TD Canadian Children’s Literature Award

On October 28, 2004 the Canadian Children’s Book Centre and the TD Bank Financial Group announced the establishment of a brand-new annual, children’s book award, the TD Canadian Children’s Literature Award for the most distinguished book of the year. “Distinguished” is defined as marked by conspicuous excellence and/or eminence, individually distinct and noted for significant achievement with excellence in quality.

All books, in any genre, written by a Canadian and for children ages 1 through 12 are eligible. In the case of a picture book, both the author and the illustrator must be Canadian. Only books first published in Canada are eligible for submission.

The grand prize is $25,000 (up from $20,000) for the most distinguished book written in English and $25,000 (up from $20,000) for the most distinguished book written in French. In addition, there is a total of $20,000 awarded for honour book winners with a maximum of four books being eligible for the honour list in each language category. (For example, there could be one grand prize winner and one honour book winner in the English-language category with the honour book winner receiving $10,000 or there could be two honour book winners who would each receive a prize of $5,000 and so on up to four honour book winners dividing the $10,000.) This would be the same for the French-language winners. Honour books must also be truly distinguished. $2,500 shall go to the publisher of the grand prize-winning book for promotion and publicity purposes.

There will be five judges for the English-language award and five for the French-language award. In finding the two most distinguished books of the year, the judges will, in their deliberations, consider only the individual book and not the entire body of work by an author nor whether the author has previously won the award.

Previous TD Canadian Children's Literature Award Winners and Finalists

CRITERIA AND SUBMISSION INFORMATION

Eligibility:

• The awards will be solely administered by the Canadian Children’s Book Centre.
• Five judges will be appointed by the CCBC and will include educators, booksellers, reviewers, and librarians.
• Only books first published in Canada are eligible for submission.
• The author and illustrator must be a Canadian citizen or landed immigrant.
• An author and illustrator winning jointly for a book will share the award between them.
• •Books must be published between January 1 and December 31 of the previous year.

Criteria:

In identifying the most distinguished book of the year, each judge shall consider the following criteria for excellence:

• Quality of the text and illustrations, if present.
• Interpretation of the theme of concept.
• Presentation of information including accuracy, clarity and organization.
• Appropriateness of style and presentation.
• Books should have distinguished qualities in all of the elements pertinent to it such as interpretation of theme and concept.
• Book must be self-contained and not dependent on other media for its enjoyment.
• Book should have been written for a child audience and should achieve excellence of presentation.
• Each book is to be considered as a contribution to literature.
• The popularity of a book and didactic intent are not to be considered.
• Books being submitted for consideration must be original works.
• Books based on traditional stories will be considered if the book is the result of original research and the retelling and interpretation are the writer’s own.

Submission Information:

Six (6) copies of each title, along with a completed Title Submission Form should be sent to:

TD Canadian Children's Literature Award
c/o The Canadian Children's Book Centre
Suite 101, 40 Orchard View Blvd.
Toronto, ON M4R 1B9

Deadline for submissions is December 18, 2009. This is a firm deadline. All submissions must be received by this date (not postmarked by this date) as our office will be closing for the holidays and we will not be able to receive packages after this time. Titles must be selected from books published between January 1 and December 31, 2009.

If you have any questions regarding the TD Canadian Children's Literature Award please contact Meghan Howe at 416.975.0010.

Link to Related Press Release