National Book Award Winners Announced

The National Book Award winners have been announced and we’re proud to say that we’re the exclusive audiobook publisher of National Book Award for Young People’s Literature winner, Mockingbird by Kathryn Erskine.

Click the link above to see the complete list of winners and honorees and read interviews with many of the authors. (Recorded Books also publishes lots of the honorees, and the Adult Fiction winner Lord of Misrule.)

Kirkus has this to say about Mockingbird:

“This heartbreaking story is delivered in the straightforward, often funny voice of a fifth-grade girl with Asperger’s syndrome, who is frustrated by her inability to put herself in someone else’s shoes. Caitlin’s counselor, Mrs. Brook, tries to teach her how to empathize, but Caitlin is used to depending on her big brother Devon for guidance on such matters. Tragically, Devon has been killed in a school shooting. Caitlin, her dad and her schoolmates try to cope, and it is the deep grief they all share that ultimately helps Caitlin get to empathy. As readers celebrate this milestone with Caitlin, they realize that they too have been developing empathy by walking a while in her shoes, experiencing the distinctive way that she sees and interacts with the world. Erskine draws directly and indirectly on To Kill a Mockingbird and riffs on its central theme: The destruction of an innocent is perhaps both the deepest kind of psychosocial wound a community can face and its greatest opportunity for psychological and spiritual growth.”

Congratulations to Kathryn and all the award winners and honorees. What do you think of the selections?