A look at the real-life implications of a “high” Newbery or a “low” Printz

When I read the first line of Lynne Rae Perkins’s Criss Cross (Greenwillow, 2005)–“She wished something would happen”–I was enchanted. By the end of the first chapter, “The Catch,” I was sure I was reading an award winner. But the catch that I thought of as I continued to read was, which award?

Was Criss Cross a “high” Newbery candidate, meaning the John Newbery Award committee members thought it held appeal for those children who are at the top end of their charge of serving ages “up to and including fourteen,” or was it a “low” Printz book, meaning the Michael L. Printz award panel felt that it held appeal for the Young Adult readers who fell toward the younger half of its stated age range of 12 through 18? Where would other librarians see it as belonging–firmly with the Young Adult books, or with the Juvenile? And what of its readers in the age group of 12 to 14 where the overlap between the Newbery and the Printz occurs?

Well, I wished something would happen, and of course it did, when in January, at the American Library Association’s midwinter meeting, Criss Cross won the Newbery Award. And though I’ll admit I tried to give the book a push toward the Printz by nominating it for a local mock award meeting at the North Suburban Library System in Illinois, and talking it up to at least one member of the Printz committee, I wasn’t terribly surprised or even disappointed by this outcome. By winning an award–any award–this very literary title will at least initially attract the attention of all types of readers.

In the long run, though, the novel’s nature as a book for those “between” may still prove problematic. At my library, funds are plentiful and Criss Cross and a fair number of other books recommended for grades five to nine get a berth both in Juvenile Fiction and YA Fiction, in the hope that readers identifying with one area or the other will find the book they’re meant to read. But I feel for those librarians, especially those in public libraries, who have to make tough decisions about where their only copy of Criss Cross will be housed, because the audience for this novel is of an age where appearances inordinately matter.

Popular wisdom about Newberys is that they belong in libraries’ Juvenile areas. But is a savvy 6th or 7th grader likely to pick up a book housed in a Juvenile collection sporting a Newbery sticker? Perhaps. They are at least close enough in age to the days when they sought books in this section and it might still seem very comfortable to them. Would an 8th or 9th grader? Doubtful, extremely doubtful. At this point in their lives they are very conscious of differentiating themselves from their younger incarnations and, unless they’re truly catholic book lovers, they’d rather die than be seen in the “little kids” stacks.

I see this phenomenon play itself out every year when the Teen Advisory Board (TAB) at my library puts its annual “Star” stickers on the 10 or so books that they’d most like to recommend to their peers. The TAB consists of kids in 6th through 12th grade, and I feel fortunate that it draws such a diverse group. The older teens are quite gracious and helpful to the younger kids, and the younger kids seem to strive to be worthy of their attention. Still, as they fan out through Youth Services to find their favorite books, their age differences become very apparent. The 6th graders almost always pick Juvenile Fiction books; the 7th graders split the difference; and the 8th through 12th graders pick only YA titles (with one genre caveat, which I’ll address later). Since, as I said, our YA area has some overlap with Juvenile, and even Adult, titles, I can only chalk the preference up to how the book is perceived vis-à-vis how it’s shelved.

The YA copy of Stephanie Tolan’s Surviving the Applewhites (HarperCollins, 2002), for instance, sports a star affixed by a high school boy. The Juvenile copy of this 2003 Newbery Honor book remains starless. Ditto for Gary Schmidt’s Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy (Clarion, 2004), which won both a Newbery Honor and a Printz Honor in 2005, and was tagged by a high school girl. Quite obviously, there are older-age-range readers for these books. But what if the library only had one copy of Lizzie Bright or Applewhites and it was shelved in Juvenile? Then I think these readers would have missed out.

When I booktalk some of the higher-age-range Newberys, and books for 6th grade through high school level on the numerous year-end best lists, I often get more initial interest from older kids. No one in the 6th-grade classes I regularly visit bit when I first spoke about the Newbery’s 2005 Medal winner, Cynthia Kadohata’s Kira-Kira (S & S, 2004). At a talk for high school freshmen, a girl quickly grabbed it.

My spiel at both schools was the same, and this may have been at the root of my failure to lure the younger readers. Since then, through trial and error, I’ve found that I need to focus on the lighter aspects of the more mature titles when talking to younger-end readers (and the same goes for lower Printz titles, too). Sad stories have less appeal for this audience than they do to older booktalk listeners. In speaking of Kira-Kira to 6th graders I need to steer away from the central theme of the older sister’s cancer and instead emphasize the sisters’ warm relationship.

Kevin Henkes’s Olive’s Ocean (HarperCollins, 2003), a 2004 Newbery Honor, was also a hard sell to 6th graders until finally in one talk I mentioned main character Martha’s summer romance with a boy living near her grandmother’s house. Forget poor dead Olive and Martha’s inner angst! Once a couple of girls read the book, its peer appeal spread by word of mouth, and now the librarian at their school finds her copy is constantly out.

While tailoring how you speak of a more literary title can go a long way toward selling it to readers, it isn’t always guaranteed to work. Recently, back at the library, no matter how enthusiastic I waxed I couldn’t overcome one 7th-grade girl’s resistance to take out Joan Bauer’s Rules of the Road (Putnam, 1998), which was a 1999 Best Book for Young Adults and a Notable Children’s Book for the same year. Because the Young Adult copy was out, I steered her toward the Juvenile shelves. “I don’t read books from here anymore,” she said. When I explained we had books by Bauer in both spots, she looked at me skeptically. I actually got the book in her hand, though, before she spied a new YA book with a glitzy pink, black, and silver cover, and that was it for Bauer.

However, it’s time to mention the caveat I referred to earlier. The exception to all generalities, I’ve found, is fantasy. Thanks to Harry Potter, adults, young adults, and children don’t seem to mind where we put a great deal of popular fantasy as long as they can get their hands on it. We keep books by J. K. Rowling, Lemony Snicket, Cornelia Funke, and Christopher Paolini almost exclusively in Juvenile Fiction, because there is no room for multiple copies in YA. It doesn’t matter. Just as I wrote this, in fact, a junior-high-aged girl asked to have the juvenile copy of Cornelia Funke’s Inkspell (Scholastic, 2005) put on hold. Every other book she was later walking around with, I noted, was a non-fantasy YA title.

Different librarians may have different experiences, but when speaking with colleagues I’ve noted many of our deepest dilemmas are the same. Therefore, if I couldn’t buy copies of in-between types of books like Criss Cross for different library areas, I’d err on the side of putting it with older titles, because I think the 6th grader who wants it will still find it on the YA shelves. Barring being able to do that, I’d definitely, when available, buy at least one paperback copy for the YA racks. I’d also continue tailoring my booktalks to appeal specifically to the grade of my audience.

I haven’t booktalked Criss Cross yet, though I’m looking forward to doing so. It’s a subtle book, and I’ll have to keep that in mind when I plan how to approach it–stressing crushes to younger listeners, and Debbie’s driving lessons and competency to those in high school. Because of winning the Newbery, it hasn’t settled on our shelves yet. It’s always out. That really is the magic of awards, getting attention for titles that might not have gotten a broad audience any other way no matter what reviewers said about it.

We can all hope for a time when books will always appeal, like fantasy, across age lines to those most receptive to their magic. Until that day, though, I do have a request for publishers. When books have appeal for those in-between groups of children/teens, maybe they could think about putting at least two different covers on the book–one to draw in younger readers, one to draw in older. This isn’t as novel an idea as it may seem. Philip Pullman’s “His Dark Materials” trilogy (Knopf), Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game (Tor, 1985), and Yann Martel’s Life of Pi (Harcourt, 2002) have all gained from this marketing ploy as applied to books that appeal to young adults and adults. Why not skew the trend younger? And since surveys among teens show that customization of goods has real cachet, I think multiple covers would stand a good chance of success. In fact, whenever I bring in copies of foreign book covers of popular books to show my booktalking audiences, they love voting on their favorites and critiquing those that fail to win them over. In case anyone hasn’t noticed, young adults are very visual these days.

Couldn’t you just see Criss Cross with its current sweet cover, drawn by the author, aimed at younger readers and a more moody shot of a necklace with a broken catch for older readers? Well, I can wish.