The Rebecca Caudill Young Readers’ Book Award (Grades 4-8)

The Rebecca Caudill Young Readers’ Book Award is an annual award given to the author of the book voted most outstanding by students in grades 4-8 in participating Illinois schools. For more information on this award, visit the Rebecca Caudill website.

Click on the titles below to view the primary source pairings:

Becoming Kareem, Written by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar with Raymond Obstfeld

Small Spaces, Written by Katherine Arden

Sweep: The Story of a Girl and Her Monster, Written by Jonathan Auxier

Drum Roll, Please, Written by Lisa Jenn Bigelow

Twelve Days in May: Freedom Ride 1961, Written by Larry Dane Brimner

Me, Frida, and the Secret of the Peacock Ring, Written by Angela Cervantes

New Kid, Written by Jerry Craft

The Only Road, Written by Alexandra Diaz

The Parker Inheritance, Written by Varian Johnson

Stormy Seas: Stories of Young Boat Refugees, Written by Mary Beth Leatherdale, Illustrated by Eleanor Shakespeare

Nowhere Boy, Written by Katherine Marsh

The Miscalculations of Lightning Girl, Written by Stacy McAnulty

Resistance, Written by Jennifer A. Nielsen

Spirit Hunters, Written by Ellen Oh

A Good Kind of Trouble, Written by Lisa Moore Ramee

Long Way Down, Written by Jason Reynolds

Amal Unbound, Written by Aisha Saeed

Speechless, Written by Adam P. Schmitt

Nightbooks, Written by J.A. White

Front Desk, Written by Kelly Yang