We’ve made it to our 10th selection for CPI Medal Mania! Spoiler alert, we have 2 more Newbery prediction books to reveal next week as we get closer and closer to the YMA awards being announced on 1/25! Can you guess which two are missing from our list? Here is a hint: both titles are novels in verse!

Newbery Prediction #10: Elatsoe by Darcie Little Badger

Publication Date: 08/25/2020

Publisher: Levine Querido (Chronicle Books)

Summary from the Publisher:

Imagine an America very similar to our own. It’s got homework, best friends, and pistachio ice cream.

There are some differences. This America been shaped dramatically by the magic, monsters, knowledge, and legends of its peoples, those Indigenous and those not. Some of these forces are charmingly every day, like the ability to make an orb of light appear or travel across the world through rings of fungi. But other forces are less charming and should never see the light of day.

Elatsoe lives in this slightly stranger America. She can raise the ghosts of dead animals, a skill passed down through generations of her Lipan Apache family. Her beloved cousin has just been murdered, in a town that wants no prying eyes. But she is going to do more than pry. The picture-perfect facade of Willowbee masks gruesome secrets, and she will rely on her wits, skills, and friends to tear off the mask and protect her family.

Darcie Little Badger is an extraordinary debut talent in the world of speculative fiction. We have paired her with her artistic match, illustrator Rovina Cai. This is a book singular in feeling and beauty.

Why have we chosen this title?

This one is a PAGE TURNER. An incredible cross between something out The X-Files meets Frankenweenie meets Law & Order with a little bit of magic and fantasy throughout. Our main character is exceptionally smart and impossibly witty. This book is just flat out cool, it has so much going on in terms of themes that everything layers together perfectly. You learn about Elatsoe, her Lipan-Apache culture, her unique and incredible magical gift and one of our favorite characters, Six-Great Grandmother. Readers will love the mystery that unfolds before them as well as author Darcie Little Badger’s Earth Scientist background sprinkled throughout. With folktales passed down through generations that delicately weave together what is taking place in Elatsoe’s world present day, readers will instantly love this fantastical mystery and be captivated by the plot, characters and storytelling.

We can’t wait for more books from Darcie Little Badger and are also secretly hoping for a book in the same world about Six-Great Grandmother!