The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) has announced the winners of the 2005 ASPCA Henry Bergh Children’s Book Awards. Named in honor of ASPCA founder Henry Bergh, the annual awards recognize books based on their exemplary handling of subject matter pertaining to animals and the environment. The winning authors will be honored at a ceremony at the American Library Association‘s Annual Conference in New Orleans on June 26.
This year, Norman Bridwell, author of the Clifford The Big Red Dog series, will be honored with the first-ever ASPCA Roger Caras Achievement Award. The award honors an outstanding individual or organization that has inspired children and made a contribution to the animal community through literature, actions or other means.
“Community and education are cornerstones of every ASPCA awareness campaigns,” said Ed Sayres, president & CEO, ASPCA. “Therefore, it is only fitting that for this year’s Bergh Book Awards we gather in New Orleans, a city that was pushed to its breaking point only to begin to rebuild due to its cooperative spirit, to honor the finest works in children’s literature and recognize Norman Bridwell for the contribution he has made to all of our childhood’s with Clifford The Big Red Dog.”
This year’s award-winning titles include the stirring historical story of a heroic and determined horse that refuses to be put out to pasture after his firefighting days come to an end; a book, in simple words and delightful illustrations, that teaches the basics of kindness to animals; a book that brings real-life gangly, delicate baby birds to life on the page in meticulously detailed, Audubon-like drawings; the inspiring story of a boy that with the help of his dog takes on the challenges of uprooting, making friends, and facing difficult people and life events; and a tale based on the true story of a charming penguin family living in New York City’s Central Park Zoo that are “a little bit different” that gets the chance they deserve at having their own family.
This year’s winners and honorees include:
Non-Fiction Companion Animals
Winner, 2005 ASPCA Henry Bergh Children’s Book Award: Tails Are Not for Pulling (set) by Elizabeth Verdick (Free Spirit Publishing).
Winner, 2005 ASPCA Henry Bergh Children’s Book Honor: ER Vets: Life in an Animal Emergency Room by Donna M. Jackson (Houghton Mifflin Company).
Non-Fiction Environment and Ecology
Winner, 2005 ASPCA Henry Bergh Children’s Book Award: Scientists in the Field series: Gorilla Doctors: Saving Endangered Great Apes by Pamela S. Turner and The Prairie Builders: Reconstructing America’s Lost Grasslands by Sneed B. Collard III. (Houghton Mifflin Company).
Non-Fiction Humane Heroes
Winner, 2005 ASPCA Henry Bergh Children’s Book Award: The Least of These: Wild Baby Bird Rescue Stories by Joan Harris (West Winds Press).
Fiction Humane Heroes
Winner, 2005 ASPCA Henry Bergh Children’s Book Award: Magnus at the Fire by Jennifer Armstrong, illustrated by Owen Smith (Simon & Schuster).
Fiction Companion Animals
Winner, 2005 ASPCA Henry Bergh Children’s Book Award: Dog Sense by Sneed B. Collard III. (Peachtree).
A Dog’s Life: The Autobiography of a Stray by Ann M. Martin (Scholastic).
Fiction Environment and Ecology
Winner, 2005 ASPCA Henry Bergh Children’s Book Award: And Tango Makes Three by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell (Simon & Schuster)(excerpt).
Poetry
Winner, 2005 ASPCA Henry Bergh Children’s Book Award: So, What’s It Like to Be a Cat? by Karla Kuskin, illustrated by Betsy Lewin (Simon & Schuster).
Young Adult
Winner, 2005 ASPCA Henry Bergh Young Adult Award: Defiance by Valerie Hobbs (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)(excerpt).
Illustration
Winner, 2005 ASPCA Henry Bergh Illustration Award: Earth Mother by Ellen Jackson, illustrated by Leo & Diane Dillon (Walker & Company).
Winner, 2005 ASPCA Henry Bergh Illustration Honor: Cool Time Song by Carole Lexa Schaefer, illustrated by Pierr Morgan (Penguin Putnam).
Along with the ASPCA Henry Bergh Children’s Book Awards, additional titles may be presented with the ASPCA Henry Bergh Children’s Book Honor, created to spotlight books that deserve recognition but are not selected as award recipients. To qualify for consideration for the ASPCA Henry Bergh Children’s Book Awards books must be written in English; written for an audience of children up to and including the age of twelve (age seventeen for the young adult award); be works of fiction, non-fiction, or collections of short stories, essays, or poetry; and be published between January and December of the previous year. Self-published books are eligible, provided that the author/publisher also publishes titles by other authors.