If you're a YA fan looking for the next big read, your search stops here. The 2019 National Book Award for Young People's Literature longlist is comprised of 10 must-read young adult novels, story collections, poems, and memoirs. If you dig YA, you're going to want to read them all. Here's your peek at the 10 longlisted titles, one of which will receive the 2019 National Book Award for Young People's Literature on Nov. 20.
Since 1950, the National Book Foundation has recognized the greatest achievements in American letters with the National Book Awards. Today, there are five primary categories — Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Translated Literature, and Young People's Literature — and the longlist for each of them is set to premiere sometime the week of Sep. 16. The shortlist of five finalists will be released on Oct. 8, and the winners are to be announced on Nov. 20.
The winner of the 2019 National Book Award for Young People's Literature will join a laundry list of great writers and books that includes Elizabeth Acevedo's The Poet X (2018), Jacqueline Woodson's Brown Girl Dreaming (2014), and Thanhha Lai's Inside Out and Back Again (2011). Several of this year's nominees were previously nominated for the award, and one, The Thing About Luck author Cynthia Kadohata, has won it outright.
Check out the 2019 National Book Award for Young People's Literature longlist below, and share your predicted winner with us on Twitter!
'The Undefeated' by Kwame Alexander and Kadir Nelson
In this illustrated poem, Kwame Alexander and Kadir Nelson track centuries of Black American life, from the transatlantic slave trade to the Black Lives Matter movement.
'Shout' by Laurie Halse Anderson
In her new memoir, Speak author Laurie Halse Anderson tells the story of her own sexual assault, and explores the shift in public perceptions of sex crimes since Speak's publication in 1999.
'Pet' by Akwaeke Emezi
Living in a city previously plagued by monsters, all Jam and Redemption have ever known is peace. But when a strange-looking creature from one of her mother's paintings comes to life, Jam discovers that there may still be monsters lurking in her hometown.
'A Place to Belong' by Cynthia Kadohata
After her home country forcibly relocated and then deported her family, a Japanese American girl named Hanako must adjust to life in post-Hiroshima Japan, where her parents have brought her to live with her grandparents.
'Patron Saints of Nothing' by Randy Ribay
A rising college freshman's summer is upended in this lauded YA novel. Accepted to the University of Michigan, Jay has few big plans for his last summer before college. But the death of his cousin, Jun, in Duterte's war on drugs causes him to drop everything in order to travel to the Philippines to find out what has happened.
'1919: The Year That Changed America' by Martin W. Sandler
Following the end of World War I, a wave of activism swept over the U.S. Martin W. Sandler's 1919: The Year That Changed America examines the actions of the women's suffrage, labor, and temperance movements in that year, and their impact on the modern day.
'Out of Salem' by Hal Schrieve
Once a powerful witch, Z, a genderqueer teenager, can no longer perform magic, following the car accident that killed their parents and left them zombified. Rejected by their friends and family, Z falls in with their fellow outcast, Aysel, who must keep her lycanthropy a secret. But when someone is murdered, and werewolves appear to be behind the killing, Z and Aysel find themselves even more distrusted by their community.
'Kiss Number 8' by Colleen AF Venable and Ellen T. Crenshaw
In this YA graphic novel, a girl comes to terms with her sexuality — and, by extension, her feelings for her best friend — after discovering that her family has connections to the transgender rights movement.
'Thirteen Doorways, Wolves Behind Them All' by Laura Ruby (Oct. 1)
Out on Oct. 1, Bone Gap author Laura Ruby's new novel examines the lives of two sisters abandoned by their father in the days leading up to World War II. Thirteen Doors, Wolves Behind Them All centers on Frankie and Toni, but is narrated by a ghost named Pearl, who tells her story alongside that of the sisters.
'Look Both Ways: A Tale Told in Ten Blocks' by Jason Reynolds (Oct. 8)
In this new book from Long Way Down author Jason Reynolds, the stories of 10 schoolmates weave together to paint a portrait of the day-to-day lives of contemporary youth.
