Newbery Award

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The Newbery Medal was named for eighteenth-century British bookseller John Newbery. It is awarded annually by the Association for Library Service to Children, a division of the American Library Association.

“The most distinguished contribution to American Literature for Children” is what it says on the medal itself. Imagine how the author feels to have a book described like that!

When the Committee called me in 1990 to tell me that Number the Stars had been awarded the medal, they found me at my desk, where I usually am. In 1994, they couldn’t find me. I was in Antarctica! Eventually they reached me by sending a radiogram. So I was feeling on top of the world, though, technically speaking, I was actually at the bottom. You can read more about the Newbery Medal at the ALSC’s website.

Click for a list of awards I have been given
  • Newbery Medal (1990 and 1994)
  • Margaret A. Edwards Award for Lifetime Contribution to Young Adult Literature
  • Regina Medal
  • National Jewish Book Award
  • Boston Globe-Horn Book Award (1987 and 1993)
  • Sydney Taylor Book Award
  • Hope S. Dean Award
  • New England Book Award
  • Chicago Tribune Young Adult Fiction Prize
  • Hans Christian Andersen Award nominee (United States)
  • Golden Kite Award
  • International Reading Association Children’s Book Award
  • International Board on Books for Young People Honor List
  • Kerlan Award
  • The Children’s Book Committee Bank Street College of Education The Outstanding Children’s Books of the Year
  • Parents’ Choice Gold
  • Little D Award
  • 2011 May Hill Arbuthnot Lecture
  • Lamstein Lecture at the University of Michigan
  • 2001 Zena Sutherland Lecture
  • Anne Carroll Moore Lecture
  • Frances Clarke Sayers Lecture

State Awards

  • Arizona Young Read’s Awards
  • Arkansas – Charlie May Simon Children’s Book Award
  • Georgia Children’s Book Awards
  • Illinois – Rebecca Caudill Young Readers’ Book Award
  • Indiana –Young Hoosier Book Award
  • Outstanding Pennsylvania Author Award
  • Iowa Children’s Choice Awards & Iowa Teen Award
  • Kansas – William Allen White Children’s Book Award
  • Maine Student Book Award
  • Maryland Children’s Book Award
  • Massachusetts Children’s Book Award
  • Missouri – Mark Twain Award
  • Nebraska – Golden Sower Award
  • Nevada Young Readers Awards
  • New Jersey – Garden State Children’s Book Awards & Garden State Teen Book Awards
  • Oklahoma – Sequoyah Children’s and Young Adult Book Awards
  • Pacific Northwest – Young Reader’s Choice Awards
  • Pennsylvania Young Reader’s Choice Awards
  • South Dakota – Prairie Pasque Awards
  • Vermont – Dorothy Canfield Fisher Children’s Book Award
  • Wisconsin – Golden Archer Award
  • Wyoming – Soaring Eagle Book Award