Cybils

This week the Children's and YA Bloggers' Literary Awards announced their 2007 finalists. As an open process for awards, it provides a good cross-section of titles. Just going through the list has made me check a bunch of things in our catalog and add to my hold queue.

Kudos to all the organizers and judges -- just reviewing the list of contributors and following some of their blog links is an education in itself.

About the Cybils:

...The Newbery Awards seemed too elitist and the Quills, well, not enough so. Was there a middle ground, an annual award that would recognize both a book's merits and popularity?

The Cybils found that middle ground. The public nominates their favorite children's books from 2007 in seven categories: Picture Books; Non-fiction Picture Books; Middle Grade fiction; Poetry; Young Adult fiction; Non-fiction (YA/MG); and Graphic Novels. Nominations open on October 1.

When we say "the public," we mean it. Anyone with an e-mail address may nominate one book per category. Then groups of bloggers get to work. First, a nominating committee reads ALL the titles in a given category. After nearly two arduous months, this committee winnows the nominees to five finalists. A second committee of bloggers considers the shortlist and, after much debate, chooses the best of the best for 2007.

Because The Cybils is a blogger-run, blogger-inspired awards process, we operate with the expectation of openness and transparency.