May 312016
The YA Book Prize 2016!
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Last year the book industry’s trade magazine The Bookseller created the YA Book Prize to credit excellence in writing for Young Adults and ‘books that engage with a youth audience’ (see the shortlist nominees and winner here). Now in it’s second year the prize will be awarded at the Hay Festival in their ‘Hay YA’ programme on the 2nd June. UPDATE: Now awarded |
| With thanks to the Bookseller and publicists FMcM Associates we met some of this year’s nominees at the Draper’s Arms at their YA Authors event on the 26th April and thought we’d share a little of that cracking event and some photos taken by The Bookseller’s Mr Patrick Clarke (see below). You can find full details of all this year’s shortlisted titles below, and / or scroll straight down and discover the winner! |
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So hard to predict who’s going to win. Last year’s winner Louise O’Neill is in the running again for one thing. Sarah Crossan has been shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal, while Frances Hardinge’s The Lie Tree has already grabbed some awards and continual attention. Secrets and revelations also very much feature in the subject matter of Holly Bourne, Jenny Downham and Catherine Johnson’s nominated titles.
| Here at Carabas we in no respect limit ourselves to the speculative or fantastical, though we’re certainly here to champion it. Amongst this year’s titles of this nature there’s Melinda Salisbury’s The Sin Eater’s Daughter which seems to be a dark romance featuring an incarnate goddess of death(!). We had chance to read Patrick Ness’s SUPERB The Rest of Us Just Live Here and can’t recommend that highly enough. Like Patrick, William Sutcliffe is always a name to watch out for who’s offers up some dystopian YA in Concentr8. Patrick was in attendance at the drinks event along with Lisa Williamson who’s The Art of Being Normal is based on her own work counselling young transgender people. We had a great chat with Lisa then and since, along with fellow David Fickling authors Andrew Prentice and Jonathan Weil whose YA titles Black Arts and Devil’s Blood have just been reissued and released respectively! * A fantastic shortlist for a fantastic prize – and it was a great night to attend. A big thanks and shout out to the Bookseller’s Charlotte Eyre and Mandy Groves for organising it, and Patrick Clarke for the pictures – great to meet you guys as well! |
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Read on for more on the nominated titles from the publishers with links on and good luck to all the nominees!
Tim Bayley
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Pub |
Title |
Author |
ISBN |
Bind |
RRP |
Publisher |
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Aug-15 |
AM I NORMAL YET? |
Holly Bourne |
9781409590309 |
PB |
£7.99 |
Usborne |
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All Evie wants is to be normal. And now that she’s almost off her meds and at a new college where no one knows her as the-girl-who-went-nuts, there’s only one thing left to tick off her list…But relationships can mess with anyone’s head – something Evie’s new friends Amber and Lottie know only too well. The trouble is, if Evie won’t tell them her secrets, how can they stop her making a huge mistake? |
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Aug-15 |
ONE |
Sarah Crossan |
9781408863114 |
HB |
£10.99 |
Bloomsbury |
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Jun-16 |
9781408827215 |
PB |
£7.99 |
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Grace and Tippi are twins – conjoined twins. And their lives are about to change. No longer able to afford homeschooling, they must venture into the world – a world of stares, sneers and cruelty. Will they find more than that at school? Can they find real friends? And what about love? But what neither Grace or Tippi realises is that a heart-wrenching decision lies ahead. A decision that could tear them apart. One that will change their lives even more than they ever imagined…From Carnegie Medal shortlisted author Sarah Crossan, this moving and beautifully crafted novel about identity, sisterhood and love ultimately asks one question: what does it mean to want and have a soulmate? Shortlisted for The CILIP Carnegie Medal in 2016 |
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Sep-15 |
UNBECOMING |
Jenny Downham |
9781910200643 |
HB |
£14.99 |
David Fickling |
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Jun-16 |
9781910989029 |
PB |
£7.99 |
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Katie’s life is falling apart: her mum’s controlling, her dad’s run off, she’s in love with someone whose identity she can’t reveal and now her estranged grandmother’s turned up on the doorstep and Katie’s expected to take care of her. Soon Katie discovers she’s not the only one in her family hiding the truth. If she’s going to get her life back together, she’s going to have to expose everyone’s deepest secrets – including her own. |
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May-15 |
THE LIE TREE |
Frances Hardinge |
9781447264101 |
PB |
£7.99 |
Pan MacMillan |
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Winner of the Costa Book of the Year 2015 * Winner of the Costa Children’s Book Award 2015*The Lie Tree is a wonderfully evocative and atmospheric novel by Frances Hardinge, award-winning author of Cuckoo Song and Fly By Night.
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Jul-15 |
THE CURIOUS TALE OF THE LADY CARABOO |
Catherine Johnson |
9780552557634 |
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£7.99 |
Random House Children’s |
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Out of the blue arrives an exotic young woman from a foreign land. Fearless and strong, ‘Princess’ Caraboo rises above the suspicions of the wealthy family who take her in. But who is the real Caraboo? In a world where it seems everyone is playing a role, could she be an ordinary girl with a tragic past? Is she a confidence trickster? Or is she the princess everyone wants her to be? This the tale of the ultimate historical hustle, steeped in delectable romance. Whoever Caraboo turns out to be, she will steal your heart… |
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Aug-15 |
THE REST OF US JUST LIVE HERE |
Patrick Ness |
9781406331165 |
HB |
£12.99 |
Walker Books |
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May-15 |
9781406365566 |
PB |
£7.99 |
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Award-winning writer Patrick Ness’s bold and irreverent novel powerfully asks what if you weren’t the Chosen One? The one who’s supposed to fight the zombies, or the soul-eating ghosts, or whatever this new thing is, with the blue lights and the death? What if you were like Mikey? Who just wants to graduate and go to prom and maybe finally work up the courage to ask Henna out before someone goes and blows up the high school. Again. Because sometimes there are problems bigger than this week’s end of the world and sometimes you just have to find the extraordinary in your ordinary life. Even if your best friend might just be the God of mountain lions… An exceptional novel from the author praised by John Green as “an insanely beautiful writer”. |
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Sep-15 |
ASKING FOR IT |
Louise O’Neill |
9781784295868 |
HB |
£12.99 |
Quercus |
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Jul-16 |
9781784293208 |
PB |
£7.99 |
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A soul-shattering novel that will leave your emotions raw. This story will haunt me forever. Everyone should read it’ Guardian In a small town where everyone knows everyone, Emma O’Donovan is different. She is the special one – beautiful, popular, powerful. And she works hard to keep it that way. Until that night …Now, she’s an embarrassment. Now, she’s just a slut. Now, she is nothing. And those pictures – those pictures that everyone has seen – mean she can never forget. For fans of Caitlin Moran, Marian Keyes and Jodi Picoult. BOOK OF THE YEAR AT THE IRISH BOOK AWARDS 2015. The award-winning, bestselling novel about the life-shattering impact of sexual assault, rape and how victims are treated. |
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Feb-15 |
THE SIN EATER’S DAUGHTER |
Melinda Salisbury |
9781407147635 |
PB |
£6.99 |
Scholastic |
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Seventeen-year-old Twylla lives in the castle. But although she’s engaged to the prince, Twylla isn’t exactly a member of the court. She’s the executioner.*As the Goddess embodied, Twylla instantly kills anyone she touches. Each month she’s taken to the prison and forced to lay her hands on those accused of treason. No one will ever love a girl with murder in her veins. Even the prince, whose royal blood supposedly makes him immune to Twylla’s fatal touch, avoids her company. But then a new guard arrives, a boy whose easy smile belies his deadly swordsmanship. And unlike the others, he’s able to look past Twylla’s executioner robes and see the girl, not the Goddess. Yet Twylla’s been promised to the prince, and knows what happens to people who cross the queen.*However, a treasonous secret is the least of Twylla’s problems. The queen has a plan to destroy her enemies, a plan that requires a stomach-churning, unthinkable sacrifice. Will Twylla do what it takes to protect her kingdom? Or will she abandon her duty in favour of a doomed love? |
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Aug-15 |
CONCENTR8 |
William Sutcliffe |
9781408866238 |
HB |
£12.99 |
Bloomsbury |
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Jun-16 |
9781408866245 |
PB |
£7.99 |
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In a future London, Concentr8 is a prescription drug intended to help kids with ADD. Soon every troubled teen is on it. It makes sense, doesn’t it? Keep the undesirable elements in line. Keep people like us safe from people like them. What’s good for society is good for everyone.*Troy, Femi, Lee, Karen and Blaze have been taking Concentr8 as long as they can remember. They’re not exactly a gang, but Blaze is their leader, and Troy has always been his quiet, watchful sidekick – the only one Blaze really trusts. They’re not looking for trouble, but one hot summer day, when riots break out across the city, they find it. What makes five kids pick a man seemingly at random – a nobody, he works in the housing department, doesn’t even have a good phone – hold a knife to his side, take him to a warehouse and chain him to a radiator? They’ve got a hostage, but don’t really know what they want, or why they’ve done it. And across the course of five tense days, with a journalist, a floppy-haired mayor, a police negotiator, and the sinister face of the pharmaceutical industry, they – and we – begin to understand why…*This is a book about what how we label children. It’s about how kids get lost and failed by the system. It’s about how politicians manipulate them. Gripping and controversial reading for fans of Malorie Blackman and Patrick Ness. |
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Jan-15 |
THE ART OF BEING NORMAL |
Lisa Williamson |
9781910200322 |
HB |
£10.99 |
David Fickling |
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Jan-16 |
9781910200520 |
PB |
£7.99 |
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Two boys. Two secrets. David Piper has always been an outsider. His parents think he’s gay. The school bully thinks he’s a freak. Only his two best friends know the real truth – David wants to be a girl. On the first day at his new school Leo Denton has one goal – to be invisible. Attracting the attention of the most beautiful girl in year 11 is definitely not part of that plan. When Leo stands up for David in a fight, an unlikely friendship forms. But things are about to get messy. Because at Eden Park School secrets have a funny habit of not staying secret for long … |
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And the winner is…
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Sarah Crossan’s ONE! |
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| The Bookseller on Twitter: @thebookseller |
| The YA Book Prize on Twitter: @yabookprize |
| The Hay Festival on Twitter: @hayfestival |
| FMcM Associates on Twitter: @FMcMAssociates |
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Check out our portal page to discover more great books publishing January to June 2016 here!
Or click one of the below for our top fantastical adults & kids YA, graphic novels and non-fiction…
| JANUARY | FEBRUARY | MARCH | APRIL | MAY | JUNE |
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