Guardian Children's Fiction Prize 2010 winner

Michelle Paver has won this year's Guardian Children's Fiction Prize for Ghost Hunter, the sixth and final book in her Chronicles of Ancient Darkness series.
It's relatively rare for a book late in a series to win a major prize but it was aunanimous choice by the judges who said it is "a towering achievement, as a whole as well as in terms of the individual books."
The shortlist for the £1500 prize included Maurice Gleitzman's Now, Gregory Hughes's Unhooking the Moon and Eva Ibbotson's The Ogre of Oglefort. Michelle Paver now joins a distinguished line of past winners, which includes Ted Hughes, Jacqueline Wilson, Anne Fine and Philip Pullman.
The Guardian children's fiction prize was founded in 1967 and is unique in that it is judged by children's authors themselves, and can only be won once by any single author.
More information and author interview.

Booktrust Teenage Prize

Launched in 2003 to recognise and celebrate contemporary fiction written for teenager, the Booktrust Teenage Prize is judged by a mixed panel of adults and teenagers. The shortlist for the 2010 prize is:

The Enemy by Charlie Higson
Halo by Zizou Corder
Nobody’s Girl by Sarra Manning
Out of Shadows by Jason Wallace
Revolver by Marcus Sedgwick
Unhooking the Moon by Gregory Hughes.
The winner will be announced on 1 November.
More information

Guardian children's fiction prize shortlist

The shortlist for the Guardian children's fiction prize has been announced.

Ghost Hunter by Michelle Paver
The Ogre of Oglefort by Eva Ibbotson
Unhooking the Moon by Gregory Hughes (also shortlisted for the Booktrust teenage prize)
Now by Morris Gleitzman.

The judging panel includes last year's winner Mal Peet and authors Linda Buckley-Archer and Jenny Downham. The winner will be announced on October 8.
More information

Summer Reading

Welcome back! What have you read during the last two months?

Over the holiday I hope many of you will have enjoyed spending some of your leisure time reading. New Year 7s - bring in your OLA Summer Reading Challenge or your Space Hop record for a commendation. Year 8s and 9s - a book review will earn you a commendation. Bring it or email it to the Library.

This term in the school library: the start of the Reading Olympics and reading buddies, book clubs, Kids' Lit Quiz heats, book chains, a book swap, 'poetree',and, of course, much more reading.

Reading! Reading! Reading!

This is the time of year when reading is on the summer agenda. All the classes which come regularly into the Library have been recommending books to each other, and to me. I have been encouraging loans of books over the summer so that pupils will keep reading. I have also used their suggestions to add to my own lists of recommendations which this year will be put in their English exercise books, and be more easily available for future reference. Year 11 suggestions, with a wide-ranging selection suggested by UVI leavers and many subject staff, have been put in the end of term mailing - look out for the pale blue sheet.

Abingdon Carnegie Forum - 23 June

Twenty-one keen readers from OLA had a wonderful day at Abingdon Guildhall to reward their reading and reviewing of the books nominated for the Carnegie Medal, the prestigious children's book award, whose past winners include The Borrowers, Watership Down, Tom’s Midnight Garden and Northern Lights. Joining with other readers from the six secondary schools in Abingdon they discussed the eight books on the shortlist and then concentrated on their favourite title, preparing a short visual review to convince a panel of judges to read ‘their’ book.

This successful reading partnership of the six state and independent schools has been running for 10 years, and has lead to joint book quiz sessions, author talks and culminates in an annual Abingdon Carnegie Forum organised by the schools’ Librarians, with over 130 teenagers, Librarians, English teachers and guest judges participating in a day to celebrate reading.

This year the six schools had special cause to celebrate as Marcus Sedgwick, one of the shortlisted authors came to Abingdon to speak to the Carnegie shadowers, following a writing workshop earlier in the day with Year 9 at OLA. At the end of the afternoon the Shadowers voted for their winning book, which was Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson with just one vote separating it from The Ask and the Answer by Patrick Ness. All eight books were outstanding in their own way and fully deserved their place on the Carnegie Medal shortlist.

The winner of the Carnegie Medal, announced the following day, was The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman, which joins the ranks of the best in children's literature.

Marcus Sedgwick and Carnegie shadowing

Marcus Sedgwick, shortlisted for the prestigious children's book award the Carnegie Medal will be at Our Lady's Abingdon on Wednesday 23 June to lead a writing workshop with Year 9. He will then move on to Abingdon Guildhall to speak to over 100 Carnegie shadowers from local secondary schools at the Abingdon Carnegie Forum. Read reviews by OLA shadowers - there are some excellent ones, and they all make you want to read the books!