All Things Middle Grade

MsJudy

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No experience with self-pubbing. Sorry. I have smaller presses with everything. I'm really happy where I'm at & am no longer pursuing the agent route. You guys are mistaking me for someone with any wisdom. I obviously need to hang our here more.

Don't be so modest! Your experience would be great to share. A lot of folks who try the agent route and don't make much progress jump right to self-pubbing, not realizing there are small-press alternatives that would provide them with some professional support. If you're happy with what you're doing, I'm sure they would love to hear about it.
 

Britwriter

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I'm excited that I made some progress with my MG rewrite this week. I now have about 56 versions of this book, but this week seemed to find the voice for a boy MC.

It's necessitating a lot of changes, but so far, I think it's working. There's a long way to go, but I'm excited to be making some progress.

It's fascinating how many expressions a girl can use, but when they are in the mouth of a boy, they just don't work. And the word count is going down, down, down.

Eg:

Girl: This is so utterly mortifying! How could this happen to me? What did I do to deserve this sort of humiliation?

Boy version (in exact same situation): Bummer.

See what I mean? I just cut 20 words. :)
 

Amarie

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I'm excited that I made some progress with my MG rewrite this week. I now have about 56 versions of this book, but this week seemed to find the voice for a boy MC.

Eg:

Girl: This is so utterly mortifying! How could this happen to me? What did I do to deserve this sort of humiliation?

Boy version (in exact same situation): Bummer.

See what I mean? I just cut 20 words. :)

:ROFL:

If you added in stomping around and door slamming, you might be able to get some words back. Physical reactions instead of lots of words are pretty typical of some boys, plus you know there is internal dialogue/thoughts happening.
 

sissybaby

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Hi, all,

I just wanted to pop in and say that I am featuring our very own Sage on my blog today. Her YA book, Love Sucks, comes out today. I know this isn't the YA forum, but she spends lots of time over here, too.

Thanks. And if I'm not supposed to do this here, I hope a mod will tell me and delete this post. I'm truly not trying to overstep boundaries.

http://cordeliadinsmore.blogspot.com/2012/04/author-sage-collins-love-sucks.html
 

Smish

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It's fine, sissy! You and Sage are both beloved kidlit gang members. :Thumbs:
 

Britwriter

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:ROFL:

If you added in stomping around and door slamming, you might be able to get some words back. Physical reactions instead of lots of words are pretty typical of some boys, plus you know there is internal dialogue/thoughts happening.

Yep, it's going to take some rewriting. Some sentences of dialogue just make me die. I can totally hear any of my daughters saying those words. My son? No way. It just makes me laugh trying to imagine those words in his voice. My son gives attitude in a totally different way. There's going to be more action, less dialogue in this rewrite, for sure. And less words. The way I'm going, 60,000 will soon be 10,000.
 

sissybaby

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Hey, Britwriter, I didn't mean to sabotage your post. Actually, I really like the boy version. It says so much, and is yet so concise.
 

Britwriter

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Yeah, I could write this book in about 50 words.

Epic
Bummer
Cool
Awesome
Dude
Man
Jeez
Rad
and so on.
Job done. :)
 

CheG

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My novel development plan has hit a snag! I realized I have NO PLOT! I read ahead in the development plan thinking there would be a day when I came up with one, or something that would spark one and there isn't!!

Arg!! This makes two MG fails in a month! One has a plot and no characters! The other characters and no plot!
 

Smish

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Just keep writing CheG. You can fix those issues when you start revising.
 

Britwriter

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My novel development plan has hit a snag! I realized I have NO PLOT! I read ahead in the development plan thinking there would be a day when I came up with one, or something that would spark one and there isn't!!

Arg!! This makes two MG fails in a month! One has a plot and no characters! The other characters and no plot!

Can they become one story?
 

MsJudy

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I do know that feeling. Actually, I'm in sort of the same place with one book--the agents loved the characters, world and voice. So now all I need is to come up with a new plot... Easier said than done!

But don't give up too quickly on it. Sometimes you just have to write some scenes and see where they lead you. Planning ahead is all well and good, but most of the really good stuff happens when you let go of the control and let the subconscious simmer for a while.

Play with the parts you do know, and maybe something will happen.
 

JKRowley

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I am surprised at what I hear here. I thought Middle Grade was 20,000-25,000 words.

I know MY middle grade kid does not like long books.
 

Britwriter

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I am surprised at what I hear here. I thought Middle Grade was 20,000-25,000 words.

I know MY middle grade kid does not like long books.

Middle grade covers a wide range. My current MG is at 60,000 words (girl version) but will be more like 50,000 (boy version.) But it is upper MG.

I"m sure someone will post some links to lengths for MG, but I always go by the principle of using how many words it takes to tell my story.

An 11 yo girl middle grader (generalizing here, btw) is not likely to be interested in a book of 20,000 words, unless it has something pretty unique that adds depth and interest to the story. An 8 yo boy, on the other hand, may be turned off by a book of 50,000 words with no illustrations or breaking up of text. Generalizing, but it is a wide range of kids, kwim?
 

MsJudy

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Actually, 20-25K is harder to get published than 30K+. The trend since Harry Potter has been towards longer books, and more of a clear separation between middle grade novels and chapter books, which are usually under 10K. Part of the reason is that chapter books and early/shorter MG books are a phase kids grow out of. One year, two, maybe three at the most, and then they're ready for longer, more meaty books. So from a money-making standpoint, there's more profit to be had from the books for older readers, when you have a longer window of time to catch them and keep them coming back for more.

Of course, there are always exceptions to the rule. And contemporary/literary tends to be much shorter than fantasy. As Britwriter says, all you need is the number of words necessary to tell your story, and not one more.
 

JKRowley

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Actually, 20-25K is harder to get published than 30K+. The trend since Harry Potter has been towards longer books, and more of a clear separation between middle grade novels and chapter books, which are usually under 10K. Part of the reason is that chapter books and early/shorter MG books are a phase kids grow out of. One year, two, maybe three at the most, and then they're ready for longer, more meaty books. So from a money-making standpoint, there's more profit to be had from the books for older readers, when you have a longer window of time to catch them and keep them coming back for more.

Of course, there are always exceptions to the rule. And contemporary/literary tends to be much shorter than fantasy. As Britwriter says, all you need is the number of words necessary to tell your story, and not one more.

That makes sense.
 

Britwriter

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I'm wondering if anyone has any interesting systems or methods for tracking their plot and character development for longer MG books.

I'm almost done with the rewrite of my MG. With the original, as I edited, I kept a huge chart on which I wrote plot chapter by chapter, color coding characters and key facts, so that I could keep track. I used colors and symbols to show where each character was mentioned and how relationships and misunderstandings developed.

Now that I'm about to start proofreading and doing final edits on the rewrite, I'm wondering if there are other ways people use to do this sort of tracking. I've moved text around, changed some characters, made some girls into boys, and boys into girls, etc. I need some sort of spreadsheet to track the plot and make sure it hasn't developed holes that I'm not noticing.

I can get out the magic markers and poster paper again, but was curious to know if anyone here had other systems that work for them? Or do you manage to hold it all in your head without a checking system?
 

MsJudy

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I haven't used any system, but I also haven't yet gotten my plots to hold together. So... maybe I should...?

This time when I revise, I'm going to try making a storyboard, following Blake Snyder's Save the Cat/beat sheet method. It's the first outlining method that has made sense to me, because it tracks the story according to certain high and low points in the emotional arc.

I recommend the book highly. Though we shall see if it works for me, or not.
 

Britwriter

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Oh, I've had Save the Cat on my amazon wishlist for a while. I will move it into my basket now. :)

Visual works for me, so I'm not sure that there is a better method for me than my big paper, colored markers, all over the living room floor system. But in these times of computers, maybe there is something better out there....

Two more chapters to rewrite, then unless I find an alternative, out come the marker pens. :)
 

Smish

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What's the basic idea of the beat sheet, Judy? I'm not sure I get what that is. :)

Plotting is definitely my weakest area, too. I'm treating myself to a writing retreat this month and I've been thinking about the novel I'm going to work on. The characters are there. The setting is there. The plot? Not so much... :rolleyes:
 

monkeymum

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I'm wondering if anyone has any interesting systems or methods for tracking their plot and character development for longer MG books.

I was thinking about having a go with some kind of mind-mapping software (I'm sure there are some free downloads). I half-heartedly used Excel last time, but I don't think it helped the creative juices flow.
 

SheilaJG

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What's the basic idea of the beat sheet, Judy? I'm not sure I get what that is. :)

Plotting is definitely my weakest area, too. I'm treating myself to a writing retreat this month and I've been thinking about the novel I'm going to work on. The characters are there. The setting is there. The plot? Not so much... :rolleyes:

I'm glad Judy mentioned this book. The author has passed away, but he has a website that explains it a bit. The book really goes into more detail, but here's an example of someone dissecting the Hunger Games into his "beats" (the numbers in parenthesis correspond to the page number in the script where the important event happens) - http://www.blakesnyder.com/2012/04/27/the-hunger-games-bookmovie-beat-sheet-comparison/