CCRCE’s TRCA Committee has shortlisted ten books for the 2025 Teen Reader’s Choice Award. Five of the books were chosen from a committee longlist and five were chosen from student suggestions. Voting will take place from May 20th to May 30th with the winner being announced on 06 June 2025.

The 2025 finalists are:

A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow by Laura Taylor Namey
Divine Rivals by Rebecca Ross
Gather by Ken Cadow
Killers of the Flower Moon: Adapted for Young Readers: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann
Ride On by Faith Erin Hicks
The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters
The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak
The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune
The Lost Year: A Survival Story of the Ukrainian Famine by Katherine Marsh
The Reappearance of Rachel Price by Holly Jackson

The selected titles include an emotional story of one teens path to adulthood amidst extreme poverty and parental neglect; a witty fantasy about chosen families, and how to celebrate differences; a charming graphic novel that will be treasured by any horse lover; a thoughtful novel about an Indigenous family broken apart; an enemies-to-lovers fantasy novel filled with hope and heartbreak; and much, much more!

Laura Taylor Namey author of A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow 

Laura Taylor Namey, a former teacher, writes young adult novels featuring quirky teens learning to navigate life and love. A proud Cuban-American, she can be found hunting for vintage treasures and wishing she was in London or Paris. She lives in San Diego with her husband and two children. A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow has been adapted for film and is expected to release shortly.

Rebecca Ross author of Divine Rivals 

Rebecca Ross grew up in Atlanta, Georgia, where she soon became a voracious reader and longed to find a portal to Narnia. That quest eventually led her to the University of Georgia, where she graduated with her degree in English. Before she dared to take her writing seriously, she worked at a Colorado dude ranch and as a school librarian. Rebecca is now the New York Times bestselling and acclaimed author of fantasy novels for both teen and adult readers alike. A coffee addict with a penchant for vintage typewriters, old postage stamps, and all things hand-lettered, she lives with her husband and a frisbee-addicted Australian Shepherd in the Appalachian foothills of Northeast Georgia.

Ken Cadow author of Gather 

Vermont author Kenneth M. Cadow has spent a lot of time in the woods, in the wood shop, and working with young adults in schools as an art teacher, English Teacher, STEM teacher, wood shop teacher, and high school principal. He and his wife, Lisa, have three grown children, a border collie named Quinine, and a cat named Rosie.

David Grann author of Killers of the Flower Moon: Adapted for Young Readers: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI

David Grann is a #1 New York Times bestselling author and an award-winning staff writer at The New Yorker magazine. Grann’s Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI, has been adapted into a major motion picture directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Lily Gladstone, Robert De Niro, and Jesse Plemons. Grann has also released Killers of the Flower Moon: A Young Reader’s Edition, which is a 2025 TRCA title. Grann holds master’s degrees in international relations (from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy) and creative writing (from Boston University). After graduating from Connecticut College, in 1989, he received a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship and did research in Mexico, where he began his career in journalism. He currently lives in New York with his wife and two children.

Faith Erin Hicks author of Ride On

Faith Erin Hicks has been writing and drawing comics “for fun” since she was a teenager. She is a graduate of Sheridan College’s classical animation program, and worked for several years in the Canadian animation industry before transitioning to making comics full time. From 2009 to 2020 she produced more than ten graphic novels, including Friends with Boys and Nothing Can Possibly Go Wrong (with Prudence Shen). She also collaborated with the bestselling author Rainbow Rowell and drew Pumpkinheads. Ride On was inspired by Faith’s childhood love of horses. Faith currently lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and their helpful cat.

Amanda Peters author of The Berry Pickers 

Amanda Peters describes herself  as “a woman, a daughter, a sister, an Auntie, a cat mom, a dog mom, a friend, a descendent of a revolutionary war sailor, of accused witches and Mi’kmaq ancestors. A Canadian, a traveler, a wine drinker, an admirer of stained glass, a listener of jazz and old country, a reader of books, and a teller of stories.”  An Associate Professor in the Department of English and Theatre at Acadia University in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, Amanda was a recent recipient of the 2024 King Charles III Coronation Medal.

Marcus Zusak author of The Book Thief 

Markus Zusak was born in Sydney, Australia. His mother Lisa is originally from Germany and his father Helmut is Austrian. They immigrated to Australia in the late 1950s. Zusak is the youngest of four children and has two sisters and one brother. He attended Engadine High School and briefly returned there to teach English while writing. He studied English and history at the University of New South Wales, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts and a Diploma of Education. The Book Thief was published in 2005 and has since been translated into more than 40 languages. The novel was adapted into a film of the same name in 2013. Zusak currently lives in Sydney, Australia, with his wife and children. 

TJ Klune author of The House in the Cerulean Sea

TJ was born in Roseburg, Oregon. He was eight years old when he first began to write fiction. Klune, who has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, has been open about his lived experiences with asexuality, queerness and neurodiversity, and how they influence his writing. As a queer author, Klune has always championed stories that represent the community and celebrate differences and diversity.

Katherine Marsh author of The Lost Year: A Survival Story of the Ukrainian Famine 

Katherine was born in Kingston, New York, a town on the Hudson River. The summer before she turned five, her parents moved to her maternal grandmother’s house in Yonkers, New York where Katherine spent a lot of time listening to her grandmother’s stories about her childhood in Ukraine. After studying English at Yale, Katherine spent a year as a high school English teacher before becoming a journalist. As a journalist Katherine worked for Rolling Stone, The Washington City Paper, and The New Republic. Besides writing, Katherine likes to read, cook for friends and family, and travel. Katherine lives in Washington, DC with her husband, two children, three cats, a rabbit, a bunch of fish, an axolotl named David, and seven chickens. 

Holly Jackson author of The Reappearance of Rachel Price 

Holly Jackson was born in 1992. She grew up in Buckinghamshire and started writing stories from a young age, completing her first attempt at a novel at the age of fifteen. She graduated from the University of Nottingham with a 1st class degree and a master’s in English, focusing on literary linguistics and creative writing. She lives in London and her hobbies include binge-playing video games and pointing out grammatical errors in street signs.