Celebrating the best in children’s writing and illustration respectively, the Medals are unique in being judged by children’s librarians, while the Shadowers’ Choice Award, recently added to the Awards ceremony celebrations, is voted for by children and young people who shadow the Medals. The 40-strong list of titles in contention for the 2020 Medals (20 on each longlist) were selected from a total of 162 nominations, read by an expert volunteer team of 14 children’s and youth librarians from across the UK.

Julia Hale, Chair, CILIP Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Medals judging panel, comments: “This year’s longlists shine a light on the breadth and quality of children’s publishing not just from the UK but from around the world. Through writing and illustration, the authors and artists offer children and young people stories of hope, discovery and understanding about themselves and the world they live in. There is a strong emphasis in the longlists on how young readers can navigate that journey, through relationships with families and friends and from learning more about themselves. We hope you will be as inspired to explore them as we were by reading them.”

The winners for both the CILIP Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Medals 2020 will be announced on 17 June 2020 at the The British Library, hosted by University Challenge star and CILIP Library Champion, Bobby Seagull. The winners will each receive £500 worth of books to donate to their local library, a specially commissioned golden medal and a £5,000 Colin Mears Award cash prize.

Now in its second year, the Shadowers’ Choice Award – voted for and awarded by the children and young people who shadow the Medals – will be announced alongside the two Medal winners in June 2020. This award has evolved out of CILIP’s Diversity Review, which identified opportunities to empower and celebrate the young people involved in the Medals through the shadowing scheme.

The 2020 CILIP Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Medals are sponsored by Peters and ALCS, and funded by Carnegie UK Trust.

2020 CILIP Carnegie Medal longlist (alphabetical by author surname):

• The Black Flamingo by Dean Atta, illustrated by Anshika Khullar (Hachette Children’s Group)
• A Pocketful of Stars by Aisha Bushby (Egmont)
• Toffee by Sarah Crossan (Bloomsbury)
• Becoming Dinah by Kit de Waal (Hachette Children’s Group)
• Louisiana’s Way Home by Kate DiCamillo (Walker Books)
• Monsters by Sharon Dogar (Andersen Press)
• Stepsister by Jennifer Donnelly (Hot Key Books)
• Lenny’s Book of Everything by Karen Foxlee (Pushkin Children’s Books)
• Nowhere on Earth by Nick Lake (Hachette Children’s Group)
• Lark by Anthony McGowan (Barrington Stoke)
• The Skylarks’ War by Hilary McKay (Macmillan Children’s Books)
• No Fixed Address by Susin Nielsen (Andersen Press)
• Inkling by Kenneth Oppel (Walker Books)
• Patron Saints of Nothing by Randy Ribay (Little Tiger)
• Lampie written and illustrated by Annet Schaap and translated by Laura Watkinson (Pushkin Children’s Books)
• Voyages in the Underworld of Orpheus Black by Marcus Sedgwick and Julian Sedgwick, illustrated by Alexis Deacon (Walker Books)
• The Boxer by Nikesh Shukla (Hachette Children’s Group)
• On the Come Up by Angie Thomas (Walker Books)
• Boy. Sea. by Chris Vick (Head of Zeus)
• Paper Avalanche by Lisa Williamson (David Fickling Books)

2020 CILIP Kate Greenaway Medal longlist (alphabetical by illustrator surname):

• Captain Rosalie illustrated by Isabelle Arsenault, written by Timothée de Fombelle and translated by Sam Gordon(Walker Books)
• Wisp: A Story of Hope illustrated by Grahame Baker Smith and written by Zana Fraillon, (Hachette Children’s Group)
• Quill Soup illustrated by Dale Blankenaar and written by Alan Durant (Tiny Owl)
• B is for Baby illustrated by Angela Brooksbank and written by Atinuke,(Walker Books)
• And the Ocean Was Our Sky illustrated by Rovina Cai and written by Patrick Ness (Walker Books)
• Fanatical About Frogs written and illustrated by Owen Davey (Flying Eye)
• Voyages in the Underworld of Orpheus Black illustrated by Alexis Deacon and written by Marcus Sedgwick and Julian Sedgwick (Walker Books)
• Lubna and Pebble illustrated by Daniel Egneus and written by Wendy Meddour (Oxford University Press)
• When Sadness Comes to Call written and illustrated by Eva Eland (Andersen Press)
• The King Who Banned the Dark written and illustrated by Emily Haworth-Booth (Pavilion Children’s Books)
• You’re Snug with Me illustrated by Poonam Mistry and written by Chitra Soundar (Lantana Publishing)
• The Iron Man illustrated by Chris Mould and written by Ted Hughes, (Faber & Faber)
• The Suitcase written and illustrated by Chris Naylor-Ballesteros (Nosy Crow)
• The Undefeated illustrated by Kadir Nelson and written by Kwame Alexander(Andersen Press)
• The Dam illustrated by Levi Pinfold and written by David Almond (Walker Books)
• Mary and Frankenstein illustrated by Júlia Sardà and written by Linda Bailey (Andersen Press)
• Little Wise Wolf illustrated by Hanneke Siemensma, written by Gijs Van der Hammen and translated by Laura Watkinson,(Book Island)
• Tales from the Inner City written and illustrated by Shaun Tan (Walker Books)
• Child of St Kilda written and illustrated by Beth Waters (Child’s Play)
• Planetarium illustrated by Chris Wormell and written by Raman Prinja (Big Picture Press)

For further information about the history of the Medals visit cilip.org.uk/carnegiegreenaway