The Lincoln Award is designed to encourage teens to read for personal satisfaction and become familiar with authors of young adult and adult books. The award is named for Abraham Lincoln, one of Illinois’ most famous residents and himself an avid reader and noted author. The Association of Illinois School Library Educators (AISLE) sponsors the award.
For a book to reach the master list, adult and young adult fiction and nonfiction titles must be nominated by teachers or librarians and vetted by the nominations committee. While the popularity of a particular title is important, the overall quality of the work is of primary importance. Each year, a panel of high school librarians, teachers, public librarians and students determines the final master list of twenty titles. It is very similar to the Monarch, Bluestem, and Rebecca Caudill Young Readers Awards if you remember those from Grades K-8.
Signup for the Algonquin Library’s Lincoln Award Challenge in Beanstack today. Read at least five titles to be eligible to vote for the 2022 winner. The winner will be announced live on the web on Friday, March 18th, 2022!
Read more for the 2022 Master List…
With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo (eBook here)
Ever since she got pregnant freshman year, Emoni Santiago’s life has been about making the tough decisions, doing what has to be done for her daughter and her abuela. The one place she can let all that go is in the kitchen. There, she lets her hands tell her what to cook, listening to her intuition and adding a little something magical every time, turning her food into straight-up goodness. Even though she’s always dreamed of working in a kitchen after she graduates, Emoni knows that it’s not worth her time to pursue the impossible. Yet despite the rules she’s made for her life – and everyone else’s rules, which she refuses to play by – once Emoni starts cooking, her only choice is to let her talent break free.
The Companion by Katie Alender (eAudiobook here)
The other orphans say Margot is lucky. Lucky to survive the horrible accident that killed her family. Lucky to have her own room because she wakes up screaming every night. And finally, lucky to be chosen by a prestigious family to live at their remote country estate. But it wasn’t luck that made the Suttons rescue Margot from her bleak existence at the group home. Margot was handpicked to be a companion to their silent, mysterious daughter, Agatha. At first, helping with Agatha–and getting to know her handsome older brother–seems much better than the group home. But soon, the isolated, gothic house begins playing tricks on Margot’s mind, making her question everything she believes about the Suttons… and herself. Margot’s bad dreams may have stopped when she came to live with Agatha–but the real nightmare has just begun.
Brazen: Rebel Ladies Who Rocked the World by Pénélope Bagieu (eBook here)
With her characteristic wit and dazzling drawings, celebrated graphic novelist Pénélope Bagieu profiles the lives of these feisty female role models, some world famous, some little known. From Nellie Bly to Mae Jemison or Josephine Baker to Naziq al-Abid, the stories in this comic biography are sure to inspire the next generation of rebel ladies.
The Inheritance Games by Jennifer Lynn Barnes (eBook here / eAudiobook here)
When a Connecticut teenager inherits vast wealth and an eccentric estate from the richest man in Texas, she must also live with his surviving family and solve a series of puzzles to discover how she earned her inheritance.
Girl Made of Stars by Ashley Herring Blake (eBook here)
When Mara’s twin brother Owen is accused of rape by her friend Hannah, Mara is forced to confront her feelings about her family, her sense of right and wrong, a trauma from her past, and the future with her girlfriend, Charlie.
Stepsister by Jennifer Donnelly (eBook here / eAudiobook here)
Isabelle is one of Cinderella’s ugly stepsisters, who cut off their toes in an attempt to fit into the glass slipper; but there is more to her story than a maimed foot, for the Marquis de la Chance is about to offer her a choice and the opportunity to change her fate. There will be blood and danger, but also the possibility of redemption and triumph, and most of all the chance to find her true self.
Ordinary Hazards by Nikki Grimes (eAudiobook here)
Growing up with a mother suffering from paranoid schizophrenia and a mostly absent father, Nikki Grimes found herself terrorized by babysitters, shunted from foster family to foster family, and preyed upon by those she trusted. At the age of six, she poured her pain onto a piece of paper late one night–and discovered the magic and impact of writing. For many years, Nikki’s notebooks were her most enduring companions. In this accessible and inspiring memoir that will resonate with young readers and adults alike, Nikki shows how the power of those words helped her conquer the hazards–ordinary and extraordinary–of her life.
The Dark Matter of Mona Starr by Laura Lee Gulledge (eBook here)
Sometimes, the world is too much for Mona Starr. She’s sweet, geeky, and creative, but it’s hard for her to make friends and connect with other people, and her depression seems to take on a vivid, concrete form. She calls it her Matter. The Matter seems to be everywhere, telling Mona she’s not good enough and that everyone around her wishes she’d go away. But with therapy, art, writing, and the persistence of a few good friends, Mona starts to understand her Matter and how she can turn her fears into strengths.
Allegedly by Tiffany Jackson (eBook here / eAudiobook here)
When Mary, a teenager living in a group home, becomes pregnant, authorities take another look at the crime for which Mary was convicted when she was nine years old.
Dig by A.S. King (eBook here / eAudiobook here)
Five white teenage cousins who are struggling with the failures and racial ignorance of their dysfunctional parents and their wealthy grandparents, reunite for Easter.
Catfishing on Catnet by Naomi Kritzer (eBook here)
Because her mother is always on the move, sixteen-year-old Steph hasn’t lived anywhere longer than six months. Her only constant is an online community called CatNet, a social media site where users upload cat pictures and the admin is CheshireCat, a sentient AI who loves cat pictures. When a threat from Steph’s past catches up to her and CheshireCat’s existence is discovered, it’s up to Steph and her friends, both online and IRL, to save them. A near-future thriller about online privacy and out-of-control technology and the importance of making connections in an increasingly fragmented society.
#NotYourPrincess by Mary Beth Leatherdale & Lisa Charleyboy (eBook here)
Presents an eclectic collection of poems, essays, interviews, and art that combine to express the experience of being a Native woman. Stories of abuse, humiliation, and stereotyping are countered by the voices of passionate women making themselves heard and demanding change. Sometimes angry, often reflective, but always strong, the women in this book will give teen readers insight into the lives of women who, for so long, have been virtually invisible.
Moxie by Jennifer Mathieu (eBook here / eAudiobook here)
In a small Texas town where high school football reigns supreme, Viv, sixteen, starts a feminist revolution using anonymously-written zines.
The Field Guide to the North American Teenager by Ben Philippe (eBook here / eAudiobook here)
When Norris, a Black French Canadian, starts his junior year at an Austin, Texas, high school, he views his fellow students as clichés from “a bad 90s teen movie.”
Stamped by Jason Reynolds & Ibram X. Kendi (eBook here / eAudiobook here)
The construct of race has always been used to gain and keep power, to create dynamics that separate and silence. Racist ideas are woven into the fabric of this country, and the first step to building an antiracist America is acknowledging America’s racist past and present. This book takes you on that journey, showing how racist ideas started and were spread, and how they can be discredited.
Sorcery of Thorns by Margaret Rogerson (eBook here / eAudiobook here)
All sorcerers are evil. Elisabeth has known that as long as she has known anything. Raised as a foundling in one of Austermeer’s Great Libraries, Elisabeth has grown up among the tools of sorcery–magical grimoires that whisper on the shelves and rattle beneath iron chains. If provoked, they transform into grotesque monsters of ink and leather. She hopes to become a warden, charged with protecting the kingdom from their power. Then an act of sabotage releases the library’s most dangerous grimoire. Elisabeth’s desperate intervention implicates her in the crime, and she is torn from her home to face justice in the capital. With no one to turn to but her sworn enemy, the sorcerer Nathaniel Thorn, and his mysterious demonic servant, she finds herself entangled in a centuries-old conspiracy. Not only could the Great Libraries go up in flames, but the world along with them.
If I Was Your Girl by Meredith Russo (eBook here / eAudiobook here)
Amanda Hardy only wants to fit in at her new school, but she is keeping a big secret, so when she falls for Grant, guarded Amanda finds herself yearning to share with him everything about herself, including her previous life as Andrew.
We Are Not From Here by Jenny Torres Sanchez (eBook here / eAudiobook here)
Pulga has his dreams. Chico has his grief. Pequeña has her pride. And these three teens have one another. But, none of them have illusions about the town they’ve grown up in and the dangers that surround them. Even with the love of family, threats lurk around every corner. And when those threats become all too real, the trio knows they have no choice but to run: from their country, from their families, from their beloved home. Crossing from Guatemala through Mexico, they follow the route of La Bestia, the perilous train system that might deliver them to a better life–if they are lucky enough to survive the journey. With nothing but the bags on their backs and desperation drumming through their hearts, Pulga, Chico, and Pequeña know there is no turning back, despite the unknown that awaits them. And the darkness that seems to follow wherever they go.
Frankly in Love by David Yoon (eBook here / eAudiobook here)
High school senior Frank Li takes a risk to go after a girl his parents would never approve of, but his plans will leave him wondering if he ever really understood love–or himself–at all.
Punching the Air by Ibi Zoboi & Yusef Salaam (eBook here / eAudiobook here)
Amal Shahid has always been an artist and a poet. But even in a diverse art school, he’s seen as disruptive and unmotivated by a biased system. Then one fateful night, an altercation in a gentrifying neighborhood escalates into tragedy. “Boys just being boys” turns out to be true only when those boys are white. Suddenly, at just sixteen years old, Amal’s bright future is upended: he is convicted of a crime he didn’t commit and sent to prison. Despair and rage almost sink him until he turns to the refuge of his words, his art. This never should have been his story. But can he change it?