I had lunch today with the head of one of the Children's and YA publishers who told me what they're looking for and what they're buying.
It's almost all chick YA (emphasis on the love story here) and fantasy, but even the fantasy has to have a female lead character. She mentioned TWILIGHT over and over again - a vampire love story that's made the YA list for weeks.
But then she added that they've had their fill of vampire series right now.
They are looking for fairies. Barnes and Nobles has decreed that they are the next YA trend.
She thinks ghosts would work, as well as witches (good witches) and goths.
They love the high school setting, complete with the popular kids versus the nerds.
She also said she thinks it's time for a nerd girl series.
And I closed on another book deal that's been dragging on for three months!
4 comments:
Thanks for the tips. They look interesting enough to try. What word count parameters do you think would be in the realm for YA from unpublished authors?
It is really interesting to me how B/N has become such a big force in deciding what will be selling. I am curious how they go about deciding such things, i.e. is it what customers are asking for, wondering about, or is it more employee driven where they see a certain lack of titles in a certain area and push for getting those kinds of titles on the shelves. It would be interesting to see how that whole process is played out.
Not my genre at all, but this will help a few friends of mine I'm sure.
I'm getting ready to query agents for a 'coming of age' YA book set in the Caribbean, with of 'A World According to Garp' flghts of fantasy in it. But I'm waiting to hear back on another project first, lol. I think I'm too prolific.
I'm surprised at the fairies - unless it's the Queen Mabb sort of fairy kingdom. 'A Midsummer's Night Dream' sort of book would be fun to write.
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