Barnes & Noble announced the shortlists for its annual Children’s & Young Adult Book Awards, with 18 books across three categories in contention for the prizes.
Author Katelyn Aronson and illustrator Eve Farb were shortlisted in the picture book category for Clovis Keeps His Cool, along with author Naaz Khan and illustrator Mercè López for Room for Everyone. The other finalists were Christopher Denise for Knight Owl, Matthew Forsythe for Mina, Nilah Magruder for Wutaryoo, and Fabio Napoleoni for Dragonboy.
Jasmine Warga’s The Shape of Thunder was named a finalist in the young readers category, as were Jake Maia Arlow’s Almost Flying, Elle McNicoll’s A Kind of Spark, Alexandria Rogers’ The Witch, the Sword, and the Cursed Knights, Maleeha Siddiqui’s Barakah Beats, and Míriam Bonastre Tur’s Hooky.
In the young adult category, the finalists were Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé for Ace of Spades, Robbie Couch for The Sky Blues, Ann Fraistat for What We Harvest, Lizz Huerta for The Lost Dreamer, Molly Knox Ostertag for The Girl From the Sea, and Xiran Jay Zhao for Iron Widow.
“The six titles in each category represent such a diverse offering, highlighting books that have been percolating throughout the past year as well as books that will be a new reading experience to our customers,” said Shannon DeVito, Barnes & Noble’s director of books. “Narrowing it down and voting on the winner will be a challenge our booksellers are surely up for.”
The winner in each category, and the overall winner among all the finalists, will be revealed in May.
Michael Schaub is a Texas-based journalist and regular contributor to NPR.
