1. A method for performing an efficient query on a parent table and one or more joined child tables, the method comprising: determining one or more search grams based on the query; identifying a parent table having one or more parent table partitions including one or more respective parent records grouped therein; identifying one or more child table partitions from one or more joined child tables, the one or more child table partitions including one or more respective child records grouped therein, wherein the identified one or more child table partitions are associated with a first of the one or more parent table partitions, and wherein the child records grouped within the identified one or more child table partitions are associated with the one or more parent records of the associated first of the one or more parent table partitions; scanning parent records in the first of the parent table partitions for the one or more search grams; scanning child records in the identified one or more child table partitions associated with the first of the parent table partitions for the one or more search grams; computing parent gram scores for scanned parent records based on a degree of matching with the one or more search grams; computing child gram scores for scanned child records based on a degree of matching with the one or more search grams; computing aggregate scores for each parent record and its associated child records based on parent and child gram scores; and repeating the identifying one or more child tables, scanning parent and child records, and computing parent and child gram scores and aggregate scores for each of the parent table partitions.