There are SO MANY things you can write for children! From board books to picture books, from chapter books, to middle grade and Young Adult books, there is so much opportunity! On today’s Writing Momentum podcast, Chris and Gena talk about the opportunities available to you…today!

LINKS:

• Children’s Book Mastery Summit https://writing.fyi/cbm
• Liz Wilcox's Email Marketing Membership at https://writing.fyi/liz
• Get your FREE Move the Needle goal-setting for authors ebook at https://www.writingmomentum.com
• Write with us! Join Chris, Gena, and Rene each Wednesday at noon Central and let's get our writing DONE! https://www.writingmoments.com

Hello and welcome to the Writing Momentum Podcast.

I'm Christopher Maselli and I'm here with my wife

Gena Maselli.

Hi, we're so glad you're here with us.

Today, we are talking about a topic that is pretty near and dear to our hearts.

And especially for Chris, and it is all the things you can write for children.

Yeah, you can write all kinds of things for children.

I'm amazed so many times when I talk to people who wanna write for children, and

the thought is, oh, I want to go ahead and I wanna write picture books, or I wanna

write the next Twilight YA series, right?

We tend to think of those two things as everything that you can write for

children, but the truth is there is a wide range of material that you

can write for children between and really around all of those age groups.

As well as there's, in each age group, there's fiction.

And nonfiction.

Absolutely.

I remember being a very young mom with very young kids.

And let me tell you, the one thing that was always in my diaper bag and Chris's

diaper bag, he was right there with me, was I had a slew of little board books.

So when we went out to restaurants I, boy, it was like a picnic that mom

opened up on the table for my kid.

For our kid to just, here's a board book, and they would, they started young,

so let's talk about those board books.

Yeah.

But board books are those small handheld books usually made of a thick

cardboard that kids like to gnaw on.

The newborns like to gnaw on them and that sort of thing is their

teeth come in and so that's how you could usually identify 'em because

they've got teeth marks in them.

But, someone had to write those, right?

And there's usually not a lot of words in those books.

This would be something that on a Microsoft Word document would be one page.

There might be so little.

In fact, there are some board books that have no writing in them at all.

They're all just pictures.

And so that, that's something else you can create is the concept of a book like

that and what would be included inside.

Do you think that, let me ask you on that kind of thing where

it's a very heavy concept book.

Do you believe that a writer would, that they would be the one to initiate

that, or do you think it would be more of an illustrator or an artist?

It can be either.

Because it depends if the writer has a certain amount of knowledge

about the way something works.

For instance, I'm thinking of, is it Tana?

What's her last name?

I wanna say Hoban.

Oh, I know.

But Tana, you'll see her books.

Her books are called Black and White.

She had done studies and knew that children saw black and white

before they actually saw color.

So she, her concept was, let's create a series of board books that

are black images on white paper and white images on black paper.

And that it was nothing but the concept, but she came up with that as the creator.

Now whether, I don't know whether she designed those herself or wrote them

or what, but that concept came to her as a creator and she carried it out.

Absolutely.

And like you said, most board books are fiction based.

They're creative, but some, not all of them.

There are non-fiction ones.

There's the colors or the numbers or the I don't know, like the trucks.

Actually, there's a lot of nonfiction when it comes to that.

So they're about learning.

So that's one type of book that we're talking about today.

What's another one, Chris?

Of course I mentioned picture books.

Picture books are very common.

They're usually 32 pages and it, they are what with picture books and

there's a wide range of those, right?

You've got Fiction stories.

You've got non-fiction stories.

Some of them have more writing in them than others.

I think everyone's pretty familiar with picture books.

Yeah, because that's what a lot of people look for.

If you go to the library, the great thing about picture books is that when you start

writing them, you really, you wanna read a lot of them, but what's great is that

they're so easy to read and so quick.

So you can go to your local library and you can read a hundred

picture books in a sitting, right?

And just get all that inside you and you start to see the commonalities.

When I was in school I went back to school to learn more about writing,

and I read literally thousands of picture books, in that experience.

And in doing that, it was really a way just to, it gets inside you and it's fun.

You can just go to the library and spend all day there.

You don't have to spend any money.

You can even go to Barnes and Noble and do it.

Well, and we do wanna say there are different styles.

And even within the fiction, you've got, you might have history, you

might have geography, you might have just different stories.

So you might have more of a fantasy style, or you might have

more of a historical fiction.

So there are different, even within the picture book market

there are some different genres or sub-genres within that.

And I'll tell you Chris, when we, when our kids were small, I fell in

love with a non-fiction picture books.

Because, and as Chris said, there are different, there's different amount of

words can be on the page that depends on who the market is, who the reader is.

If it's a picture book for a younger kindergarten age, that's

gonna be a certain, you're gonna be writing to that group.

And it's gonna be shorter sentences, it's gonna be simpler sentences, simpler words.

Versus writing for an upper elementary.

That's gonna be a little bit more.

But I'll tell you picture books, non-fiction picture books, the

ones that really fall into the STEM category and that science, technology,

engineering, and mathematics for stem, STEAM adds in art science, technology,

engineering, art, and mathematics.

Those traditional publishers are looking for those because why?

Who's wanting those?

Not only the parents, but also who, libraries, schools.

There's a big market for that.

And I think, this is such a wide open market because most of us, when we

think about writing picture books, we're thinking, or even children's

books, we're thinking we're coming at it from a creative standpoint and

we're thinking about fiction, right?

We're thinking of, oh, I want to tell this fantastic story and that's great,

but that is a much more competitive market than the nonfiction side of this.

So if you wanna write a science book, that has science principles in it

that's based on a true story or it's just about the principles, you're gonna

find a much wider open market for that than you would for the fiction side.

Yeah just because there's not, as, not as many people are writing that,

so there's not as much competition.

And if I could just, as a homeschool mom, throw a plug in there.

Those of you who have really interesting historical events or scientific things

that are within your areas, there's like just a wealth of information that you have

at your fingertips about local history, about local geology or local science

type situations that you've got going on.

When Chris and I were traveling the country with our kids several years

ago, it's been several, it's been five years ago that we were doing this.

We went around to 35 states in a year, and it was wonderful.

But we went to a lot of different things that were historical in nature

that were there, that maybe it had something with the Native American

population that those people stories that came from there, their history.

What other natural history did we have?

Bottom line, go to a museum.

Go to your local museum or other national park area.

Anything like that.

And you will find that so many of these exist.

Because they have a great story or series of stories behind them.

If you go to a museum based on the Civil War, you're gonna

have all kinds of stories.

And you can take those stories and you can turn them into children's books.

And again, this is now nonfiction, so you're not gonna have as much competition.

And you can create picture books from there.

You can create chapter books, middle grade books, YA books.

Those are some of the other ones we're gonna talk about here in a moment.

But any of those can be a great source of inspiration.

If you get stuck, just go to your local museum.

Now, Chris, what is a chapter book?

You talked about that, what is that?

Yeah, so a chapter book is the next step up from picture books.

So generally you've got your newborn books, which are board books.

Then you've got ages about two to, let's say six or so, which is your picture

books, and then ages about six to eight.

It's a small range, are generally your chapter books.

These are books like your Captain Underpants or your Boxcar children, right?

They've got short chapters.

There's usually maybe one subplot, if that, it's very straightforward.

But they're very fun to write because kids are starting to

see the depth in their books.

And and by the way, when I mention these different age groups, none

of those are hard rules, right?

I know there are kids who are eight years old who love picture books and

there are kids who are, six years old and they can read a middle grade book.

We've seen that happen all the time, but we still, we delineate

these on different age groups just to, just for clarification.

And it's important for you as the writer to be aware of what those are.

And to be aware that, especially if you're gonna be traditionally published

and really independently published too, you need to know, Chris and I have always

said, you need to know who your market is.

So if you were writing a picture book, You don't necessarily wanna

write it with words that would be on like an eighth or ninth grade level.

You wanna make sure that you're getting on the right level for the right market.

Who's the majority, not counting the outliers, but the majority

of who your readership is.

That's exactly right.

Tips like this can really help propel what you do when you get writing

for children, learning from others really makes a big difference.

That's why one of the things that we are excited to be a part of is

the Children's Book Mastery Summit that happens every single year.

If you go to writing.fyi/cbm, that's Children's Book Mastery writing.fyi/cbm.

You will find this wonderful summit that our friend Karen, I always

say Karen and it's Karen that she puts on and it's wonderful.

She gets together a whole bunch of writing professionals and publishing

professionals just to talk about children's books, and the best part of

it, is that as they're recorded each week, those sessions are completely free.

And that's going on this week as we release this podcast.

If you're interested in watching those messages and you're listening to this

in real time, go to writing.fyi/cbm and you can become part of the

Children's Book Mastery Summit.

I talk about children's book blunders in that summit this year, and you talk about?

I'm talking about literary techniques that you can include

in your children's writing.

That can really elevate that writing to bring your word pictures alive.

And in addition to us, there's at least a dozen other speakers.

Over 25.

Again, it's completely free.

You're welcome to enjoy it.

But if you'd like the videos, to save and watch later.

Or if you're listening to this at a later date and you'd still like to be a part of

what's going on with the Children's Book Mastery Summit, then just go ahead and go

to writing.fyi/cbm and you can actually still go ahead and get those videos.

There's a small cost associated with it cuz they're having

to host those on the servers.

But it's very affordable.

And I do wanna point out also that the Children's Book Mastery

Summit is an international event.

That's right.

This is not just what's happening in America.

This is an international book event from people speaking

into it from around the world.

So it's a beautiful opportunity, so please don't miss it.

Yeah.

And then if you're looking at some of these areas that we're talking about,

board books, picture books, chapter books, you'll find there are sessions dedicated

just to those kinds of books there.

So the next kind of books that we want to talk about are after chapter

books are middle grade books.

This is my sweet spot.

Yes, this is what I wrote to for years.

And then still love writing to it's ages eight to 12.

And these are kids who, where you can use multiple subplots, so you can really

start to do a full on just regular book the way you think about regular books.

It's really more just the subjects that you're taming back a little bit.

That you may not cover certain things that you would otherwise like in YA books.

Right.

Definitely.

I think it's, I think they're really fun because they're at that age

where they're a very quick read.

They're still easy for parents to read to their kids.

You do that chapter a night kind of thing.

But it's a little bit deeper than it's definitely deeper than

just a 32 page picture book.

So it's got a deeper story, a more intricate story with greater characters.

And again, you can just really use that to just get kids interested

in reading for themselves and they don't have pictures in 'em.

I think that's one of the bigger things that you start to see.

Even with chapter books, there's usually a small illustration at the

beginning or throughout the book.

When you're getting into these middle grade books, these really

are full novels without pictures, but that can be just this beautiful

transition time for your reader.

Yes.

And then finally, there are young adult books.

These are the books like the Twilights that, that so many

people are familiar with.

And they are just they're an interesting bridge between children's

books and books for adults.

Because a lot of times kids, once they read age, 13, 14 year old, a lot of times

they go straight to books for adults.

And so what keeps kids in the YA genre is generally the the type of book it is.

And that is usually it's fantasy, science fiction or it deals with things in high

school the, those kind of subjects.

So it's really the subject matter that makes it a YA book.

More than maybe even a lot of the writing itself, and the

main characters is being kids.

There's definitely a crossover here because I would think Hunger Games.

Yeah.

Hunger Games like that.

And what's the other one I'm thinking of this, some of the dystopian.

The divergence.

Divergent, yeah.

Those were books.

Even Harry Potter.

And Harry Potter was really considered, I think a middle grade when it began.

But it grew with a character.

As Harry grew, so did the so did the books.

But how many of us as adults really enjoyed those books?

So even Tolkien's books I think would be considered YA books.

So yeah, these are books that really can crossover.

There are a lot of subgenres.

Now, Chris and I can't go into all the subgenres here.

But there are subgenres within the YA books.

Chris said, there's fantasy, there's the dystopian, there's science

fiction, there's just all sorts of different books and genres there.

But even within that, there are those books that are classified as clean.

Yes.

And some of the publishers, the traditional publishers

are putting these out.

There are books that are within more of the Christian inspirational.

So there are different subgenres to this as well that we just encourage

you to check out and see what books are showing up in those different subgenres.

But here's the thing, it's not just about board books, picture books,

chapter books, middle grade YA books.

There are also all the other things that you can write for all of those age

groups that make all the things that you can write for children possible.

For instance, you can write magazine articles.

People all the time, they never think about magazine articles.

And yet, do you know if you write a magazine article in the

children's magazine, chances are, more kids will see it than we'll

actually see a book that you write.

Because they have very large subscription bases.

So if their subscription base goes out to 120,000 kids around the world.

That's probably more books than you would sell.

So it's amazing.

You can also do activity books.

You can do devotionals and Bibles, you could do graphic novels.

I've written graphic novels and I've written comics.

And I don't illustrate at all, but I know how to write those kinds of things

so that illustrators can then turn them into actual comics and graphic novels.

And those are the kind of things when we talk about writing for

children if you see something written for children, the back of a cereal

box, someone had to write that.

Yeah, I think that's the thing that really can just make people, wake

them up to how big this market is.

That it is not just, I'm gonna write a picture book or it's not

just, I'm gonna write a YA novel.

It really is.

There is so much that you can write for this.

And when Chris is even talking about activity books, I mean that encompasses

not only, puzzles, but also trivia.

Any type of trivia thing.

You've done some really fun like code breaker type work.

Yes.

A lot of code breaking.

You've had the short mysteries, that are like the short stories.

The solve it yourself mysteries and short stories.

Kind of the encyclopedia brown kind of thing.

Yeah, there's just so much opportunity.

So if you have a heart and a desire to write for children,

there is so much out there.

We just encourage you to go to your local library and just take an

afternoon and just start looking around.

There is so much there and so that you don't just limit yourself.

And I would even say also, if you are a children's book writer,

that you are writing maybe fiction and you have a desire to write

a middle grade fiction book.

That's great.

But you know what?

There are some complimentary products that you might be able to write around

that so that book is not standalone, but maybe you do come out with an activity

book to support it, or maybe you do come out with a trivia book or some kind

of nonfiction offshoot, and before you know it, you can create yourself a line

instead of just that standalone book.

A hundred percent.

Hey, if you've been writing for children, we'd love to hear what you have written.

Go ahead and let us know.

And if you have an opportunity to attend the Children's Book Mastery

Summer we'd love to see you there.

We've got sessions on there.

And again, that's at writing.fyi/cbm for Children's Book Mastery writing.fyi/cbm.

Meanwhile, if you know someone else who enjoys writing or writing for children and

you think this podcast would help them, please go ahead and share it with them.

That's the best way to get the news out.

And then also, if you can leave a review, it means so much to us when

people leave reviews and just let us know that they enjoy these episodes.

But yeah, we never do this alone.

We're not writing in a box, even though sometimes it seems as writers like

we do, it's not a solitary activity.

It's something that we do together.

That's why we say that, together we

have writing momentum.