Lorna Bradbury takes another swipe at The Bunker Diary, claiming that the Carnegie judges’ bias in favour of teenage fiction means that “a flawed but obviously risk-taking book for older teenagers, such as The Bunker Diary, is free to scoop the prize.”

She claims that “Many librarians and people in the wider publishing world are calling for the Carnegie to create a separate award for teens…”

Really?

“I would like to add my voice to this groundswell,” she says.

IS there a groundswell of opinion amongst librarians? I doubt it. We have to respect the fact that both the Greenaway and Carnegie Medals are awards judged by librarians. I can’t imagine they will take very kindly to being ticked off like this: “In addition to this, the Carnegie should look to its full judging criteria, as stated on its website, and make sure its future winners recognise both literary quality and reading pleasure.”

And then, for good measure, “The Carnegie Medal should not be allowed to go on with its dark teenage heart unchecked.”

There is something about that “with its dark teenage heart unchecked” which renders the opinion risible.

By all means let’s have this discussion but not like this – not with petulant point-scoring against a book which (yes, we’ve got it, Lorna, you didn’t like it) librarians decided was a worthy winner of their award.

I have to say the answer to the question she poses below is not as emphatic as she suggests. And when she says that Katherine Rundell’s Rooftoppers had “no chance of winning the Carnegie if the judges are thinking purely in terms of literary sophistication” I have no idea what she means by “literary sophistication”.

Would classics such as The Borrowers or Tom’s Midnight Garden or Arthur Ransome’s Pigeon Post, which won the first prize in 1936, stand a chance of winning today?

The answer to that question is emphatically “no”, and this comes down to two factors: the proliferation of teenage fiction, much of which crosses over into adult territory; and the medal’s judging criteria, which, like those of the Man Booker prize, are deliberately highbrow, honing in on “outstanding literary quality”, as the chair of judges for the Carnegie puts it.
Katherine Rundell’s Rooftoppers, one of this year’s shortlisted novels, is a fine book for ages eight to 10 but has no chance of winning the Carnegie if the judges are thinking purely in terms of literary sophistication. So has no chance of winning the Carnegie if the judges are thinking purely in terms of literary sophistication. So a flawed but obviously risk-taking book for older teenagers, such as The Bunker Diary, is free to scoop the prize.

via The Carnegie Medal should create a separate award for teenage fiction – Telegraph.