Thin books die here. Thick ones sell.

Query: “maze book for kids ages 8-12” · paperback · Amazon.com · about 10,000 competing books

Sort this page by page count and the ranking sorts itself. The 256-page book ranks 449. The 208-page book ranks 7,769. The 78-page book ranks 1,031,257.

Both self-published entries are at the bottom — ranks 171,794 and 1,031,257 — and both are the thinnest books on the page.

A publisher title from December 2025 landed at rank 7,769 with only 33 reviews, so the shelf does admit newcomers. It just admits substantial ones.

Who holds page one

Title	Price	Rating	Reviews	BSR (Books)	Published	Pages	Who
Ultimate Puzzle Challenge!: 125+ Brain Games for Kids	$6.99	4.8	6,154	449	Febr 5 2019	256	Publisher
The Ultimate Maze Challenge!: 175 Mind-Bending Mazes	$8.94	4.7	33	7,769	Dec 2 2025	208	Publisher
Fun and Challenging Mazes for Kids 8-12	$8.99	4.7	3,800	13,912	March 15 201	79	Publisher
Mazes For Kids Ages 8-12: Maze Activity Book	$9.19	4.7	881	40,509	Jan 5 2021	94	Publisher
Mazes For Kids Ages 8-12: Fun and Challenging	$9.99	4.7	572	93,446	October 20 2	112	Publisher
Maze Book for Kids Ages 8-12: The Ultimate Puzzle Adventure	$8.99	4.8	85	171,794	June 7 2024	131	Indie
The Book of Mazes for Kids Ages 8-12	$9.99	4.7	11	1,031,257	August 7 202	78	Indie

What the numbers say

Page count tracks rank almost perfectly here, which is unusual — on the sudoku and word-search shelves the longest books ranked worst.
Parents are buying volume. A 256-page puzzle compendium at $6.99 beats a 78-page maze book at $9.99 by six orders of magnitude in rank.
Both indie books are dead, while five publisher titles occupy the live ranks. This is the opposite of the large-print puzzle shelves, where indies lead.
Ten thousand competitors — the smallest field we have measured — yet the hardest for a self-publisher to enter. Field size keeps proving to be a useless signal.
The winning books are not mazes only; the top title mixes mazes with other brain games. The pure-maze books rank below it.

What I would actually do

Only enter with volume

Under 150 pages there is no evidence anyone sells here. That changes your printing cost and your pricing at the same time.

Mix the puzzle types

The rank-449 book is a compendium, not a maze book. Parents buy the bigger promise.

Expect to lose on price

Winners sit at $6.99–8.99 with 200+ pages. Your margin on that is thin; check the KDP calculator before drawing anything.

Or pick a large-print shelf instead

Same puzzle skills, older audience, and self-publishers actually win there.

Where these numbers come from, and what they are not

Every figure was read off Amazon.com on 18 September 2026: the organic results for that query with sponsored slots removed, then each listing's own page for rank, review count, publication date and length. Prices are US list prices at that moment and move constantly. Best Sellers Rank is a live position, not a sales figure — a rank read on a Tuesday can differ from the same rank on Sunday. “Indie” means the listing shows no traditional publisher, the closest public signal for a self-published title; it will occasionally mislabel a small press. Only paperbacks were counted. And know the width of the lens: this is the first page of one query — eight organic listings — not a census of the niche. A shelf that looks closed to newcomers here may be open on a neighbouring phrase, and seasonality is not accounted for: gift-driven categories rank differently in September than in November. One snapshot is not a trend.

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