2013 Youth Media Awards

Yesterday the American Library Association (ALA) announced the winners of the 2013 Youth Media Awards.  Nineteen different awards were given to the best of the best in children's literature.  As I have done for the past several years I will document the biggest, oldest, and most prestigious of these awards:  The Caldecott and Newbery Medals.  A full list of today's awards and their recipients can be found here. 

Caldecott Medal

The Caldecott Medal is awarded each year to, "the most distinguished American picture book for children."  This year the award goes to This Is Not My Hat, written and illustrated by John Klassen.  In this follow-up to last year's I Want My Hat Back, which was the recipient of a 2012 Theodore Seuss Geisel Honor, Klassen has crafted a similar story involving an animal's stolen hat.  This latest offering had a new cast of characters, a new color scheme, and plenty of clever humor to keep audiences happy.  One of the coolest things about this picture book is the way that the illustrations really do tell the story, adding plenty of detail that the text alone cannot provide.

A whopping five books were given Caldecott Honors:

• Creepy Carrots by Aaron Reynolds, illustrated by Peter Brown
• Extra Yarn by Mac Barnett, illustrated by John Klassen
• Green by Laura Vaccaro Seeger
• One Cool Friend by Toni Buzzeo, illustrated by David Small
• Sleep Like a Tiger by Mary Logue, illustrated by Pamela Zagarenski

Newbery Medal

The Newbery Medal is given every year to, "the most outstanding contribution to children's literature."  This year the award goes to The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate.  This poetic, lyrical novel tells the story of Ivan, a silverback gorilla who lives in an exhibit at a mall.  Ivan has never really questioned his existence there and is happy enough drawing pictures with the crayons provided by his caretaker.  When a baby elephant is added to the mall's menagerie, Ivan suddenly realizes that he needs to find a better home for his new friend.  The language in this book really makes it stand out from the crowd as it brings Ivan's story to life.  The emotional story - based on real-life events - will warm your heart and bring a tear to your eye.

Three books were awarded Newbery Honors:

• Splendors and Gloom by Laura Amy Schlitz
• Bomb:  The Race to Build - and Steal - the World's Most Dangerous Weapon by Steve Sheinkin
• Three Times Lucky by Sheila Turnage

My Thoughts

This year the Youth Media Awards has yielded a varied crop of winners, some of which I expected and some of which were complete surprises.   The Caldecott, with its unusually large pool of recipients, was especially filled with surprises.  I didn't expect either This Is Not My Hat or Creepy Carrots to make the cut, though both books are full of humor and real appeal for all sorts of audiences.  I had expected that John Klassen would win the Caldecott Medal this year, but not for the book that got the big prize.  Still, it pleases me to see Extra Yarn on the list of honor books.  And how cool is it that Klassen came away with two Caldecott awards for two different books this year?  This has only happened once before in the history of the award, when Leonard Weisgard won both a Caldecott Medal and Honor in 1947.

I'd read so many good, worthy children's novels this year that it was very difficult to predict which ones would come away with the Newbery.  There are a couple of titles that I was sad to see neglected - The Unfortunate Son and The Lions of Little Rock come to mind - but generally the recipients seem to be worthy.  I was somewhat surprised to see Three Times Lucky come away with a Newbery Honor.  Personally, I just wasn't terribly enchanted by this book and might have preferred to see another "plucky girl" story (Summer of the Gypsy Moths) come away with an award instead.  But that's just me.