The First Annual Children's Book Awards, Blog Edition

I have an exciting message for all of you kid lit bloggers out there!

This month we've seen a spate of book awards, some of which have left us wondering: couldn't we, the intelligent, savvy members of the kidlitosphere do better? Or, at least, differently?

So, we're inaugurating our own book awards, honoring books published in English for children in 2006. The idea is to identify books that are excellent in quality and are also exciting to readers. We want books that you can't put down. Books that you lose yourself in. Books that you love so much that you want to share them with everyone that you know. You, fellow bloggers, can help us to come up with these books, and to come up with winners in each category.

Anne Boles Levy, of Book Buds, will launch a site this week and administer the awards process. To read all about the new Children's Book Awards, head on over to Big A little a, where Kelly Herold will have the full scoop. To suggest a name for the Book Awards, leave a comment with Anne at Book Buds.

This site will be the administrating blog for the Young Adult Fiction category. Do you run a blog about young adult books, are you a young adult author who blogs, or do you run a general book blog? Then volunteer to serve on the YA book nominating committee or on the YA judging committee. Here are the duties of each committee:

Nominating: Nominating committees of five members will narrow the recommendations (everyone with web access can make nominations) down to a shortlist of five books per category.  A list of all recommendations will be received by the nominating committee on November 21, 2006. The shortlists will be announced January 1, 2007. Discussion groups will be set up for each committee to discuss the shortlists.

Judging: Judging committees of five members, different and non-overlapping from those serving on the nominating committees, will decide which title per category will win the Children's Book Award, Blog edition. The winners will be announced January 15, 2007. To serve on this committee, keep in mind you will have to read five books during a very busy time of the year and discuss them with the other members of the committee.

Please comment if you would like to volunteer for the YA fiction nominating committee or the YA fiction judging community. If you prefer, you can email me directly at books@jkrconsult.com. When leaving your comment, please list a second choice category also just in case we have too many volunteers for Young Adult Fiction. The other categories are: Picture Books, Middle Grade Fiction, Fantasy/Sci Fi, Non Fiction (Picture Book), Non Fiction (MG/YA), Graphic Novels, and Poetry

Personally, I'm most interested in being on the judging committee for either Young Adult Fiction or Middle Grade Fiction, wherever I'm needed most. What's great about the kidlitosphere is that we cover a wide diversity of interests, and I'm sure that we'll get all of the categories covered. Just let me know if you'd like to participate.