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BATON ROUGE, La. – More than 24,000 Louisiana K-12 students read in excess of 82,000 books during the last year to select the winners of the 2024-2025 Louisiana Readers’ Choice Awards.
Participation in nearly all age group categories increased over last year, continuing an upward trend in readership over the past several years. Most significant was an 88 percent increase in voting among students in 6th through 8th grade. Over the program’s 26-year history, students have read more than 1.5 million books and cast nearly 485,000 votes.
“Reading is fundamental to learning and opening the doors to opportunity,” said Lieutenant Governor Billy Nungesser. “Every year, the Louisiana Readers’ Choice Awards inspires K-12 students across the state to enjoy the great range of selections at their local libraries and build the foundation for a lifelong relationship with reading.”
“We’re very encouraged to see the participation in the Young Readers’ Choice Awards continuing to increase,” said State Librarian Meg Placke. “Instilling a genuine interest and love of reading is the program’s main objective, and our state’s educators and librarians have done an outstanding job engaging students through the annual voting process.”
Students in grades K-12 who reside in Louisiana are eligible to vote after reading or listening to two or three nominated titles from the booklist corresponding to their grade level. Booklists are carefully chosen by committees of school and public librarians across the state, which include a mix of high-quality fiction, non-fiction, graphic novels, and poetry, providing a variety of genres that cater to different reading preferences.
An award winner and an honor book are chosen in each grade level category based on student votes, with many students casting their ballots on voting machines supplied by the Secretary of State’s Voter Outreach Division. This year’s winners and honor titles are:
Louisiana Young Readers’ Choice
Kindergarten-Second Grade
Winner:
Acorn Was a Little Wild
(Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, Simon & Schuster)
written by Jen Arena, illustrated by Jessica Gibson
Honor:
Knight Owl
(Cristy Ottaviano Books, Hachette Book Group)
written and illustrated by Christopher Denise
Louisiana Young Readers’ Choice
Grades 3-5
Winner:
The Gardener of Alcatraz: A True Story
(Charlesbridge Publishing)
written by Emma Bland Smith, illustrated by Jenn Ely
Honor:
Anglerfish: The Seadevil of the Deep
(Candlewick Press)
written by Elaine M. Alexander, illustrated by Fiona Fogg
Louisiana Young Readers’ Choice
Grades 6-8
Winner:
Swim Team
(HarperAlley, HarperCollins)
written by Johnnie Christmas
Honor:
Camp Scare
(Delacorte Press, Penguin Random House)
written by Delilah S. Dawson
Louisiana Teen Readers’ Choice
Grades 9-12
Winner:
The Sunbearer Trials
(Feiwel & Friends, Macmillan)
written by Aiden Thomas
Honor:
I Must Betray You
(Philomel Books, Penguin Random House)
written by Ruta Sepetys
Honoree authors will be recognized at a special award ceremony during the Louisiana Book Festival on Saturday, November 1. For more information about the program, including previous winners, participation information, please visit the Louisiana Readers’ Choice Awards webpage. Promotional resources for the 2025-26 program such as bookmarks, posters, and study guides will be available through the site in the coming weeks.
The Louisiana Readers’ Choice Awards is a reading enrichment program of the Louisiana Center for the Book in the State Library of Louisiana. Founded in 1999, the program motivates young readers to engage with high-quality literature and vote for their favorite books.
Contact information:
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Kevin Calbert |
Barry Landry |