Changing Previously Published Book from YA to MG

I had a fantasy novel previously published as a YA book, with the mc being 15 years old. I always pictured it being a younger YA book, but once it started getting reviews the general consensus was that it read more like a MG book. When I tried requesting reviews from MG reviewers, I was told 15 was too old for a mc in a MG book, which I generally know to be true. The book is now out of print and I'm still trying to decide whether I want to try and find a new home for it or self-publish it - but that's a whole other discussion in itself and I'd rather focus on switching from YA to MG right now.

I think I could easily change the mc's age to 13 - would this be young enough to be considered upper MG? The main reason I wanted the mc to be 15 originally is because there is a little bit of romance, and I know my 13 year old self was not interested in boys at all...but everyone is different and times are changing?

There is little else I would need to change besides when first mentioning her age, it would say 13 instead of 15. I would also change her LI from 15 to 13, so they'd still be the same age. The mc also has two friends and a younger sister, who's ages might be adjusted, but it would still work.

If I do re-publish, I heard that if you use the same title and author name, your reviews from Amazon/Goodreads will transfer over. If I made this small change, would it be okay to use the same title so I can transfer my reviews?

Has anyone had similar experiences of re-publishing the same book with minor changes? Or in this case, switching it from YA to MG??

Sage said:

As someone who has had a book stuck between adult and YA (adult readers saying it reads YA, YA readers telling me it's an adult book...even after I changed the ages and other things), I can tell you that aging it down is not as easy as sticking a new age on the characters. There are huge differences between the markets and the ages.

In my personal opinion, I would let this one go and move on to your next book. Those old reviews will confuse future readers and listings of either version will lead both MG readers and YA readers even more confused about what market your book is supposed to be than they currently are. It's not a minor change because you're switching markets completely.

As for 13, I'm seeing a few books getting written as MG with 13yo MCs and then marketed as YA for some reason. But I've also seen MG books with 14yo MCs.

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Thanks for the input Sage.

Yes, I suppose a minor change would be something more along the lines of changing a character's hair colour or name, as long as those things didn't play an important part in the story.

I'm obviously going to be reading over the whole manuscript and seeing if I can make other changes to make it more MG. I was also thinking of changing the title now, because it wouldn't make sense to switch over the reviews to the new book when it's technically not the same book.