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Recommended Reads: Carnegie Shortlist

This week’s Recommended Reads includes some of the books shortlisted for the prestigious Carnegie Award.

From pre-school to adults, there are recommendations for all ages, featuring some new and thought-provoking reads.

For full details of the Kate Greenaway shortlist click here.

Pre-School: Again! by Emily Gravett (Shortlisted for Kate Greenaway Award)
It's nearly Cedric the dragon's bedtime -- there's just time for his mum to read him his favourite book. Unfortunately for her, Cedric likes the story so much that he wants to hear it again . . . and again . . . and again . . . with incendiary consequences!

5-7 years: Weasels by Elys Dolan
A stunning debut picture book which reflects on the not often asked question - What Do Weasel's Do All Day? Following their cunning and detailed plans for nothing less than world domination this shows that weasels may soon take control of the world. Next time you look at the TV there may be a weasel rather than a human on it! It's a chilling thought but, luckily, the weasels are also rather delightful is this hugely entertaining and busy book.

8-10 years: I Am Not A Loser by Barry Loser
I've never minded that my name's Barry Loser because my coolness has always cancelled it out, but ever since Darren Darrenofski joined school with his horrible little crocodile face he's been completely ruining my life about it. "I Am Not A Loser" is the first of three notebooks belonging to Barry Loser. Follow Barry as he tries throw off his loserness, take revenge on the terrible Fronkle-burping Darren Darrenofski and finally become a winner.

11-13 years: Wonder by RJ Palacio (Carnegie)
'My name is August. I won't describe what I look like. Whatever you're thinking, it's probably worse.'
Auggie wants to be an ordinary ten-year-old. He does ordinary things - eating ice cream, playing on his Xbox. He feels ordinary - inside. But ordinary kids don't make other ordinary kids run away screaming in playgrounds. Ordinary kids aren't stared at wherever they go. Born with a terrible facial abnormality, Auggie has been home-schooled by his parents his whole life. Now, for the first time, he's being sent to a real school - and he's dreading it. All he wants is to be accepted - but can he convince his new classmates that he's just like them, underneath it all?

14+ years: In Darkness by Nick Lake (Carnegie)
In the aftermath of the Haitian earthquake, a boy is trapped beneath the rubble of a ruined hospital, thirsty, terrified and alone. Shorty is a child of the slums, a teenage boy who has seen enough violence to last a lifetime, and who has been inexorably drawn into the world of the gangsters who rule Site Solèy; men who dole out money with one hand and death with the other.

16+ years: Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein (Carnegie)
Two young women become unlikely best friends during WWII, until one is captured by the Gestapo. Only in wartime could a stalwart lass from Manchester rub shoulders with a Scottish aristocrat, one a pilot, the other a special operations executive. Yet whenever their paths cross, they complement each other perfectly and before long become devoted to each other. But then a vital mission goes wrong, and one of the friends has to bail out of a faulty plane over France. She is captured by the Gestapo and becomes a prisoner of war. The story begins in "Verity's" own words, as she writes her account for her captors. Truth or lies? Honour or betrayal? Everything they've ever believed in is put to the test...

Adults: The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson
It all starts on the one-hundredth birthday of Allan Karlsson. Sitting quietly in his room in an old people's home, he is waiting for the party he-never-wanted-anyway to begin. The mayor is going to be there. The press is going to be there. But, as it turns out, Allan is not...Slowly but surely Allan climbs out of his bedroom window, into the flowerbed (in his slippers) and makes his getaway. And so begins his picaresque and unlikely journey involving criminals, several murders, a suitcase full of cash, and incompetent police. As his escapades unfold, we learn something of Allan's earlier life in which - remarkably - he helped to make the atom bomb, became friends with American presidents, Russian tyrants, and Chinese leaders, and was a participant behind the scenes in many key events of the twentieth century.

Other Suggested Reads - Waterstones Children's Bookprize Winners 2013

Ketchup Clouds by Annabel Pitcher (overall teenage winner)
Lunchtime by Rebecca Cobb (picture book winner)