works

• Every Monday for four weeks you’ll receive a series of short video tutorials via email.

• You’ll also receive downloadable lesson prompts, task sheets, guidelines and other support material.

• You’ll also have free (and happy) access to a special, private Facebook group — our  Junior Fiction Mastermind .

This is your chance to workshop your problems with kindred souls. Maybe find an accountability buddy or form a Junior Fiction critique group. The FB group will give you extra energy, motivation and momentum.

• At the end of the four weeks, I’ll host a live coaching call . Yippee! I’ll check in with the group and together we’ll talk about each other’s progress, challenges, wins and discoveries!

From  Truly Tan: Spooked! Written by Jen Storer. Illustrated by Claire Robertson.

Junior Fiction is a specialised category of children’s literature.

You need specialised knowledge to understand it and master it.

You’ll finish this course:

• Motivated

• Clued up with your questions answered

• Ready to take the next big leap!

Includes Live Coaching Call with Jen

(The call is recorded and available to all participants for at least 12 months.)

I cannot wait to share this course with you. I know you’ll LOVE it!

You’ll come away with a deeper understanding of Junior Fiction, a finished story and a massive boost to your confidence and creativity!

How much is the course?

I am only running this course once in 2023 and I’m keeping it at last year’s price: $177.00 AU (includes GST) . Payment plan available. See below.

Can I buy now but start later?

Yes, of course! While it’s fantastic to go through with the group, you can also buy the course, receive all the modules at the same time as everyone else, but do the course work later when you’re ready. Just store the course modules on your computer. Computer says YES!

How long do I have access to the course materials?

You have access for at least 12 months from time of purchase.

Do you have a payment plan?

Yes! You can make two payments of $94.00 AU over two months. Price includes GST.

I already know a lot about Junior Fiction. Will this course be of any use to me?

I can’t imagine how you wouldn’t enjoy this course and get heaps out of it! #keeplearning

I’m clueless about Junior Fiction. Will this course help?

You betcha!! I’ll help you get laser focussed. You might even find you have a hidden talent for Junior Fiction!

What if I can’t make it to the live coaching call?

No worries. The call will be recorded then posted on the course website.

Where can I ask more questions?

Just flick us an email: [email protected] . We LOVE helping our people!

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Writing Tips Oasis - A website dedicated to helping writers to write and publish books.

How to Write Middle Grade Fiction: A Beginner’s Guide

By Georgina Roy

Welcome to Writing Tips Oasis’ newest guide , dedicated on how to write middle grade fiction. Writing for children, regardless of their age, can be more difficult than writing for adults – in any genre, mostly because it’s very easy for us to forget what it’s like to be children.

Hence, we end up with stories that no child would want to read. Moreover, children between the ages of 8 and 13 are very different. An 8-year-old is more viable to enjoy a novel targeted towards children, but a 13-year-old will be more interested in young adult fiction, for example. Trying to write a middle grade fiction novel means understanding the fact that if you become “too childish’’ in your novel, half of your intended audience will not enjoy it. However, go for a bit more mature and a bit more dramatic, and you get very close to young adult fiction.

However, that doesn’t mean that you cannot find a balance. For example, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, falls into middle grade fiction. Even so, children and adults of all ages have come to enjoy it.

Knowing beforehand how middle grade fiction distinguishes itself in comparison to children’s fiction and young adult fiction will enable you to guide your novel in the right direction.

This guide is divided in three parts, all three of which is dedicated to understanding and deconstructing of all the elements that make middle grade fiction.

Table of Contents

Part One: Defining the Middle Grade Genre

1) age in middle grade fiction, 2) middle grade fiction: early ages 8-10, 3) middle grade fiction: late ages 11-13, 4) finding the kid voice, 5) getting inside the protagonist’s head, 6) mixing in other genres, part two: plotting, characterization, and narrative, 1) defining a protagonist, 2) creating the plot, 3) defining the cast of characters, 4) narrative, 5) themes and ideas, 6) impact of the modern age on middle grade fiction, part three: illustrations and other extras in middle grade fiction, 1) illustrations: yes or no, 2) mixing other genres, 3) writing style, 4) on preaching vs. teaching, 5) creating impact and grabbing attention, 6) importance of word count.

One of the best things about the middle age genre is this: it’s an age demographic. People only recently began to consider it a separate genre belonging to children’s fiction. However, that doesn’t mean that writing for the specific age demographic of 8 until 12 is somehow more difficult than writing for children or young adults. The elements of a good story remain the same in every genre. The difference here is in the themes you choose to tackle in your stories, and what your target audience will be. For that reason, it’s impossible to not further divide middle grade fiction into two age categories: early and late, early covering ages 8-10, and late covering ages 11-13.

However, another way of looking at middle grade fiction is through themes, writing style and tone. Younger children, belonging in the early group, will be interested in lighter topics, while older children might be more interested in crushing and very light romance. And while all children’s stories are essentially coming of age, middle grade is the time when we first discover the big bad world. Themes like being self-conscious, friendship, and even bullying in modern times, are interesting to the children who like to read about discovering oneself. On the other hand, humor, adventure, and fantasy will interest other children.

That’s what makes age so important in middle grade fiction.

Your protagonist can be a little older or younger than your targeted audience, however, an 8-year-old might not pick up a book about a 7-year-old protagonist, but they will definitely pick it up even if the protagonist was aged 9 or 10. So, ideally, the age of the protagonist will be the same or older than your intended readers. For example, a late middle grade fiction protagonist can be aged 13 or even 14. 14 can be too young for young adult (depending on the story), but it can fit in late middle grade fiction. Children like to read about characters that are a little older than themselves – but not too much.

The second difference between early and late middle grade fiction stems from the themes, situations, and aims of your novel. If your novel is aimed at the younger crowd of eight to ten-year-olds, then your themes should revolve around friendship, family, humor. In other words, lighter themes that would engage the mind of the children. Many kids turn into lifelong readers at this age, which makes your novel really important. It’s one thing to write a great novel that all adults can enjoy, but writing the kind of novel that will make an 8-year-old say “I want to read more stories like this” is a completely different thing. The early middle grade novels focus more on lighthearted stories, like child superheroes and their friends. Some of them maybe even have juvenile humor (think fart jokes), because that’s what some middle graders want to read. You’re not writing a school textbook; you’re providing entertainment for children. And while it’s okay to dab into serious themes and topics, you have to do it while using the right perspective and voice. When you’re writing novels aimed for the early middle grade age, think more like a child and less like a young adult.

The latter ages, from 11 to 13 are a very special time in a child’s life. Children slowly leave more and more of their childhood behind, and they get closer and closer to being teenagers. An 11-year-old might be interested in reading about the adventures of an 8-year-old child, but chances are they would be more interested in a protagonist who is 12 or 13. The themes in this age range from friendship and family to first crush and romance. These are the times when the child begins to really see the world around them. The children that sit alone at lunch have different views of the world than those who walk around in a clique of friends. Belonging and fitting in become important themes that continue into the young adult (teenage) age, and while birthday parties and sleepovers are the highlight of a child’s social life, when they do not happen, there is a reason for it.

However, this doesn’t mean that just because you decided to make your protagonist 12 years old, that you need to shy away from lighter topics and adventure (and even fart jokes). Kids are different, and some kids want to read about self-discovery, but others just want the fun a story can bring.

The voice of your protagonist is, obviously, the most important, regardless of whether you’re writing in first person point of view or third. First, you need to decide how eloquent the protagonist will be. A child up to 13 years old will not use words that are too long or too obscure. An even younger child might still have problems saying some words. For example, the word repercussions might become ripper cushions.

There are three ways for you to try to capture the voice of your protagonist (and other children in your novel). First, you can (and must!) read other books in your intended genre. Not to copy, but to see how it’s done, and to determine whether it’s good or not. The second way is by delving deep into your own childhood memories and remembering what it was like to be in that age. The third way to do this is by talking, conversing, and communicating with children of the same age.

Because here is the kicker: you might have loved Anne of Green Gables as a child, especially if you grew up before the digital age came with all its smartphones and tablets and even hoverboards (even though they don’t hover). An 8-year-old today is much more viable to have a hoverboard rather than a skateboard. Your memories serve to put you in the child’s state of mind, but unless you spend time with children who are middle grade in 2018, you will not know how a child views a smartphone, a tablet, or a computer.

Since we’re talking about children, getting inside their heads (or, your protagonist’s head), is both easy in one aspect and difficult in another.

The reason why it’s easy: your protagonist has only lived for less than a decade. You do not need to craft an extensive backstory that includes everything the protagonist has been through up until the moment your novel starts.

The difficulty stems from the fact that you’re still an adult, and middle grade was a long time ago for you. Add in the fact that the world changes drastically in the last 20 years, this makes your job even more difficult. In addition, think about the message you’re sending. If you show a 10-year-old girl whose goal in the day is to make a cute Facebook selfie, what kind of a message are you sending to other 10-year-old girls?

However, this is where backstory comes to help, in addition with the three ways of finding the voice of a child we mentioned in the previous section.

How did your protagonist grow up? Does he or she live with both her parents, or is he or she the child of a single parent? Where are the grandparents? Are they in the picture or not, and if not, what happened to them? Moreover, how does the child feel about the presence (or lack thereof) of parents or grandparents?

Then, we move on to school. Did the child go to pre-school or not? If he or she did not go to pre-school, did he or she have problems socializing in elementary school? Then, move on to middle grade before the novel starts. How many friends? How good of a friends? What is their daily routine? Do they care about school and learning, or do they prefer to go out and play? Add in the modern technology – is the child more comfortable sitting at home playing Nintendo Wii or PlayStation, or they prefer to go out and play football?

Create one normal day in the life of your protagonist, follow his or her thoughts and goals during that day, and figure out the right moment when his or her adventure begins.

Adventure is prevalent in middle grade fiction, as well as children’s fiction, not because the characters go on a literal adventure (although, most often they do), but because the events of the novel are presented as such.

But, you can target any kind of genre towards children, within some limits, of course. Science fiction and fantasy, for example, but also mystery and slice-of-life become adventures when one constant in a child’s life is changed (visiting Grandma in the countryside, for example, can be a great slice-of-life adventure).

We already covered romance – it should be light, and you might add in a first kiss if the protagonist is of the older, late category. Mystery revolves around a missing item or a pet that has accidentally escaped.

You can cover tougher themes, because God knows that not every child has a happy childhood, but it goes without saying that if you choose to put a child in a thriller, then you’re not writing a book for children, regardless of their age. Unfortunately, children do not buy novels for themselves – their parents do, and if their parents decide that your novel has the potential to psychologically scar their children, your novel will remain on the shelf for years, waiting to be bought. This doesn’t mean that tougher themes cannot prevail in middle grade fiction – A Series of Unfortunate Events is prime example of how you can write books with difficult themes aimed at children. It’s all in the interpretation, perspective, and tone.

For some writers, the most difficult thing is to know what to write. Other writers sit down and write a story in one sitting, no previous planning needed. Regardless of which group you belong to, knowing how to build a plot, how to show your characters within it, and to wrap it up in a narrative suitable and attractive to children, is imperative to telling a story. You might want to rely on instinct, and some writers are able to instinctively feel their way when telling a story, however, in most cases, something ends up missing.

For that reason, in this section, we’ll talk about plotting, characterization and narrative in middle grade fiction, and what makes middle grade fiction stand out.

Defining the protagonist is a task that every writer takes on differently. Some writers prefer to discover more about their characters as they write the story, while others define their protagonists from the start.

Here, we will talk about defining the protagonist in the simplest sense. Besides age and appearance, you need to answer the following questions:

– What kind of traits does the protagonist possess?

– What kind of a lesson will the protagonist learn at the end?

– What changes in the protagonist from start to finish.

Your characters should not be perfect, even though they are children. Children can be just as ‘flawed’ as adults. By flawed, we do not mean ‘defect’ in any kind of way, we’re referring to traits that are and should be subjected to change. A child that doesn’t know how to share might be told that they are about receive a baby brother or a sister. The story revolves around the child learning how to share with friends, cousins and relatives. A spoiled child, for example, might learn that just because they want that new shiny expensive object, it doesn’t mean that they need it.

Sure, you might tell yourself, “I want to write a story about an orphaned child,” but unless you define that orphan, his or her surroundings, the things that he or she will learn along the way, you will have a series of events that might be loosely connected via cause and effect, but at the end, the readers will ask themselves, “so, what was the point of this story?”

And, you don’t really want that, do you?

In a good novel , there are always two things: a plot and a character’s arc for the protagonist. When you have a well-defined protagonist, when you know which traits the protagonist will change, you can create a plot that will help you bring these things to life. The plot is easy to define: in all novels, the protagonist is presented with a problem that they have to solve. The protagonist always goes for the easiest solution, which leads us to the first plot point. However, the easiest solution doesn’t work, and it is only when the protagonist learns his or her lesson, when they change for the better, that we get the second plot point – the correct solution to the problem, and from there, move on to the resolution of the overall conflict.

In middle grade fiction, these problems do not have to be worldly problems where the child has to save the world (although, there are great novels out there where children do save the world). Saving the world can mean anything for a child. Saving the world can mean defeating the neighborhood bully for good just so that the protagonist and his or her friends can play outside again in peace without the bully bothering them.

Once the protagonist has a single goal in mind, you can begin to build your novel in three acts.

Act 1: The first act in any novel is always the same: you introduce your characters, the protagonist, and the normal world where they live and interact. Even if you’re writing science fiction or fantasy, you need to define the “normal world” and present it to the readers. Act 1 also introduces the problem that the protagonist has to solve, and the inciting incident that causes the problem or makes the protagonist aware of it. When the protagonist makes the easiest (wrong) decision to solve the problem (or even deny it), you end the first act and begin with the second.

Act 2: At the beginning of act 2, it appears as if the protagonist has made the right decision. Things might even go really well for a while. However, since the problem hasn’t really been solved, this leads to small disasters, then bigger ones, until finally, the protagonist has to really face the problem and make the right decision. This moment is known as the second plot point, and this is when the second act ends.

In the third act , or, the resolution, the protagonist, now changed for the better, has made the right decision, and the time has come to either defeat the enemy, or fight a final battle, or do something that previously they did not want to even consider doing. This leads to the ending.

Now, the above is only a blueprint. You need to build up the plot as such following the line of cause and effect. You need to get from the inciting incident to the first plot point, and then to the second.

Another thing you must remember is that the first and second plot points are not connected by cause and effect directly. As such, with the help of your cast of characters and the protagonist’s traits, you can add subplots – small mini stories that include the other characters and that help you show your protagonist’s character better, or a bigger subplot that will take more page time and run almost parallel to the main one. Whichever way you decide to go, remember that every scene needs to be either plot related, subplot related via cause and effect, and serve to portray your characters better. If it’s just slice of life without any real plot-related substance, that scene will have to go.

There are two reasons why you need a cast of characters in your novel. The first is because your protagonist will never be all-knowing and able to do everything by themselves. Another reason is connected to the protagonist. The easiest way to show a character’s personality traits is in contrast with other characters. Adult characters help you show better the mind of a child – especially through the relationship between the child and the adult character.

Besides, the world of children can be full of people: friends, family members, extended family members, teachers, school mates, and more. Defining the cast of characters means choosing the role of each character. Once you’ve defined the role, you will have to create extensive backstories for the characters. The backstories will help you give each character a distinct voice, which is highly important, especially in scenes with dialogue.

What you need to remember, at all times, is who is telling the story. Writing in omnipresent point of view gives you the opportunity to get into many characters’ head and reveal things to the reader that the protagonist doesn’t know. On the other hand, writing in first or third person limited point of view means telling a story as the protagonist – no jumping around in other people’s heads. What the protagonist knows is the same thing that the readers know.

Remember that you’re writing a story about children meant to be read by children. Keep the narrative in the spirit of childhood, even if you’re showing themes that are difficult for a child to fully comprehend. Using words that children understand is imperative, keeping the violence to a minimum is preferable, and keeping the tone light and hopeful ideal for a middle grade story.

On the other hand, if your narrative is adult-like, how do you expect children to fully understand and enjoy your novel? Children can tell when the narrator is “adult” just by reading a couple of paragraphs. This makes them not want to finish reading and leave your novel aside in favor of novels with a lighter narrative that enables them to go on a ride, have an adventure, and still understand everything that’s happening.

Reading other middle grade books will give you a good idea on the themes and ideas that are prevalent in it. From love, friendship, family, to loyalty, courage, bravery, determination and perseverance. Including kindness, empathy, working in a team, and compassion. Conveying these ideas in writing is a different matter entirely. One of the best ways to show these themes is through the events of the plot.

Perseverance is shown through the protagonist taking on impossible odds and achieving his or her goal. The only difference between adult fiction and middle grade fiction, when it comes to themes, is the representation. For a child, perseverance can be shown by not giving up on even the simplest of goals. Kindness is shown through adversary, while true friendship, just like true love, can survive all sorts of trials.

What you should not do is try to cram too many themes into one novel. Choose one or two prevalent themes that the plot will revolve around, and let the other themes show themselves naturally in specific moments or events in the novel.

As we previously said, a middle grader today will most probably ride a hoverboard rather than a skateboard. Kids from today barely even know what a landline telephone with a cord is, let alone a VHS. But, they do know how to use tablets, smartphones, and computers from a very young age.

Sure, you can omit technology in your novel, but that automatically transfers your novel back to the 90s when smartphones did not exist. But, today’s children might not find your novel believable. For example, a child running away from home and spending a day on their own in the city might have worked as a story in the 90s, but today? Today that kid will have their phone on them, so either have the kid discard the phone, or show the kid answering or ignoring its parents’ frantic phone calls. Point is, modern technology is a big part of children’s worlds today, and you should find a way to use it in your novel. Even social media is becoming more and more present in children’s world, as more and more kids have connections on Facebook and Instagram.

Adding modern technology in your novel does not encumber you in any way, especially since the use of technology by children opens up many opportunities for themes like childhood and what it means in the modern world, how fast do you grow up with technology at your fingertips, and what kind of dangers can come, not from the outside world, but from the world inside a child’s smartphone.

It’s very uncommon for an adult novel to have illustrations and other extras, but even adults are happy when a book offers something more than just words and sentences. When it comes to children, these extras can make your novel even more attractive. If you’re writing a middle grade fiction novel, you need to consider which one of these extras you can and should include.

By default, this will depend on the story you’re telling, and on the impact you’re trying to achieve. In the last part of this guide, we’ll be focusing on illustrations, writing style – especially, writing style meant for children, and other extras that can help you boost your novel to great levels.

If you’re writing for the early middle graders, ages 8 to 10, you might want to consider adding illustrations to your novel. Now, there are a few things you need to know. Unless you’re a gifted illustrator, you will need to hire one to create these for you. That means commissioning art, which might be expensive, especially if you’re self-publishing. If a big publishing house stands behind you, on the other hand, illustrations might be included in your novel regardless of whether or not you want them in your novel or nor.

If you decide to go for it, know that early middle grade fiction allows for full page illustrations of places, characters, and events. But, this might make your book longer and more expensive to print. On the other hand, if you’re writing for ages 10 and up, you should remember that one illustration of an object or a character at the beginning of each chapter is enough.

Middle grade fiction, as we previously said, turns any kind of story into an adventure, due to the ages of the characters and the protagonist. However, here are a few things to keep in mind if you wish to mix in other genres.

Science fiction and fantasy: do not think that it’s easy to add science fiction and fantasy in a novel for middle graders, thinking that since these kids barely know the laws of science, no one can dispute your worldbuilding. But that’s not exactly true. Children know and understand rules, and if you deem to break your own worldbuilding rules in science fiction and fantasy, they will know what you’ve done. Many of them will scoff and say, “that’s not possible,” and they’ll be taken out of the story just like any adult would.

If you wish to mix in a mystery, treat your protagonist like a mini-detective with a keen mind, and do not offer the solution out of the blue. Have the protagonist solve the mystery by following clues and making the right deductions (and wrong ones from which he will learn). Do not believe that you get a shortcut just because you’re writing for children, working under the false belief that children will believe anything.

Of course, children have great imagination, and yes, if you present a planet that has no gravity in your story and everybody is flying around on the surface, then they will accept the possibility of such a planet existing. But, this doesn’t mean that you can also have that planet rain candy out of rainbow-colored clouds, wrappers and everything. Keep it real and imaginative, rather than throwing everything on the wall and see what sticks, even if it doesn’t make sense.

One of the biggest mistakes you can make in writing for middle graders (and children in general) is to write down at them. They are children, but they are neither slow nor stupid. There is no need for you to repeat the same things over and over again, and there is no need for you to dumb down the language and writing style.

Remember, middle grade is the age when children begin to discover the world. They are curious and can be very sharp at times, and they will know when a writer is dumbing it down. There is no need for that.

However, a middle grade novel is also not the place for philosophical statements, recollections, and long paragraphs of inner reflection and thoughts. This has the opposite effect: the children read but do not understand much, which means, they are not enjoying reading your novel. And while some adults might overcome this problem and finish your novel, children will stop reading and never go back to it.

Your best bet is to have a child read your middle grade story (or a part of it). Gauge their reaction and then make changes accordingly.

When it comes to talking down to children, another problem that arises is the difference between preaching and teaching. Teaching is guiding the child to understanding something about life. You do not tell them, you show them and you help them come to the right conclusion and learning the lesson.

Preaching, on the other hand, is telling the child over and over again that the sky is blue and can only be blue (even though it can be grey when it rains, white when it snows, black at night). Everyone has their own beliefs, but writers always face the problem of preaching – even when writing for adults. Do not preach your principles and opinions in your novel, especially not when it’s intended for children. With the theme of your novel in mind, find a way to include important life lessons in it – but through the eyes and perspective of your protagonist.

Guide your protagonist, let your protagonist learn on his own, and you will not have the problem of preaching in your novel. Yes, stealing is bad, for example, but instead of having five different characters say that in five different scenes, have the protagonist steal something, face the consequences, and then learn and understand why stealing is wrong.

Here is the moment where your creativity shows itself to its full light. Alas, maybe you wanted to wind surf when you were a kid, and maybe you think that this will be so fun to depict in a novel, but unless that activity makes sense in the story, it might not really belong in there.

Your middle grade novel is not the place where you can live out your childhood wishes and things you never got to do.

On the other hand, having a middle grader attend school and only school in your novel is also not a good idea, even though school takes up most of a child’s day. Focus on action, and on change. Open your novel with the child going to school, then immediately have the action happen that jumpstarts the plot. Middle grade fiction novels are shorter, in general, than adult contemporary novels. This means that you need to exclude everything that’s not necessary to the story. Keep school only if the story happens at the school. And even then, in the name of entertainment, make the events that happen both fun and realistic.

When it comes to word count, middle grade fiction ranges anywhere from 20K to 50-60K. This is because children have shorter attention spans than adults, and if they see that a book is ‘very big’ they might not even want to read it. And while that epic fantasy revolving around children will be awesome for you to write, the children meant to read it might not be interested in reading such a long novel, no matter how amazing it might actually be.

On the other hand, a shorter novel means a quicker plot (because you still need to get from plot point one to plot point two). You have less page time to show and develop and flesh out your characters, so make sure that every scene in your novel has an impact on the plot and it serves to show character. Otherwise, you will have to cut it out in the editing process.

All readers want to read a story that they enjoy. Some readers prefer to read a story that will take them on an adventure and make them think. Other readers prefer only the adventure. They read to escape, not to reflect on the real world or their own lives.

Children are the same. Your story might be an adventure that also teaches kids about love, friendship, loyalty, and more, or your story might be intended to make children laugh. Whichever way you go, if your characters are vivid enough, if your story is interesting, and if you do not write down to children and preach in your story, then children will love it. Writing a great novel for adults is easier because we are also adults, and we understand adults a lot more. Writing a great novel for children might be more difficult, but it can be done, and who knows when the next JK Rowling will come along?

Keep writing and practicing your craft, and you will write a novel that all kids would enjoy. Good luck!

Georgina Roy wants to live in a world filled with magic. As a screenwriting student, she is content to fill notebooks and sketchbooks with magical creatures and amazing new worlds. When she is not at school, watching a film or scribbling away in a notebook, you can usually find her curled up, reading a good urban fantasy novel, or writing on her own.

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How to Write Next Level Dialogue in YA Fiction

Related books, your rights as a student in us public schools, 34 books with multiple narrators to add to your tbrs, choose a romance trope, we’ll give you a book rec.

“Don’t tell me you’re seriously gonna do homework this weekend,” Kenzie said as she watched me load my backpack with my physics textbook and my precalc notebook .

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“Um, because our school is closing? And therefore homework is pointless from now on?” She leaned over me, dabbing her lip gloss into place in the small magnet mirror on the inside of my locker door.

“Oh really? And what was your excuse before today?”

“I’m philosophically opposed to homework. You know that.” She smacked her lips together, satisfied, and began vigorously finger-combing her impossibly shiny waist-length hair. “Young girls like us should spend our free time freely . We have the rest of our lives to shrivel away in a library reading”—she picked up the novel I was reading by its spine, with her thumb and forefinger, like it was a rotting banana peel—“ Pride and Prejudice. ”

“You know,” I said, “you’d actually really like that book.”

“‘It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife,’” she read. “Oh, I see. You think I’d like it just because it’s about a rich single guy? I have other interests, you know, Wendy.”

“Name one.”

“Well, poor single guys, for one. And rich married guys. And emotionally unavailable middle-class guys—”

Entirely through conversation, with minimal description and zero expository paragraphs, we learn a lot about Wendy and Kenzie, and the differences between them. You could probably pinpoint three character traits each of them has, just from this brief excerpt. Dialogue can also be used to reveal group dynamics without spelling them out. Here’s a scene with all four of the friends together—Wendy and Kenzie, plus Sapphire and Emily. Wendy has just gotten into Emily’s car, and the group is on its way to a football game:

“You look hot,” [Kenzie] said approvingly, arching a penciled eyebrow. “I have a feeling about tonight. A good one.”

“Your hair looks adorable,” Sapphire said with a pout, shoving over to make room for me. “Mine looks disgusting. I wish I had your hair.”

“No,” I said, reciting my lines. “ My hair looks disgusting. Your hair is gorgeous.”

She began teasing the crown of her hair with her fingers, using the mirror on the back of her iPhone case to make adjustments. Sapphire’s beautiful, thick curls were her greatest vanity, so in the strange, inverted world of popularity, it meant that she had to spend as much time as possible ridiculing them.

“I love your top,” Emily shouted over the music as she eyed me from the rearview mirror.

“This?” I snapped the shoulder strap dismissively. “This stupid thing was like three bucks.” Which, of course, was a lie. The top was from the Young Contemporary section at Bloomingdale’s, a gift from my rich aunt Kathy, and it was my favorite piece of clothing.

From these lines—mainly dialogue with some description and just a bit of exposition interspersed—you can infer a lot about Wendy’s friends. For instance, they’re fake. For another, there’s a routine they go through when they are together. What else can you determine about their characters, based on the dialogue in this scene? Who speaks to Wendy first, for example? Who’s the last of the group to interact with Wendy after she gets into the car? Is what that character has to say original, or does it fall in line with what the others have already expressed? What does that tell you about where she might fall in the hierarchy of the group? Finally, let’s look at a scene with all four characters—Wendy, Kenzie, Sapphire, and Emily—in which a fifth character, Christian, who was recently introduced in the book, now functions as the subject of conversation for the four young women:

“Christian’s hot, Kenz,” Emily observed. “And he’s totally into you.”

“He’s pathetic.” Kenzie picked a long black hair from the strap of her tank top and rubbed it between her delicate fingers until it sifted to the ground. “Does he even know that me and Evan are kind of a thing now? Evan would beat his ass if he saw Christian ogling my boobs like that.”

“Yeah,” Emily said, quickly reevaluating her opinion. “I guess he is kind of sad.”

“His party should be good, though,” Kenzie said. She took out her phone. “I’m going to tell Evan to meet us there after the game.”

“What about that other guy?” Sapphire said. “Wendy, he was staring at you.”

“He wasn’t staring at me,” I objected. “I mean, he just likes Springsteen.”

“ Staring. Like a stalker.”

“He seemed cool,” I ventured.

“Code for ‘I want to bang him,’” laughed Emily.

“Well, you’ll get your chance,” Kenzie said. “Christian’s parties are always out of control. Come on. Let’s go find a seat.”

What have you learned about Wendy from this conversation? How about Emily? How does Jessie Ann Foley illustrate that Kenzie is the one in control of the group? Whereas the previous scene showed how the four characters interacted when the topic was themselves and their appearances, this scene depicts the four of them talking about someone else, which is another way of developing their characters. It reinforces the roles that each of them plays within the group, but again, without resorting to lines of background information or explanation, which readers tend to get bored with. Instead, the dialogue is punchy and authentic—and it moves the plot forward by setting up a conflict between Kenzie’s two romantic interests, as well as hinting at a possible love interest for Wendy herself.

Now it’s your turn!

To work on dialogue in your own writing, here are some exercises to try:

1. Write a scene with your main character and their best friend, or come up with two characters. Think about three major differences between them. How can you convey those differences through conversation, without actually articulating them on the page? Now reverse the dialogue and give the characters each other’s lines. If the lines feel interchangeable, can you pinpoint why that is? You might have more work to do developing dialect and character in each person’s speech, so it feels distinct.

2. One way to improve the dialogue you write is by listening to other people’s conversations, or writing down your own. Transcribe a recent exchange you overheard, or that you had with someone else. Can you identify how this conversation might function in a book—for example, as character development or to move the plot forward? Could you adapt this conversation to use as dialogue for your own writing?

What other writing advice do you want to hear? Tell us in the comments below!  Up Next:  How To Master Sensory Language In Your Writing

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Writing for Children with Karen Cioffi

Ghostwriting | Rewriting | Editing | Coaching

Chapter Book Guidelines

I like writing children’s chapter books. They allow the writer more freedom than picture books or early readers, but they’re not as involved as middle-grade or young adult books.

The children’s chapter book is just right—at least to me.

I’m currently working in three different genres: picture book, chapter book, and a young adult. And, there’s also my own middle-grade story which, I’ve had to put on the back burner for the time being.

Working in multiple genres, I know what’s involved in each and as I mentioned in the first sentence, I like chapter books best. Picture books are a close second, though.

HOW DOES THE CHILDREN’S CHAPTER BOOK COMPARE TO OTHER GENRES?

Chapter Books vs. Picture Books

I prefer chapter books over picture books because you have more words to work with. A good length for a chapter book is 10,000 words, but it can be from under 5,000 to around 15,000 words.

That amount of words gives the writer the freedom to provide details, descriptions, and so on, that you just can’t do in a picture book as the picture book should be well under 800 words. And that word count keeps shrinking. Hopefully, one day it’ll go back up to around 1,000.

You need to write tight with picture books in order to get a full story arc.

Chapter Book vs. Early Reader

Compared to the early reader, chapter books, again, allow for a lot more freedom. While you do have to consider the age of the reader for the plot, sentence structure, paragraphs, and so on with the chapter book, it’s not as stringent as the early reader.

The early reader is geared toward the emergent reader. The words, sentences, and paragraphs have to be in accordance with educational tools like the Lexile Framework for Reading.

Chapter Books vs. Middle Grade and Young Adult

The other great thing about chapter books is they’re not as involved as the middle grade or young adult.

A middle-grade book is usually anywhere from 20,000 (for a simple middle grade) to 55,000 (for upper middle grade).

The young adult books are usually 55,000 up to 80,000 words. This kind of word count calls for a lot of organization and a lot of notes. And a good memory helps, too.

While a larger word count allows for a much more in-depth story with lots and lots of details, including subplots, and even more than one point of view , there’s a lot to keep track of.

To add to this, if you’re working with a client, you may encounter pauses in the writing momentum due to the client taking a long time to review what you send. This is a big deal when you’ve got a good momentum going and you have to put it on pause.

CHAPTER BOOK GUIDELINES

So, What Exactly Are the Guidelines of the Chapter Book?

According to editor Mary Kole, the chapter book’s key element is for the reader to have “easy wins.” This means the new reader will get a sense of accomplishment for each chapter he reads. This is a huge win for a child just learning to read.

This age group varies, but the usual is seven to nine.

Word Count, Pages, and Chapter Length

As mentioned earlier, the word count can be 5,000 to 15,000, but the sweet spot is around 10,000. And the book can have 48-80 pages.

Because the child is new to reading independently, the chapters should be 500-700 words. Short and sweet. This helps with the ‘easy wins.’

Along with having easy wins, shorter chapters allow the young reader to pause or stop reading at the end of a chapter. This makes reading less tiresome.

Considering the word count per chapter, having 10-20 chapters is a good amount.

The plot should be simple, and subplots should be avoided.

The young reader is just beginning to get comfortable reading on his own. Making the story easy to understand and follow along is essential.

The book should have a full story (narrative) arc.

Popular topics include friendship, inclusion, school, bullying, being yourself, and achieving goals. The topics need to be relatable to kids in grammar school.

Word choice should be age-appropriate. And keep in mind that the characters should sound like ‘real’ kids.

For example, if a character refuses to do something, how would he say it?

“I’d rather not do that.” Or “No way!”

If you don’t have personal access to kids, watch age-related shows and read lots of chapter books.

Sentence Structure

Sentences should be short, around 12-20 words. The average sentence length in J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter is 12.

Vary the length, and you can use some sentence fragments. The “No way!” from above is a sentence fragment.

You can also use onomatopoeia sound words. These are words that sound like the action that’s happening: plop, zap, buzz, boom, clank, achoo…

Story timeframe

The timeframe for the story should be short.

For simpler chapter books, it should be limited to one incident. For the longer chapter book, the timeframe could be longer. But not too long – it shouldn’t span years or even one year.

There should be a full character arc. The protagonist struggles to overcome a problem or obstacle and ‘grows’ in some way as a result of the journey.

The character might become more assertive, wiser, friendlier, happier, accepting, social, helpful, understanding, a better person, better in sports, etc.

The protagonist should be at the top end of the target age group or a little older. So, basing it on the average reader of seven to nine, the protagonist should be nine to ten. Kids don’t like to read down. In other words, they don’t want to read about a protagonist younger than they are.

There should be only one point of view: that of the protagonist.

Illustrations

Kids in this age group are still learning to gather information through text only; having illustrations here and there will be helpful. The beginning of each chapter is a good place or where you want to ‘show’ the reader what’s going on.

Similar to picture books, the illustrations can help tell the story, so physical characteristics don’t need to be mentioned in the text.

You do have the option of having black and white illustrations rather than full color like picture books. In this case, you would mention characteristics in regard to color, such as blonde hair, a purple room, and so on.

This is the basics of a chapter book.

If you’re not familiar with chapter books, a good way to get a feel for them is to take a lot recently traditionally published ones out of the library and study them.

If you’re a children’s writer and haven’t written one yet, give it a try!

References :

(1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngDXXlVrL1U&feature=youtu.be

https://www.masterclass.com/articles/what-are-the-elements-of-a-narrative-arc-and-how-do-you-create-one-in-writing#quiz-0

6 thoughts on “ Chapter Book Guidelines ”

Thanks for posting this helpful article! I’m thinking of venturing into the Children’s Chapter Book market..

Janine, I’m so glad the article was helpful! And best wishes on your endeavor into children’s chapter books!

Thanks for explaining that chapter books often have more words compared to other books intended for early readers. I want to look for a good early reader chapter book series because I want to help my son adjust more easily in a school environment. I think that being more comfortable reading will help him a lot in being more confident in his vocabulary.

Hi, Alice. Chapter books are a great way to help kids transition from picture books to middle grade. And your son will definitely feel more confident when he can master chapter books. If he’s a reluctant reader, look for books with lower word counts to ease him into reading. Thanks for stopping by!

Thank you for sharing your ideas and helping me understand a little more as to what it takes to writing a chapter book for children.

Glad it was helpful, Rafaela!

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• Write For Us

How to Be Horrific (in an Age-appropriate Way): YA Horror Fiction

Young readers want to be scared, but parents don’t want to be alarmed. Alex Woolf – veteran young adult (YA) horror author of  titles such as  Soul Shadows , which was shortlisted for the RED Book Award, and  Aldo Moon and the Ghost at Gravewood Hall  – looks at how to write horror fiction aimed at young people on the cusp of maturity.  

We’re exposed to horror stories from an early age: a ravenous wolf dressed as a grandmother, a witch that fattens up a little boy in a cage, a gorgon with a face that is literally petrifying. Children have always loved being unsettled, scared, shocked and terrified, but there are, of course, limits. All who write horror for the young must be aware of these and tread sensitively.

Achieving this balancing act can be particularly tricky, since young adults aren’t going to be satisfied with the genteel fantasy horror of goblins and monsters under the bed. On the other hand, anything too brutal or gory may not be appropriate either – at least in the eyes of their teachers, librarians and parents. Besides scariness, there are several other aspects of YA horror that have to be pitched right if it’s going to succeed in a crowded market. Here are a few tips for making yours reach out and grab the right readers.

Give Your Topic a Twist

Young adults may no longer be captivated by the simple fairy tales of early childhood, but that doesn’t mean they won’t enjoy stories featuring similar supernatural beings. Ghosts, witches, vampires, zombies and werewolves have all been repurposed successfully in YA horror – the trick to find a new and exciting twist.

One way might be to make the monsters teenagers themselves, with all the usual human problems like dating and acne being complicated by a thirst for human blood or a tendency to turn hairy and howl at the moon. If this is your preferred route, remember not to rely too much on laughs. Horror stories must, first and foremost, be scary. When choosing a topic, try casting your mind back to when you were a teenager and ask yourself, “Would this have scared me then?”

Go Easy on the Gothic

Setting is one of the aspects that really marks out YA horror from spooky stories aimed at middle grade or younger audiences. Gone are the eerie forests and gothic castles of fairy tales, and along with them the comforting sense that this is a fantasy world with bad things that can’t really happen to us. YA horror is often set disconcertingly close to home, and usually in modern times.

Common settings include schools, friends’ houses, pizza joints, shopping malls, bowling alleys, and other teen hangouts. That doesn’t mean protagonists enjoy much personal autonomy.  The Dead House  (Dawn Kurtagich) is partially set in a hospital for the mentally ill, where freedoms are severely curtailed. In Michael Grant’s  Gone  series, an invisible barrier cuts a town off from the outside world.

There are no absolute rules, though. Many great modern YA horror tales have a distinctly old world or otherworldly backdrop.  The Forest of Hands and Teeth  (Carrie Ryan) and  Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children  (Ransom Riggs) are just two examples of YA horror novels with fantastical settings.

Empower Your Protagonists

The typical protagonist of a YA horror novel is a teenager with a troubled past, absent or dysfunctional parents, and/or an almost insane willingness to venture towards a suspicious noise in the middle of the night armed with nothing but a torch. The most important thing to remember about YA horror is that teen characters have agency. They are the powerful, brave and clever ones in the story.

Unlike in horror stories geared toward younger audiences, where parents are needed for money and car rides and to tell the kids to stop imagining things, YA horror parents are weirdly absent, and the role of adult characters is usually either to terrorize our intrepid young heroes and heroines, or to offer them assistance (unless they are the police, in which case they are almost invariably useless).

Don’t Hold Back on the Evil

Every successful YA horror tale requires an evil, yet also mysterious and fascinating villain at its heart. He, she or it can be either human or supernatural, but this assignation often marks it out from middle grade horror, where the villains tend to be magical entities. One popular subgenre of YA horror featuring human villains is the slasher, such as  There’s Someone Inside Your House  (Stephanie Perkins) or  I Know What You Did Last Summer  (Lois Duncan), where the killer is usually a mentally disturbed person stalking and killing young people because of some perceived wrong. These tend to be fairly formulaic and predictable, yet undeniably successful.

Modern YA horror features an imaginative array of supernatural villains, too, from the vengeful and gluttonous spectres of  A Banquet for Hungry Ghosts  (Ying Chang Compestine) to the reverse-aged Hollowgasts of  Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children . But if you don’t feel up to creating your own evil entity, there are plenty of traditional monsters from which you can take your pick.

Of these, the undisputed titan of YA horror villains remains the vampire. The trouble is there’s such a glut of these books on the market today. You’ll need to work extra hard to make your undead antagonist stand out. You might wish to take inspiration from  The Coldest Girl in Coldtown  (Holly Black), which introduces the debonair bloodsucker Lucien Moreau with his trademark cream suit and white shirt (the better to show off the blood of his victims), or the mysterious Mr. Crepsley and his performing spider in Darren Shan’s  Cirque du Freak . And of course, one cannot ignore the beautiful sparkling vampires in Stephanie Meyer’s classic  Twilight  series.

Keep It Tight and Punchy

In the age of Instagram and Snapchat, the typical teen reader’s attention span is pretty short, so it’s best to structure your horror novel in tightly written, punchy action scenes with plenty of scares. These can be interspersed with quieter moments to explore character, establish mood, and build suspense.

It’s almost obligatory these days to open your novel in a moment of high-octane excitement to grab the reader’s attention and lure them in. Personally, I think this can be overdone, and I think a novel with a slow, yet intriguing or unsettling opening can be just as effective. Remember also to use plenty of sudden plot twists – teens love to be kept guessing about certain aspects of the story, such as who the next victim will be, and who is really the villain.

Build Suspense

In terms of suspense, the same rules apply with YA as with all horror writing, only more so. So while an adult horror writer might be content to build suspense slowly with subtle hints of menace, the YA author likes to set the pulse racing early and keep that momentum going.

The easiest way to do this is to get inside the lead character’s head so the reader gets to share their apprehension about what might be lurking in the cellar, or what could emerge when the sun goes down. This is why a lot of YA horror is written in the first person present, creating a strong sense of immediacy, so that whatever is happening is happening  right now .

Another fun way of building a menacing atmosphere is through imagery: a raven picking at the entrails of a rat, a fat centipede crawling out of a doll’s eye socket, a shadowy figure at the window of an abandoned house. YA readers adore this kind of thing.

How scary, exactly, are you allowed to be? The surprising and gratifying truth is that with YA horror, there are no set-in-stone limits. Be as scary as you can – you can always backtrack later if you feel you’ve overdone it. Fear is subjective and difficult to quantify. I’ve never found snakes scary, for example, but have a particular dread of scuttling creatures like spiders and beetles. And, as every horror writer ought to know, the fear comes from what you don’t mention, the things you hint at but are never seen or entirely understood.

Nothing fully described, however horrid, can ever be as scary as things imagined, and the teenage imagination is a wondrous and powerful thing. Readers will readily form their own mental images of the monstrous entities and dark deeds that haunt your book. What you should be very wary of in YA horror is focusing on gore, or describing violence in gruesome detail.

Some YA authors manage to pull this off, such as Rick Yancey in  Monstrumologist . He writes his gory scenes with an almost cartoonish exuberance, with heads wrenched from necks and steaming geysers of blood. This takes quite a bit of skill, but can be fun if done well. On the other hand, a decent horror writer should be able to evoke plenty of terror without indulging in an all-out splatterfest.

Beware Happy Endings

Unlike younger readers, the YA audience does not hanker for a happy ending. In fact, they might be seriously disappointed by a conclusion where all the plot threads are neatly tied up, the villain vanquished, and the good guys riding off into the sunset.

Rather, they want to be left feeling unsettled and discombobulated, with everything they thought they knew thrown out the window. They want to know that the horror, though foiled for now, may come back, that the evil has spread, and that new unsuspecting victims are about to get the shock of their lives.

Above all, YA horror fans love a sequel!

About the author

Alex Woolf and Dan Brotzel are co-authors of a new comic novel, Kitten on a Fatberg (Unbound). As a reader of this website, you can pre-order Kitten on a Fatberg for a 10% discount – simply quote promo code KITTEN10.

Alex has written over 100 books for children and adults, published by the likes of OUP, Ladybird, and Heinemann and Watts.

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Juvenile Fiction Definition – Complete List of Book Genres

by Mark Malatesta | Jan 17, 2019 | Children's Book Genres

Home » Children's Book Genres » Juvenile Fiction Definition – Complete List of Book Genres

Juvenile Fiction Definition –  What’s the best definition for the juvenile fiction book genre? Books in the juvenile fiction genre contain stories that would appeal to middle grade to young adult readers; it spans the age group of twelve to eighteen. The juvenile genre contains anything that would appeal to the teen demographic. The actual age of the target reader is determined not only by the age of the main character, but also the conflict and issue that teen is dealing with. Example: the age of the main character may be thirteen, but their issue is drug related. This would cause the story to appeal to not only thirteen-year-olds, but also to older teens that are dealing with, or have been exposed to, the same issue.

Books in the juvenile fiction genre are often 2-10,000 words in length for ages 7-9, and 20-40,000 words in length for ages 9-12, and 40-80,000 words in length for ages 13-18.

Scroll below now to see 25 juvenile fiction book genre examples, or click here to see all book genres for kids .

Juvenile Fiction Definition – Examples

Review this list of popular examples to help you get a better understanding of the juvenile fiction book genre.

1. Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer

2. Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder

3. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling

4. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling

5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling

6. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling

7. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling

8. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling

9. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling

10. Harry Potter Boxset by J.K. Rowling

11. Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder

12. Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder

13. Little Town on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder

14. Meet Felicity: An American Girl by Valerie Tripp

15. My Pants Are Haunted by Jim Benton

16. Stormbreaker by Anthony Horowitz

17. The Bad Beginning by Lemony Snicket

18. The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis

19. The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman

20. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis

21. The Long Winter by Laura Ingalls Wilder

22. The Magic of Finkleton by K.C. Hilton

23. The Magician’s Nephew by C.S. Lewis

24. The Silver Chair by C.S. Lewis

25. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Juvenile Fiction Definition – Related Book Genres

* Middle Grade Book Genre

*  Juvenile Book Genre

* Juvenile Nonfiction Genre

*  Young Adult Genre

* YA Fiction Genre

* YA Nonfiction Genre

Click here now to see all

book genres for kids .

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Writing Juvenile Stories and Novels: How to write and sell fiction for young people Hardcover – January 1, 1976

• Print length 188 pages
• Language English
• Publisher The Writer, Inc.
• Publication date January 1, 1976
• ISBN-10 0871160986
• ISBN-13 978-0871160980
• See all details

Product details

• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0006CO24C
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ The Writer, Inc. (January 1, 1976)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 188 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0871160986
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0871160980
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 9.6 ounces
• Best Sellers Rank: #2,815,712 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books )

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Fitting Into a Fiction Medium

• Author: Natalie Leif

On June 4th, my first novel was published. This was shocking news to my library coworkers, who last heard of my writing side-gig when I shared a comic book I’d drawn back in 2022.

( 7 Things I Learned While Writing Across Genres .)

“I thought you were the comic book guy...?” one coworker mumbled after the announcement. “Are you not doing any drawings anymore?”

She had a point: The jump from drawing 20-page junior educational comics to drafting a novel manuscript was like going from driver’s ed to jet fighting. Everything I knew about writing had to change if I didn’t want to crash and burn.

But that’s the boon of working at a library: There are endless ways to tell a story in our archives. A story that works in one medium might flop entirely in another. My second story idea is a queer romance about zombies, chronic disability, and empty towns, and I wanted to use the best medium possible for it—but how to narrow one down from a building full of them?

To start, I had to make a list of the pros and cons of our three major categories of fiction: Novels, Short Fiction, and Graphic Novels.

GRAPHIC NOVELS

The benefits of a comic are obvious: They’re BEAUTIFUL. 

Unlike a novel or a short story, which can take a while to build up interest or “get good,” a comic can catch a reader’s attention with a single panel. That isn’t to say they’re simpler than books—far from it. A good comic is a crafted miracle, balancing the impact and stunning color work of an artist with the gut-wrenching dialogue and unique settings of a writer. 

As a storytelling medium, they’re full of potential and criminally underrated.

The bad news is: Art takes an extremely long time . When I started my comic, I was baffled by all the things I’d never drawn before. Like a train. Or a shrimp. Or historical figure Chief Seattle. It isn’t the beautiful cover art that kills your wrist—it’s figuring out what shrimp look like. Which carries over to scripting as well; if it takes three days to draw a shrimp, it’s not practical to have a long story with complex scenes and a huge cast. Most comics have short, action-packed stories that can fit in a weekly magazine issue, with a single, distinct main character (like Batman or Monkey D. Luffy).

This was my first clue that my story idea wouldn’t work with the comic format I’d used last time. My comic was only 20 pages, with two main characters and simple backgrounds, but I’d still ended up cutting a lot of ideas to save the wrist pain. An older, bigger cast of characters in a grittier setting sounded exhausting—and, with The Walking Dead already in our comic collection, hard to sell.

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SHORT STORIES

A short story is a great way to experiment with a new idea. It has many of the benefits of comics—readable in an afternoon, fast-paced, can even be shared online—without needing me to draw any shrimp. 

It’s easy to get into for a new writer; art supplies are expensive and querying a novel is infamously hard; both options face a high risk of burn out part way through, leaving stories half-finished. Not to mention, our library already hosted several open mic nights and short story critique groups—if I wanted readers, they were never more than a meeting room away.

The biggest downside to a short story is obvious: It’s short. Like comics, short story formats struggle with complex world-building or large casts. Unlike a novel, which holds a reader for hours in the universe it’s created, a short story is a sample platter of ideas, prompting only a taste before making room for the next one in the collection. 

And if an author is unlucky enough to find their story printed next to a wildly different story or article, the whole collection can taste like a ham and strawberry and cigarette sandwich. Short stories have to be curated and paired with their neighbor stories for best impact.

While I loved the ease of a short story, my story idea didn’t seem like a good fit for it, either. A post-apocalyptic romance would need time to slow burn, and I wanted extra word count to really linger on the desolate setting. And as a mixed-genre story, I worried it might be too horror for our romance collections and too romantic for our horror collections, making it difficult to curate.

With a growing catalog of instructional writing videos available instantly, we have writing instruction on everything from improving your craft to getting published and finding an audience. New videos are added every month!

If I asked a patron what they consider to be a “real book,” most would point me to our novels. They’re classic, well-regarded story tools. They can be anywhere from a couple dozen pages to several hundred, they come in a variety of genres, and the number of guides our library has on how to craft one is staggering. 

And it’s easier than ever to make one, too—I could have a novel finished, post it on Amazon, and have 100 copies ordered without ever leaving my desk chair. By far, they’re the most varied and adaptable category. The only limit is writing one!

Writing one.

Writing an entire novel is harder than comics and short stories combined. It’s the most common category, with thousands added to the archive every year, which means it takes a lot for one novel to stand out on its own. But a novel has none of the artistic beauty or open mic nights of the other two to help it along. It takes hours of painstaking labor, and unlike drawing a shrimp or picking a short story anthology to apply to, there’s no reference images or past issues to check for if you’re doing it right. It’s a leap of faith in all ways.

And that’s the dark truth I realized: A novel wasn’t a good fit for my story, either. I didn’t have a celebrity background or connections to help market my novel. I wasn’t sure if I could pull off apocalyptic romance without comic panels, and I wasn’t sure if I could keep someone’s attention for more than a short story without burning myself out. I didn’t even have money to put up an advertisement about it.

The truth is, there’s no such thing as the “right” medium for a story. Every medium has its standard story types, and also has ones that go directly against the norm. Every one has benefits and drawbacks.

In the end, I went with a novel solely because I wanted to try something new, and it sounded fun. And that’s all we can do with the mediums we have available: Try something new, and have fun. 

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Tavi Gevinson’s Taylor Swift Fan Fiction Is Actually Genius

There are almost no firsthand accounts of what it’s like to be friends with Taylor Swift . It makes sense; she is the most famous person in the world, and who would want to jeopardize their relationship with her by revealing to the masses that she’s a real person? This is what makes Tavi Gevinson’s new zine, Fan Fiction , so fascinating. It’s 76 pages of reflections of her time both as a Swiftie and as Swift’s actual friend, though as the title suggests, it’s intentionally ambiguous how much of it is “real.”

Gevinson, a writer and actor who has previously written for the Cut , broke her zine into three parts. The first, “New Romantics,” is a bit of cultural criticism about Swift as a musician and an idol. The second, “Mirrorball” is more personal, a (perhaps slightly fictional?) account of Gevinson and Swift’s real-life friendship. The third, and the most fan-fic-y of the bunch, is called “Mine.” Gevinson publishes a long email exchange between her and Swift, which reads more like two sides of the author going back and forth.

Maybe your brain space is occupied with things that are useful, like math or the state capitals, and you didn’t remember that Gevinson and Swift were friends. Gevinson writes that they met when she was a teenager and Swift was 22 (Zooey Deschanel apparently facilitated the meeting) and started actually hanging out once both of them moved to New York. In between, Gevinson stayed at Swift’s Rhode Island home while visiting colleges. There are photos of the two of them paddleboarding, if you’re interested.

Around 2014, Gevinson was occasionally spotted with Swift in the city. They went out to lunch . She went to Swift’s birthday party . She went to the 1989 tour. She interviewed Swift for the cover of Elle . Gevinson rose to prominence as the creator and editor-in-chief of Rookie Mag, an online publication by and for girls, and real heads will remember that someone named Taylor makes an appearance in Gevinson’s “ Infinity Diaries” project , excerpts from her actual diaries from around this time.

In Fan Fiction , Gevinson recounts this time with precision and angst, wondering if one night in particular — spent alone with Swift in the singer’s apartment — was where it all fell apart.  The zine is heartbreaking, funny, and full of just enough details to make it kind of gossipy. It’s so open and honest that you kind of can’t believe it exists at all. Gevinson’s vulnerability is rare, but putting it in the context of her being friends with the most famous person in the world? Unheard of. As we come upon the release of The Tortured Poets Department , it’s a rich text for any Swiftie. I think anyone who self-describes as such has wondered, even briefly, what it would be like to be friends with Swift. Well, now we have a first-person account from someone who isn’t just going to say, “She made us cookies!”

The zine ends with a note: “This has been a work of satire by Tavi Gevinson.” How much is satire and how much is a vulnerable recollection of becoming friends with your favorite pop star is up to the reader. It’s probably Gevinson’s best work to date — and crucial reading for anyone who will be staying up to listen to The Tortured Poets Department tonight.

• taylor swift
• tavi gevinson

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Prolific bestseller Tracy Chevalier loves reading historical fiction as well as writing it

In her new novel, “ The Glassmaker ,” Tracy Chevalier follows the fates of a family of Murano glassblowers from the Renaissance until now as the island faces plague, invasion and, eventually, mega-tourism. Chevalier is the best-selling author of “ Girl With a Pearl Earring ,” which has been adapted into a film, a play, and an opera. Born in Washington, D.C., she lives in London with her husband.

BOOKS: What are you reading?

CHEVALIER: “ The Lover of No Fixed Abode ” by Carlo Fruttero and Franco Lucenti. It’s a poignant love story that is kind of strange. Mostly the novel has an incredible sense of what Venice is like. I’m just about to start Elif Shafak ’s new novel, “There Are Rivers in the Sky.” I’m going to Turkey for a yoga retreat and she’s Turkish, so that seemed perfect.

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BOOKS: Do you read more fiction or nonfiction?

CHEVALIER: I prefer fiction. I find it harder to get through nonfiction. Sometimes I get the point of a nonfiction book and then it goes on and on. I’ll start skimming. You can’t do that with a novel. You have to read the whole book to get it. Also, I use books to escape daily life and nonfiction doesn’t do that as well for me.

BOOKS: Have you always read for escape?

CHEVALIER: My mother got sick when I was 3 and died when I was 8. So, it was a tricky household for a while. I used books a lot to escape. I went to the public library after school. The children’s librarian there gave me recommendations and nudged me into reading books that were more challenging. It was a wonderful education in reading.

BOOKS: What was the first historical novel you read?

CHEVALIER: Rose Tremain’s “ Restoration ,” which is set in the 1660s when Charles II was restored to the throne. It has a wonderful central character who is a doctor who treats the king. It was funny and wore its history lightly. But I realize now that the Laura Ingalls Wilder’s “ Little House on the Prairie ” series I read as a child was historical fiction.

BOOKS: What was your last best read?

CHEVALIER: Two books. One was Hannah Pylväinen’s “ The End of Drum-Time ,” which was a finalist for the 2023 National Book Award. It’s set in the Arctic Circle, and is about a clash between the indigenous reindeer herders and the Swedish settlers. The other is Yael van der Wouden’s “ The Safekeep .” That has a strange heroine and takes a lot of twists. Oh, and two other historical novels, Daniel Mason’s “ North Woods ” and Lauren Groff’s “ The Vaster Wilds .” I’ve had a good run of reading.

BOOKS: Do you ever have bad runs?

CHEVALIER: I had one during the pandemic. Suddenly, everything I was reading didn’t make sense. I ended up reading two books written in the 1930s. One was Elizabeth von Arnim’s “ The Enchanted April ,” which is about four women renting an Italian villa for a month. It’s very gentle. I also read R.C. Sherriff’s “ A Fortnight in September .” It’s a novel about a family that goes on holiday to the same place each year. It takes about 100 pages for them to even get out of their house as they pack sandwiches for the train and take the canary to the neighbor’s. It sounds so boring but you get totally into it.

BOOKS: What are your reading habits?

CHEVALIER: I make a reading resolution every year. Once I resolved to read a book per month by a man because I was tending to read only women. Another year I decided to read mostly books that I owned rather than buy new ones. That didn’t last very long. One year I resolved to take one of my art books out each week, put it on the coffee table and look at it. That worked out pretty well.

BOOKS: Do you have a lot of books?

CHEVALIER: Yes, but every couple of weeks, I choose three to donate. I don’t do a lot all in one go because that would pain me so. Sometimes I like just seeing a book on the shelf. I just picked up “Backroads of Ohio.” There are such beautiful pictures in it. I can’t possibly give that away. It’s about nostalgia and comfort. My own history surrounds me by having all these books.

Follow us on Facebook or Twitter @GlobeBiblio. Amy Sutherland is the author, most recently, of “ Rescuing Penny Jane ” and she can be reached at [email protected] .