US Children's Book News

New Trends in YA:
The Agents' Perspective
A decade into the boom in YA literature, agents' in-boxes are as full of manuscripts-in-want-of-a-publisher as they ever have been. Josh Adams estimates Adams Literary gets 10,000 submissions a year, a slight majority of which are YA. Same with Laura Rennert of the Andrea Brown Agency: "I'm still getting an enormous volume of manuscripts, partly because it's an amazing time to be writing YA." But the ground beneath their feet is shifting a bit. Certain YA trends – paranormal love triangles, apocalyptic aftermaths – have become played out; what was once a fledgling segment of the market, kids 12 and up, has matured into a vital category. more

Kids' Books and Authors
Front and Center at NAIBA
Rock stars don't usually show up at book conferences in industrial parks in the middle of New Jersey, but it sure felt like one did when Judy Blume walked into the awards banquet at last week's New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association fall conference. Blume stopped the show before she even came to the podium to receive both the NAIBA Legacy and Carla Cohen Free Speech Awards, by getting up to hug Children's Book of the Year winner Tom Angleberger after his speech. It's "a real honor to receive the award, an even bigger honor when Judy Blume is in the room," he said. more

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