The William C. Morris Award

On Monday, December 8, the shortlist for the first-ever William C. Morris YA Debut Award was announced. This is the only award bestowed by YALSA that creates a shortlist, and the five titles being considered are:

A Curse Dark As Gold by Elizabeth C. Bunce
Graceling by Kristin Cashore
Absolute Brightness by James Lecesne
Madapple by Christina Meldrum
Me, the Missing, and the Dead by Jenny Valentine

Over the next few weeks, leading up to the ALA Midwinter Conference and the announcement of the winner, I'll be reading and reviewing each of the shortlisted books. I hope you enjoy my perspective on each of these books.

If you're curious, the Morris Award will be "honoring a debut book published by a first-time author writing for teens and celebrating impressive new voices in young adult literature." (About the Award)

The three qualifications that these shortlisted titles have are:

• Compelling, high quality writing and/or illustration
• The integrity of the work as a whole
• Its proven or potential appeal to a wide range of teen readers

Let's see how these five books meet these qualifications!