‘Last Cuentista’, ‘Unspeakable’ win children’s book awards | Arts

NEW YORK (AP)Donna Barba Higuera’s “The Last Cuentista,” a post-apocalyptic tale about a young girl who must preserve the memory of Earth’s history, won the John Newbery Medal for best children’s book of the year.

Another Memory Story received the Randolph Caldecott Medal for Outstanding Children’s Picture Book. “Watercress,” in which a Chinese-American girl learns about her heritage, was illustrated by Jason Chin and written by Andrea Wang.

The Newbery and Caldecott Medals were part of the Youth Media Awards recently announced by the American Library Association.

Higuera also received a Pura Belpré Award, which honors Latinx writers and illustrators, for best author, while “Watercress” was also named Best Asian/Pacific American Picture Book of the Year. Malinda Lo’s Last Night at the Telegraph Club, winner of the National Book Award for Children’s Literature last fall, received the Asian/Pacific American Award for Youth Literature.An illustrated book by beloved artist Floyd Cooper, who died last year, was a Caldecott Prize finalist and received the Coretta Scott King Awards for Best Book of the Year by a Black Author and Illustrator. Cooper collaborated with author Carole Boston Weatherford on the landmark work “Unspeakable: The Tulsa Race Massacre.” about the 1921 massacre of a black community in Oklahoma by a white mob.

Nikki Grimes, whose dozens of works include Coretta Scott King’s 2002 winner for Best Book “Bronx Masquerade,” received the Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement. Grace Lin, a Taiwanese American whose works include ‘The Ugly Vegetables’ and ‘The Red Thread’, won the Children’s Literature Legacy Award for ‘books that demonstrate integrity and respect for the lives and experiences of all children”. The Margaret A. Edwards Lifetime Achievement Award for a Young Adult Writer went to AS King, author of “Still Life with Tornado” and “Ask the Passengers”, among others.

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Copyright 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.