How to Write a Children's Book: A Step-by-Step Guide

To write a children's book, first choose the age band you're writing for, because that decides your word count, vocabulary and format. Then draft a short, focused story, read it aloud until the rhythm is right, plan where the page turns fall, and line up illustrations from an illustrator or a separate art tool before you lay out and publish. The steps below take you through each stage in order.

What you need before you start

You don't need much to begin, but a few things make the work easier:

• Some current children's books in your chosen age band. Get a stack from the library, ideally ones published in the last few years, so you can see what length and style look like now.
• A way to read aloud and record yourself. A phone voice memo is enough.
• A plan for illustrations. Picture books and early readers need art. You will either hire an illustrator, draw it yourself, or use a separate image tool. Writing software alone won't produce it.
• A rough idea of how you'll publish. Self-publishing and traditional publishing ask for different things from you, and Step 8 covers both.

Step 1: Choose your age group

Children's books are sorted into fairly standard bands. Publishers and agents vary, so treat the numbers below as typical ranges. Compare them with recent books in your genre before you settle on a length.

Format	Typical reader age	Typical word count	Illustrations	What it looks like
Picture book	About 3–8 (read to the child)	Usually under 1,000 words, often 500–800	On every page or spread	Usually 32 pages, art carries much of the story
Early reader	About 5–8 (child reading alone)	Roughly a few hundred to a few thousand words, depending on level	Frequent, often every page	Short sentences, controlled vocabulary, large type
Chapter book	About 6–10	Roughly 4,000–15,000 words	Some black-and-white art	Short chapters, simple plots, often a series
Middle grade	About 8–12	Roughly 20,000–55,000 words	Few or none	Full novels with subplots and deeper themes

Pick one band and commit to it. A lot of rejected manuscripts are "in between": too long for a picture book but too simple for a chapter book.

Step 2: Find a children's book idea that works

A good children's book idea usually fits in one sentence and has three parts:

1. A child-sized main character. Often an animal or a kid. Your reader should be able to picture themselves in the role.
2. A problem the reader recognises. Losing a toy, a first day at school, a fear of the dark, a fight with a friend.
3. A resolution the character earns. Children's stories work best when the main character solves the problem, not a parent or teacher who steps in at the end.

Write your idea as one sentence: "When [character] [problem], they must [action] before [stakes]." If you can't fill that in, the idea needs more work before you draft.

Avoid stories that exist only to teach a lesson. Children (and the adults buying for them) can tell when a book is a lecture. Let the message come through what the character does.

Step 3: Write the first draft

How you draft depends on the band you chose.

Picture books

Write the whole story in one sitting if you can. It will be short. Keep it to one main character, one problem and one setting, or very few settings.

Leave out what the pictures will show. If the art will show a red balloon floating over a park, your text doesn't need to say "the red balloon floated over the park." Write what the pictures can't show: dialogue, sounds, feelings, and the gap between what a character says and what's really happening.

Some writers add short art notes in brackets, such as [Illustration: the cat is hiding behind the curtain], only where the text would make no sense without them. Keep these to a minimum.

Early readers and chapter books

Use short sentences and familiar words. In early readers, repetition is a feature, because it helps new readers build confidence. In chapter books, keep chapters short and end most of them on a small hook so the child wants to keep going.

Middle grade

Middle grade is novel writing for younger readers. You'll want an outline, a cast list and a sense of how each chapter moves the plot. Our guide on how to write a book covers outlining and drafting at novel length.

If you're drafting a chapter book or middle grade novel, Inkora's AI children's book generator plans a book bible (premise, characters, style guide and a chapter-by-chapter outline) that you can edit. It then writes each chapter with continuity notes and a locked narrator voice. Its lengths start at about 12,000 words, so it suits longer children's books better than a short picture book text.

Step 4: Make it read well aloud

Picture books and early readers are performed. A parent might read the same book every night for months, so the text has to sound good out loud.

• Read every draft aloud. Then record it and listen back. You'll hear stumbles you can't see on the page.
• Vary sentence length. A run of short sentences builds tension. A longer one releases it.
• Use sound. Onomatopoeia, alliteration and refrains ("But the bear was still hungry") give children something to join in on.
• Use patterns of three. Three tries, three friends, three doors. The third time is where the surprise lands.
• Only rhyme if you can keep the meter. Rhyming text has to keep a steady beat as well as rhyme. Forced rhymes and lines that don't scan are a common reason picture book manuscripts get rejected. If you rhyme, count the stressed syllables in each line and keep them consistent.

Have someone else read your draft to you. If they trip over a line, rewrite it.

Step 5: Plan page turns

A page turn is the picture book's version of a chapter break. It's where you build suspense and deliver surprises.

The standard picture book has 32 pages. After the title page, copyright page and dedication, you're usually left with around 12 to 14 spreads (two facing pages) for the story itself.

To plan your turns:

1. Make a dummy. Fold eight sheets of paper in half and staple them to make a 32-page booklet. Number the pages.
2. Cut your text into chunks and tape or write each chunk on a page or spread.
3. Put a question before each turn. End a spread with "And behind the door was…" and put the answer after the turn.
4. Check the pacing. If one spread has far more text than the others, split it or cut it. If two spreads say the same thing, merge them.
5. Check that every spread can be illustrated. Each spread needs something different to draw. If three spreads in a row show the same character in the same room, the art will feel static.

Chapter books and middle grade novels don't need a dummy. Use chapter endings for the same job.

Step 6: Decide who does the illustrations

Writing tools don't create the illustrations inside your book. You need one of these:

• Hire an illustrator. Agree in writing on the number of illustrations, the style, deadlines, revision rounds, who owns which rights, and whether you pay a flat fee or a share of royalties. Ask for sketches before final art.
• Illustrate it yourself. This works if you can draw consistently across 14 or so spreads. Characters need to look the same on every page.
• Use a separate AI image tool. Read the tool's licence terms on commercial use. Check the store's rules too: KDP, for example, asks you to disclose AI-generated content when you publish, so check the current wording in your dashboard. Our article on whether it's legal to sell AI-written books covers the wider questions.

If you plan to go the traditional publishing route and you aren't an illustrator, don't hire one. Publishers usually choose and pay the illustrator themselves. Submit the text only.

To be clear: Inkora's cover designer can add artwork to your cover, but it doesn't produce illustrations or photos inside the book. Interior art has to come from an illustrator or a separate tool and be placed in a layout program.

Step 7: Choose a trim size

Picture books are often square or wider than they are tall, which gives illustrations room to spread across two pages. Common square choices include 8.5 x 8.5 inches and similar sizes. Chapter books and middle grade novels usually use standard portrait novel trims.

When choosing:

• Check what your printer offers. KDP, IngramSpark and Lulu each have their own list of trim sizes and their own options for colour and paper. Confirm in each platform's documentation.
• Plan for bleed. If your illustrations run to the edge of the page, you need full-bleed pages. That means extending the art past the trim line by the amount your printer specifies.
• Expect colour to cost more. Full-colour interiors raise the print cost per copy, which affects your list price and royalty.
• Check the minimum page count. Print-on-demand services set a minimum number of pages for paperbacks, and short picture books can fall near it.

Once you know your trim and page count, use the book cover size calculator to get your full cover dimensions. Use the spine width calculator to find the spine width.

Step 8: Publish your children's book

You have two main routes.

Traditional publishing. Most children's publishers accept submissions through literary agents. You send a query letter and, for picture books, usually the full manuscript. If you sign a deal, the publisher handles illustration, printing and distribution.

Self-publishing. You handle (or hire out) editing, illustration, layout and cover, then upload to the stores yourself. Some points specific to children's books:

• Paperbacks on Amazon KDP need an ISBN. KDP offers a free one that can only be used on KDP, or you can use your own. KDP's published terms put paperback royalties at 60% of list price minus printing cost (50% below $9.99 on Amazon.com, and 40% with Expanded Distribution). Confirm current rates in your KDP dashboard, and run your numbers through the KDP royalty calculator. Colour printing changes the result a lot.
• IngramSpark requires your own ISBN for each format. It's worth considering if you want bookshops and libraries to be able to order your book.
• Picture book ebooks need a fixed-layout file, which keeps text and art in place on each page. This is a different format from the reflowable EPUB used for novels, so check each store's fixed-layout requirements.
• Chapter books and middle grade publish like any novel. Reflowable ebooks and standard paperbacks work fine.

For the full process, see how to self-publish a book and the Amazon KDP publishing guide.

For text-led books, Inkora exports a print-ready interior PDF (including an 8.5 x 8.5 trim), a full-wrap cover PDF with spine width from your page count, EPUB 3 and a publishing kit with description, keywords and BISAC categories. Its Publishing Hub gives checklists for each store, and you upload in your own accounts.

Common problems and fixes

My picture book is 2,000 words. It's probably two stories, or a chapter book idea. Cut every sentence that describes what the art will show, remove secondary characters, and see if the core story survives at under 1,000 words. If it doesn't, consider rewriting it as an early reader or chapter book.

The rhyme feels forced. Try rewriting it in prose. Many rhyming drafts get stronger when the rhyme is dropped, and you can keep a refrain or repeated line for rhythm.

The adult solves the problem. Rewrite the ending so the child or animal character takes the decisive action. Adults can help along the way but shouldn't fix things at the end.

Every spread looks the same. Go back to your dummy and change the setting, action or emotion between spreads. Move a character to a new spot, add a reveal, or cut a spread.

The illustrator's characters change from page to page. Ask for a character sheet showing each character from several angles before final art starts. Include this step in your agreement.

The print cost makes the price too high. Try a different trim, reduce the page count, or compare colour paper options. Check whether a paperback and ebook together cover your goals better than paperback alone.

My file was rejected by the printer. The usual causes are missing bleed, images below the required resolution, or a cover built for the wrong page count. Recheck the printer's specs and rebuild the cover to your final page count.

Writing a children's book takes fewer words than a novel, but every word works harder. Choose your age band, read the draft aloud until it flows, plan your page turns, and sort out illustrations early. That way the publishing stage is about uploading files rather than fixing them.