Every year, CPL's Teen Services librarians gather to predict which books will win the American Library Association's Youth Media Awards. Here are the teen books we picked this year for the Morris, the Printz, and the Best Graphic Novel and Manga Awards.
The Morris Award is given to the best debut novel written for teens. This year, we chose Gather as our first-place winner. It's a moving story about Ian, who copes with poverty and his mom's opioid addiction with the help of his adopted pup Gather.
We chose The Eternal Return of Clara Hart, a time loop redemption story, for second place and She Is a Haunting, a gruesome haunted house story set in Vietnam, as our third-place book.
The Printz Award is given to the most literary book written for teens. This year we picked Imogen, Obviously, an earnest story of high school senior Imogen slowly realizing she's bisexual, as our winner.
Accountable, a compelling nonfiction book about the aftermath of a racist Instagram account, got second place, and The Blood Years, a fictionalized account of the author's Jewish grandmother's experiences in Romania in World War II, got third place.
The Graphic Novel and Manga Award (based on the Eisner Awards) is given to the best comic or manga written for teens. This year we chose The Hills of Estrella Roja, a spooky graphic novel about a college student named Kat investigating paranormal activity in a small Texas town for her podcast, as our winner.
Second place went to Mage and the Endless Unknown, a nearly wordless graphic novel about a magical creature on a strange journey, and third place was a tie between Monstrous, a painful yet hopeful memoir of a girl adopted from Korea, and Is Love the Answer?, a manga about a girl named Chika who discovers that she's asexual during her first year of college.
The YMA winners were announced on January 22 - take a look to see who won!
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