The New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults are trying something new this year with an expanded Children’s Choice Awards.  Children in schools from around the country have been given the opportunity to select their own list of finalists for the 2015 Children’s Choice Award.  It’s an awesome opportunity and something that I wish I had had the chance to do when I was at school.  Read all about it below and check out the finalist list for the 2015 Children’s Choice Award.  I think it’s a great list and it’s good to see the difference between the childrens’ finalists and those of the judges.

New Children’s Choice finalists’ list now decided by children

Children’s choices rule in the newly revamped Children’s Choice Awards in 2015. This year, more than 6,500 children and young adults from 106 schools from throughout the country have selected their own finalists from the 149 books submitted for the Awards. In previous years, the Children’s Choice was made from the judges’ finalist list, rather than from the full number of submitted books.

Nicola Legat, chair of the New Zealand Book Awards Trust, says, ”We wanted to hand this section over to the children – for them to decide which books they engaged with and which books they loved, rather than making their choices based on the criteria the judges used to make their decisions. Of the 20 books chosen as Children’s Choice finalists, seven match those on the judges’ list, so we’re very much looking forward to seeing the results of round two of the children’s vote over the next seven weeks.”

Voting for the Children’s Choice opens on Tuesday, 9 June and closes on Friday, 31 July. This year there will be a winner in each category.

Picture Books

• I am not a Worm by Scott Tulloch – Scholastic NZ
• Little Red Riding Hood ….Not Quite  by Yvonne Morrison & Donovan Bixley – Scholastic NZ
• The Anzac Puppy by Peter Millett & Trish Bowles – Scholastic NZ
• Doggy Ditties from A to Z by Jo van Dam & Myles Lawford – Scholastic NZ
• Marmaduke Duck on the Wide Blue Seas by Juliette MacIver & Sarah Davis – Scholastic NZ

Junior Fiction

• Dragon Knight: Fire! by Kyle Mewburn & Donovan Bixley – Scholastic NZ
• The Island of Lost Horses by Stacy Gregg – HarperCollins
• How I Alienated My Grandma by Suzanne Main – Scholastic NZ
• 1914 – Riding into War by Susan Brocker – Scholastic NZ
• My New Zealand Story: Canterbury Quake by Desna Wallace – Scholastic NZ

Non-fiction

• New Zealand Sports Hall of Fame: 25 Kiwi Champions by Maria Gill & Marco Ivancic – New Holland Publishers
• Maori Art for Kids by Julie Noanoa & Norm Heke – Craig Potton Publishing
• The Letterbox Cat & other poems by Paula Green & Myles Lawford – Scholastic NZ
• A New Zealand Nature Journal by Sandra Morris – Walker Books Australia
• Waitangi Day: The New Zealand Story by Philippa Werry – New Holland Publishers

Young Adult Fiction

• I Am Rebecca by Fleur Beale – Penguin Random House NZ
• Night Vision by Ella West – Allen & Unwin
• Spark by Rachael Craw – Walker Books Australia
• Awakening by Natalie King – Penguin Random House
• The Red Suitcase by Jill Harris – Makaro Press