Congratulations to …
The tension is over for another year. With the announcement this morning of the winners and honour books in the Children’s Book Council of Australia awards, the speculation has ended and the debates begin. Did your favourites get the nod?
Congratulations to all authors and illustrators who have been acknowledged in Australia’s most prestigious children’s book award in the following categories:
Book of the Year – Older Readers
(note that these titles are for mature readers)
Winner : Sonya Hartnett – The Ghost’s Child
Honour Books: John Heffernan – Marty’s Shadow and David Metzenthen – Black Water
Book of the Year – Younger Readers
Winner: Carole Wilkinson – Dragon Moon
Honour Books: Sherryl Clark – Sixth Grade Style Queen (Not!) (illustrated by Elissa Christian)
and Odo Hirsch – Amelia Dee and the Peacock Lamp
Book of the Year – Early Childhood
Winner: Aaron Blabey – Pearl Barley and Charlie Parsley
Honour Books: Mike Dumbleton – Cat (illustrated by Craig Smith) and Margaret Wild – Lucy Goosey (illustrated by Ann James)
Picture Book of the Year
(note that some of these titles are for mature readers)
Winner: Matt Ottley – Requiem for a Beast
Honour Books: Li Cunxin – The Peasant Prince (illustrated by Anne Spudvilas) and Colin Thompson – Dust (illustrated by Colin Thompson and 13 other illustrators)
Eve Pownall Award for Information Books
Winner: Frances Watts – Parsley Rabbit’s Book About Books (illustrated by David Legge)
Honour Books: Kaz Cooke – Girl Stuff : Your Full-on Guide to the Teen Years and Peter Macinnis – Kokoda Track : 101 Days
Crichton Award for New Illustrators
Winner: Anna Walker for Santa’s Aussie Holiday (written by Maria Farrer)
August 21st, 2008 at 6:39 am
I think Requiem for a beast should not have won. My choices were either Dust or The Island by Armin Greder. Requiem is too pretentious, a work written to be clever and literary, and all I could do was ask myself “Who will actually pick this up and read it?” I also think it is time to have two picture book categories: one for older readers (e.g. Dust, Requiem, The Island and several excellent works from last year) and one for younger readers – so that the traditional audience for picture books is not sidelined. I know Brian Banana Duck Sunchine Yellow was pooh-poohed last year, but kids love it – so maybe we need a second category.
August 21st, 2008 at 8:14 am
Thanks for your thoughts. What do others think of the suggestion of two PB categories? The Early Childhood category is inevitably a picture book for little people, so is this the ‘traditional audience’ that this post refers to? In recent years the Picture Book of the Year has been awarded to books for a much more mature readership and could also have qualified for the Older Readers category. Both The Arrival and Requiem for a Beast beg the questions of what is a picture book and who is the audience, but I think Dust and The Island also do this. There is no doubt that Requiem is not an easy text, but as with all complex texts readers are rewarded for the effort they put into unpacking them. I am aware of several schools that are using it successfully as a class text but it is now out of print as the publishers also didn’t know what to do with it – it certainly defies easy categorisation. I think this is a work of genius (that has taken the same gestation time as The Arrival, another work of genius) – there are not many in the field of children’s literature who are author, illustrator and composer and equally talented in alll three fields. Requiem is a work that has attracted fierce criticism and glowing praise. While it may appear pretentious and overly literary to some readers, to hear Matt Ottley speak about it is to know that it has come from the heart of one of the least pretentious practitioners in children’s lit. Please keep the discussion going – there is so much to talk about!
August 21st, 2008 at 9:50 am
We CAN do both! Alternating Informatiom Literacy skills lessons with the promotion of reading in Literacy Skills lessons – using the SLAV P-6 CD Rom outlines – works well at my Prep-12 school. All P-4 classes visit us weekly (5 & 6 ) fortnightly, and in a teaching program developed in consultation with the classroom teachers, we provide relevant lessons that ensure that our role in the school is valued. Year 7 classes visit once a fortnight to be introduced to what’s new and what we hope will engage them with reading in a positive way. This program involves the parents as well by asking them to minitor home reading habits. We will only become redundant, as a profession, when we stop trying to make a difference, when we stop listening to the research which tells us that by working in both these areas we Do make a difference.