Target Market For Narrative

This is a blog post, detailing a few of the areas I could choose to be my target market, for the eventual creation of my book.


Children's Book Market:
The children's book market, is a very niche market, aimed solely at children and parents, and these are the ones who mainly purchase in this genre of books. This market in itself is a very big, and exciting one.

Children's book publishing is a very rapidly growing frontier, and it has been growing substantially year on year, since 2009. This growth as of now, doesn't indicate any signs of slowing down, as the population only increases, and parents want the best for their children, as it's been proven that items, such as well developed books at a young age, aid in their development.

For publishers, it is a booming market, and is the most booming, out of all the book genres. It is a very desirable market, for not only a publisher to go into, but also for an illustrator to venture into. As you can see in this link below, to an online book store.

 http://www.whsmith.co.uk/dept/books/home?page=1&results=60&sort=asc_bestSellerRanking

The amount of children's books up for purchase, is almost numbering 46000 (including sub genres within). This is still very huge, and on this site, there are more children's books, than other genres such as crime, mystery, and even biographies. This most likely reflects the whole industry. This is the main reason, why I have chose, to research into this market the most.

It is a very promising entry market, for any kind of illustrator, especially in particular, a 'fresh out of university educated' illustrator.

Image taken myself, in a WHsmith outlet.

New Adult Fiction:

The new adult fiction market is a term that encompasses novels, involving characters who are in their late teens, to early 20s, usually with the theme of the characters exploring what it means to be adults, and revolving round the theme of growing up. 

The term 'new adult fiction' first appeared in 2009, with St. Martin’s Press, who "launched a contest calling for novel submissions that would appeal to 'new adult' readers in their early 20s." The contest excited authors and readers. Some well known authors who delve into elements of this genre include J.K. Rowling.

Here, I will quote a useful point in this article, which I will provide the link for below.

"a study released last year by Bowker revealed that an astounding 55 percent of the readers of books intended for ages 12–17 are actually over the age of 18".

Interestingly, companies such as Random House and Harper Collins, are players in this newer, emerging genre market, which seems to be one that is growing. In conclusion, this market definitely seems like an interesting sector, that is developing in narrative.

Ditto.

http://www.writersdigest.com/online-editor/new-adult-the-next-big-thing < reference for new adult fiction research at this link.

Poetry:

Poetry as a market is a very varied one. There is a market for both adult and children's poetry, and the latter can be seen in such books as Colin West's the big book of nonsense, and related themed works.




--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Update:
I have decided after my research in this blog, that I will go down the route of developing narrative toward the children's market. I have chosen this market, because of the popularity of this market, as well as the fact that it is a booming market. This sector is expected to grow for many years to come, and I wish to take advantage on this. In my opinion, it has never been so good, to be entering this sector. It looks very promising.







Thomas.