Booktrust Teenage Prize 2009

Although I'd meant to use the Book-of-the-Week slot to recommend books ranging right from the youngest up to teens, I've been tending towards the much younger end and leaving the top end for other people to recommend. Why? Because as of a few weeks ago I'm judging this year's Booktrust Teenage Prize! Which is great fun (tho' I'm trying to average slightly more than a book a day for three months, which scares me...), but it doesn't seem sensible to be airing my opinions about eligible books in public while I'm doing it. The judges meet to shortlist probably towards the end of June (also the end of the eligibility period for this year's prize), and after that I'll be able to recommend new teen stuff on this blog again. In the meantime will stick to picture books and pre-teen novels and leave the teens for other people. Tho' by the end of June I may never want to see another teen book again, of course...