Now I know I’m a curmudgeon, or there’s something missing in my critical analysis faculty, or something. Again I am in complete disagreement with both the Printz committee and the Cybils panelists, and I don’t understand what it is that I don’t get.
The Michael L. Printz Award is an award for a book that exemplifies literary excellence in young adult literature. It is named for a Topeka, Kansas school librarian who was a long-time active member of the Young Adult Library Services Association. The award is sponsored by Booklist, a publication of the American Library Association. The winner of the 2009 Michael Printz Award: Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta.
I read this book. Well, again, I read half of it. Brown Bear Daughter read a few chapters. We (independently) came to the same conclusion: HUH?
We didn’t understand what was going on, whether the teens in the book were supposed to be for real or not, why they were marking out territory and having what seemed like gang wars, and where all the adults were. My unmediated reaction before I found out about the Printz: “I made it about 100 pages into this Lord of the Flies goes to an Australian boarding school novel before I finally realized that I couldn’t figure out what was going on nor did I care. The boarding school had adults, but apparently they were all out to lunch except for one named Hannah who disappeared about fifty pages in, and the kids were busily fighting some kind of gang wars but out in the countryside instead of the inner city.”
As for honor books, I really liked The Disreputable History of Frankie-Landau Banks by E. Lockhart. Semicolon review here. (Can I redeem my tarnished credentials with that one?)
The other honor books I haven’t read:
The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume II, The Kingdom on the Waves, by M.T. Anderson, published by Candlewick Press.
Nation, by Terry Pratchett, published by HarperCollins Children’s Books, a division of HarperCollins Publishers.
Tender Morsels, by Margo Lanagan, published by Alfred A. Knopf, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
Dare I try them? And Suzanne Collins’s The Hunger Games didn’t win anything? What a disappointment.
You will not and are not supposed to understand what’s going on in Jellicoe Road until the end; I loved it, but I can see how that could be frustrating. It’s excellent if you finish it, though.
I noticed you mentioned that Hunger Games didn’t get a even a nod. I hadn’t thought about it until you mentioned it, but now (even though I liked The Graveyard Book) I’m upset. Maybe it will still be eligible for the 2009? I have no idea what the date range is, but a book published in Oct. -Dec. seems at a disadvantage if the schedule is January to January.
Nope, books are only eligible in the calendar year they’re published.
I thought The Hunger Games was a great book, but I don’t think it fulfills the “distinguished” criteria for either the Newbery or the Printz. Happily, it’s getting so much word-of-mouth that lots and lots of people are going to read it anyway.
I just started Jellicoe Road and am a little relieved to know that it’s OK to be confused right now. I really liked both Nation and Tender Morsels.