Читать книгу Writing Children's Books For Dummies - Peter Economy - Страница 21

You can group children’s books into two overarching categories:

 Fiction: Made-up stories; a big plate onto which other derivative (and delicious!) morsels may fall

 Nonfiction: Writing based on real facts, people, places, or events

Within those categories, you can also divide children’s books into formats based on the various ages the books serve, as well as the book’s size, shape, and content. Some examples of formats include picture books, board books, chapter books, and young adult (YA) books.

Formats help publishers group their titles by age appropriateness (meaning where children are developmentally), physical characteristics, or both. These groupings, in turn, help children’s book readers know what type of books will appeal to children in particular age ranges, or with certain interests or goals.

Always refer to your work’s title and the format together — in the same sentence — when talking to agents and publishers. Say something such as, “Alphababies is a 300-word board book that uses photographs of babies to teach the alphabet to toddlers.” With that information, the person reviewing your work can immediately identify the format into which your book falls.

Many writers can’t figure out their format until they actually write their story down. But other writers find it helpful to know the parameters of the various formats ahead of time. Those constraints help them make decisions along the way about plot complexity, word count, vocabulary level, and other elements that go into defining a format. Just because you know about formats doesn’t mean you have to choose one before you start writing your book. You also can’t squeeze just any story into any format.

Note: Publishers often release downloadable digital copies and e-book versions simultaneously with the print versions across many children’s book formats. This is so consumers have many choices in how they read the book.