2023 Youth Media Awards

1) Ain't burned all the bright

Author

Reynolds, Jason

Notes

Caldecott Award Honor Book

Formats:

Audiobook CD, Book - Hardback, eAudiobook

Description

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"A smash up of art and text that viscerally captures what it means to not be able to breathe, and how the people and things you love most are actually the oxygen you most need"-- Provided by publisher.

2) All my rage

Author

Tahir, Sabaa

Series

Thorndike Press youth large print young adult

Notes

Michael L. Printz Award

Formats:

Book, Book - Hardback, eAudiobook, eBook, Kindle, Large Print - Hardback

Description

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A family extending from Pakistan to California, deals with generations of young love, old regrets, and forgiveness. Lahore, Pakistan. Then. Misbah is a dreamer and storyteller, newly married to Toufiq in an arranged match. After their young life is shaken by tragedy, they come to the United States and open the Clouds' Rest Inn Motel, hoping for a new start. Juniper, California. Now. Salahudin and Noor are more than best friends; they are family....

3) Aviva vs. the dybbuk

Author

Lowe, Mari

Notes

Sydney Taylor Book Award Gold Medal - Middle Grade

Formats:

Book - Hardback, eAudiobook, eBook

Description

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A long ago "accident." An isolated girl named Aviva. A community that wants to help, but doesn't know how. And a ghostly dybbuk, that no one but Aviva can see, causing mayhem and mischief that everyone blames on her. That is the setting for this suspenseful novel of a girl who seems to have lost everything, including her best friend Kayla, and a mother who was once vibrant and popular, but who now can't always get out of bed in the morning. As tensions...

4) Babel: or the necessity of violence : an Arcane history of the Oxford translators' revolution

Author

Kuang, R. F

Notes

Alex Award

Formats:

Book - Hardback, Book - Paperback, eAudiobook, eBook, Kindle

Description

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Instant #1 New York Times Bestseller from the author of The Poppy War

"Absolutely phenomenal. One of the most brilliant, razor-sharp books I've had the pleasure of reading that isn't just an alternative fantastical history, but an interrogative one; one that grabs colonial history and the Industrial Revolution, turns it over, and shakes it out." — Shannon Chakraborty, bestselling author of The City of Brass

From

...

5) Berry song

Author

Goade, Michaela

Notes

Caldecott Honor Book

Description

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As a young Tlingit girl collects wild berries over the seasons, she sings with her Grandmother as she learns to speak to the land and listen when the land speaks back.

6) Big dreams, small fish

Author

Cohen, Paula (Illustrator)

Notes

Sydney Taylor Book Award Silver Medal - Picture Book

Formats:

Book - Hardback, eAudiobook, eBook

Description

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When the opportunity arises, Shirley, the daughter of immigrants who live above their corner grocery store, turns some overlooked gefilte fish into a marketing strategy that changes the flavor of the neighborhood.

7) Black bird, blue road

Author

Pasternack, Sofiya

Notes

Sydney Taylor Book Award Silver Medal Honor Book - Middle Grade

Formats:

Book - Hardback, eAudiobook, eBook

Description

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Publisher Annotation: Pesah has lived with leprosy for years, and the twins have spent most of that time working on a cure. Then Pesah has a vision: The Angel of Death will come for him on Rosh Hashanah, just one month away. So Ziva takes her brother and runs away to find doctors who can cure him. But when they meet and accidentally free a half-demon boy, he suggests paying his debt by leading them to the fabled city of Luz, where no one ever dies—the...

8) Breathe and count back from ten

Author

Sylvester, Natalia

Notes

Schneider Family Book Award for Teens Honor Book

Formats:

Book - Hardback, eAudiobook, eBook

Description

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Publisher Annotation: Verónica, a Peruvian-American teen with hip dysplasia, auditions to become a mermaid at a Central Florida theme park in the summer before her senior year, all while figuring out her first real boyfriend and how to feel safe in her own body.

9) Burn down, rise up

Author

Tirado, Vincent

Notes

Pura Belpré Young Adult Author Award

Formats:

Book - Hardback, Book - Paperback, eAudiobook, eBook, Kindle

Description

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When an urban legend rumored to trap people inside subway tunnels seems to be behind mysterious disappearances in the Bronx, sixteen-year-old Raquel and her friends team up to save their city--and confront a dark episode in its history in the process.

10) Chef's kiss: a novel

Author

Alexander, T. J

Notes

Alex Award

Description

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"A high-strung pastry chef's professional goals are interrupted by an unexpected career transition and the introduction of her wildly attractive nonbinary kitchen manager"-- Provided by publisher.

11) Choosing brave: how Mamie Till-Mobley, Emmett Till sparked the civil rights movement

Author

Joy, Angela

Notes

Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Talent Illustrator Award & Robert F. Sibert Informational Award Honor Book

Description

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"The story of the mother of Emmett Till, and how she channeled grief over her son's death into a call to action for the civil rights movement"-- Provided by publisher.

12) Daughter of the Moon goddess: a novel

Author

Tan, Sue Lynn

Series

Celestial Kingdom

Notes

Alex Award

Formats:

Book - Hardback, eAudiobook, eBook, Kindle

Description

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The acclaimed national and international bestseller

"Epic, romantic, and enthralling from start to finish."—Stephanie Garber, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Caraval series

"An all-consuming work of literary fantasy that is breathtaking both for its beauty and its suspense."—BookPage, starred review

A captivating and romantic debut epic fantasy

...

13) A face for Picasso: coming of age with Crouzon syndrome

Author

Henley, Ariel

Notes

YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction Finalist

Formats:

Book - Hardback, eAudiobook

Description

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Publisher Annotation: At only eight months old, identical twin sisters Ariel and Zan were diagnosed with Crouzon syndrome -- a rare condition where the bones in the head fuse prematurely. They were the first twins known to survive it. Growing up, Ariel and her sister endured numerous appearance-altering procedures. Surgeons would break the bones in their heads and faces to make room for their growing organs. While the physical aspect of their condition...

14) Freewater

Author

Luqman-Dawson, Amina

Series

James Patterson presents

Notes

John Newbery Medal & Coretta Scott King Author Book Award

Formats:

Audiobook CD, Book - Hardback, Book - Paperback, eAudiobook, eBook, Kindle

Description

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After fleeing the plantation where they were enslaved, siblings Ada and Homer discover the secret community of Freewater, and work with freeborn Sanzi to protect their new home from the encroaching dangers of the outside world.

15) Frizzy

Author

Ortega, Claribel A

Notes

Pura Belpré Children’s Author Award winner

Formats:

Book - Paperback, eComic, Kindle

Description

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Publisher Annotation: Marlene loves three things: books, her cool Tía Ruby and hanging out with her best friend Camila. But according to her mother, Paola, the only thing she needs to focus on is school and "growing up." That means straightening her hair every weekend so she could have "presentable", "good hair". But Marlene hates being in the salon and doesn't understand why her curls are not considered pretty by those around her. With a few hiccups,...

16) From the tops of the trees

Author

Yang, Kao Kalia

Notes

Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature

Formats:

Book - Hardback, eAudiobook, eBook

Description

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"A powerful true story of a young girl who has never known life outside a refugee camp and a father determined to help her dream beyond the fences that confine them"-- Provided by publisher.

17) Gigi and Ojiji

Author

Iwai, Melissa

Series

I can read books

Notes

Theodor Seuss Geisel Award Honor Book

Formats:

Book - Hardback, eBook

Description

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"Gigi crafts her Japanese American identity in this -enchanting early reader. The cuteness, inclusivity, and cross-cultural problem-solving represented will have young -readers coming back again and again. A must-buy." -School Library Journal (starred review) "The text is well supported by the endearing illustrations, which capture all of Gigi's big emotions and depict her as a biracial child, with a white father and Japanese mother." -Booklist (starred...

18) The high desert

Author

Spooner, James

Notes

Alex Award

Formats:

Book, Graphic Novel

Description

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"Scene: Apple Valley, California, in the late eighties, a thirsty, miserable desert. Teenage James Spooner hates that he and his mom are back in town after years away. The few Black kids here seem to be gangbanging, and the other kids fall on a spectrum of microaggressors to future neo-Nazis. Mixed-race and acutely aware of his Blackness, James doesn't know where he fits until he meets Ty, a young Black punk who introduces him to the school outsiders...

19) Himawari House

Author

Becker, Harmony

Notes

Asian/Pacific American Award for Youth Literature

Description

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"When Nao returns to Tokyo to reconnect with her Japanese heritage, she books a yearlong stay at the Himawari sharehouse. There she meets Hyejung and Tina, two other girls who came to Japan to freely forge their own paths. The trio live together, share meals, and even attend the same Japanese-language school, which results in them becoming fast friends. But will they be able to hold one another up as life tests them with new loves, old heart breaks,...

20) Hot dog

Author

Salati, Doug

Notes

Caldecott Medal

Formats:

Book, Book - Hardback

Description

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This hot dog has had enough of summer in the city! Enough of sizzling sidewalks, enough of wailing sirens, enough of people's feet right in his face. When he plops down in the middle of a crosswalk, his owner endeavors to get him the breath of fresh air he needs. She hails a taxi, hops a train, and ferries out to the beach. Here, a pup can run! With fluid art and lyrical text that have the soothing effect of waves on sand, the author shows us how...