The Center for Children’s Books at the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana is pleased to announce that the annual Gryphon Award for Children’s Literature has been given to Michelle Edwards for her easy-to-read book, Stinky Stern Forever (Harcourt, 2005), illustrated by the author.

Three honor books, representing a diversity of styles, were also named: Jigsaw Pony by Jessie Haas (Greenwillow, 2005), illustrated by Ying-Hwa Hu; Babymouse: Queen of the World! written and illustrated by Jennifer L. Holm and Matthew Holm (Random House, 2005)(illustrator interview); and Chameleon, Chameleon by Joy Cowley (Scholastic, 2005), illustrated with photographs by Nic Bishop.

The Gryphon Award, which comes with a $1,000 prize, is given annually to the author of an outstanding English language work of fiction or non-fiction for which the primary audience is children in Kindergarten through Grade 4. The title chosen best exemplifies those qualities that successfully bridge the gap in difficulty between books for reading aloud to children and books for practiced readers.

The Gryphon Award was started in 2004 as a way to focus attention on transitional reading, an area of literature for youth that, despite being crucial to the successful transition of children from new readers to independent lifelong readers, does not receive the critical recognition it deserves.

The award is sponsored by the Center for Children’s Books at the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign and funded by the Center for Children’s Books Outreach Endowment Fund. Income from the endowed fund supports outreach activities for the Center for Children’s Books in general and the Gryphon Award for children’s literature. Gifts may be made to the Fund.

See more information about the Center and the award.

Cynsational News & Links

“I Write What I Am” by Vicki Cobb from the Children’s Book Council. “Vicki Cobb is the well-known author of more than eighty highly entertaining nonfiction books for children.”

Non-fiction Submissions Editors Love with Cricket Group editors Heather Delabre and Paula Morrow from the Institute of Children’s Literature.

Teen Angels: a bestselling novelist [Libba Bray] on why boys aren’t the only ones who like sci-fi, and how writing helped her survive a tough adolescence by Nicole Joseph from Newsweek. Note: I learned of this link on Big A little a. Read a Cynsations interview with Libba Bray.