[walton-burns Posts: 3 Status: Offline I love kids' books!]

I'm working on a mystery novel for kids and having a really hard time targeting it.  I know my style is not terribly gritty and I've done some mystery puzzle activities for students that seem to be popular among 7th/8th graders. So I was thinking of targeting MG and have thoughts about a book written around a school. I've read plenty of advice suggesting mysteries for MGs shouldn't  be about murder, but when I read other MG books, certainly kids detectives are sometimes kidnapped and implicitly threatened with death, jewel thieves, kidnappers, gangsters, pickpockets, do appear in these books.  Kids even beat up bad guys occasionally.  So any advice on targeting a particular audience, or maybe the inverse, figuring out what audience your writing is good for?

[AnneB Posts: 3,753 Status: Offline]

I suggest chatting up children's librarians at a few different central libraries/branches and read what mysteries are popular with their patrons. What kids like/can handle seems a lot darker than what gatekeepers sometimes think they're ready for! There are some librarian blogs out there that might be useful. The one I'm familiar with is  https://msyinglingreads.blogspot.com/ -- she does a great job of pointing out strengths and weaknesses in the books she reviews (often with the caveat that while kids in her school don't like that kind of book/books by that author, kids in other schools/demographics might).

[mrh Posts: 4,759 Status: Offline www.marciahoehne.com WWW]

I think the murder barrier has been broken for this age group. Try the Murder Most Unladylike series and the Myrtle Hardcastle books. Wells and Wong, too, I think. There’s usually some feature that softens the murder aspect, like humor or a precocious or tongue-in-cheek voice.

[Debbie Vilardi Posts: 7,004 Status: Offline Language is so cool! WWW]

There aren't many taboos left in middle grade. But just because things happen doesn't mean they are shown happening. There is no graphic violence or gore in middle grade. A lot of really bad stuff happens off page. Think about the scenes in which Luke Skywalker finds out his family is gone. This has almost no emotional impact in the movie. It's also middle grade. It's all in how you handle things.

That said, if you feel you'd like to keep it cleaner, you can. If your main character is 8 or 9, you may be writing a chapter book.  If they are 11, it could be young middle grade. Write th book and see what it needs/ wants to be. Anything can be fixed in revision.

[walton-burns Posts: 3 Status: Offline I love kids' books!]

Thanks everyone. Some good advice here! I definitely need to do some more reading. I'm so used to writing for educational publishers where you can't even have a character eat an unhealthy snack!

[martin-porter Posts: 4 Status: Offline I love kids' books!]

I have just written a MG mystery with teen protagonists. I have definitely added elements where the bad guys have got guns, and there is the threat of menace, but I've kept it so the threat is there but we certainly don't see any actual physical violence or death. That said, death didn't fit this particular story, but I would have no qualms about including murder in future MG, just not perhaps shown or written about in any great detail.

My work is not yet published so also keen to hear if there are any guidelines and whether I need to edit out those themes

[Debbie Vilardi Posts: 7,004 Status: Offline Language is so cool! WWW]

A lot of material for ages 9-12 contains threats of violence. But in the modern era, there is more concern about guns in the hands of kids because of the spate of school shootings. Think carefully about how you handle it and the effects of facing down a gun on a young teen. Be real with it, unless it's a fantasy world. Then, fit the world. If it happens and has no emotional impact, that could be a problem unless your characters are often around guns. Some kids are. But it's all in how you do it and what you've established as normal for them.

[walton-burns Posts: 3 Status: Offline I love kids' books!]

That said, if you feel you'd like to keep it cleaner, you can. If your main character is 8 or 9, you may be writing a chapter book.  If they are 11, it could be young middle grade. Write th book and see what it needs/ wants to be. Anything can be fixed in revision.

That's what I'm thinking. I'll write the book I want to write and then see what an editor or, dream of dreams, an agent says about leveling it up or down!

[Debbie Vilardi Posts: 7,004 Status: Offline Language is so cool! WWW]

That's what I'm thinking. I'll write the book I want to write and then see what an editor or, dream of dreams, an agent says about leveling it up or down!

Start with a critique group or post on the Blueboard for critique. You can also find critique partners through most SCBWI chapters or by posting here: https://www.scbwi.org/boards/index.php?board=127.0