The Cybils Awards finalists were announced on January 1st, and I was excited to see some of my favorite books in the lists! Apparently, 1047 books nominated across all categories. Wow!
I thought I’d share all the finalists with you along with a few of my thoughts. I’d love to hear from all of you—what books would you like to see win?
I haven’t read any of the books for these first three categories, so I can’t comment on them much, but several look really cute!
I’ve read three of these and LOVED all three of them! Operation Frog Effect was actually my nomination (yay!!), but I also adored Maybe He Just Likes You and Song for a Whale. I’d actually be happy to see any of those win. If the other books are the same quality, I don’t know how the judges will pick!!
This is the category I’m judging! I’m not going to say much about this category since I’m supposed to hold off on reviews until after winners are announced, but I will say that I’ve read five of them so far and it’s been very enjoyable reading!
I don’t read much nonfiction, so it’s not surprising that I haven’t read any of the nominees from these three categories (though I have read the regular version of Born a Crime and loved it—I think it’s fabulous that they created a version for younger readers!).
Surprisingly, I haven’t read any of these either (though I did read several good MG and YA graphic novels this year). I really want to read Kiss Number 8, Mooncakes and New Kid, though!
Shout and Other Words for Home are on my must-read list, but I haven’t read any of these yet!
And, wow—I haven’t read any of these yet either. Guess I have lots of great books I need to read!!! (I do own Heroine, Aurora Rising and Sorcery of Thorns, and several of the other books have been on my radar as well—but I haven’t actually read any of them yet).
Watch for the winners to be announced on February 14th!!
Have you read any of the books that were nominated for the Cybils this year? Have any favorites that you’re hoping will win? I want to know!
I read so few of these. I loved Roll With It. It was a very sweet and lovely story of family and autonomy. Rosa Santos, With the Fire on High, and Aurora Rising were all hits for me too.
I want to read Roll with It (and the others too, actually). So many books to read!!
Love all of the graphics you created for this one! Here are my thoughts on what I read:
Middle Grade Fiction: I only read Coyote Sunrise, and while I really liked it, it was not my favorite middle grade read of the year.
Middle Grade Nonfiction: I have only read Free Lunch (which until I read your post I didn’t realize was classified as nonfiction even though I knew the author used much of his personal experience in it). This was an excellent read on poverty in our country, and I think many kids could learn a great deal about their own expectations by reading it.
Young Adult Graphic Novels: I read They Called Us Enemy, and it was one of my few 5 star reads of the year (I give very few books 5 stars).
Poetry: I read both Shout and Other Words From Home. I felt that Speak was better than Shout (even though both are very good). I LOVED Other Words From Home, and would be so excited for Jasmine Warga to win!!!!
Young Adult Fiction: I read On the Come Up and With the Fire on High. I LOVED With the Fire on High and would love to see that win (although On the Come Up is an excellent book as well). I am hoping to get to Heroine and The Downstairs Girl sometime…..sigh….never enough time to read.
I’m excited to see what the winners will be!
I can’t take credit for the graphics—those were created by the Cybils team. (They are great, I agree!)
I REALLY want to read Other Words from Home because I’ve heard such amazing things about it. And I put Free Lunch on my TBR recently when you recommended it, so thanks for that!
I see 0 books I’ve read and a bunch of books on my TBR list. Award lists always remind me of how bad I am at reading new releases.
I feel like I’m fairly good at reading new releases, and yet I’ve still read very few of these. There are just too many good books in the world!
i see books on my reading list, but i’m not sure if i’ve read any of those you shared. thanks for taking the time to create the wonderful post
Thanks for checking it out!
You KNOW I have opinions about this, although like many others, I see more TBR books here than ones I’ve already read. The only picture book I’ve read is Hair Love, which I loved, but the others look really good too. In MG, I’ve read Coyote Sunrise and Maybe He Just Likes You. I thought both were very good, but Maybe He Just Likes You blew me away. I haven’t read any of your category! Tristan Strong, Sal & Gabi, and Dark Lord Clementine are all high on my to-read list. I haven’t read any of the nonfiction, except like you I’ve read the original of Born a Crime. I’m surprised it’s listed as MG; I would have expected it to be a YA nonfiction title. For MG Graphic Novels I’ve read Meg Jo Beth & Amy, Crush, Hidden Witch, and New Kid. I can see New Kid or Crush winning. For YA graphic novels I’ve only read Kiss #8 (I think I nominated it?!?) but obviously need to read and get the others for my classroom. The poetry all looks good: I’ve only read Shout and don’t think it lives up to Speak. YA is mostly on my TBR, but I really loved Heroine. I like On the Come Up, but don’t see it as the winner. And YA spec fic is my judging category, so all I can say is I’ve read five so far and none have disappointed me!
Happy reading! Next year if I do title selection for my state Battle of the Books and Cybils again, I definitely need to choose MG for one of them, because I have SO MUCH READING to do this month, and a lot of it is pretty long. I’m just glad I didn’t volunteer for nonfiction this time. I love judging it, because it’s so interesting and yet I rarely pick it up unprompted, but exactly that would make it hard for me to keep up on it when I’m distracted by the “fun” YA titles I’m looking at for OBOB.
I LOVE that you have opinions—I am here for ALL the opinions! 🙂
And I can definitely see how reading so many YA books in this timeframe would be tough—I’ve got five of my seven read (plus one extra that I read because the finalist book is a sequel and I CAN’T read books out of order). But MG is generally much quicker to read!!
I have only read 1 book from all of these groups. I really enjoyed Song for a Whale and would love to see it get some recognition.
I agree that it’s definitely worthy!!
What a fabulous group of books, I am specially looking at the easy readers because that’s where I buy for young relatives!
I hope you’ve gotten some great ideas for them, then!
I’m judging for YA Fiction and it’s tough – I still have a few to read! I want to read a lot of the graphic novel nominees, but I enjoyed Kiss Number 8 and Grimoire Noir!
-Lauren
I’m down to my last two for my category, and I’ve really been enjoying them all—it’s going to be hard for us to choose!
I’m glad you’ve enjoyed some of the books you’ve read so far.
Yes, I’ve been very happy with the finalists in my category!
I love how there are separate categories for speculative fiction and graphic novels. I’ve only read The Wicked King, Aurora Rising, and Fireborne out of all these books. They’re great reads in very different ways. Best of wishes with the judging process!
Judging is going to be hard because we’ve read some great books that I love in different ways!
I’m shocked to see the nominees for YA! I’ve actually read most of them and they weren’t 5 star reads to me. Though I understand Echo North and Internment were favorites that I have read yet. So many books to read though to be able to judge them!
It’s interesting to see how these types of awards can match up (or not) with our own thinking when we’re reading!
I have heard such good things about Song for a whale and roll with it. I really loved reading Hair Love and seeing the animated film of it too. I am so impressed and happy with how diverse these books are that are on the list! 😀 Especially in the YA section ^.^
Roll with It is one that I definitely want to read!! I agree that the diversity is good to see.
I am really pleased to see both Surviving the City and This Place: 150 Years Retold make the shortlist for YA graphic novels! Both are from a publisher in my hometown who does good work producing Indigenous #ownvoices books.
Oh, how cool! I’ll definitely have to check those out!