I’ll cut to the chase: I wrote a science book aimed at children. I spent a year trying to find an agent. I didn’t get an agent. I self published the book on Amazon because I believe that there is a market for science fiction books aimed at middle grade readers. Now let’s see how the story ends.

It began with a desire to write the kind of books that ten-year-old me would have enjoyed. There are lots of children who like science fiction. Maybe they aren’t into reading books — yet. But then perhaps there just aren’t that many science fiction books out there? And the ones that are, are hoovered up by keen enquiring young minds. (See this article in Publishers’ Weekly regarding the reading habits of middle grade readers, based on research of US libraries: https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/columns-and-blogs/soapbox/article/89175-sci-fi-for-kids-is-a-missed-publishing-opportunity.html)

In my quest to find representation, one agent whom I was lucky enough to meet in person told me that, generally, editors at publishing houses are quite snobby about science fiction. Those were her words. She said they didn’t grow up with it, and so tend to look upon it as something not ‘worthy’ for children. In other words, she warned me it was running against the tide.

Her advice was to wait until a celebrity writes a successful science fiction book to make it popular — and then it will be easier 🙂 So thank you David Walliams for Astrochimp! Come on … errrr Ed Sheeran! It’s got to be his turn next to write a book, surely!