Carnegie Top 10

To celebrate its 70th anniversary, the organisers of the Carnegie Children's Book Awards are inviting people to vote for the best winner of the past 70 years.

As The Times somewhat breathlessly reports:

The Top Ten, put together by an expert panel and published today, does not include C. S. Lewis, Arthur Ransome or Walter De La Mare. Enid Blyton, J. K. Rowling and Jacqueline Wilson are also notable by their absence. Instead, the selection includes contemporary novels such as Melvin Burgess’s Junk, which realistically depicts the lives of young heroin users.

The Top Ten are:

• Skellig - David Almond (1998)
• Junk - Melvin Burgess (1996)
• Storm - Kevin Crossley-Holland (1985)
• A Gathering Light - Jennifer Donnelly (2003)
• The Owl Service - Alan Garner (1967)
• The Family From One End Street - Eve Garnett (1937)
• The Borrowers - Mary Norton (1952)
• Tom's Midnight Garden - Philippa Pearce (1958)
• Northern Lights - Philip Pullman (1995)
• The Machine-Gunners - Robert Westall (1981)