First off, Agent Tips: From Querying to Accepting an Offer is now up on the blog. Check it out! I plan on doing more "Tips" articles like these from time to time. If you have any suggestions, let me know.
Second, congratultions to Ed Young and Barbara DaCosta--Nighttime Ninja (Little, Brown, 2012) won The Children's Choice Book Award for
Kindergarten to Second Grade Book of the Year!!Here's a list of winners: http://www.cbcbooks.org/sub-news.php?id=1005#.UZJWn76045x.twitter
Ed accepting the award: http://instagram.com/p/ZRUlw3RvrQ/#
Lastly, I had answered one of the questions from my first post, but thought I'd showcase it here for those who are interested:
Hi everyone! Thanks for your questions. I'm seeing many of you are asking about MG and the difference between it and YA-both tone-wise and theme-wise.
Think of YA as a PG-13 movie and MG as a PG movie. For middle-grade there's rarely any swearing, if so it's very minimal, no sex, minimal violence (of course there will be action scenes and people can die, but there wouldn't be any graphic description of the violence or blood/gore). There is darker MG, but it'd perhaps be more creepy or eerie than terrifying/distrubing. MG is generally age 8-11, so these are young children.
To answer GKByrne, 13-15 is in the YA age range. I wouldn't consider that MG, although something for 12-13 is on the cusp so that could have cross-over appeal. Middle grade romance is usually more "puppy love"--they sit together at lunch or hold hands once, maybe a kiss on the cheek, but it's generally very "tame."
