The Michael L. Printz Award is an

American Library Association The American Library Association (ALA) is a nonprofit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with 49,727 members ...

literary award A literary award or literary prize is an award presented in recognition of a particularly lauded literary piece or body of work. It is normally presented to an author. Organizations Most literary awards come with a corresponding award ceremony. M ...

that annually recognizes the "best book written for teens, based entirely on its

literary merit Artistic merit is the artistic quality or value of any given work of art, music, film, literature, sculpture or painting. Obscenity and literary merit The 1921 US trial of James Joyce's novel '' Ulysses'' concerned the publication of the ''Naus ...

". It is sponsored by ''

Booklist ''Booklist'' is a publication of the American Library Association that provides critical reviews of books and audiovisual materials for all ages. ''Booklist''s primary audience consists of libraries, educators, and booksellers. The magazine is av ...

'' magazine; administered by the ALA's young-adult division, the

Young Adult Library Services Association The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA), established in 1957, is a division of the American Library Association. YALSA is a national association of librarians, library workers and advocates whose mission is to expand the capacity of l ...

(YALSA); and named for the

Topeka, Kansas Topeka ( ; Kansa: ; iow, Dópikˀe, script=Latn or ) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Kansas and the seat of Shawnee County. It is along the Kansas River in the central part of Shawnee County, in northeast Kansas, in the Central U ...

, school librarian Mike Printz, a long-time active member of YALSA. Up to four worthy runners-up may be designated Honor Books and three or four have been named every year.

History

The Printz Award was founded in 2000 for 1999 young adult publications. Waddle, Linda. "The Association's Associations: YALSA Becomes Printz-Oriented. (Young Adult Library Services Association introduces Michael L. Printz Award) (Michael L. Printz Award) (Brief Article)". ''American Libraries'' 30.11 (Dec 1999): 7. Student Resource Center - Gold. Gale. Hennepin County Library. June 30, 2009. The award "was created as a counterpoint to the Newbery" in order to highlight the best and most literary works of excellence written for a young adult audience. Jonathon Hunt, a ''

Horn Book ''The Horn Book Magazine'', founded in Boston in 1924, is the oldest bimonthly magazine dedicated to reviewing children's literature. It began as a "suggestive purchase list" prepared by Bertha Mahony Miller and Elinor Whitney Field, proprietres ...

'' reviewer, hopes that the Printz Award can create a "canon as revered as that of the Newbery." Michael L. Printz was a librarian at Topeka West High School in Topeka, Kansas, until he retired in 1994. He was also an active member of YALSA, serving on the Best Books for Young Adults Committee and the Margaret A. Edwards Award Committee. He dedicated his life to ensuring that his students had access to good literature. To that end he encouraged writers to focus on the young adult audience. He created an author-in-residence program at the high school to promote new talent and encourage his students. His most noteworthy find was

Chris Crutcher Chris Crutcher (born July 17, 1946) is an American novelist and a family therapist. He received the Margaret A. Edwards Award from the American Library Association in 2000 for his lifetime contribution in writing for teens. Biography Crutcher w ...

. Printz died at the age of 59 in 1996.

Criteria and procedure

Source: "The Michael L. Printz Award Policies and Procedures""The Michael L. Printz Award Policies and Procedures"
YALSA. ALA. Retrieved 2012-04-20. The selection committee comprises nine YALSA members appointed by the president-elect for a one-year term. They award one winner and honor up to four additional titles. The term 'young adult' refers to readers from ages 12 through 18 for purposes of this award. The Michael L. Printz Award is sponsored by Booklist, a publication of the

(ALA). * Non-fiction, fiction, poetry and anthologies are all eligible to receive the Printz Award. * Books must have been published between January 1 and December 31 of the year preceding the announcement of the award. * Titles must be designated 'young adult' by its publisher or published for the age range that YALSA defines as "young adult," i.e., 12 through 18. Adult books are not eligible. * Works of joint authorship or editorship are eligible. * The award may be issued posthumously. * Books previously published in another country are eligible (presuming an American edition has been published during the period of eligibility).

Recipients

The Printz Medal has been awarded to one person annually without exception in its first nineteen years, 2000–2018. No one has won it twice, though some authors have received both the medal and honor books.

Multiple awards

As of 2022, no writer has won two of the twenty-three Printz Awards.

Marcus Sedgwick Marcus Sedgwick (8 April 1968 – 15 November 2022) was a British writer, illustrator and musician. He published novels such as '' Floodland'' (2001; winner of the Branford Boase Award) and '' The Dark Horse'' (2002; shortlisted for The Guard ...

has written one Award winner and two Honor Books.

David Almond David Almond (born 15 May 1951) is a British author who has written many novels for children and young adults from 1998, each one receiving critical acclaim. He is one of thirty children's writers, and one of three from the UK, to win the bie ...

John Green John Michael Green (born August 24, 1977) is an American author, YouTube content creator, podcaster, and philanthropist. His books have more than 50 million copies in print worldwide, including '' The Fault in Our Stars'' (2012), which is ...

Geraldine McCaughrean Geraldine McCaughrean ( ; born 6 June 1951) is a British children's novelist. She has written more than 170 books, including '' Peter Pan in Scarlet'' (2004), the official sequel to '' Peter Pan'' commissioned by Great Ormond Street Hospital, ...

, A. S. King and

Gene Luen Yang Gene Luen Yang (Chinese Traditional: 楊謹倫, Simplified: 杨谨伦, Pinyin: ''Yáng Jǐnlún''; born August 9, 1973) is an American cartoonist. He is a frequent lecturer on the subjects of graphic novels and comics, at comic book conventions a ...

have written one Award winner and one Honor Book. Eight people have two Honor Books:

M. T. Anderson Matthew Tobin Anderson (born November 4, 1968), is an American writer of children's books that range from picture books to young adult novels. He won the National Book Award for Young People's Literature in 2006 for '' The Pox Party'', the first o ...

Margo Lanagan Margo Lanagan (born 1960 in Waratah, New South Wales) is an Australian writer of short stories and young adult fiction. Biography She grew up in Raymond Terrace and moved to Melbourne circa 1971/1972. After overseas travel, she moved to Sydney ...

Terry Pratchett Sir Terence David John Pratchett (28 April 1948 – 12 March 2015) was an English humourist, satirist, and author of fantasy novels, especially comical works. He is best known for his '' Discworld'' series of 41 novels. Pratchett's first no ...

Markus Zusak Markus Zusak (born 23 June 1975) is an Australian writer with Austrian and German roots. He is best known for '' The Book Thief'' and '' The Messenger'' (US title: ''I Am the Messenger''), two novels which became international bestsellers ...

Deborah Heiligman Deborah Heiligman is an American author of books for children and teens. Her work ranges from picture books to young adult novels and includes both fiction and nonfiction. Early life and education Heiligman grew up in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Sh ...

Mariko Tamaki Mariko Tamaki (born 1975) is a Canadian artist and writer. She is known for her graphic novels '' Skim'', ''Emiko Superstar,'' and '' This One Summer'', and for several prose works of fiction and non-fiction."Mariko Tamaki". CBC Radio, '' The Nex ...

, and

Angie Thomas Angie Thomas (born September 20, 1988) is an American young adult author, best known for writing '' The Hate U Give'' (2017). Her second young adult novel, ''On the Come Up'', was released on February 25, 2019. Early life Angie Thomas was born ...

Four writers have won both the Printz Award and the annual Carnegie Medal from the British librarians:

, Aidan Chambers,

, and Meg Rosoff. Chambers alone has won both for the same book, the 1999 Carnegie and 2003 Printz for the novel ''

Postcards from No Man's Land ''Postcards from No Man's Land'' is a young-adult novel by Aidan Chambers, published by Bodley Head in 1999. Two stories are set in Amsterdam during 1994 and 1944. One features 17-year-old visitor Jacob Todd during the 50-year commemoration of th ...

''."The Carnegie Medal: Full List of Winners"
Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (

CILIP The Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, since 2017 branded CILIP: The library and information association (pronounced ), is a professional body for librarians, information specialists and knowledge managers in the ...

). Retrieved 2014-02-06. In its scope, books for children or young adults (published in the UK), the British Carnegie corresponds to the American Newbery and Printz awards.

References

External links

ALA Youth Media Awards

YALSA's Teen Book Finder
— free

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