Newbery/Caldecott 2025: Final Prediction Edition

Kind of hard to believe it’s almost here. In the thick of 2025 we have a little time left to try and predict what it is that will win the most prestigious awards in American children’s literature. The tension is high. The books? They are strong. I tell you, the state of children’s books was fantastic in 2024. I have surprisingly few personal villains (a.k.a. books that I REALLY don’t want to see win anything so, naturally, they will). And there are just so many wonderful potential winners that hopefully no matter how it all shakes out, I’ll be happy with the results.

Predicting these awards is an impossible game. I mean, look at last year. I thought Big would Honor and There Was a Party for Langston would win, which was backwards. And on the Newbery side I only chose two of the correct Honors and predicted the actual winner would also Honor. So it’s all a crap shoot in the end… except not entirely. The cream often rises to the top and the committees can always surprise you.

This post is a little different from the three other prediction posts that preceded it this year. I’m not talking about what I want to win, necessarily, but what I think WILL win. So buckle up and enjoy this crazy ride . . .

2025 Caldecott Predictions

Caldecott Award Winner

The Yellow Bus by Loren Long

Here’s a fun fact about Newbery and Caldecott committees: They don’t care bupkiss about what the rest of us think. So I might say stuff like, “Oh, Loren Long is due for a major award” and “It’s Loren’s year and we’re just living in it”, but they won’t care. All a Caldecott committee cares about is picking the best possible book as its winner. Now like I’ve said many times before, a true Caldecott winner is meant to combine stylistic aplomb with great storytelling AND heart. The heart part is the hard part. Long’s work on this book more than covers all three of those areas, and he looks like he’s having fun while doing it. I don’t know if he’ll be able to pull it off for the ultimate win, but I have a good feeling about this book. We shall see.

Caldecott Honor Winners

Home in a Lunchbox by Cherry Mo

Let me state for the record, that I consider this book neck and neck with The Yellow Bus for the Caldecott win. I’m giving Long the edge here, but maybe I should be considering Cherry Mo a little more seriously. This is a book that has been beloved across the board. The people who like classy picture books like it. The ones who like heartfelt books like it. The ones who like clever books like it. It has a message we can get behind, a clever art style, and the creator has never won before. What’s more, it’s fun. So I ultimately decided it would Honor but if it wins it all I will NOT be surprised even one jot! Not a speck! It has it all.

Being Home by Traci Sorrell, ill. Michaela Goade

I’m playing it safe. There’s a chance that the committee this year will be the kind that likes to hand awards out to just the folks who’ve won before. If that’s the case then Goade’s a shoo-in. It’s the joy man. As a whole, the year 2024 was crap. Just the utter worst. Whole swaths of us got dunked into a deep, dire depression. That’s why I think the Caldecott committee (at least) is going to counter that with genuine joy on the page. Look at the titles I’ve selected today. Each one talks about joy in some context. And taken as a whole, they make a powerful statement about where our joy should truly come from.

My Daddy Is a Cowboy by Stephanie Seales, ill. C.G. Esperanza

This one’s my long shot. Esperanza’s never won before and I have, admittedly, encountered some blowback to this title. I think it may have a good shot, though, depending on how open the committee is to the art style. Heart? It flows off the page. And look at how well the man paints a horse! Maybe I’m a dreamer, but I still say this is a contender.

Touch the Sky by Stephanie V.W. Lucianovic, ill. Chris Park

If this book wins it’ll be as much for typography as anything else. Maybe. It’s such a successful book on every level, though. It’s not simply the art, which so cleverly moves the reader from page to page. You know what this reminded me of to some extent? Caldecott Honor winner Leave Me Alone!, that’s what. It has that same vibe, and is equally successful on the page.

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2025 Newbery Predictions

Newbery Award Winner

Not Quite a Ghost by Anne Ursu

Ursu gets passed over for this award year after year after year. So much so, that I’m sure she won’t be getting her hopes up when she reads posts like this one. Even so… read the first chapter of this book. I mean it, just read that chapter. Doesn’t it just sing? Doesn’t it work well? And the book as a whole… look how smart and compact and tight the writing is. We’ve had horror books win the Newbery time and again (Scary Stories for Young Foxes and Doll Bones come immediately to mind). This is so much in that vein, yet it’s such a successful amalgamation of the metaphor and the actual plot. And you want to talk literary? It’s based on The Yellow Wallpaper, for crying out loud. If the writing itself wasn’t so keen, that right there should tip it over. I hope.

Newbery Honor Winners

Black Girl You Are Atlas by Renée Watson, ill. Ekua Holmes

Because the Newbery for some inexplicable reason goes to 14 (an oversight that I pray is amended someday) YA always has a chance of getting on the list. Normally I groan, moan, and kvetch about this fact… but not with this book. I truly believe it can be read by all ages. There are poems for the older middle schoolers and poems for the younger set. And what poems! Brilliant ones! The Newbery has a lamentable track record when it comes to rewarding funny poetry (which is the sole reason I’m not including Beware the Dragon and the Nozzlewock on this prediction list) but it does a pretty good job with meaningful middle school poetry fare. I mean, if we’re rewarding language with our Newberys, we should reward THIS!

I’m Sorry You Got Mad by Kyle Lukoff, ill. Julie Kwon

My wild card. My darling book. Is this year’s Newbery committee the kind that wants to throw a random Honor at an unusual choice? Perhaps. There aren’t many graphic novels I’d consider in that way, and nonfiction is always far too unlikely (though maybe Enigma Girls has a fair shot). Picture books are also very hard, PARTICULARLY if they’re funny. But has the need for this book ever been stronger? Read this book enough times and you begin to understand why it’s as amazing as it is. There are a lot of balls in the air, and Lukoff doesn’t drop a single one of them. Consider!

Mid Air by Alicia D. Williams

About his point you may be noticing that aside from Anne Ursu and someone else I’m about to mention, my prediction list this year is filled with previous winners (unlike my Caldecott list). As I mentioned in my review of it, I never read Ms. Williams’s Honor winner Genesis Begins Again, but if the writing was anything to compare with the words in this book then I get why it won. I was unprepared for the lyricism of the writing. Trust me, I’ll never be unprepared again.

The Wrong Way Home by Kate O’Shaughnessy

This actually pairs rather well with a book I’m not including on this list, The Tenth Mistake of Hank Hooperman. In both cases you have two kids with very skewed views about which adults to trust in their lives (though the moms in the two books could not be more different). Of the two books, I think O’Shaughnessy may have the better shot. I mean, YOU name a Newbery winner that was about escaping a cult. It can’t be done! Oh. Except for maybe, like, The Giver or something. But the sheer reality of this book, and how adeptly O’Shaughnessy twists the main character’s unreliable narration? *chef’s kiss*

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In case you’d like an alternate opinion, Travis Jonker had his own predictions up earlier this week as well. And if you want to watch the announcements live, the ALA Youth Media Awards will be visible on Monday, January 27th at 8 a.m. MT here. Should be a great time! Can’t wait!

Filed under: Best Books, Best Books of 2024, Newbery / Caldecott Predictions