Happy Valentine's Day, Katniss! Love, Cybils

The 2009 Cybils winners have been announced, and Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games (my absolute favorite book of 2008) is finally getting the love and appreciation it deserves, receiving the award for Young Adult Science Fiction/Fantasy! Congratulations and thank goodness. Neil Gaiman's Newbery winning The Graveyard Book received the award for Middle Grade award in the same category.

Other Young Adult winners include...

Graphic Novel: Mariko Tamaki's Emiko Superstar

Fiction: E. Lockhart's The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks

and in Middle Grades...

Graphic Novel: Shannon Hale and Dean Hale's Rapunzel's Revenge

Fiction: Siobahn Dowd The London Eye Mystery

I've been spending so much of my reading time attempting to "catch up" on YA novels that I haven't really devoted much reading time to books appropriate for Middle Grade readers, but that is something I want to change. I clearly need to hustle on reading The Graveyard Book.

It was a busy week without much time for posting, let alone reading, but I'm also proud to report that I have begun my previously mentioned (and newly named) Printz Project. I'll be reading titles in pretty much no particular order, but starting with those I'm most excited about. As I read, I'll be noting various author and protagonist characteristics and once I've read them all (this will take a while) doing some analysis on attributes related to diversity.

I'm also hoping to begin reviewing ARCs (Advance Reader Copy) of yet-to-be-released titles. Of course, I need to get my hands on some good ARCs. I'm working on it. The teen librarian at my library has been kind enough to share a few of her ARCs with me. Sadly, the one that I read was sooo horribly campy and ridiculously overdone and foolish that I refuse to name it or review it. I can only assume the author and publisher are new to the English language and/or think so little of teenage boys (target audience) that they figured stringing together any old plot line would make a good book. Wrong. Very, very wrong.