You might find yourself having to read an award winning book for school at some time, so we thought we’d help out a bit and produce a list of recent award winning books (with one or two critically acclaimed almost-award-winning books), most of which (but not all) are in the Young Adults collection.

For space reasons we haven’t included all past winners of the New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults — but you can find them all in this From The Vaults post if you’re looking for them.

If you’re still on the lookout after browsing through here then have a look at this post, which has links to different award websites. Also, don’t forget the Classic Novels booklist.

Updated September 2023

New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults: YA Fiction Award (NZ)

Storylines Tessa Duder Award (NZ)

Storylines Notable Book List 2022 (NZ)

Children’s Book Council of Australia: Book of the Year for Older Readers (AU)

Australian Book Industry Awards: Book of the Year for Older Children (AU)

The Carnegie Medal (UK)

YA Book Prize (UK and Ireland)

Young Adult Library Services Association Book Awards (USA)

The International Literacy Association Children’s and Young Adults’ Book Awards

Goodreads Choice Awards