A glance at the most salient features of MG fiction

“Middle grade” is an age category, not a genre. This is fiction for earlier-than-pre-teen and pre-teens, from about ages 8 to 12.

The category encompasses most of the usual genres — mystery/detective, action and adventure, thriller, horror, sci-fi, fantasy, historical — with the story, details, and tone appropriate for the age group. If romance, for example, the story is limited to the budding interest typical of the older kids in this range (in stories for those older kids), where the two are primarily friends.

The focus for you as a reviewer is on all those things you’d consider for any novel — is the story compelling, is it developed well, does it follow genre conventions — but through the lens of that age group. Most particularly, also, keeping an eye on age-appropriateness.

It’s helpful to contrast fiction written for the middle-grade reader with fiction written for young adults, ages 12 to 18. The distinctions between the two categories can help to sharpen the characteristics and boundaries of each.

summary of characteristics

• For ages 8 to 12

  • Young middle-grade fiction: 8–10

  • Late middle-grade fiction: 11–13

• Word count

  • Young/early/lower middle grade: 15,000–25,000

  • Middle grade: 25,000–45,000

  • Late/upper middle grade: 45,000–65,000

  • Middle-grade fantasy: 65,000–85,000

• POV: typically third person

• Main characters are typically between the ages of 9 and 13 (depending on whether this is young or late middle grade) with the majority of the other characters in that age range as well

• Nearly any genre can be tailored to this age: mystery/detective, action and adventure, thriller, horror, sci-fi, fantasy, historical. Romance is appropriate only for late middle grade, with a light treatment, possibly a first kiss

• Strong content restrictions:

  • No profanity

  • No graphic violence

  • Romance is tentative, centering on crushes and first kisses

  • Stories can be dark or scary, but the treatment must be age-appropriate

• Early middle grade

  • Themes: friendship, family, humor

  • Lighthearted stories

  • Tougher themes handled with care: it’s all about interpretation, perspective, tone

  • Juvenile humor often helps pull readers in

• Late middle grade

  • Themes: more definition of self apart from family; first crush and budding romance; belonging and fitting in

  • Stories that begin to look at the new world opening up for these readers: contemporary middle-grade fiction is becoming more complex, taking on darker, more serious, and more complicated themes — but the books typically do so in a well-rounded, approachable way

  • Where there’s humor, it will typically be more nuanced and sophisticated

• Tone: can be ironic, but ought never to become cynical; somber, but not bleak

• Middle-grade voice: difficult to define, easy to recognize (if you’re a middle-grade librarian or editor, you know it)

  • Doesn’t talk down to readers, but engages them where they are in this moment in their lives

  • Isn’t too mature

  • Isn’t too flat

  • Should have some compelling quality that keeps readers reading

• In contrast to YA, the middle-grade characters’ world is smaller: home, neighborhood, school; friends and family

• The challenges these characters face come from within their immediate world of friends and family, and they tend not to face those challenges alone

• In contrast to YA, stories tend to be more external than internal, more focused on what the characters perceive: the main characters do not engage much in self-reflection, but must address real-life situations

• Any internal conflicts there are reflect what the readers in this age group are grappling with: navigating the deepening terrain of friendship and potentially shifting loyalties, addressing the small acts of injustice in their lives, sticking up for friends, dealing with bullies

• The story must not talk down to readers