Longlists announced for The Carnegies 2025

The longlists have been announced for the 2025 Carnegie Medals, including awards for writing and illustration, and for the books chosen by young people in the Shadowers' Choice Medal.  The Carnegies, the UK's longest running book awards for children and young people, aim to spark a lifelong passion for reading by connecting more children with books that will change lives. 

The Carnegie Medals celebrate outstanding reading experiences in books for children and young people and are judged by librarians, with the Shadowers' Choice Medal voted for by children and young people. Schools begin to shadow the awards after the shortlists are announced on 11 March.

The longlists were chosen from 119 nominations by the judging panel, which includes 14 children's and youth librarians from CILIP's Youth Libraries Group. This year some 35 titles have been longlisted; 19 titles for the Carnegie Medal for Writing, and 16 for the Carnegie Medal for Illustration.  Independent publishers dominate the longlists, with 23 books longlisted, including titles from small presses Firefly Press, Otter-Barry, Little Island, Lantana and UCLan Publishing.

Books longlisted for the Medal for Writing this year are heavily weighted to young adult readers, exploring the realities of young lives including prevalent themes of masculinity and a search for self, grief and recovery. Books selected for the Medal for Illustration longlist, meanwhile, can be shared across primary years and feature the transformative power of books, nature and the environment, as well as weightier topics around memory, depression and difference.

The Carnegies dates:  Follow #Carnegies2025.
11 March:  The shortlists for the 2025 Carnegie Medals will be announced at a panel event at London Book Fair beginning at 3.15pm.
12 March:  Schools can begin their shadowing programme for the awards the next day, 12 March.
19 June: The winners' ceremony will be hosted live at the Cambridge Theatre and streamed on Thursday 19 June.

The 2025 Carnegie Medal for Writing longlist is (alphabetical by author surname):

On Silver Tides by Sylvia Bishop (Andersen Press)  Author Video  Extract
You Could Be So Pretty by Holly Bourne (Usborne)  Extract
I Am Wolf by Alastair Chisholm (Nosy Crow)  Author Video  Extract
Treacle Town by Brian Conaghan (Andersen Press)  Extract
Sisters of the Moon by Marie-Louise Fitzpatrick (Faber and Faber)  Extract
The Things We Leave Behind by Clare Furniss (Simon and Schuster)
The Final Year by Matt Goodfellow, illustrated by Joe Todd-Stanton (Otter-Barry Books)  Author Video
Island of Whispers by Frances Hardinge, illustrated by Emily Gravett (Macmillan Children's)   Extract
If My Words Had Wings by Danielle Jawando (Simon and Schuster)  Extract
King of Nothing by Nathanael Lessore (Bonnier Books UK)   Extract
Little Bang by Kelly McCaughrain (Walker)  Author Video   Extract
Glasgow Boys by Margaret McDonald (Faber and Faber)   Extract
Trigger by CG Moore (Little Island Books)
All That It Ever Meant by Blessing Musariri (Head of Zeus)   Extract
Play by Luke Palmer (Firefly Press)  Author Video   Extract
Fallout by Lesley Parr (Bloomsbury Publishing)   Extract
The Wrong Shoes by Tom Percival (Simon and Schuster)   Extract
Louder Than Hunger by John Schu (Walker)   Extract
Us in the Before and After by Jenny Valentine (Simon and Schuster)   Author Feature  Extract

The 2025 Carnegie Medal for Illustration longlist is (alphabetical by illustrator surname):

The Last Zookeeper by Aaron Becker (Walker)
The Invisible Story by Wen Hsu Chen, written by Jaime Gamboa, translated by Daniel
Hahn (Lantana)
Grey by Lauren Child, written by Laura Dockrill (Walker)
Flower Block by Hoang Giang, written by Lanisha Butterfield (Puffin)
I Love Books by Mariajo Ilustrajo (Quarto)
The Dictionary Story by Oliver Jeffers and Sam Winston (Walker)
Clever Crow by Olivia Lomenech Gill, written by Chris Butterworth (Walker)
Dive, Dive into the Night Sea by Thea Lu (Walker)
Letters in Charcoal by Juan Palomino, written by Irene Vasco, translated by Lawrence Schimel (Lantana)
Homebody by Theo Parish (Macmillan Children's Books)
The Bridges by Tom Percival (Simon and Schuster)
Wolf and Bear by Kate Rolfe (Macmillan Children's Books)
Flying High by Yu Rong, written by Cao Wenxuan, translated by Simone Monnelly
(UCLan Publishing)
Do You Remember? by Sydney Smith (Walker)
Grandad's Star by Rhian Stone, written by Frances Tosdevin (Harper Collins Publishers)
The Wild by Yuval Zommer (Oxford University Press)

British writers dominate the Medal for Writing longlist, including Scottish writers Brian Conaghan, and Margaret McDonald, Welsh writer Lesley Parr and Irish writer C.G. Moore, while international talent dominates the Medal for Illustration with illustrators longlisted from Mexico, Costa Rica, Vietnam, Spain, Canada and the US, as well as the UK.

Ros Harding, Chair of Judges for The Carnegies 2025, said the two longlists "Celebrate a diversity of ideas, themes, viewpoints, language and illustrative styles. There is a strong focus on identity in all its many forms. These are books that will both challenge and comfort children and young people, as they navigate the world around them."

Carnegie Medal for Writing themes

Masculinity and what it is to be a young man has emerged as an important theme on the Medal for Writing longlist and is explored by Danielle Jawando in If My Words Had Wings, the life affirming story of a teenage boy who finds his voice through spoken word after being released from a young offenders' prison, and by debut author Margaret McDonald in Glasgow Boys, a story about the precarious friendship between two boys growing up in foster care. Play by Luke Palmer is a story of disaffected youth as four boys navigate society's expectations of what it means to be a man, while Nathanael Lessore's heartwarming King of Nothing offers a comedic take on the theme, as a self-proclaimed bad boy forges an unlikely friendship that makes him reassess his priorities.

Two verse novels exploring hard-hitting subjects from the perspective of teenage boys are Louder Than Hunger by children's librarian John Schu, about disordered eating, and Trigger, an impactful story about sexual assault by acclaimed Irish author C.G. Moore. The perspectives of younger boys finding their place in the world are offered in the fantastical and futuristic story I am Wolf by Alastair Chisholm, powerful verse novel The Final Year by Matt Goodfellow and 1980s set novel Fallout by multi-award-winning Welsh writer Lesley Parr, the story of a boy seeking a life free from his criminal family.

Societal pressures on teenage girls are explored in several novels on the Writing longlist including Little Bang, a bittersweet Northern Irish romance exploring teen pregnancy and a young woman's right to choose her own future by Kelly McCaughrain; and powerful dystopian novel You Could Be So Pretty by first-time Carnegie longlisted Holly Bourne. Another dystopian novel, The Things We Leave Behind by Clare Furniss depicts a near-future London at the epicentre of the refugee crisis while the redemptive power of female friendship is explored in Jenny Valentine's emotional novel Us in the Before and After and Marie-Louise Fitzpatrick's atmospheric Sisters of the Moon.

Lack of opportunity balanced with hope for the future is explored in Treacle Town by Scottish former teacher, Brian Conaghan, as a teenage boy embraces the world of slam poetry to escape gang violence; and The Wrong Shoes by award-winning author-illustrator Tom Percival, an empathetic novel about living in poverty but finding hope in friendship and art. Grief and recovery are the central themes of All That It Ever Meant, about a neurodivergent girl coming to terms with the death of her mother, by Zimbabwean writer Blessing Musariri, and Island of Whispers, a compelling gothic fantasy about loss, kindness and fulfilling one's destiny by Frances Hardinge.

Carnegie Medal for Illustration themes

The transformative power of reading is explored by several books on the Medal for Illustration list including The Bridges by author-illustrator Tom Percival, about an isolated girl on a remote island who connects with the rest of the world through books; Columbia-set Letters in Charcoal written by Irene Vasco and colourfully illustrated by Juan Palomino; and I Love Books, celebrating the power of books to feed the imagination by Spanish writer-illustrator Mariajo Ilustrajo. The Invisible Story by Jamie Gamboa, illustrated by Wen Hsu Chen, combines watercolours and cut-paper illustrations to tell the story of a young blind girl finding adventure in a Braille book and The Dictionary Story by author-illustrators Oliver Jeffers and Sam Winston is a boundary-pushing celebration of the beauty of words featuring innovative interplays of typography and illustration.

Nature and the environment are once again central themes on the Medal for Illustration longlist explored in wordless picture book The Last Zookeeper, a futuristic Noah's Ark parable for our changing world by 2024 winner Aaron Becker; The Wild, a hopeful contemporary fable about how our environment needs us just as much as we need it by Yuval Zommer; and Flower Block by Lanisha Butterfield, illustrated by Hoang Giang, which celebrates the power of nature to bring communities together.

The winners of the Carnegie Medals will each receive a specially commissioned golden medal and a £5,000 Colin Mears Award cash prize. The winners of the Shadowers' Choice Medals - voted for and awarded by the children and young people - will also be presented at the ceremony. They will also receive a golden medal and £500 worth of books to donate to a library of their choice.