How to Know If Your Book Is Middle Grade or Young Adult

I see a lot of confusion over middle grade and young adult books. I see this from authors and readers. And I also see it in book reviews, especially when a reviewer will slam a book for not getting deep enough into the characters emotions or for dealing with mature subject matters. But here’s the thing, most of the time, those complains are because the reader doesn’t understand which genre he or she is reading.

First of all, there are usually three age groups of books for middle grade and young adult. There are the middle grade 8-12, the YA 14 and up, and the middle grade/YA crossover books 12-16. Confusing, I know. But knowing who your own target audience is, and knowing which publishers are publishing the type of book you are writing will make your life easier.

Kids like to read about characters that are older than they are. So, if your main character is 14, you’re likely writing a middle grade book. If your main character is 18, you’re likely writing YA. Don’t write a YA book with a twelve-year-old protagonist, unless it’s a coming-of-age story and the bulk of the book’s content fits YA better that middle grade.

Keep in mind that the conflicts that your characters are dealing with should fit the interests and conflicts that your target readers have. A ten-year-old reader isn’t concerned with romance, so putting romance into a middle grade book for 8-12 year old readers is a mistake. But a sixteen-year-old reader is interested in romance, so romance is often included in YA books.

Middle Grade
These are books written for readers from ages 8-12. These books tend to focus more on plot than characters. That’s not to say that middle grade books have bland characters. They just don’t tend to go as deep into the characters’ points of views. These types of stories are often about the adventure and fun.

Eight to twelve year old kids don’t tend to buy their own books. Yes, there are always exceptions to this rule, but mostly, for this age group, parents are buying the books or the kids are getting them from a school or library, which means a teacher or librarian is buying the books. This means that these books are being examined by adults before they get into the hands of the kid reader.

Middle grade books are also edited for content by the publishing house. These editors know that parents, teachers, and librarians are going to be checking these books over. Romance, drugs, graphic violence, swearing … these things don’t usually fly in a middle grade book.

Young Adult
These are books written for ages 12 and up. YA books tend to focus more on the characters and their problems. They tend to have deeper points of view and be more emotional. The plot is important, but often not as important as the drama. Teens tend to buy their own books, and often, adults no longer pay attention to what teens are reading.

YA books are sometimes edited for content, but you can get away with a lot grittier things. For those of you who read Captives, my editors really helped me with the content in that book. And Captives is a 14 and up book. Replication is a 12-16 book. There is some romance and violence in it, but it’s not graphic enough to need a 14 and up rating from the publisher. Every publishing house is different, of course. There are some YA publishers who will let anything slide. *shudders*

So what do you have?
Ask yourself: How old is my protagonist? What is my plot about? If I have more mature issues, how mature? Stories that involve sex, drugs, extreme violence, and language will put your book into the 14 and up YA category. But if you have only a little of one of those mature topics and it’s a subplot and handled tastefully, you might be able to fit into the 12-16 YA category. Really, it’s all about finding the right publisher for your story. Studying books similar to yours will help you figure that out.

Don’t think that middle grade books can’t be cool. They can. And teens who are sixteen will read them. So will adults. And they can have have a little romance, just not emotional romance. The Percy Jackson books are all middle grade. The romance in those books was tame enough that the series never crossed over into young adult. If you have soap opera-type drama in your book, it’s probably YA. The Harry Potter books changed as Harry got older. The first three books were middle grade. The last four were YA because of Harry’s age and the more emotional plot lines.

Do you know if your book is middle grade or YA? Do you know your target age group?