Monica Hughes
The Canadian Children’s Book Centre has launched the Monica Hughes Award for Canadian children’s literature. Sponsored by HarperCollins Canada, the new award will honor children’s sf and fantasy fiction and comes with a $5,000 cash prize.
Hughes, who passed away in 2003, wrote over thirty-five books and has been called “Canada’s finest writer of science fiction for children” by critic Sarah Ellis in The Horn Book magazine. Her genre work is listed at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database.
She won many major literary awards including the Governor General’s Award (then known as the Canada Council Prize) for Children’s Literature in 1982 and 1983.
To be eligible for the Monica Hughes Award, a book must be an original work in English, aimed at readers ages eight to 16. The first award will be given in October 2012.
[Thanks to John Mansfield for the story.]
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“aimed at readers ages eight to 16”
Who does the aiming? Author? Publisher?
So … if Author X writes a book they think of as YA, but the publisher thinks otherwise ….? Or perhaps the reverse?
Traditionally, awards will respect the publisher’s labeling. One particularly infamous example is Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, which was published in the UK as both YA fantasy and an “adult” edition with more respectable-looking artwork, and went on to win an award which was specifically given to the non-YA edition.
All of the UK Potter books have had “adult” or perhaps “non-YA” covers:
http://harrypotter.wikia.com/wiki/Cover_art
It’s an interesting marketing ploy.