By SLJ Staff January 11, 2011

It was a year of many first-timers. While there were no clear favorites for this year's most prestigious awards in children's literature, many were pleased with the choice of debut author Clare Vanderpool's Moon over Manifest (Delacorte) for the Newbery Medal and debut illustrator Erin E. Stead's A Sick Day for Amos McGee (Roaring Brook) for the Caldecott Medal.

Clare Vanderpool Photo: Annmarie Algya

Vanderpool says she’s amazed by her win. She was at home putting her dishes in the dishwasher when a call from the Newbery Committee came in at 8:45 a.m. local time in her hometown of Wichita, KS.

“You see all those mock Newbery blogs, and my book was not one of the frontrunners,” she says by phone. “I just feel very honored and humbled and almost as if I am receiving the award on behalf of the characters in my book.”

Vanderpool's big-hearted, multi-generational epic, set in small-town Kansas, alternates between World War I and the Great Depression and focuses on the tough-yet-vulnerable heroine, Abilene Tucker. With a mix of letters, newspaper articles, and a fortune teller's tales, the eclectic people and mysteries of Manifest spring to life.

"This thoroughly enjoyable, unique page-turner is a definite winner," reads SLJ's review of the book.

The town of Manifest is based on Frontenac, KS, home of Vanderpool's maternal grandparents. The author, who lives in Wichita with her husband and four children, was inspired to write about what the idea of "home" might look like to a girl who had grown up riding the rails.

"Vanderpool illustrates the importance of stories as a way for children to understand the past, inform the present, and provide hope for the future," says Cynthia K. Richey, committee chair for the Newbery, given to the author of the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children published in the U.S. during the previous year. The winners were announced by the Association for Library Service to Children January 10 during the American Library Association midwinter meeting in San Diego, CA.

Erin Stead

It's a good thing the husband and wife team of Erin E. Stead, 28, and Philip C. Stead, 29, decided to collaborate on a book for the first time. It landed them a Caldecott for the most distinguished picture book. Theirs is a tender tale of reciprocity and friendship as zookeeper Amos McGee gets the sniffles and receives a surprise visit from his five special and caring animal friends: an elephant, tortoise, penguin, rhinoceros, and owl. Stead's delicate woodblock prints and fine pencil work complement her husband's understated, spare, and humorous text to create a well-paced, gentle book.

Stead, who says winning the award has left her speechless, lives with her husband in a renovated 100-year-old barn in Ann Arbor, MI, and the young couple divides its time between there and New York City. A Sick Day for Amos McGee is her first book, and it appeared on The New York Times 10 Best Illustrated Children's Books list of 2010.

"My love for picture books, illustrations, and the libraries that give everyone access to them borders on reverence," says Stead by email. "I am floored that this year's award went to our quiet little book and that it has the privilege of sharing space with Bryan Collier and David Ezra Stein."

Meanwhile, Ship Breaker (Little, Brown), Paolo Bacigalupi's young adult debut, is the winner of the Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature. It tells the story of Nailer and his young crew who eke out a meager existence by scavenging materials on the ship-littered American Gulf Coast near a New Orleans ravaged by hurricanes and global warming. Bacigalupi, who won a Hugo and a Nebula award for his science fiction novels for adults, "artfully intertwines themes of loyalty, family, friendship, trust and love," says Printz Award Committee Chair Erin Downey Howerton.

Award-winning illustrator Bryan Collier can add two more to his list of honors: the Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award and a Caldecott Honor for Laban Carrick Hill's Dave the Potter: Artist, Poet, Slave (Little, Brown), which tells the true story of a slave who lived in South Carolina in the 1800s and had an extraordinary talent for pottery and poetry, and whose work survives today. Collier is a previous two-time winner of the Coretta Scott King Award and a two-time Caldecott Honoree.

The beloved Tomie dePaola is winner of this year's 2011 Laura Ingalls Wilder Award honoring an author or illustrator published in the United States whose books have made a substantial and lasting contribution to literature for children. His numerous works include 26 Fairmont Avenue (Putnam, 1999); Strega Nona (Prentice-Hall, 1975); The Legend of the Poinsettia (Putnam, 1994); and Oliver Button Is a Sissy (Harcourt, 1979).

"Tomie dePaola is masterful at creating seemingly simple stories that have surprising depth and reflect tremendous emotional honesty," says Wilder Award Committee Chair Megan Schliesman. "They have resonated with children for over 40 years."

This year's well-deserved Margaret A. Edwards Award (sponsored by SLJ) went to Terry Pratchett, honoring his significant and lasting contribution to writing for teens. Pratchett, who published his first short story when he was 13, was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 2009 for his services to literature. A resident of Somerset, England, Pratchett has published more than 50 books--including his tales of Discworld, which have won over generations of teen readers--and his works have been translated into 36 languages.

Pratchett will be honored at the Edwards Award Luncheon during the 2011 ALA Annual Conference in New Orleans, from June 23 to 28.

Here is the entire list of ALA's Youth Media Awards:

John Newbery Medal for the most outstanding contribution to children's literature:

Moon over Manifest (Delacorte) by Clare Vanderpool.

Four Newbery Honor Books:

Turtle in Paradise (Random) by Jennifer L. Holm

Heart of a Samurai (Amulet) by Margi Preus

Dark Emperor and Other Poems of the Night (Houghton) by Joyce Sidman, illustrated by Rick Allen

One Crazy Summer (HarperCollins) by Rita Williams-Garcia

Randolph Caldecott Medal for the most distinguished American picture book for children.

A Sick Day for Amos McGee (Roaring Brook), illustrated by Erin E. Stead, written by Philip C. Stead.

Two Caldecott Honor Books:

Dave the Potter: Artist, Poet, Slave (Little, Brown), illustrated by Bryan Collier, written by Laban Carrick Hill.

Interrupting Chicken (Candlewick) written and illustrated by David Ezra Stein

Michael L. Printz Award for excellence in literature written for young adults.

Ship Breaker (Little, Brown) by Paolo Bacigalupi

Four Printz Honor Books:

Stolen (Scholastic) by Lucy Christopher

Please Ignore Vera Dietz (Random) by A.S. King

Revolver (Roaring Brook) by Marcus Sedgwick

Nothing (Atheneum) by Janne Teller

Coretta Scott King (Author) Book Award recognizing an African American author of outstanding books for children and young adults.

One Crazy Summer (HarperCollins) by Rita Williams-Garcia

Three King Author Honor Books:

Lockdown (HarperCollins) by Walter Dean Myers

Ninth Ward (Little, Brown) by Jewell Parker Rhodes

Yummy: The Last Days of a Southside Shorty (Lee & Low) by G. Neri, illustrated by Randy DuBurke

Coretta Scott King (Illustrator) Book Award recognizing an African American illustrator of outstanding books for children and young adults.

Dave the Potter: Artist, Poet, Slave (Little, Brown), illustrated by Bryan Collier, written by Laban Carrick Hill

One King Illustrator Honor Book

Jimi Sounds Like a Rainbow: A Story of the Young Jimi Hendrix (Houghton), illustrated by Javaka Steptoe, written by Gary Golio.

Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Talent (Author) Award

Zora and Me (Candlewick) by Victoria Bond and T. R. Simon

Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Talent (Illustrator) Award

Seeds of Change (Lee & Low), illustrated by Sonia Lynn Sadler

Coretta Scott King/Virginia Hamilton Practitioner Award for Lifetime Achievement

Dr. Henrietta Mays Smith is the winner of the 2011 Coretta Scott King/Virginia Hamilton Practitioner Award for Lifetime achievement. The award pays tribute to the quality and magnitude of beloved children's author Virginia Hamilton's contributions through her literature and advocacy for children and youth.

Schneider Family Book Award for books that embody an artistic expression of the disability experience:

Award for children ages 0 to 10

The Pirate of Kindergarten (S & S) by George Ella Lyon, illustrated by Lynne Avril and wins the.

Award for ages 11-13

After Ever After (Scholastic) by Jordan Sonnenblick

Award for ages 13-18

Five Flavors of Dumb (Penguin) by Antony John

Alex Awards for the 10 best adult books that appeal to teen audiences

The Reapers Are the Angels: A Novel (Holt) by Alden Bell

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake: A Novel (Random) by Aimee Bender

The House of Tomorrow (Penguin) by Peter Bognanni

Room: A Novel (Little, Brown) by Emma Donoghue

The Vanishing of Katharina Linden: A Novel (Delacorte) by Helen Grant

The Radleys (S & S) by Matt Haig

The Lock Artist (St. Martin's Press) by Steve Hamilton

Girl in Translation (Penguin) by Jean Kwok

Breaking Night: A Memoir of Forgiveness, Survival, and My Journey from Homeless to Harvard (Hyperion) by Liz Murray

The Boy Who Couldn't Sleep and Never Had To (Random) by DC Pierson

Andrew Carnegie Medal for excellence in children's video

Paul R. Gagne and Melissa Reilly Ellard of Weston Woods, producers of "The Curious Garden," are the Carnegie Medal winners. The video is based on the book of the same name, written and illustrated by Peter Brown, and is narrated by Katherine Kellgren, with music by David Mansfield.

Laura Ingalls Wilder Award honors an author or illustrator whose books, published in the United States, have made, over a period of years, a substantial and lasting contribution to literature for children. The 2011 winner is Tomie dePaola, author and illustrator of over 200 books, including: 26 Fairmont Avenue (Putnam, 1999), The Legend of the Poinsettia (Putnam, 1994), Oliver Button Is a Sissy (Harcourt, 1979) and Strega Nona (Prentice-Hall, 1975).

Margaret A. Edwards Award honors an author, as well as a specific body of his or her work, for significant and lasting contribution to young adult literature.

Terry Pratchett is the 2011 Edwards Award winner. His books include: The amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents, The Wee Free Men, and A Hat Full of Sky (all HarperCollins).

May Hill Arbuthnot Honor Lecture Award recognizing an author, critic, librarian, historian or teacher of children's literature, who then presents a lecture at a winning host site.

Peter Sís will deliver the 2012 lecture. Born in Brno, Czechoslovakia, in 1949, Sís attended the Academy of Applied Arts in Prague and the Royal College of Art in London. He has lived in the United States since 1982. Sís was awarded the 2008 Robert F. Sibert Medal and has illustrated three Caldecott Honor books. Sís' work is admired throughout the world, and in 2003 he was named MacArthur Fellow, an honor bestowed by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

Mildred L. Batchelder Award for an outstanding children's book translated from a language other than English and subsequently published in the United States.

A Time of Miracles is the 2011 Batchelder Award winner. Originally published in French in 2009 as Le Temps des Miracles, the book was written by Anne-Laure Bondoux, translated by Y. Maudet, and published by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House Children's Books, a division of Random House, Inc.

Two Batchelder Honor Books

Departure Time (Namelos), written by Truus Matti and translated by Nancy Forest-Flier

Nothing (Atheneum) by Janne Teller and translated by Martin Aitken.

Odyssey Award for best audiobook produced for children and/or young adults, available in English in the United States

"The True Meaning of Smekday," produced by Listening Library, an imprint of Random House Audio Publishing Group, is the 2011 Odyssey Award winner. The book is written by Adam Rex and narrated by Bahni Turpin.

Four Odyssey Honor Recordings:

"Alchemy and Meggy Swann," produced by Listening Library, an imprint of the Random House Audio Publishing Group, written by Karen Cushman and narrated by Katherine Kellgren "The Knife of Never Letting Go," produced by Candlewick on Brilliance Audio, an imprint of Brilliance Audio, written by Patrick Ness and narrated by Nick Podehl

"Revolution," produced by Listening Library, an imprint of the Random House Audio Publishing Group, written by Jennifer Donnelly and narrated by Emily Janice Card and Emma Bering

"will grayson, will grayson," produced by Brilliance Audio, written by John Green and David Levithan, and narrated by MacLeod Andrews and Nick Podehl.

Pura Belpré (Author) Award honoring a Latino writer whose children's books best portray, affirm and celebrate the Latino cultural experience

The Dreamer,(Scholastic) by Pam Muñoz Ryan, illustrated by Peter Sís, is the 2011 Belpré Author Award winner.

Three Belpré Author Honor Books:

¡Olé! Flamenco (Lee & Low) written and illustrated by George Ancona

The Firefly Letters: A Suffragette's Journey to Cuba (Holt) written by Margarita Engle 90 Miles to Havana (Roaring Brook) by Enrique Flores-Galbis

Pura Belpré (Illustrator) Award honoring a Latino illustrator whose children's books best portray, affirm and celebrate the Latino cultural experience

Grandma's Gift (Walker) illustrated and written by Eric Velasquez

Three Belpré Illustrator Honor Books for illustration:

Fiesta Babies (Tricycle) illustrated by Amy Córdova, written by Carmen Tafolla

Me, Frida (Abrams), illustrated by David Diaz, written by Amy Novesky

Dear Primo: A Letter to My Cousin (Abrams), illustrated and written by Duncan Tonatiuh

Robert F. Sibert Medal for most distinguished informational book for children

Kakapo Rescue: Saving the World's Strangest Parrot, (Houghton) written by Sy Montgomery, is the 2011 Sibert Award winner. The book features photographs by Nic Bishop.

Two Sibert Honor Book:

Ballet for Martha: Making Appalachian Spring, (Roaring Brook) written by Jan Greenberg and Sandra Jordan, illustrated by Brian Floca

Lafayette and the American Revolution (Holiday House) by Russell Freedman

Stonewall Children's and Young Adult Literature Award

Almost Perfect (Random) by Brian Katcher is the winner of the 2011 Stonewall Children's and Young Adult Literature Award, given annually to English-language children's and young adult books of exceptional merit relating to the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered experience.

Four honor books were selected:

will grayson, will grayson (Penguin) by John Green and David Levithan

Love Drugged (Flux) by James Klise

Freaks and Revelations (Little, Brown) by Davida Willis Hurwin

The Boy in the Dress (Penguin) by David Walliams

Theodor Seuss Geisel Award for the most distinguished beginning reader book

Bink and Gollie (Candlewick) by Kate DiCamillo and Alison McGhee, and illustrated by Tony Fucile is the 2011 Seuss Award winner.

Two Geisel Honor Books:

Ling & Ting: Not Exactly the Same! written (Little, Brown) by Grace Lin

We Are in a Book! (Hyperion) by Mo Willems

William C. Morris Award for a debut book published by a first-time author writing for teens.

The Freak Observer (Carolrhoda) by Blythe Woolston

Four other books were finalists for the award:

Hush (Walker) by Eishes Chayil

Guardian of the Dead (Little, Brown) by Karen Healey

Hold Me Closer, Necromancer (Holt) by Lish McBride

Crossing the Tracks (S & S) by Barbara Stuber

YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults honors the best nonfiction book published for young adults during a November 1 - October 31 publishing year.

Janis Joplin: Rise Up Singing (Amulet) by Ann Angel

Four other books were finalists for the award:

They Called Themselves the K.K.K.: The Birth of an American Terrorist Group (Houghhton) by Susan Campbell Bartoletti

Spies of Mississippi: The True Story of the Spy Network that Tried to Destroy the Civil Rights Movement (National Geographic Society) by Rick Bowers

The Dark Game: True Spy Stories (Candlewick) by Paul Janeczko

Every Bone Tells a Story: Hominin Discoveries, Deductions, and Debates (Charlesbridge) by Jill Rubalcaba and Peter Robertshaw