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Award-Winning Children's BooksIncludes selected major awards and winners, 2002-2012, and information about the awards
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Now updated with the awards announced at the 2012 ALA Midwinter Convention.
Why awards matter, and what you'll find here
Awards are important in children's books. They tell publishers, writers, and illustrators, what is considered to be "the best," and thus the standards they must strive to attain.
Awards are important to publishers for an additional reason. Many children's book awards, though not all, are selected by librarians. The library market is still important to many publishers, and the most prestigious awards not only bestow honors but lead to significantly increased sales. They are an important part of the business.
For writers and illustrators, getting to know the award-winning books is one of the ways to understand what is considered to be the best today, rather than 20 or 30 or 40 years ago, when we were children. We can't read every new book that's released, but we can make a point of finding the award-winners.
This section provides information about 10 US awards, most of them awarded by the American Library Association. It lists recent award winners, and some of the "honor books," announced from 2002 to 2011. This is a dual-purpose information and shopping area. So you'll find links to pages where you can purchase the book or books you want, and also links that provide more information, including the official home pages of the various awards. (Purchase of books from this page will generate referrals that help keep this web site operating.)
The most recent award-winners are picked out in red text. This section has been updated with the major ALA awards announced in January 2012.
More sources of information and places to buy award-winning books
- For even more awards, visit David K. Brown's Children's Book Awards page, which at least used to be the most comprehensive list on the Internet. It's now a few years out of date, but so comprehensive that it's still very useful.
- Database of Award-Winning Children's Literature. Compiled by a librarian, and also very comprehensive.
- The Children's Book Council has a comprehensive awards database online, but you must pay for access.
- Anastasia Suen created this Best Children's Books Lists page, to get you beyond the winner-take-all awards.
- Cynthia Leitich Smith hosts this Children's and YA Books State Awards list.
- The Children's Book Committee of Bank Street College produces an annual list of recommended books. The most recent edition is available via their home page, and they have posted a "Best of the Best" list, compiling all the starred books from the 1998 through 2009 lists, conveniently organized by age.
- And the Winner Is...: This is a great background piece on the history and impact of the Newbery and Caldecott awards.
- As a handy starting point to buy these books and other award-winners, go straight to this Amazon.com page of award-winners, including some awards not covered here.
- To find award-winning books "on sale", see the award-winning books available at BookCloseouts.com. This page links to discount copies of Newbery, Caldecott, Coretta Scott King, and other winners (these are remainders or discontinued editions).
Articles about children's book awards
- The Bank Street Children's Books Committee Children's Book Awards: My blog entry on some awards and a "Best" list that deserve to be better-known.
- Roger Sutton on Gender Imbalances in the Caldecott [and other awards]: This starts as a short comment by Roger Sutton of The Horn Book on the disproportionate number of men among Caldecott award-winners, which kicks off a lengthy series of comments on this and other awards. Well worth browsing.
- Slippery Slopes and Proliferating Prizes: Comments by Marc Aronson from 2001: a critique of identity-based awards.
