THE CYBILS ARE HERE! THE CYBILS ARE HERE!

For the past three years, I have had the honor of serving as a panelist for the CYBILS awards. In 2008, I was on the YA nonfiction panel. In 2009 and 2010 I did nonfiction picture books. We started out with about one hundred books in mid-October (I think the exact number was 112) and whittled it down to seven of our favorites (NOT an easy decision!). A second round of judges had the incredibly difficult job of selecting the best book from those seven books.

As I was frantically reading nonfiction picture books, other panels were reading in other genre- picture books, easy readers, poetry, graphic novels, intermediate grade novels, YA novels. I have loved, loved, loved serving on the committee. There is nothing more fun than getting to talk books with extraordinary teachers, librarians, and booksellers from all over the world.

Anyway, today the winners were announced! THE EXTRAORDINARY MARK TWAIN, ACCORDING TO SUSY won the nonfiction picture books. Some of my other personal favorites won too- these- included INTERRUPTING CHICKEN (fiction picture books), YUMMY (graphic novels), and ORIGAMI YODA (intermediate grade novels).

Head over to the CYBILS website to check out all the other winners!