Fresh pencils for a new season! (CC-licensed image by Flickr user Rex Boggs.)

If you’re new here, this is the place to be for Printz speculation (we’re here and you’re here, so it must be). Admittedly, we’re usually wrong when it comes to predicting the winners, but that’s ok: the point is not to accurately predict but to speculate and discuss at RealCommittee level the plausible contenders for the Printz Award.

Of course, Printz committee work is shrouded in secrecy, and none of us are on the committee, so we’re just guessing. Mostly we’re here for fun — because don’t we all love arguing passionately about books? — and we’re thrilled to be back online and gearing up our arguments to defend our top choices for the 2015 gold!

Want to know what to expect? Need to catch up on your reading so you can join in? We’ll post our longlist later this week, once we’ve taken a look at the criteria and discussed just what “literary excellence” means. And we’ll be running our own Pyrite Printz later in the season so that we can have some RealCommittee style fun and voting.

So please, drop by the comments and say hi, and start plugging your top Printz picks — we can’t wait to get talking with you all!

The Pyrite Printz, or Pyrite, is the Someday My Printz Will Come mock Printz deliberation, and should not in any way be confused with YALSA’s Michael L. Printz Award, often referred to here as the RealPrintz or Printz. Our predictions, conversations, and speculation about potential RealPrintz contenders and winners reflect only our own best guesses and are not affiliated with YALSA or the RealPrintz committee. You probably figured that out on your own, but we like to make it clear!