The Printz Award

2012 Printz Award Winner

Most readers know about two big book awards presented by the American Library Association - the Newbery Award and the Caldecott Award. As the years have passed, a number of new awards and selected lists of best books for youth have evolved.

In 1999, the Young Adult Library Services Association (aka YALSA,) a division of the American Library Association created an award for the best book for young adult reading audiences. The first book to receive the Printz Award was Walter Dean Myers's chilling novel, Monster. Each subsequent year, a Printz Award Winner and several Honor Books are named. For a full list of all the Printz Award Winners and Honor Books, check out amazon.com. 

This year's winner, Where Things Come Back, was also the recipient of the Morris Award, which is given for the best debut novel for young adults. This is the first time that one book has won both awards! The twenty-eight year-old author, John Cory Whaley, has crafted a multi-level, bittersweet story of two brothers, a small town, and an endangered woodpecker. To read a bit more about the story, click here. To see the catalog record, click here.