There’s a lot of confusion out there about the difference between middle grade and young adult books. I see it all the time in queries. Even bookstores sometimes aren’t sure where to shelve titles. This is, of course, because there didn’t used to be so many children’s books in the world, and no real use for so many distinctions. These days, middle grade titles are often in the section of the bookstore labeled something like “young readers” while the young adult books are usually called “teen readers.”
Traditionally, middle grade books are books for children aged 8-12. (It may be helpful to think of middle school when you think middle grade, though that is not a perfect analogy.) While young adult titles are for readers 12+. So it is important for authors to know who their audience is when trying to decide if a book is middle grade or young adult.
Some points to consider if you’re unsure:
Typically, the main character in a work of middle grade fiction is between the ages of 8 and 12, reflecting the readership. Though this is a good rule of thumb, it’s not always the case. Some middle grade books are about animals who can’t be fit into our human age categories, like The One and Only Ivan, and even though the Harry Potter books were shelved as middle grade in my bookstore, Harry was a teen by the end of them. Complicating matters, kids often want to read up. Twelve-year-old kids don’t always want to read about themselves, they’d rather read about kids who are 14 or 16 so they can feel more adult. The intended audience is still the best measure in all these situations.
The themes of middle grade are often quite different from young adult. Middle grade books usually deal with discovering the world–whether that be finding a portal to a magical realm or learning that adults aren’t always right. At that age, there are a lot of revelations about life.
Young adult books, on the other hand, more often wrestle with a character’s place in the world. It’s more about them as an individual making choices about who they want to be (that often includes choosing romantic partners).
But with so many young adult books on the market today, it is difficult to make generalizations as to what a typical young adult book is about. So again, we come back to the notion that the best measure for whether your book is YA or MG is your intended audience. Before sending your query you should really think about what kind of readers will most enjoy your work, and what other books you could see it sitting next to in the bookstore.
