CALEDCOTT & NEWBERY WINNERS AND OTHER CHILDREN'S BOOK AWARDS ANNOUNCED

Brian Selznick Wins Caldecott; Laura Amy Schlitz Wins Newbery

By Diane Roback -- Publishers Weekly, 1/14/2008

Brian Selznick has won the 2008 Randolph Caldecott Medal for The Invention of Hugo Cabret (Scholastic Press), a 533-page novel that he also illustrated. It’s the first time that a novel has won the country’s top prize for illustration, and it’s also Scholastic’s first Caldecott Award.

And Laura Amy Schlitz won the 2008 Newbery Medal for Good Masters! Sweet Ladies!: Voices from a Medieval Village, illustrated by Robert Byrd (Candlewick). Schlitz is a school librarian in Baltimore; this is the second year in a row that the Newbery has been won by a librarian.
The awards were announced this morning at the American Library Association's midwinter conference in Philadelphia.

Three Newbery Honor Books were named:

Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis (Scholastic Press); The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt (Clarion); and Feathers by Jacqueline Woodson (Putnam).

There were also four Caldecott Honor Books:

Henry’s Freedom Box: A True Story from the Underground Railroad, illustrated by Kadir Nelson, written by Ellen Levine (Scholastic Press); First the Egg by Laura Vaccaro Seeger (Roaring Brook/Porter); The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain by Peter Sís (FSG/Foster); and Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity by Mo Willems (Hyperion).

The White Darkness by Geraldine McCaughrean (HarperTempest) won the Michael L. Printz Award for excellence in literature for young adults.

Four Printz Honors were given:

Dreamquake by Elizabeth Knox (FSG/Foster); One Whole and Perfect Day by Judith Clarke (Front Street); Repossessed by A.M. Jenkins (HarperTeen); and Your Own, Sylvia: A Verse Portrait of Sylvia Plath by Stephanie Hemphill (Knopf).

The Robert F. Sibert Award for the most distinguished informational book was won by Peter Sís’s The Wall.

There were two Sibert Honors:

Nic Bishop Spiders by Nic Bishop (Scholastic Nonfiction) and Lightship by Brian Floca (Atheneum/Jackson).

Christopher Paul Curtis won the Coretta Scott King Author award for Elijah of Buxton, and Ashley Bryan won the Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award for Let It Shine: Three Favorite Spirituals (Atheneum). The John Steptoe Award for New Talent went to Sundee T. Frazier, author of Brendan Buckley's Universe and Everything in It (Delacorte).
There were two King Author Honors:

Sharon M. Draper for November Blues (Atheneum); and Charles R. Smith Jr. for Twelve Rounds to Glory: The Story of Muhammad Ali, illustrated by Bryan Collier (Candlewick).

And there were two King Illustrator Honors:

N. Joy for The Secret Olivia Told Me, illus. by Nancy Devard (Just Us Books); and Leo and Diane Dillon, for Jazz on a Saturday Night (Scholastic/Blue Sky).

The Mildred L. Batchelder Award for best work of translation went to Viz Media for Brave Story by Miyuki Miyabe, translated by Alexander O. Smith.

There were two Batchelder Honors:

Milkweed Editions, for The Cat: Or, How I Lost Eternity by Jutta Richter, illustrated by Rotraut Susanne Berner, translated by Anna Brailovsky; and Phaidon Press, for Nicholas and the Gang by René Goscinny, illustrated by Jean-Jacques Sempé, translated by Anthea Bell.

The Odyssey Award for Excellence in Audiobook Production was given out for the first time this year. The winner was Jazz by Walter Dean Myers and Christopher Myers, narrated by Vaneese Thomas and James Williams (Live Oak Media).

There were five Odyssey Honor titles:

Bloody Jack by L.A. Meyer, narrated by Katherine Kellgren (Listen and Live); Dooby Dooby Moo by Doreen Cronin, illustrated by Betsy Lewin, narrated by Randy Travis (Scholastic/Weston Woods); Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling, narrated by Jim Dale (Listening Library); Skulduggery Pleasant by Derek Landy, narrated by Rupert Degas (HarperChildren’s Audio); and Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, narrated by Alfred Molina (Listening Library).

The Theodor Seuss Geisel Award for beginning reader books went to There Is a Bird on Your Head! by Mo Willems (Hyperion).

There were four Geisel Award Honors:

First the Egg by Laura Vaccaro Seeger (Roaring Brook/Porter; Hello, Bumblebee Bat by Darrin Lunde, illustrated by Patricia J. Wynne (Charlesbridge); Jazz Baby by Lisa Wheeler, illustrated by R. Gregory Christie (Harcourt); and Vulture View by April Pulley Sayre, illustrated by Steve Jenkins (Holt).

The Margaret A. Edwards Award for lifetime contribution in writing for young adults was given to Orson Scott Card, and Walter Dean Myers was chosen to deliver the May Hill Arbuthnot Honor Lecture.

Three Schneider Family Book Awards were announced:

Kami and the Yaks by Andrea Stenn Stryer, illustrated by Bert Dodson (Bay Otter) won for best children’s book, Reaching for Sun by Tracie Vaughn Zimmer (Bloomsbury) won for best middle school book, and Hurt Go Happy by Ginny Rorby (Starscape) won for best teen book.

Yuyi Morales, illustrator of Los Gatos Black on Halloween, written by Marisa Montes (Holt) won the Pura Belpré Illustrator Award. Margarita Engle, author of The Poet Slave of Cuba: A Biography of Juan Francisco Manzano, illustrated by Sean Qualls (Holt) won the Pura Belpré Author Award.

There were two Pura Belpré Honor Books for illustration:

My Name Is Gabito: The Life of Gabriel García Márquez/Me llamo gabito: La vida de Gabriel García Márquez, illustrated by Raúl Colón, written by Monica Brown (Luna Rising) and My Colors, My World/Mis colores, mi mundo by Maya Christina Gonzalez (Children’s Book Press).

Three Pura Belpré Author Honor books were named:

Frida: ¡Viva la vida! Long Live Life! by Carmen T. Bernier-Grand (Marshall Cavendish); Martina the Beautiful Cockroach: A Cuban Folktale, retold by Carmen Agra Deedy, illustrated by Michael Austin (Peachtree); and Los Gatos Black on Halloween.

And the Andrew Carnegie Medal for excellence in children’s video went to Jump In! Freestyle Edition (Disney).