Young Hoosier Book Award Nominees

Have you heard about the Young Hoosier Book Awards (YHBA)? It's a program run by the Indiana Library Federation to engage school-age kids in fun, recreational reading.

Every year, kids in Indiana get to vote for the book nominee they like best! Check out the nominees for the 2018-2019 YHBA Intermediate list, aimed at 4th-6th graders! Print the full list or see it below.


Compiled by:
Alex G.
The Adventurers Guild

Zack Loran Clark
Juvenile Fiction - J Clark

Best friends Zed and Brock live in the city of Freestone, surrounded by high walls that keep out monsters. Only members of the Adventurers Guild dare to venture outside those walls regularly for the city's defense. On Guildculling Day, Brock feels confident that he will follow his father into the Merchants Guild, while Zed, the half-elf child of a servant, hopes to join the Mages—but each finds himself in the Adventurers Guild. Their initiation night, spent outside the walls with other new members, turns violent when monsters breach the magical wards intended to keep them at bay. But the problem goes deeper: Is there a traitor within the city walls? 


Amina's Voice

Hena Khan
Juvenile Fiction - J Khan

Amina enjoys spending time with her best friend Soojin and practicing her singing, as long as no one is around to hear her. When Soojin starts talking about selecting a second, more American name when she becomes a citizen, Amina feels she is starting to lose her friend, especially as Soojin starts to befriend classmate Emily and talk about boys. To add to Amina's worries, her parents have signed her up to be part of a statewide Quran recitation competition. While Amina has a beautiful singing talent, she's afraid she won't do well and is searching for a way out. When the Islamic Center is vandalized, however, Amina begins to discover things about her family, her friends, her community, and herself that ultimately help her through her difficulties, in particular, that the support she needs is all around her. 


Beyond the Bright Sea

Lauren Wolk
Juvenile Fiction - J Wolk

Twelve-year-old Crow has lived her entire life on a tiny, isolated piece of the starkly beautiful Elizabeth Islands in Massachusetts. Abandoned and set adrift in a small boat when she was just hours old, Crow's only companions are Osh, the man who rescued and raised her, and Miss Maggie, their fierce and affectionate neighbor across the sandbar. Crow has always been curious about the world around her, but it isn't until the night a mysterious fire appears across the water that the unspoken question of her own history forms in her heart. Soon, an unstoppable chain of events is triggered, leading Crow down a path of discovery and danger.


Chester and Gus

Cammie McGovern
Juvenile Fiction - J McGover

Chester has always wanted to become a service dog, but when he fails his certification test it seems like that dream will never come true, that is until a family adopts him to be a companion for their ten-year-old son, Gus, who has autism.


Clayton Byrd Goes Underground

Rita Williams-Garcia
Juvenile Fiction - J William

When his grandfather, Cool Papa, dies suddenly, Clayton Bryd decides to run away and join Cool Papa's band--but he has to take the subway to find the remaining members. He spends a good portion of the book in the underworld of the NYC subway system, meeting interesting characters and performing. 


Confessions From The Principal's Kid

Robin Mellom
Juvenile Fiction - J Mellom

During the school day, fifth-grader Allie West is an outsider. Everyone knows the principal's kid might tattle to her mom! But after school, Allie is an insider. She's friendly with the janitor, knows the shortest routes around the building, and hangs out with the Afters, a group of misfits whose parents are teachers at their school. Although Allie secretly loves her insider life, she's sick of being an outsider—so she vows to join the Pentagon, the popular math team led by her ex–best friend. But can Allie change her status without betraying where she really belongs?


Curse of the Boggin

D.J. MacHale
Juvenile Fiction - J MacHale
Series: Library

When supernatural phenomenon start following Marcus O'Mara around, he discovers a key that leads to The Library, a place where all the stories of the living and dead are kept that will help him and his friends solve a terrifying mystery.


A Dog Like Daisy

Kristin O'Donnell Tubb
Juvenile Fiction - J Tubb

Daisy has only ten weeks to prove her usefulness or else be sent back to the pound. Yet if she goes back, who will protect Colonel Victor from his PTSD attacks? Or save the littler human, Micah, from those infernal ear muzzles he calls earphones? What if no one ever adopts her again? Determined to become the elite protector the colonel needs, Daisy vows to ace the service dog test. She'll accept the ridiculous leash and learn to sit, heel, shake, even do your business, Daisy when told to. But Daisy must first learn how to face her own fears from the past or risk losing the family she's so desperate to guard--again.


The First Rule of Punk

Celia Pérez
Juvenile Fiction - J Perez

Twelve-year-old María Luisa O'Neill-Morales (who really prefers to be called Malú) reluctantly moves with her Mexican-American mother to Chicago and starts seventh grade with a bang--violating the dress code with her punk rock aesthetic and spurning the middle school's most popular girl in favor of starting a band with a group of like-minded weirdos.


Grace Hopper: Queen of Computer Code

Laurie Wallmark
Juvenile Non-Fiction - J 921 Hopper Wal

Grace Hopper, a girl with a keen mind and a determined attitude, grows up to become the "queen of computer code." The book shares incidents and stories from the scientist's remarkable life that illustrate "Grace being Grace," and with these anecdotes, the author paints an engaging portrait of a unique woman in this bright and informative biography. At age seven, Hopper dismantled several clocks in her house to find out what made them tick. Finishing high school two years early, she overcame difficulties with Latin before she was admitted to Vassar College. Convinced she could make a difference to the war effort, Hopper enlisted in the U.S. Navy during World War II and embarked on a lifelong military career writing computer programs. After finding a moth trapped inside a navy computer, she coined the phrase computer bug.


Making Friends With Billy Wong

Augusta Scattergood
Juvenile Graphic Novel - J Scatter

In 1952 eleven-year-old Azalea is sent to Paris Junction, Arkansas, to help out her grandmother who has injured her foot, but does not really seem to want her help; Billy Wong is a Chinese-American boy whose uncle owns the local grocery store, in town to attend the "white" school, since the Chinese mission school has closed, but frustrated by the overt prejudice of the local children--and over the summer the two begin to forge a friendship.


Mrs. Smith's Spy School for Girls

Beth McMullen
Juvenile Fiction - J McMulle

Twelve-year-old Abigail is shocked to discover her elite boarding school is really a cover for a huge spy ring, and must undergo Spy Training 101 in order to save her mother, who happens to be the spy ring's top agent.


Mutant Mantis Lunch Ladies

Bruce Hale
Juvenile Fiction - J Hale
Series: Monstertown Mysteries

Best friends Benny and Carlos risk their lives to investigate when AJ reports seeing one of Monterrosa Elementary's beloved lunch ladies change into a giant mantis.


Real Friends

Shannon Hale
Juvenile Graphic Novel- J-GN Hale Real Friends

Hale revisits her elementary school years in this insightful exploration of the ups and downs of friendship. Young Shannon meets her BFF Adrienne in kindergarten, and the two bond until Adrienne moves away. When Adrienne returns, Shannon is thrilled—until Adrienne joins a clique. In over her head, Shannon copes with feelings of inadequacy as she compares herself to pretty and seemingly perfect ringleader Jen, as well as resentment and intense anxiety as callous Jenny throws barbs her way. There's trouble at home, too: middle child Shannon often feels lost and is bullied by older sister Wendy. 


Restart

Gordon Korman
Juvenile Fiction - J Korman

Chase does not remember falling off the roof, in fact he does not remember anything about himself, and when he gets back to middle school he begins to learn who he was through the reactions of the other kids--trouble is, he really is not sure he likes the Chase that is being revealed, but can he take the opportunity amnesia has provided and restart his life?


Stef Soto, Taco Queen

Jennifer Torres
Juvenile Fiction - J Torres

Seventh grader Estefania "Stef" Soto is itching to shake off the onion-and-cilantro embrace of Tia Perla, her family's taco truck. She wants nothing more than for her dad to get a normal job and for Tia Perla to be put out to pasture. It's no fun being known as the "Taco Queen" at school. But just when it looks like Stef is going to get exactly what she wants, and her family's livelihood is threatened, she will have to become the truck's unlikely champion. 


Superstar

Mandy Davis
Juvenile Fiction - J Davis

Lester's first days as a fifth grader at Quarry Elementary School are not even a little bit like he thought they would be -- the cafeteria is too loud for Lester's ears, there are too many kids, and then there's the bully. Lester was always home-schooled, and now he's shocked to be stuck in a school where everything just seems wrong. That's until he hears about the science fair, which goes really well for Lester! But then things go a bit sideways, and Lester has to find his way back.


The Unlikely Story of a Pig in the City

Jodi Kendall
Juvenile Fiction - J Kendall

A little pig in a big city leads to lots of trouble! Josie Shilling's family is too big, their cramped city house is too small, and she feels like no one is ever on her side. Then, on Thanksgiving Day, her older brother, Tom, brings home a pink, squirmy bundle wrapped in an old football jersey--a piglet he rescued from a nearby farm. Her name is Hamlet.


Watchdog

Will McIntosh
Juvenile Fiction - J McIntos

Homeless thirteen-year-old twins Vick and Tara survive by scavenging junkyards. Tara, an autistic technical wizard, designs robot dog Daisy, which catches the eye of villainous crime boss Ms. Alba. In this dystopian world, the siblings must rely on help from other downtrodden individuals to save themselves and Daisy from a disastrous end.


What Makes a Monster

Jess Keating
Juvenile Nonfiction - J 591.6 Kea

Author, Keating, warns readers about 17 monsters with cautionary advice ranging from "don't dine with the vampire bat" to "look out for the Humboldt squid." The creatures include the death stalker scorpion, with its predatory pincers and stinging tail, and the Komodo dragon, with its toxic proteins.