The International Literacy Association (ILA) today announced the winners of the ILA Children’s and Young Adults’ Book Awards, which recognize newly published authors who show exceptional promise in the children’s and young adult book fields.
These titles, ranging from children’s books about a young girl who learns the origins of her very long and meaningful name and a gender-questioning child who finds acceptance from his grandmother to a YA novel about a high school girl navigating school politics and life in the wake of her brother's death, delve into issues of love, loss, family, identity, gender, race and politics.
“In today’s vibrant world, teachers must design their classroom libraries consciously to show they value all students’ lives and identities,” said ILA Executive Director Marcie Craig Post. “We’re excited to shine a spotlight on these titles, which draw readers into the worlds of characters who may be different from themselves and that celebrate empathy, kindness and acceptance.”
Awards were presented for fiction and nonfiction in each of three categories: primary, intermediate and young adult.
The 2019 award winners are:
Primary Fiction
Winner: Julián Is a Mermaid. Jessica Love. 2018. Candlewick Press.
Honor: Alma and How She Got Her Name. Juana Martinez-Neal. 2018. Candlewick Press.
Primary Nonfiction
Winner: Let the Children March. Monica Clark-Robinson. 2018. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Honor: Prickly Hedgehogs! Jane McGuinness. 2018. Candlewick Press.
Intermediate Fiction
Winner: Hope in the Holler. Lisa Lewis Tyre. 2018. Nancy Paulsen Books.
Intermediate Nonfiction
Winner: Trash Revolution: Breaking the Waste Cycle. Erica Fyvie. 2018. Kids Can Press.
Young Adult Fiction
Winner: Dear Rachel Maddow: A Novel. Adrienne Kisner. 2018. Feiwel & Friends.
Honor: The Beauty That Remains. Ashley Woodfolk. 2018. Delacorte Press.
Young Adult Nonfiction
Winner: I Have the Right To: A High School Survivor’s Story of Sexual Assault, Justice, and Hope. Chessy Prout with Jenn Abelson. 2018. Margaret K. McElderry Books.
Additional information on the ILA Children's and Young Adults' Book Awards can be found here.
Alina O'Donnell is the communications strategist at ILA and the editor of Literacy Daily.