Still missing these 2025 YMA winners and honorees? 🏅 Get them in Sora today!
During this year’s LibLearnX conference in January, the American Library Association (ALA) announced winners and honorees for the 2025 Youth Media Awards (YMAs), honoring exceptional books for children and young adults released in 2024.
When a book has a decorated resume, it doesn’t just make it easier for you to make the case for adding it to your digital collection. It’s also an important way to provide students with impactful, diverse literary experiences that expose them to new cultures and perspectives.
Many of the acclaimed titles honored by this year’s YMAs are available right now – in both ebook and audiobook formats – through the Sora reading platform! It’s simple to add them today to give your students access to some of the best of the best in student literature this year.
2025 YMA winners & honorees in Sora
John Newbery Medal
Awarded for the most outstanding overall contribution to American literature for children.
The First State of Being by Erin Entrada Kelly
It’s August 1999. For twelve-year-old Michael Rosario, life at Fox Run Apartments in Red Knot, Delaware, is as ordinary as ever—except for the looming Y2K crisis and his overwhelming crush on his sixteen-year-old babysitter, Gibby. But when a disoriented teenage boy named Ridge appears out of nowhere, Michael discovers there is more to life than stockpiling supplies and pining over Gibby.
Randolph Caldecott Medal
Honors the most distinguished American picture book for children.
Chooch Helped, written by Andrea L. Rogers & illustrated by Rebecca Lee Kunz
Sissy’s younger brother Chooch isn’t a baby anymore. They just celebrated his second birthday, after all. But no matter what Chooch does—even if he’s messing something up! Which is basically all the time!—their parents say he’s “helping.” Sissy feels that Chooch can get away with anything! Chooch Helped is a universal story of an older sibling learning to make space for a new child, told with grace by Walter Award-winner Andrea L. Rogers and stunning art from Rebecca Lee Kunz, and showing one Cherokee family practicing their cultural traditions.
Coretta Scott King Book Awards
Recognizes African American authors and illustrators of outstanding books for children and young adults.
Twenty-Four Seconds from Now . . .: A LOVE Story (King Author Book winner) by Jason ReynoldsÂ
#1 New York Times bestselling author Jason Reynolds tackles it—you know…it—from the guy’s perspective in this stream of consciousness story of a teen boy about to experience a huge first.
My Daddy Is a Cowboy (King Illustrator Book winner) illustrated by C.G. Esperanza; written by Stephanie SealesÂ
In the early hours before dawn, a young girl and her father greet their horses and ride together through the waking city streets. As they trot along, Daddy tells cowboy stories filled with fun and community, friendship, discovery, and pride.
Seeing her city from a new vantage point and feeling seen in a new way, the child discovers that she too is a cowboy—strong and confident in who she is.
Michael L. Printz Award
Awarded for excellence in literature written for young adults.
Brownstone by Samuel Teer; illustrated by Mar Julia
Almudena has always wondered about the dad she never met. Now, with her white mother headed on a once-in-a-lifetime trip without her, she’s left alone with her Guatemalan father for an entire summer. Xavier seems happy to see her, but he expects her to live in (and help fix up) his old, broken-down brownstone. And all along, she must navigate the language barrier of his rapid-fire Spanish—which she doesn’t speak. An exciting teen coming-of-age epic from author Samuel Teer and debut graphic novel artist Mar Julia, Brownstone is a vivid, sweeping, ultimately hopeful story about navigating your heritage even when you feel like you don’t quite fit in.
More 2025 YMA winners and honorees
To explore and purchase these and other Newbery, Caldecott, Coretta Scott King and Printz Award honorees, in addition to Schneider Family Book Award winners, Alex Award winners and more, check out our curated list in OverDrive Marketplace.
Shop 2025 YMA award winners and honorees
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