Hello!
If you have been checking back regularly, you might have A: been disappointed when we did, after all, go dark, and B: noticed that we edited our last post to reflect that we would indeed be going mostly dark.
Life. It gets in the way, doesn’t it?
The results are in, and opening the honor vote to the larger list made for some interesting shifts in some of the votes — although not statistically significant shifts when it comes to the actual Pyrite* honor slate.
ALA definitely affected our voter pool (another note for next year, get all the voting done by the Thursday of ALA week), so we went down to only 35 voters (from nearly 70 for the Pyrite gold — can you have Pyrite gold? Hmmm), and it wasn’t exactly the same voter pool. However, the results show that this smaller and somewhat different pool was mostly in agreement with the original voter pool.
Which gives us hope that Seraphina, which we love a LOT, does indeed have a chance at the RealPrintz (although we left it off our prediction list, given the challenge real fantasy has historically faced), since it continues to be the second most loved title for the Pyrite, first giving CNV something that resembled a run for its money and now sweeping the honor vote. Read on for details and the rest of the lineup.
Look! The results! Only… we stripped out the titles from this version. So now you HAVE to read on.
Before we say anything else, or share shiny data, and definitely before we name the book that gets the Pyrite* medal (which, really, would be more of a paperweight), we want to say thank you.
Thank you, of course, for reading the blog. But mostly, and most importantly, thank you for caring about YA literature. Thank you for sharing your passion, for having opinions, for thinking about books, and for making this all worthwhile. We have such a lovely little corner of the internet — our community is so thoughtful, passionate, and kind; it’s a joy to be a part of it.
Ok, enough sentimentality. We’ll save the rest of the emotions for Monday’s tears (for joy or sorrow, but Karyn at least almost always cries a little during the YMAs).
So, you wanna know what won? [Read more…]
Another (and last for the year) guest post from pinch-hitter Joy Piedmont. This time, Joy raves about a book that made the contenda list with three stars but mostly deserves recognition as a serious buzz book. I’m a long time fan of Adele Griffin’s, and this is, I think, a stronger candidate than her last few YA titles when it comes to award chat. But I’ll let Joy explain why…
All You Never Wanted, Adele Griffin
Knopf, October 2012
Reviewed from final copy
All You Never Wanted: it’s a gem of a title, isn’t it? It’s a warning, a temptation, and a promise written directly at you, pulling you in.
And Adele Griffin’s latest has more than a great title. It’s an engaging study of two teenage sisters told from their alternating perspectives. Attention-seeking Thea and anxiety-stricken Alex seem to be direct descendants of Edith Wharton’s characters. (It’s no surprise that in a recent online Q&A, Griffin revealed that she went through a Wharton phase, and discussed how that may have influenced AYNW). Like Wharton’s, Griffin’s characters are complex and fully realized in an exploration of wealth, privilege, class, desire, jealousy, and anxiety.
In the end, it’s a gorgeous little TARDIS of a novel.
(Bigger on the inside, for you non-Whovians).
Another guest post from Joy Piedmont, who is saving our bacon at this crunch time, as we realize just how many books we haven’t read yet!
My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece, Annabel Pitcher
Little, Brown, August 2012
Reviewed from an ARC
Annabel Pitcher’s debut novel has earned four starred reviews landed on Kirkus’ Best Children’s Books of 2012 and the Atlantic Wire’s YA/Middle-Grade 2012 Book Awards (in the “Most Deftly Handled” category). Originally published in the UK in 2011, this is a haunting story about how grief and hatred destroys families, told through the voice of a 10-year-old boy trying to make sense of it all.
Yes, that’s right. The protagonist is a 10-year-old. Which raises one question right off the bat: Who is this book for? Kirkus lists ages 10-14, while SLJ and the publisher list grades 7-10 (or ages 12-15, roughly). The content is probably best suited to young teens (13 to 15, much as SLJ says), but the voice is so young. Could this be a nostalgia read for that audience? (Do young teens read new books as nostalgia reads??) Does the youth of the protagonist make this more suited for the Newbery audience (of course, as a British import, this isn’t actually eligible for the Newbery at all), and not a true Printz contender? What do we do with these books that really are liminal — not J because of content, not YA because they’re too young? Would this have been better served written for an adult audience, like The Curious Incident of the Dog in a the Night Time or Room, where the thematic scope and young voice don’t pull in different directions, to the detriment of the novel?
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