Tag: BFYA

Teens Needed for Virtual Best Fiction for Young Adults Teen Feedback Session

YALSA is recruiting teens to participate in its Best Fiction for Young Adults (BFYA) Teen Feedback Session. This session is scheduled to take place virtually via Zoom on Saturday, January 9th from 2-3:30pm CT. During the session, teens will be asked to give constructive feedback to the BFYA committee members on the titles that have been nominated for the 2021 BFYA list. The list of books can be found here. The session will be recorded but will not be made public. It will also only be sent to BFYA Committee members.

YALSA takes input from youth very seriously, and in order to get a wide representation, there are two ways to participate.  First, we are seeking up to 50 teens to participate virtually. Participating teens are asked to read as many of the BYFA titles as possible, but all titles do not need to be read by each teen. Secondly, librarians may gather feedback from their teens to share on behalf of their teens during the session. Both teens and librarians interested in participating in the feedback session should apply by January 5. 

YALSA Goals for Youth Participation:

  1. To organize and implement youth participation to support division goals,
  2. To collect a wide range of ideas from as diverse a young adult population as possible,
  3. To incorporate youth participation into programs and services in order to provide a richer experience for YALSA members,
  4. To create valuable experiences for the participating young adults in which they can gain knowledge and/or skills useful in future endeavors.

2020 Best Fiction for Young Adults List Announced

The official titles of YALSA’s 2020 Best Fiction for Young Adults (BFYA) list have been announced.

The list consists of 71 titles which were posted and discussed in blogposts on The Hub. View the full list here. The top ten titles were selected after receiving feedback at the BFYA Teen Feedback Session that took place at ALA’s 2020 Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia.

The top ten titles are:

  • The Field Guide to the North American Teenager. By Ben Philippe. HarperCollins/Balzer+Bray. $18.99 (9780062824110).
  • Girls on the Verge. By Sharon Biggs Waller. Holt. $17.99 (9781250151698).
  • Heroine. By Mindy McGinnis. HarperCollins/Katherine Tegen. $17.99 (9780062847195).
  • Like a Love Story. By Abdi Nazemian. HarperCollins/Balzer+Bray. $17.99 (9780062839367).
  • Lovely War. By Julie Berry. Viking. $18.99 (9780451469939).
  • On the Come Up. By Angie Thomas. HarperCollins/Balzer+Bray. $18.99 (9780062498564).
  • Patron Saints of Nothing. By Randy Ribay. Penguin/Kokila. $17.99 (9780525554912).
  • Pet. By Akwaeke Emezi. Random/Make Me a World. $17.99 (9780525647072).
  • The Stars and the Blackness Between Them. By Junauda Petrus. Dutton. $17.99 (9780525555483).
  • With the Fire on High. By Elizabeth Acevedo. HarperTeen. $17.99 (9780062662835). 

The suggestion form for the 2021 Best Fiction for Young Adults list is open. If you’d like to suggest a title to the blogging team for consideration as a nominee, please fill out the form.

A huge thank you goes out to the BFYA blogging team for all the hard work and time they put into curating this great list. Thank you!

Members of the 2020 Best Fiction for Young Adults Blogging Team are: Coordinator, Kimmie DePinto, High Plains Library District, Greeley, CO; Jodi Kruse R.A. Long High School Library, Longview, WA; Michael Fleming, Juanita High School, Kirkland, WA; Isaiah West, Alexandria Library, Alexandria, VA; Molly Dettmann, Norman North High School, Norman, OK; Alicia Abdul, Albany High School, Albany, NY; Laura Giunta Garden City Public Library, Garden City, NY; Stephanie Charlefour, Keene, NH; Barbara, CA; Audrey Hopkins, Oak Lawn Public Library, Dallas, TX; Ness Shortley, Horton Middle School, Pittsboro, NC; Molly Wetta, Santa Barbara Public Library, Santa Barbara, CA; and with the help of administrative assistant Molly Moore, Bishop, GA.

2018 Best Fiction for Young Adults List

Have you heard? The Best Fiction for Young Adults list has been released! Check out the top ten below!

  • Arnold, Elana. What Girls Are Made Of. Lerner/Carolrhoda Lab. 2017. Sixteen-year-old Nina experiences sex, betrayal, loss, and a dysfunctional home life, all while trying to understand what it means to be female in the world and whether love can ever be truly unconditional.
  • Bardugo, Leigh. The Language of Thorns: Midnight Tales and Dangerous Magic. Illus. by Sara Kipin. Macmillan/Imprint. 2017. Traditional fairy tales are refreshingly twisted, re-created, and wrapped in gorgeous illustrations in this stand-alone collection of six short stories. The world-building will be familiar to Bardugo’s fans, and readers new to her Grishaverse have the pleasure of knowing they can take further excursions into this world.
  • Lee, Mackenzi. The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue. HarperCollins/Katherine Tegen. 2017. Montague, the son of a British nobleman, embarks on a European tour with his best friend (and secret crush) Percy and his sister Felicity. Along the way, they encounter adventure and conflict that leads them to a very different destiny than the one awaiting their return to England.
  • Moon, Sarah. Sparrow. Scholastic/Arthur A. Levine. 2017. Sparrow has a secret: her closest friends are birds. When she feels anxious, she goes to the roof and flies. One day, this practice lands her in the hospital, facing questions from the adults in her life. Slowly, she recovers, finds her voice, and makes new friends along the way.
  • Reynolds, Jason. Long Way Down. Simon & Schuster/Atheneum. 2017. Will’s brother has been shot. In this free-verse novel, Will steps into an elevator ready to head downstairs and to follow the rules he’s been taught and avenge his brother’s death, when he encounters the ghosts of victims of a chain reaction caused by a shooting.

Continue reading 2018 Best Fiction for Young Adults List

BFYA Teen Feedback Session at ALA Midwinter 2017

On Saturday, January 21st, in the room as far as you can possibly get from the exhibit hall, a crowd of teen librarians anxiously awaited for the BFYA Teen Feedback Session to begin. Unfortunately, we were missing a key component–the teens!  But they finally made their way down the long hall, loaded with bags of books and swag.

The titles under consideration filled 10 full pages. So the moderator went page by page, inviting teens to step up to the mic and express their feelings about any of the books that were on the page. The teens responses were eloquent and insightful. And they did not hold back at all, for better (or worse). Leave it to teens to be completely and unabashedly honest.

The overall theme of the day: The books that came out this year caused them to have a lot of “compassion fatigue” — too many characters died this year! Also, teens are seeking out diverse stories–they recognize the importance and want to see themselves or others they know represented in the books they read.

The links to the long list and top ten Best Fiction for Young Adult lists are here. Below are the highlights from the feedback session!

Continue reading BFYA Teen Feedback Session at ALA Midwinter 2017

Beta Books: Teens Review Advance Reading Copies

ARCIt’s time for another post from the Beta Books club at my library, which reads, reviews, and generally has a grand time discussing ARCs (Advanced Reading Copies) of upcoming teen books. Our review form includes a cover discussion, space to share thoughts on the book, and 1-5 star rating. Thanks to today’s reviewers for agreeing to share their thoughts on The Hub! SPOILER ALERT: Some reviews mention plot points.

gospel of winterReviewer: Piper

Book: The Gospel of Winter, by Brendan Kiely

What did you think of the cover? I really liked the cover, I really think it fit the story quite well. Also I would change nothing about the cover.

What did you think of the book? I enjoyed the overall storyline but at times it could be slow and a bit dragged on. Yes, I would tell a friend to read this book.

How would you rate this book? 3 stars: Pretty good. I wanted to see how it ended.

* * * * * * * *

splinteredReviewer: Izzy

Book: Splintered, by A. G. Howard

What did you think of the cover? I liked the cover, I think it matched the story. No, I would not change anything about the cover.

What did you think of the book? I thought it was really good. I liked the romance. I wish it described more with better details. My favorite part was when her mom got better. Yes, I would recommend this to a friend!

How would you rate this book? 5 stars. Unbelievable! I’d rather read this book than sleep! Continue reading Beta Books: Teens Review Advance Reading Copies

ALA Annual 2014: Best Fiction for Young Adults Teen Feedback Session

alaac14_logoWant to get real teen input on some of the best recent titles in YA fiction? The Best Fiction for Young Adults Teen Feedback Session at ALA Annual is the place to be! Local Las Vegas area teens have been reading the BFYA nominations and are here at the conference to weigh in with their thoughts as the BFYA committee and other interested librarians observe. These teens are always sharp, witty, and honest, and the BFYA Teen Feedback Session is a highlight of the conference for many avid YA lit readers.

If you can’t be here in person, the next best way to experience this session is via the #bfya hashtag on Twitter. Follow along and tweet your thoughts– we’re streaming the hashtag here on The Hub for your convenience, and the real action starts at 1:00 pm Pacific time when the session kicks off. Enjoy!


ALA Midwinter 2014: Best Fiction for Young Adults Teen Feedback Session

For librarians working with young people, the announcement of the Youth Media Awards is the paramount event of ALA’s Midwinter Conference. Hub blogger Chelsea Condren shared her personal account of attending the YMAs in her post on February 5. I think it’s fair to say that the second-most anticipated event for us YALSA folks is the teen feedback session for the Best Fiction for Young Adults nominees. This year, I was there.

The teens only had a few seconds to weigh in on the books they had read. The BFYA nomination list included 175 titles, while the teen feedback session was just two and a half hours long. For a recap, I’ve put together a visual presentation featuring some of the nominated titles coupled with their corresponding teen comments.

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Special thanks to the participating teens and their sponsors:  Joyce Ames, St. Stepehen’s & St. Agnes School, Alexandria, VA; Jennifer Hubert Swan, L R E I Little Red School House & Elisabeth Irwin High School, New York, NY; Megan England, Atlantic City Free Public Library, Atlantic City, NJ, and Katherine Liss, Metuchen Public Library, Metuchen, NJ.

For a lovely take on this same session, read Vicky Smith’s account. And now that you’ve gotten an idea of the teens’ feedback, be sure to check out the full list of titles that made this year’s BFYA list!

-Diane Colson, currently reading The Night Gardener (advanced reader’s copy) by Jonathan Auxier

Schneider Family Book Award: Rose Under Fire

Schneider Family Book Award SealLast week at ALA Midwinter, the 2014 ALA Youth Media Awards were announced (if you missed the ceremony, you can still watch it online). The Youth Media Awards encompass many different prizes recognizing media created for children and young adults, including the Schneider Family Book Award, which was established by Dr. Katherine Schneider and “honors an author or illustrator for a book that embodies an artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences.” This year, in addition to being named one of YALSA’s Best Fiction for Young Adults top ten titles, Rose Under Fire by Elizabeth Wein is the the Schneider Family Book Award’s teen award winner.

Though it is a companion to 2013 Michael L. Printz Honor book Code Name Verity and references characters and events from that title, Rose Under Fire focuses on the story of a new character named Rose Justice. Continue reading Schneider Family Book Award: Rose Under Fire

Hang Out at the Popular Table, or My List-style Love of BFYA

yalsa logoListen, I love a good award.  Oscars?  I’m there.  Grammy’s?  For sure.  Video Music Awards?  Just point me to Kanye (yes, I’m defaulting to Kanye because I will scream if we have to rehash Miley again.  You understand, right?).  But I love book awards more than any other award.  I can’t read all the books in the world (no matter how high I set my Goodreads reading goal), so awards help lead me to the greatest hits.  But you know what I love even more than an award?  A list.  And I’m not alone!  McSweeney’s, Buzzfeed, and Thought Catalog have shown us how America loves them a good list (preferably with animated GIFs).

So, I dream of “best of” lists.   Lists of awesome books that are all uniquely rad but all completely worthy of my precious reading time.  Presented with little fanfare except a Twitter-length description and the unspoken but earnest promise of a good book you won’t regret reading.  I look forward to ALA’s Youth Media Awards, but not for the Newbery or the Printz (okay, maybe a little bit for the Newbery and the Printz).  I’m most looking forward to the Best Fiction for Young Adults list.

So to pay homage to my love of lists and the upcoming 2014 BFYA list (which will name the best books of 2013), here is a list of things I love about the Best Fiction for Young Adults list (and animated GIFs because I know you love them).

  1. Best Fiction takes nominations from YALSA members (like you!), has a committee read them all, and weed out the best books of the year, leaving you with books that will make you fall in love.  The guesswork is gone.
  2. Although we all love to describe and book talk a book as “award-winning,” the Printz award is not going to be an accessible read for every reader.  I have much more luck connecting teens with a great read by using the BFYA list as a jumping off point for recommendations. What teen doesn’t take a book when you go all Emma Stone on them?
  3. “But, Christiana,” you say, “I don’t need a BIG list of things.  I need, like, ten.  Just the best of the best.”  BFYA has thought of that too!  The top 10 of the year are denoted with a star.  If you’re looking for a starting point of the year’s best in YA, second star to the right and straight on till morning.
  4. Last year’s BFYA chair Ted Schelvan was quoted as saying, “our final list is comprised of books a library can be proud to add to their Young Adult collection.”  Which reminds me of the other great part of BFYA: the bang for your buck part (that’s the scientific term).  We’re all trying to do more with less all the time and that includes what we spend money on.  Wouldn’t it be better if we could know we were buying all-stars instead of bench warmers?
  5. Best means books teens AND adults who love good teen lit will love.  Think of it as something of a reverse Alex award.

So– greatest hits.  Not a problem.  I know where you’ll be January 27, but I encourage you not to run away after the Printz and Newbery winners are announced.  BFYA is where all the popular kids (and books) hang out.

-Christiana Congelio, currently reading Better Off Friends by Elizabeth Eulberg (and loving it!)