Ready, set, go! Start reading the nominees for the Eliot Rosewater Book Award and vote for your favorite. You just might choose the winner!


Compiled by:
Tyana H
American Royals

Katharine McGee
(Young Adult - Y Mcgee)

In an alternate America, princesses Beatrice and Samantha Washington and the two girls wooing their brother, Prince Jeffrey, become embroiled in high drama in the most glorious court in the world.


The Castle School for Troubled Girls

Alyssa B. Sheinmel
(Young Adult - Y Sheinme)

Paralyzed by grief, Moira feels punished when her parents send her to a therapeutic boarding school in Maine where she meets eleven other troubled girls and gradually begins to understand her parents' true intentions behind sending her there.


Cemetery Boys

Aiden Thomas
(Young Adult - Y Thomas)

Yadriel, a trans boy, summons the angry spirit of his high school's bad boy, and agrees to help him learn how he died, thereby proving himself a brujo, not a bruja, to his conservative family.


Charming as a Verb

Ben Philippe
(Young Adult - Y Philipp)

Henri "Halti" Haltiwanger can charm just about anyone. But his easy smiles mask a burning ambition to attend his dream college, Columbia University. There is only one person who seems immune to Henri's charms: his "intense" classmate and neighbor Corinne Troy. When she uncovers Henri's less-than-honest dog-walking scheme, she blackmails him into helping her change her image at school. Henri agrees, seeing a potential upside for himself. Soon what started as a mutual hustle turns into something more surprising than either of them ever bargained for ...


Clap When You Land

Elizabeth Acevedo
(Young Adult - Y Acevedo)

Camino Rios lives for the summers when her father visits her in the Dominican Republic. But this time, on the day when his plane is supposed to land, Camino arrives at the airport to see crowds of crying people ... In New York City, Yahaira Rios is called to the principal's office, where her mother is waiting to tell her that her father, her hero, has died in a plane crash. Separated by distance -- and Papi's secrets -- the two girls are forced to face a new reality in which their father is dead and their lives are forever altered. 


The Companion

Katie Alender
(Young Adult - Y Alender)

The other orphans say Margot is lucky. Lucky to survive the horrible accident that killed her family. Lucky to have her own room because she wakes up screaming every night. And finally, lucky to be chosen by a prestigious family to live at their remote country estate. But it wasn't luck that made the Suttons rescue Margot from her bleak existence at the group home. Margot was handpicked to be a companion to their silent, mysterious daughter, Agatha. At first, helping with Agatha--and getting to know her handsome older brother--seems much better than the group home. But soon, the isolated, gothic house begins playing tricks on Margot's mind, making her question everything she believes about the Suttons . . . and herself. Margot's bad dreams may have stopped when she came to live with Agatha - but the real nightmare has just begun.


Dagger Hill

Devon Taylor
(Young Adult - Y Taylor)

After a mysteriously catastrophic incident shakes up their sleepy hometown, seventeen-year-old best friends Gabe, Kimberly, Charlie, and Sonya discover they are being hunted by a sinister presence.


Enduring Freedom

Jawad Arash, Trent Reedy
(Young Adult - Y Arash)

In this dual-narrative tale, a teenage American army private and an Afghan boy living under the horrors of the Taliban, caught on separate sides of the world during the tumultuous times leading up to and following 9/11, come to discover how much more they have in common than they ever could have imagined.


Felix Ever After

Kacen Callendar
(Young Adult - Y Callend)

Felix Love, a transgender seventeen-year-old, attempts to get revenge by catfishing his anonymous bully, but lands in a quasi-love triangle with his former enemy and his best friend.


Fireborne

Rosaria Munda
(Young Adult - Y Munda)

Two dragonriders must go head-to-head for the top position in the Callipolan fleet, and protect the new regime from those who lost power.


Five Total Strangers

Natalie D. Richards
(Young Adult - Y Richards)

Desperate to reach her grieving mother, Mira joins a group of college students driving home after their flight is stranded, but the road conditions are not the only mortal danger they face.


A Good Girl's Guide to Murder

Holly Jackson
(Young Adult - Y Jackson)

As her senior capstone project, Pippa Fitz-Amobi is determined to find the real killer in a closed, local murder case, but not everyone wants her meddling in the past.


Grown: a novel

Tiffany Jackson
(Young Adult - Y Jackson)

When legendary R&B artist Korey Fields spots Enchanted Jones at an audition, her dreams of being a famous singer take flight. Until Enchanted wakes up with blood on her hands and zero memory of the previous night. Who killed Korey Fields? Before there was a dead body, Enchanted's dreams had turned into a nightmare. Because behind Korey's charm and star power was a controlling dark side. Now he's dead, the police are at the door, and all signs point to Enchanted.


Hard Wired

Len Vlahos
(Young Adult - Y Vlahos)

After fifteen-year-old Quinn learns that he is the first fully-aware artificial intelligence, that his entire life is a lie, he feels entirely alone until he bonds with Shea, the real girl behind his virtual crush.


The Inheritance Games

Jennifer Lynn Barnes
(Young Adult - Y Barnes)

When a Connecticut teenager inherits vast wealth and an eccentric estate from the richest man in Texas, she must also live with his surviving family and solve a series of puzzles to discover how she earned her inheritance.


The Loop

Ben Oliver
(Young Adult - Y Oliver)

Luka Kane has spent 736 days wrongfully imprisoned inside the Loop awaiting his execution. Each day is the same and torturous. But things are starting to change. Whispers of war are circulating. Then the warden delivers a message: Luka, you have to get out ... Now Luka must decide whether breaking out of the Loop is his only way to survive. But the population on the outside may be far more terrifying than anything he could have imaged. And in order to save his family, he'll have to discover who is responsible for the chaos that has been inflicted upon the world.


The Lucky Ones

Liz Lawson
(Young Adult - Y Lawson)

In the aftermath of a school tragedy, May and Zach struggle with grief, survivor's guilt, and the complex emotional impact of the event, learning how to heal and hope in the face of it all.


The Mary Shelley Club

Goldy Moldavsky
(Young Adult - Y Moldavs)

Scholarship student Rachel keeps to herself at Manchester Prep, preferring the company of horror films to trust fund babies. When a prank puts her on the radar of a mysterious student society, "The Mary Shelley Club", they subject her to a number of escalating Fear Tests which eventually puts them on the radar of a serial killer.


Skyhunter

Marie Lu
(Young Adult - Y Lu)

The Karensa Federation has conquered a dozen countries, leaving Mara as one of the last free nations in the world. Refugees flee there to escape a fate worse than death, transformation into mutant war beasts known as Ghosts. The legendary Strikers, Mara's elite fighting force, are trained to stop these monsters. But as the number of Ghosts grows and Karensa closes in, defeat seems inevitable. Still, one Striker refuses to give up hope. Robbed of her voice and home, Talin Kanami knows firsthand the brutality of the Federation. Mara seems ready to fall, but when a mysterious prisoner is brought from the front, Talin senses there's more to him than meets the eye.


Somewhere Between Bitter and Sweet

Laekan Zea Kemp
(Young Adult - Y Kemp)

As an aspiring pastry chef, Penelope Prado has always dreamed of opening her own pastelería next to her father's restaurant, Nacho's Tacos. But her traditional Mexican-American mom and dad have different plans. Xander Amaro Is a new hire at Nacho's. For him, the job is an opportunity for a chance at a normal life, to settle in at his abuelo's, and to find the father who left him behind. When both the restaurant and Xander's immigrant status are threatened, he will do whatever it takes to protect his new found family and himself. 


Superman Smashes the Klan

Gene Luen Yang
(Young Adult - Y Yang)

When Dr. Lee moves his family to Metropolis, his son Tommy adjusts to the new neighborhood while daugher Roberta feels out of place, so when the evil Klan of the Fiery Cross begins a string of terrorist attacks on the city, Superman fights them, and Roberta and Superman soon learn to embrace their own unique features that set them apart.


They Went Left

Monica Hesse
(Young Adult - Y Hesse)

Zofia, a teenage Holocaust survivor, travels across post-war Europe as she searches for her younger brother and seeks to rebuild her shattered life.


Today Tonight Tomorrow

Rachel Lynn Solomon
(Young Adult - Y Solomon)

Throughout the years both Rowan and Neil have been at competition with one another on everything from who has the best ideas for school functions to which one will be their graduating class's valedictorian. However, in the twenty-four hours left they have as high school students, the two learn they share something much deeper than a rivalry.


Tweet Cute

Emma Lord
(Young Adult - Y Lord)

Pepper is a chronic overachiever and perfectionist. Her family may be falling apart, but their massive fast-food chain is booming-- thanks to Pepper, who is secretly running its massive Twitter account. Jack is a class clown and a constant thorn in Pepper's side. He works at his family's deli. His relationship with the business that holds his future might be love/hate, but when Big League Burger steals his grandma's iconic grilled cheese recipe, he'll do whatever it takes to take them down, one tweet at a time. 


We Are Not Free

Traci Chee
(Young Adult - Y Chee)

For fourteen-year-old budding artist Minoru Ito, her two brothers, her friends, and the other members of the Japanese-American community in southern California, the three months since Pearl Harbor was attacked have become a waking nightmare: attacked, spat on, and abused with no way to retaliate--and now things are about to get worse, their lives forever changed by the mass incarcerations in the relocation camps.