What will you nominate for the Cybils?

We can all go nominate books for the Cybils starting at midnight, PST, which means that when I wake up and rush to the computer at c. 5:30 EST (rushing carefully, so as not to spill my coffee), I will get to see hundreds of people's favorite books.  Yes, there are people who are on their own computers right at the stroke of midnight, nominating away...

Two Notes:

Note:  you can nominate one book for each of the disperate categories.  Any book published in the US and/or Canada, from October 16, 2011 to October 15, 2012 is eligible.  This is always a little scary for the books published in these first two weeks of October--fewer people, of course, have read these and fallen hard for them.  However, the Cybils organizers, with great sagesse, have changed the rules so that the publishers can fill in at least some of the blanks, so it will not be quite as tense this year as in years past.

Note 2:  The Cybils panelists look for two things in the books under consideration: quality writing of a knock the readers' socks off variety, and young reader appeal of the sort that reduces a pristine book to a tattered mass of pulp because it's been passed from hand to hand so often.   The winners won't necessarily be the same books that one might chose if one were awarding the prizes to "children's books with tremendous appeal to adult readers."

End of Notes.

So anyone can nominate one book per category.  Or just one book, in one category.  These nominations from the floor (from readers, bloggers, parents, publishers, authors--in short, anyone in the whole world who loves children's and YA books) shine lovey bits of light on the dear books you feel should be loved more, and this is good. 

However, it's also a chance to nominate the books that are being loved plenty.  Zita.  Seraphina.  The Fault in Our Stars.  Code Name Verity.

And this is where all those people nominating at the stroke of midnight have an advantage.  A book can only be nominated once.   So if you want your name up on the Cybils website in glowing lights as The One Who Picked the Winner in a specific category, and if the books you have in mind fall into the much-loved category, you might want to plan accordingly. 

I myself have planned not to get up at four in the morning (I did it for Charles and Diana when I was a kid, and that was plenty).   So, just for the record, here are the books I'll nominate if they aren't taken already in the really, really small number of categories of genres I read:

Younger graphic novels:  I love Zita, and Legends of Zita is just as good as her first book.  But I'm giving my nod to Giants Beware! (my review) which tickled me tremendously.

YA Sci Fi/fantasy:  I really liked Vodnick, by Bryce Moore (my review)

YA:  The Fault in Our Stars.   Out of the six straight YA books I've read this year, this was my favorite....

And I'm waiting and seeing on the MG SFF, because of being a panelist in that category.

(and so now I leave this post, feeling a little sad that I've read so few picture books and children's non-fiction books....what was I thinking??????  Of course the Cybils Short Lists, coming earlier January, will tell me which ones I must go back and find.  But in the meantime I just might head over to the bookstore and try to quickly fall in love before the nomination period ends....)